August 16, 2010
HUD housing policy conference includes no affordable housing advocates
Bankers and academics will debate the administration's housing policy without help from, say, community organizers
Salon.com
by Alex Pareene
Brooklyn's biggest affordable-housing-free affordable-housing project makes a cameo in this critique of an Obama administration housing conference.
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan has exactly the sort of resume that would impress Meritocrat-in-Chief Barack Obama. Degrees from Harvard, a master's in Public Administration from the John F. Kennedy School of Government, and even a master's in architecture. He word for HUD in the Clinton administration, and then, most importantly, went on to work on housing and development for our nation's foremost technocrat executive, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Which should've immediately disqualified him.
The Bloomberg administration has a wretched and largely ignored history of promising affordable housing and never delivering. (Not to mention the worst failure of the Bloomberg era: homelessness. It was at historically high levels even before the great financial crisis and no serious attempts at ameliorating it ever developed.)
The Bloomberg housing plan was to give land to private developers, for pennies, in exchange for the promise to build affordable housing for middle and low-income families, and then just not do anything, at all, when the developers simply ignored their promises and built nothing but luxury units. This happened on the Williamsburg waterfront, and it's happening right now near my neighborhood at the Atlantic Yards. Those developments are the norm, not exceptions.
NoLandGrab: A reader points out that it's not true that only luxury units are being built in Williamsburg, nor planned for Atlantic Yards. The reality is perhaps even worse — subsidized units which in many cases rent at market rates.
Posted by eric at 11:00 AM
August 10, 2010
Bertha Lewis May Be Rethinking The Smacker She Gave Bruce Ratner Now
Brownstoner
Based on this post from Atlantic Yards Report, it doesn't sound like the non-profit's constituents are going to be able to afford any of the apartments at Atlantic Yards.
Related coverage...
Curbed, Back in the U-S-S-Yards
After analyzing a whole bunch of reports, charts, stats and—oops, sorry, we fell asleep for a moment there—Atlantic Yards watchdog Norman Oder writes that the first wave of Yards affordable housing might not be so affordable: "In five of the six scenarios contemplated for the first housing tower, the monthly rent for most of the affordable apartments would range from $2287 to $3790, depending on household size." Well someone's got to pay for the billboard!
Posted by eric at 9:12 PM
Orwellian, almost: that first Atlantic Yards tower most likely would have most "affordable" units at market rate
Atlantic Yards Report
Remember, the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) asserts that "Whatever the pace may be for the delivery of the many public benefits of the [Atlantic Yards] Project, the nature of those benefits remains the same."
I wrote yesterday that such a claim was poppycock--of course affordable housing and tax revenues arriving at a vastly slower schedule would make a difference.
Here's another reason why: the nature of those benefits, at least when it comes to the first subsidized housing units, would in fact change.
Remember, the Atlantic Yards affordable housing was sold to the public and supported by ACORN as a way to help the poor. Forest City Ratner attorney Jeffrey Braun swore in a 1/25/08 affidavit (p. 5) in a case challenging the Atlantic Yards environmental review:
“Furthermore, pursuant to an innovative Community Benefits Agreement, the FCRC affiliates that sponsor the project are contractually bound to provide a wide array of far-reaching benefits to the historically most disadvantaged segments of Brooklyn’s communities…”
(Emphasis added)
Not only is that claim contradicted by the fact that a majority of the subsidized units would be unaffordable to ACORN's constituency, it's quite likely that the first building would be even less affordable to that constituency.
In five of the six scenarios contemplated for the first housing tower, the monthly rent for most of the affordable apartments would range from $2287 to $3790, depending on household size. Those are the kind of unaffordable rents that ACORN members have cited in arguing for the project.
NoLandGrab: But hey, don't worry, 'cause as Bertha Lewis likes to say, those affordable units will be on the same floors as the market-rate units. You won't even be able to tell which are affordable and which are not!
The chickens have come home to roost, and they've knocked all the acorns off the tree.
Posted by eric at 10:08 AM
August 5, 2010
Is The Domino Sugar Factory M.O.U. Sweet With No Substance?
MultiFamily Investor
The Domino Sugar Factory site is the second biggest multifamily development project in Brooklyn behind Atlantic Yards.
In 2004, the Refinery LLC purchased the 11.2 acre Domino Sugar Factory complex on the waterfront of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, at 314 Kent Avenue, for just over $55 million.
...The Domino Sugar Factory and Atlantic Yards thus share two qualities: magnitude and location.
They also share a third point:
For years, a development team proposing to build a $1.5 billion luxury apartment complex on the former Domino Sugar factory site in Williamsburg has vowed that 30 percent – or 660 – of the project’s 2,200 apartments would be affordable units.
The 30-percent affordable-housing promise, however, has been memorialized in a “Memorandum of Understanding” that both the city and the development team of CPC Resources and Isaac Katan recently signed off on. However, as even the document notes, this M.O.U. is a non-binding agreement.
City officials have not articulated why they have failed to implement language guaranteeing 30-percent affordability.
There is no guarantee the property will now be sold to another developer, who could then ignore the M.O.U.
Followers of the Atlantic Yards saga and this blog must have a sense of deja vu: Brooklyn’s Atlantic Yards project is one such example. Its M.O.U. has come under fire for not legally holding developer Bruce Ratner fiscally responsible if the project doesn’t get delivered as planned.
Posted by eric at 10:10 AM
July 27, 2010
For the New Domino, newly unveiled MOU casts doubt on affordable housing promises
Atlantic Yard Report
Last week, I raised questions about the guarantees of 30% affordability in the New Domino plan in Williamsburg (which approaches a full City Council vote on Thursday).
Now Williamsburg Greenpoint News+Arts advances the story, reporting:
Unlike the Greenpoint-Williamsburg rezoning of 2005, which spelled out the inclusionary housing goals and benefits in the zoning text, the affordability aspects within the New Domino proposal are in a separate letter, a non legally binding document called a memorandum of understanding (MOU).
...In the case of the New Domino plan, the “out” lies not just with the city but with the developer CPCR as well. From a copy of the actual MOU (see at end of article) for the proposed New Domino plan, exclusively obtained by WG News + Arts, paragraph 9 in the text clearly states:
“Whereas, this MOU is not a legally binding instrument and is only intended to set forth the understandings of the parties without creating any legally enforceable rights or obligations.”
If it sounds too good to be true, remember that in other famous MOUs that have so far not been fully met, if at all met, like the second MOU attached to the Atlantic Yards proposal, developers were actually required to pay fines and restitution if the deal were to fall apart.
Related coverage...
Williamsburg Greenpoint News+Arts, New Domino Development Goes to a Vote in City Council w*/ no Guarantees for Community
The Brooklyn Blog [NYPost.com], City set to approve Domino plan -- without guarantees
NY Observer, At New Domino, Affordable Housing Promise More of a Pledge
Alas, this resembles the groundwork of many a development project in New York. While a good number of developers do end up delivering on promises, other projects are sold to the public on the promise of certain public benefits (in exchange, the public's representatives grant approvals), only to see those benefits eroded over time as they prove difficult or impossible to fulfill. A couple other case studies to look at: Battery Park City, once meant to be mostly below-market rate housing; and Atlantic Yards once meant to have a green roof and a Frank Gehry-designed arena.
Posted by eric at 9:26 AM
July 20, 2010
New Domino plan passes key hurdle with no essential modification; is affordable housing subject to same loopholes as with Atlantic Yards?
Atlantic Yards Report
When it comes to big developments, you always have to look behind the curtain. And when it comes to the controversial New Domino development in Williamsburg--the second-largest in Brooklyn, after Atlantic Yards--the land use process, the affordable housing, and the urban planning all deserve another look.
Notably, the project has been justified because of the promised affordable housing, but, as with Atlantic Yards, the developer won't commit to building the housing in the announced timetable.
So the likely loopholes should be part of the public discussion.
And here's a number you haven't seen in print: $2.5 million, which is (nearly) the total the New Domino developer spent on lobbying in the last five years (details below).
...I posed several questions to the New Domino developers, including whether the 660 units had to be built in ten years, whether the timing or number of units is subject to subsidy availability, and whether the developer--as in some Community Benefit Agreements--was required to put money in an affordable housing fund up front.
"I apologize, but no one is available at CPC Resources to answer this inquiry," spokesman Richard Edmonds responded.
NoLandGrab: Hey, at least he apologized!
Posted by eric at 9:59 AM
July 17, 2010
Cool “New Jersey Nets” images
NBA & Basketball
Taken on a bitterly cold day in late January, not long after plans to build a new basketball stadium and high-rise complex on this site were first announced.
For a closer look at the Atlantic Yards project and its effects on the surrounding neighborhood, I strongly recommend Tracy Collins’ excellent collection, Atlantic Yards: [De]Construction of the Neighborhood.
Photo by Genial 23, via Flickr
Posted by steve at 7:58 AM
June 7, 2010
In Queens, a major affordable housing project involves multiple sites and competitive bidding
Atlantic Yards Report
Heard about the affordable housing project, unlike Atlantic Yards, in which public land is divided into multiple sites for which competitive bids will be solicited?
From a New York Times article today headlined City Proceeds With Big Middle-Income Housing Project on Queens Waterfront:
After four years of planning and delays, the city will start soliciting bids on Monday to begin building what could become the city’s largest development for middle-income residents in 40 years.
The Bloomberg administration, which is heavily subsidizing the project, is asking developers to compete to build 1,000 apartments on a once industrial strip of Queens land known as Hunters Point South, where Newtown Creek enters the East River.
Posted by eric at 11:06 PM
May 15, 2010
Public Advocate Asked About Jobs, Affordable Housing
The Local (NY Times Blog)
By Alison Stephen
The issue of affordable housing to be built as part of the Atlantic Yards project was part of a meeting with Public Advocate, Bill de Blasio, hosted by the Brown Community Development Corporation (BCDC) at the Brown Memorial Baptist Church.
The BCDC leadership committee also expressed concern about the amount of affordable housing planned for the Atlantic Yards site. Emphasizing his role as a watchdog, Mr. de Blasio pledged to look into the Atlantic Yards project’s plans to create affordable housing.
NoLandGrab: de Blasio knows very well that the affordable housing component for Atlantic Yards is dependent on city and state subsidies. He called for an end to subsidies for the project during his campaign for Public Advocate. Although he probably wasn't thinking of subsidies for affordable housing, de Blasio has kept his stance on Atlantic Yards ambiguous. Don't expect him to do much more than "look."
Posted by steve at 7:03 AM
May 12, 2010
Another push to turn luxury condos into affordable housing, but cost is unclear; report proposes eminent domain for condos but slams it for AY
Atlantic Yards Report
Can 4000 empty luxury condos, including some in and around Downtown Brooklyn, really be converted into low-income housing owned by a community land trust or the New York City Housing Authority?
Several activist groups say yes, though their proposals--involving tax foreclosure and the use of eminent domain--are thin on the actual number of condos that might qualify, given that only a fraction are in empty buildings rather than simply languishing on the market.
...Still, a report issued yesterday makes some policy recommendations that deserve discussion: development tax breaks should be suspended, and owners of buildings who warehouse their units for more than a year should be assessed fees.
...The report criticizes New York State for using eminent domain "to pave the way for large-scale, luxury development projects," such as Atlantic Yards, the "vast majority of which will be luxury, market-rate housing despite the proliferation of failed luxury housing that already currently exists in this area."
(The report says AY will help" further the gentrification of low-income communities." By contrast, ACORN, Forest City Ratner's partner, contends the project will help fight gentrification. The Empire State Development Corporation says gentrification was already happening in the areas nearby.)
Also, given the large number of market-rate units yet unsold, the report implicitly casts doubt on projections by Empire State Development Corporation consultant KPMG that condo prices in AY towers would reach $1217/sf in 2015.
Here's some more news: money-bags Bruce Ratner owes the city $240,000 in back taxes for 80 DeKalb.
Forest City Ratner's 80 DeKalb, according to a Brownstoner tipster, is supposed to be 50% rented. If it's in tax arrears, I'd bet it's less that the building is vulnerable to foreclosure than Forest City Ratner maintaining cash flow.
Or maybe it's more complicated. FCR also missed a mortgage payment at 10 MetroTech, which is the main component of the block-wide complex that includes 80 DeKalb.
NoLandGrab: Bruce Ratner has gotten hundreds of millions of dollars in handouts from the taxpayers, and he can't make good on less than a quarter-million in arrears?
Posted by eric at 11:19 AM
May 11, 2010
4,000 new luxury condos sitting vacant
Units are in 138 buildings that owe city $3.8 million in back taxes; study recommends seizing and converting them to low-income or affordable housing.
Crain's NY Business
by Amanda Fung
Here's more evidence that the housing component of Atlantic Yards is a long, long way off.
There are more than 4,000 new luxury condominium apartments in the city that are sitting vacant and unused, according to a comprehensive new report due to be released Tuesday afternoon. What's more, the units are in 138 condo buildings that owe the city a total of $3.8 million in back taxes.
Right to the City-NYC, a coalition of community organizations, will unveil its detailed report, "People without Homes, & Homes without People" at a press conference Tuesday afternoon in Harlem with officials from the boroughs. The report identified and tallied units in completely and partially finished buildings in six neighborhoods with sizeable low-income populations: downtown Brooklyn, the Lower East Side, Harlem, Bushwick, the South Bronx and the West Village/Chelsea.
...Across the six surveyed neighborhoods, 74 buildings with 1,159 units were completely vacant, while 190 building with 2,933 units were partially vacant.
In the 72-page report, Right to the City recommends that the city convert the empty condos to public housing or community land trusts. It even suggests that the city seize the vacant condos through eminent domain. In addition, the group said the city should suspend tax breaks for developers and impose fees on building owners who warehouse their units for more than a year.
...“In a city where a record number of families are going homeless every night, this report shows us that there is an opportunity to turn some of these problematic buildings into real community benefits,” said Councilman Brad Lander of Brooklyn, who will be joined by Council members Melissa Mark Viverito and Leticia James at the press conference, in a statement.
NoLandGrab: And speaking of the homeless, we know Bruce Ratner's record when it comes to sheltering them.
Posted by eric at 10:41 PM
April 21, 2010
Orwellian, almost: mayor claims commitment from Ratner to build affordable housing in first tower, but it's really the other way around
Atlantic Yards Report
I finally figured out why Crain's New York Business last month proclaimed as news that the first apartment tower in the Atlantic Yards project would consist of at least 50% subsidized, "affordable" units.
Because Mayor Mike Bloomberg said so.
And, at the time, I didn't notice how "Orwellian, almost" it was, given that the mayor claimed that he'd gotten a commitment from developer Forest City Ratner, while the real news was that the developer could only make a commitment if he was ensured scarce city subsidies.
(Forest City Ratner has long promised that the first tower would be 50% subsidized, as in this 5/5/08 press release, also embedded below.)
From the press release
On the occasion of the March 11 arena groundbreaking, the press release from the mayor's office deviated from the official press release (both embedded below), in part, by adding this:
In the first phase of development, which includes four buildings, Forest City Ratner Companies committed that at least 30 percent of the housing units would be income-targeted. Mayor Bloomberg also announced today that the City has secured an additional commitment from the developer to ensure that at least 50 percent of the units in the first residential building will be affordable to a mix of low-, moderate- and middle-income families.
(Emphases added)
An additional commitment from the developer?
Forest City Ratner won't build subsidized housing unless there are sufficient affordable housing subsidies; that's in the Development Agreement, which allows for eight renewable one-year delays in the absence of subsidies.
So the news was really that Bloomberg has implicitly made a commitment to subsidize that tower.
Related coverage...
Atlantic Yards Report, If Bloomberg's fortune comes from selling financial information, should he be trusted on such municipal issues? Not when it comes to AY
New York Daily News columnist Errol Louis, in a column yesterday (Mayor Bloomberg right on the money in supporting community banks) hailing Mayor Mike Bloomberg's effort to change a state law and allow government agencies to put their money into community banks and credit unions, wrote:
The movement will get a huge boost if New York City government follows suit, particularly with the added credibility supplied by a mayor whose personal fortune was earned selling financial information.
It's a plausible observation, but, when it comes to the mayor's performance on Atlantic Yards, it doesn't hold water.
Spinning for Ratner
Rather, Bloomberg has been more than willing to spin for Forest City Ratner, though he and his staff haven't completely gotten their ducks in a row. Consider the press release issued March 11 on the occasion of the Atlantic Yards groundbreaking.
Posted by eric at 11:25 AM
March 29, 2010
City Hall News article accepts claim of ACORN Housing's successor that it's unaffiliated with ACORN; AY housing murky but Lewis says role continues
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder debunks claims by Mutual Housing New York (aka ACORN) that they are not an ACORN affiliate.
City Hall News reports, in an article headlined ACORN Housing Arm, Battered by Federal Funding Ban, Lives On that, yes, Mutual Housing New York will continue to work on the Atlantic Yards affordable housing deal.
However, the article credulously accepts the explanation that ACORN Housing Corporation was always separate from ACORN and fails to mention crucial elements in the Atlantic Yards deal, such as ACORN's pledge to publicly support the project and Forest City Ratner's $1.5 million loan/grant to national ACORN.
...Not an affiliate? See page 20 of the 7/23/09 report by the Republicans on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. (Whatever the politics behind the report, the documents cited speak for themselves.)
Steven Kest, Executive Director of ACORN, explains to a funder that Mike Shea: Executive Director, ACORN Housing Corporation, is among “the following people... working for affiliated organizations."
(Emphasis added)
...The Atlantic Yards deal
The article states:
MHANY will also be charged with leasing and marketing the roughly 2,250 units of affordable housing built at the controversial Atlantic Yards site in Prospect Heights. Advocates say ACORN’s shuttering has thrown the Atlantic Yards plan—which has already changed several times—into disarray.
“One of the big issues of course is that nobody has any idea when this affordable housing might be built,” said Jo Anne Simon, a lawyer and activist with the Brooklyn Speaks coalition, which is lobbying for accountability at the Atlantic Yards site. “And of course ACORN was there to ensure not just that it was built, they were going to be managing that property.”
Bertha Lewis, the CEO of ACORN, said in an interview that she was unsure how the Community Benefits Agreement the group signed with Forest City Ratner would have to be amended to reflect the change in organizations. But she insisted that ACORN would continue to live on in some way in order to enforce the housing provisions in the agreement.
“I don’t know what we would have to technically do,” she said, adding, “ACORN still exists, and Bertha Lewis still exists.”
ACORN's not doing much enforcing, given that the Development Agreement requires only 300 units in 12 years.
And ACORN, not merely required by the Affordable Housing Memorandum of Understanding to publicly support the project, gained $1.5 million from the developer to limp along, bailed out temporarily, and folding only after the groundbreaking for the Atlantic Yards arena.
Posted by eric at 10:54 AM
ACORN Housing Arm, Battered by Federal Funding Ban, Lives On
City Hall News
by Sal Gentile
The nationwide community organizing group ACORN may be shutting down, but its non-profit housing developer, ACORN Housing Corporation, lives on.
The organization, which manages and develops affordable housing units in New York, has gone through a re-branding of its own, changing its name to Mutual Housing NY. Ismene Speliotis, the group’s executive director, said that was ACORN Housing Corporation’s original name when it was founded in 1986.
Speliotis said the group is neither an affiliate nor a subsidiary of ACORN, but that it has nonetheless been hurt by Congress’s decision last year to ban federal funding for ACORN or any of its “allies,” a term Speliotis said is overly broad. A court has since deemed Congress’s decision unconstitutional, though the Obama administration is appealing.
“We’ve tried to make it clear to the government that MHANY is a separate entity, that it’s always been a separate entity,” Speliotis said. “If the law says ‘don’t fund ACORN,’ and then we say, ‘we’re not ACORN,’ and then somebody decides that we are ACORN even though we’re not ACORN, then it’s a bit of a problem.”
NoLandGrab: Sounds to us like ACORN is playing a shell game.
Posted by eric at 10:49 AM
March 26, 2010
ACORN's Original Sin
Critics of the expiring activist group say it was driven by the vision of Saul Alinsky. If only that were true.
Reason.com
by Jesse Walker
The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, better known as ACORN, will shut its doors as a national operation next week. A wellspring of activism for four decades, the left-wing group has gotten more attention lately for a series of scandals, from an embarrassing embezzlement case at the top of the organization to the hidden-camera videos that captured low-level employees doling out advice on how to operate a brothel without raising red flags at the IRS. Republicans hated the group, which they loved to link to the ideas of the veteran activist Saul Alinsky, a demon figure on the right. But the primary problem with the organization—a trouble running deeper than either corruption or ideology, one with lessons for grassroots activists across the political spectrum—is that ACORN wasn't Alinskyan enough. It may have emerged from the community organizing tradition that Alinsky helped to found, but it also rejected some of his most important advice.
Advice like not getting into bed with companies whose projects you should by all rights be fighting against.
Consider one recent financial relationship. As my colleague Damon Root has reported, ACORN allied itself with Bruce Ratner, the real estate and sports tycoon who is using eminent domain to seize and demolish private homes and small businesses in Brooklyn, allowing him to build a 22-acre development called the Atlantic Yards. Under other circumstances, ACORN might have fought against this sort of mass eviction, but in this case the group agreed to lend Ratner their "political might" and "political cover." (The phrases come from ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis, in an interview with the Regional Labor Review.) In exchange, Ratner would include some allegedly affordable housing in the plan, which ACORN would (quite profitably) help to operate. Perhaps more importantly, Ratner gave the group $1.5 million at a time when it was desperately short of cash. The results, Root writes, included "large numbers of noisy ACORN members present at every Atlantic Yards public hearing, press conference, and media event—including an August 2006 event trumpeting 'community support' for the project where Bertha Lewis acted as MC."
Atlantic Yards is the sort of state-corporate partnership that earlier generations of community organizers fought against, bringing pastors and housewives and union men and business owners together to stop the threat to their homes. Saul Alinsky battled urban renewal plans in neighborhoods ranging from Woodlawn in Chicago to Chelsea in New York. Whatever flaws you might find in Alinsky's political vision, I can't imagine him endorsing Ratner's land grab.
Posted by eric at 9:28 PM
March 25, 2010
What Progressives Must Learn from the ACORN Debacle
Colorlines
by Rinku Sen
I’ve been expecting it for months, but I was still bummed to see the official announcement: ACORN, a decades-old community organizing powerhouse, will be closing its operations permanently as of April 1.
...I’m not [an] ACORN apologist. The organization had some serious quality-control issues, and hasn't always played well with others. The embezzlement could have been handled more forthrightly, for example, and in the struggle over Brooklyn’s Atlantic Yards stadium project, a number of New York activists charged ACORN with cutting an inadequate deal with developers. I am struck now, though, by the ease with which a 40-year-old stalwart could be taken down with a flimsy, if concerted right-wing smear campaign. Some of the challenges ACORN faced are commonplace among progressive organizations and leaders. Loose internal oversight combined with poor media and communications skills left the organization prey to shoddy corporate journalism, all of which contributed to this outcome.
NoLandGrab: Activists don't think ACORN's deal with Forest City Ratner was inadequate — they think it was flat wrong.
Posted by eric at 8:54 PM
March 21, 2010
Public Editor: Times was wrong about ACORN, should have assigned one reporter to follow narrative (and what about AY?)
Atlantic Yards Report
Today, in a remarkable but late mea/nostra culpa headlined The Acorn Sting Revisited, New York Times Public Editor Clark Hoyt agrees that the paper misled readers by describing James O'Keefe as presenting himself as a pimp in some heavily edited videos.
Hoyt writes:
Here is what I found: O’Keefe almost certainly did not go into the Acorn offices in the outlandish costume — fur coat, goggle-like sunglasses, walking stick and broad-brimmed hat — in which he appeared at the beginning and end of most of his videos. It is easy to see why The Times and other news organizations got a different impression.
...But I am satisfied that The Times was wrong on this point, and I have been wrong in defending the paper’s phrasing. Editors say they are considering a correction.
(Hoyt, of course, has never addressed the Times's failure to cover--and later, minimal coverage--of ACORN's bailout by Forest City Ratner.)
...For Atlantic Yards watchers, perhaps the key Hoyt passage was this:
The report [on ACORN] by Harshbarger and Crafts was not covered by The Times. It should have been, but the Acorn/O’Keefe story became something of an orphan at the paper. At least 14 reporters, reporting to different sets of editors, have touched it since last fall. Nobody owns it. Bill Keller, the executive editor, said that, “sensing the story would not go away and would be part of a larger narrative,” the paper should have assigned one reporter to be responsible for it.
The same goes for Atlantic Yards, where the Times sent an AY rookie to cover the March 11 groundbreaking.
NoLandGrab: But the paper covers the heck out of the Nets' silly promotions, carnival hype and community outreach, all of which have questionable news value — and always forgets to mention the business relationship between the team owner's role in developing the paper's headquarters building.
Posted by eric at 10:30 PM
March 11, 2010
Affordable housing deal at Atlantic Yards
Crain's NY Business
by James Comtols
Thursday's long-awaited groundbreaking ceremony for the Barclays Arena at the edge of downtown Brooklyn came with some surprises.
At the ceremony at the site of the vast Atlantic Yards development, Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced that the city has secured a commitment from project developer Forest City Ratner to ensure that at least 50% of the units in the first residential tower to be built will be affordable to a mix of low-, moderate- and middle-income families.
The developer hopes to begin construction on the first residential tower in the spring of next year and the second six to nine months later. Forest City expects work to start on the third tower six to nine months after that.
NoLandGrab: What Forest City expects, and reality, are two very different things. Forest City expected the Nets to be wrapping up their fourth season in Brooklyn next month.
Related coverage...
Atlantic Yards Report, Crain's whiffs on affordable housing
Norman Oder writes that Crain's surprise is no surprise at all.
Crain's New York Business thinks this is news...
Um, any all-rental building would be 50% affordable--that's the financing plan.
This represents "progress" only compared to the not-so-affordable plan contemplated for the first building, with most units at a very high Area Median Income.
Posted by eric at 11:01 PM
March 5, 2010
The iffy requirements for Block 1129 affordable housing and even iffier gap regarding construction over the railyard
Atlantic Yards Report
The incredible shrinking benefits of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards superboondoggle now come with amazing stretching timelines able to leap decades in a single bound:
At a press conference Tuesday, BrooklynSpeaks reminded us of requirements, first reported by AYR, that Forest City Ratner has to build only 300 units of affordable housing on the arena block within 12 years.
But the developer is supposed to build more, in the part of the project--Phase 2--beyond the arena block.
As it turns out, the Development Agreement, as excerpted below, requires 500 additional affordable housing units, to be built on Block 1129, the southeast block destined for interim surface parking.
How long do they have? 25 years.
Posted by lumi at 6:04 AM
February 23, 2010
Catching up on the ACORN story: Brian Lehrer, Politico, City Room
Atlantic Yards Report
The latest ACORN news — really a non-story, akin to a new coat of paint on a termite-ridden house — still needs some straightening up by AYR's Norman Oder.
The ACORN story and Atlantic Yards, including my role, got three mentions today in the media, and all needed some corrections.
Posted by eric at 10:51 PM
An ACORN development deal lives on
Politico
by Ben Smith
Smith follows up on his Brian Lehrer appearance, but for some reason seems incapable of crediting Atlantic Yards Report. He does, however, shed some light on how Forest City Ratner views the metamorphosis of NY ACORN into New York Communities for Change.
This morning, WNYC's Brian Lehrer asked me what would become of one of ACORN's most prominent New York projects, a "community benefits agreement" the group signed with a real estate developer [aka "Forest City Ratner"] seeking political support for a huge, subsidized project in Brooklyn [aka "Atlantic Yards"].
A blogger [aka "Norman Oder"] opposed to the project, which would include a basketball arena for the Nets, speculated today that the agreement with Forest City Ratner over the Atlantic Yards could transfer to the national group. But an official at the company, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the developer continues to work with what he sees as New York's renamed, but otherwise unchanged, ACORN.
"The people that we deal with still exist," said the Forest City official, noting that Jon Kest, ACORN's top official, is now a key player at the new New York Communities for Change, and that the developer will work with that new group.
"It’s ACORN by a different name — all the players are the same," the official said.
NoLandGrab: Apparently, "New York Communities for Change" haven't really changed anything.
Additional coverage...
City Room, Restart, Acorn Edition
The Atlantic Yards Report was among the first to notice, early Monday morning, the rebranding effort. New York Acorn had been engaged in the effort to include moderately priced housing as part of the Brooklyn renovation project.
NLG: "Renovation project?" Why didn't they say so sooner? If we'd only known they were just changing the wallpaper and replacing the cabinet hardware, we wouldn't have spent the past five years opposing Atlantic Yards.
Posted by eric at 4:40 PM
ACORN By Any Other Name
WNYC Radio [The Brian Lehrer Show]
City Hall editor Edward-Isaac Dovere, and Politico.com senior political writer Ben Smith join Brian Lehrer to discuss the reorganization of New York ACORN, which is now calling itself New York Communities for Change. The inevitable Atlantic Yards question comes up around the 9:40 mark.
Brian Lehrer: And recently, in New York, it wasn't only the right that hated ACORN, it was opponents of the Atlantic Yards project.
Ben Smith: They were among the first to notice yesterday this transformation.
BL: And does this affect their deal with the Atlantic Yards developer to take a lot of money from them to administer community benefits agreements?
BS: Now that is a great question. I have not seen anywhere that Ratner has renegotiated with them. I suspect it gets Bruce Ratner off the hook in terms of even having any responsibility to any group. His community benefits agreements were always negotiated privately with the lowest bidder, essentially, which happened to be ACORN. And because it was a private agreement I don't really see whether Ratner is bound by it at all.
NoLandGrab: Hate ACORN? No. Have big problems with ACORN providing critical political cover for a terrible project in return for a contract — and a bailout? Yes.
Commenter Norman Oder adds:
I don't hate ACORN; however, having watched their role in the Atlantic Yards project (which they are contractually obligated to support), I've grown increasingly skeptical.
Oder also reported earlier today that it's unlikely that the reorganization of New York ACORN will affect the Atlantic Yards Community Benefits Agreement.
Posted by eric at 2:34 PM
While New York ACORN has supplied public support for Atlantic Yards, the Housing MOU points to national ACORN
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder wonders how ACORN's cosmetic makeover into "New York Communities for Change" might affect the organization's relationship with Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner.
I wrote yesterday that New York ACORN, Forest City Ratner's key partner in the Atlantic Yards Community Benefits Agreement, has been renamed New York Communities for Change.
But is FCR's formal partner the New York organization, no longer extant, or national ACORN?
The point person for the agreement was always Bertha Lewis of New York ACORN, as noted in this city press release. Also, New York ACORN (most recently located at 2-4 Nevins Street in Brooklyn) certainly has supplied people to rally for the the project.
But the Affordable Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) was signed in May 2005 simply by ACORN, as was the Community Benefits Agreement.
More ACORN coverage...
Atlantic Yards Report, The ACORN story goes national, some sunlight on the new organization, and lingering questions from ACORN foes in Congress
Well, the New York ACORN story that I broke yesterday (though the Villager had the gist earlier) turned into national news after City Hall News--which has led the investigation into the curious activities of the ACORN-affiliated Working Families Party--advanced the story.
Only Gothamist, however, noticed the Atlantic Yards angle.
Gothamist, ACORN Shuts Down, Rebrands
Posted by eric at 11:03 AM
Are doubts about Atlantic Yards affordable housing one piece of Bloomberg's revised housing goal?
Atlantic Yards Report
The Daily News reported yesterday on Mayor Mike Bloomberg's affordable housing plan:
Gone is the mayor's first-term goal of creating 92,000 affordable units and preserving 73,000.
The 2014 goal in a report Bloomberg plans to release Monday is now 60,000 new units and 105,000 preserved.
Surely the delayed and more doubtful plan for Atlantic Yards affordable housing plays a small role in those calculations.
Posted by eric at 10:40 AM
February 15, 2010
Gentrification, "Brooklyn's Roommate Belt," and how housing code changes could produce more affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder looks at some less-apparent factors shaping New York City's housing market.
You can't just blame developers, or Wall Streeters with cash to burn. One important driver of gentrification may be the housing code, which makes it hard for developers to build low-cost studio apartments, instead aiming at larger apartments and luxury studios.
Former Citizens Housing and Planning Council (CHPC) fellow Denali Dasgupta, now a Policy Analyst in the New York City Comptroller's Office, at the Dreamland Pavilion Conference last October contended that the cause may be less market forces than market failure.
And a revision in regulations might produce a lot more affordable housing, I'd suggest, leaving less opportunity for projects like Atlantic Yards, however questionable, to be seen as saviors.
Posted by eric at 10:25 AM
February 9, 2010
Award of No-Bid Mega-Monopoly Means Forest City Ratner Hopes To Claim an Awful Lot of Housing Subsidy, ALSO Without Bid
Noticing New York
Forest City Ratner is looking to glom onto an awful lot of housing subsidy with respect to its proposed Atlantic Yards megadevelopment. If you’re interested in knowing how much, this article attempts to close in on that figure. It’s in the neighborhood of about at least half a billion dollars, probably a fair amount more and the transaction has been set up so Forest City Ratner can blackmail the public for that money.
Posted by eric at 11:05 AM
February 5, 2010
City to Bronx Community About a Homeless Shelter: ‘Not in Your Backyard’
The New York Times
by Sam Dolnick
When New York City shuts down a 10-bed shelter in the Bronx because of bureaucratic bullheadedness, it's big news to The Times. When that same city kicks out dozens of families and shuts down a shelter in Brooklyn on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday so The Times's development partner can knock it down and build a parking lot... well, that's not news that's fit to print, apparently.
In the perpetual battle against homelessness in New York, the Kingsbridge Heights Community Center in the Bronx was only a bit player, with about 10 beds in its gym. But offering space for even a handful of destitute people meant something to those who benefited from a warm, safe place to sleep, as well as to those who helped provide it.
But this winter, when New York’s homeless population is above 37,000 and shelters are working to increase capacity, the gym now sits empty at night because city officials have ordered the program to close.
Posted by eric at 6:09 PM
January 15, 2010
Asked for current Atlantic Yards affordable housing plans, NYC HDC sends back resolutions more than three years old
Atlantic Yards Report
If developer Forest City Ratner and its government partners have concrete plans to build affordable housing at the Atlantic Yards site, they haven't yet made moves to implement them.
In a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request, I asked the New York City Housing Development Corporation (HDC) for "documents that describe the current plans and timetable for affordable housing at the [Atlantic Yards] site, including the public costs/bonds involved."
What I got back was old hat: a collection (see below) of 20 documents, each a Resolution of Declaration of Intent, passed by the HDC board between 7/20/04 and 1/8/07, adding up to more than $2.2 billion in bonds.
They do not assure tax-exempt bonds for a measure of affordable housing; they simply mean that a developer may apply for such financing.
NoLandGrab: Once again, we guess we should just trust Forest City's "guarantee." Uh huh.
Posted by eric at 1:03 PM
December 8, 2009
603 Dean
Photo, by Tracy Collins, via flickr Atlantic Yards Photo Pool.
 |
603 Dean Street near Carlton Avenue
Prospect Heights
Brooklyn, New YorkThis building, currently a homeless shelter, would be demolished for Atlantic Yards.
The building behind 603 Dean, 750-754 Pacific Street, would also be demolished.
The vacant lot next to it used to be the Ward Bread Bakery.
As reported yesterday, by Atlantic Yards Report:
Residents in a two-building shelter for homeless families in the Atlantic Yards footprint just got some not-so-sunny holiday greetings, as the facility is slated to be closed by January 15.
A mandatory meeting at Pacific Dean will be held tonight "to provide details and help you through the transition," according to a message distributed to residents.
The buildings typically house more than 90 families. Some will be moved to permanent housing, others to another shelter.
Posted by lumi at 7:01 AM
December 7, 2009
Isn't It Time For ACORN to Stop Shilling for Ratner and Atlantic Yards?
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
In the wake of the ACORN scandals, ACORN commissioned and internal review of its practices. A report on the findings from that review was released today [pdf]. Executive Director Bertha Lewis said, "The report is part vindication, part constructive criticism and 100% road map to the future."
The report inluded nine recommendations for ACORN as a "roadmap to reform and renewal, if implemented in their entirety in concert with other measures to regain the public’s trust."
Here is recommendation number one from the report:
- ACORN should return its organizational focus to its core competency – community organizing and citizen engagement empowerment, with related services – and transition away from the provision of services that may be provided more effectively and efficiently by others.
Taking this to heart should mean that the organization—which has received a $500,000 gift and a $1 mllion low interest loan as a bailout from developer Forest City Enteprises and is contractually obliged to support and promote the Atlantic Yards project—should stop shilling for a developer and a project that is abusing eminent domain to displace low-income tenants, spending hundreds of millions of scarce public dollars on a money-losing arena, shutting down a long-term homeless shelter to make a parking lot, and yet, does not guarantee any "affordable" housing.
Posted by eric at 9:49 PM
November 27, 2009
ACORN’s Flagrant Eminent Domain Abuse
David Horowitz's Newsreal
by Matthew Vadum
The relentlessly sanctimonious radical advocacy group-cum-organized crime syndicate has become the leading cheerleader for the real estate development that is slated to use eminent domain to remove the poor people it claims to represent.
ACORN, which has long prided itself on fighting the so-called gentrification of neighborhoods as rising property values force the poor to move, has taken money from the project’s developer and signed a binding agreement forcing it to stand behind the project no matter what.
In the world of corporate shakedowns it is commonplace for liberal activist groups to use the money they extract from a supposed “donor” to fund operations, but it is very unusual for a group to take money in exchange for betraying those it is supposed to represent.
Posted by lumi at 5:08 AM
November 19, 2009
New market-rate units at FCR's 80 DeKalb building would be cheaper than some AY affordable housing (as of 2006!)
Atlantic Yards Report
If you have any doubts that Bruce Ratner's economic analysis and financial projections for the Atlantic Yards project are bogus, check out the figures from Ratner's other residential project the next neighborhood over.
In July 2006, Forest City Ratner projected that the most expensive "affordable" studios in the Atlantic Yards project would rent for $1861 a month.
That was over market-rate then--and it still is. Forest City Ratner's new 80 DeKalb building in Fort Greene will offer studios at $1795 a month, according to the Brooklyn Eagle.
Given that the Area Median Income (AMI) has gone up since 2006, the rent for AY units would be higher now--and likely would be even higher when and if units are built.
NoLandGrab: Yes, you heard it right, some "affordable housing" units at Atlantic Yards would be more expensive than comparable market-rate housing. That's totally sick, considering that housing advocate Bertha Lewis declared that she will "fight to the death to get this project done."
Posted by lumi at 7:01 AM
How ACORN Profits from New York’s Eminent Domain Abuse
Big Government Blog
Damon Root explains how ACORN stands to benefit from eminent domain abuse at Atlantic Yards, leading ACORN head Bertha Lewis to declare, "I’ll fight to the death to get this project done."
Posted by lumi at 6:40 AM
October 27, 2009
How 2005 fudge from the mayor's office on AY affordable housing led the Times into a 2009 error it won't correct
Atlantic Yards Report
Back in 2005, Mayor Bloomberg's office overstated the City's role and commitment to affordable housing in Atlantic Yards, which found its way into an October 2009 article in The NY Times, which has informed Oder that the paper has no intention of setting the record straight, since the "reference to Atlantic Yards captured a specific moment in time."
[T]he Times claims that city officials were "signing off" on an "agreement" to help finance the Atlantic Yards affordable housing, even though the Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), excerpted at right, involved only Forest City Ratner's subsidiary Atlantic Yards Development Company and the advocacy group ACORN, not the city.
The error, as noted below, apparently was derived from a mayoral press release that inaccurately announced the deal as a fait accompli.
The bottom line: an error reprinted is an error, even if it can be attributed to a seemingly reliable source.
The larger context: the amount of time the Times spent in responding to me--and rather defensively denying that readers could be misled--could better have been used to print a correction or clarification regarding the article at hand.
Read the rest of the article to find out how Times staffers put their heads together and still got it wrong.
NoLandGrab: Norman Oder has a point — maybe the article "captured a specific moment in time," but it still erroneously cited "The city’s agreement to help finance the plan." There wasn't and still isn't a signed agreement with the City.
If Oder wasn't burning his time reminding the Times of this fact, few people would know otherwise.
Posted by lumi at 5:01 AM
October 24, 2009
Affordable? U.N. Puts a Questioning Eye on New York’s Housing
The New York Times
By Mike Reicher
Everybody knows New York City is an expensive place to live. But the United Nations wants to know if affordable housing is so tough to come by that it actually violates human rights.
The United Nations has assigned an official, “a special rapporteur on the right to adequate housing,” to check the city’s affordable housing. The rapporteur, Raquel Rolnik, is to tour the city for the next three days with housing advocates and city officials to “hear the voices of those who are suffering on the ground,” she said.
...
Housing advocates will be taking Ms. Rolnik to the Atlantic Yards site in Brooklyn to see the results of the government’s use of eminent domain to seize property; to the New York City Housing Authority’s Grant Houses in Harlem to see how public housing residents live; and to the Bronx to meet residents whose landlords are in foreclosure.
NoLandGrab: "rapporteur - One who is designated to give a report, as at a meeting." Yeah, I never heard of that word before, either.
So, did UN "special rapporteur" on housing visit Atlantic Yards site? Not quite
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder adds clarity to this story.
So, is the United Nations "special rapporteur on the right to adequate housing," a Brazilian urban planning professor who's briefly visiting New York, actually going to see the Atlantic Yards site?
...
Actually, no. I called around and learned that Rolnik this afternoon is learning about displacement and gentrification issues in and near Downtown Brooklyn from her host, Families United for Racial and Economic Equality (FUREE). But she has no time to visit the AY site.
The City Room post did not make it clear whether the host was a housing advocacy group like ACORN, which favors the project, or a group like FUREE or the Fifth Avenue Committee, which oppose or criticize the project.
...
A fact sheet prepared by the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative for Rolnik's visit shows a critical stance toward AY:
Eminent Domain and Predatory Development
Developer Forest City Ratner is constructing 16 skyscrapers and a $950 million sports arena in the Prospect Heights and Park Slope neighborhoods of Brooklyn. Besides relying heavily on the use of taxpayer subsidies, the Atlantic Yards project extensively utilized eminent domain, which allows the state of New York to seize private properties, homes and businesses, and transfer them to commercial developers.Actually, eminent domain is planned but not actually used.
And maybe it's for the best that Rolnik didn't get to focus on Atlantic Yards. The housing issue would require her, for example, to sort out ACORN's role. That has flummoxed the New York Times, which has a lot more time to devote to it, and led some housing advocates to strain in ACORN's defense.
Posted by steve at 8:49 AM
October 22, 2009
State must keep Ratner on hook for affordable housing
The Brooklyn Paper, Editorial
The nine words in the Sept. 17 Empire State Development Corporation staff memo defy all previous agreements made between [Bruce] Ratner and the state about the developer’s requirement to include a sizeable number of below-market-rate units in the mega-project.
Previously, those units were an iron-clad promise. Now, according to the new language, the affordable housing is merely “subject to governmental authorities making available … affordable housing subsidies.”
Make no mistake: Ratner has always said that he would build the 2,250 rental units with the help of taxpayers, who pay for those housing subsidies as part of a larger goal of keeping the city affordable and its neighborhoods comprised of families of mixed incomes.
...Of course, we are confident that a developer of Ratner’s reputation will make good on his prior promises to build the affordable units, which gave the project virtually all of its political support.
NoLandGrab: It's impossible to tell if whomever wrote the Brooklyn Paper's editorial was smirking or rolling his or her eyes when writing that last paragraph, but as far as we're concerned, Bruce Ratner's reputation is the precise reason why we've never trusted a thing about the Atlantic Yards project.
Posted by eric at 11:24 PM
New state-Ratner deal has ‘clause’ for concern
The Brooklyn Paper
By Gersh Kutzman
The Brooklyn Paper editor Gersh Kuntzman scrutinizes the dirty little secret about Bruce Ratner's new-n-approved deal with NY State:
State development officials are drafting a new deal with Bruce Ratner that will give the Atlantic Yards developer a loophole out of the project’s main selling point: thousands of units of affordable housing.
New language quietly inserted into a Sept. 17 lease proposal between the Empire State Development Corporation and the Downtown-based developer now make the construction of the long-promised 2,250 units of below-market-rate housing “subject to governmental authorities making available … affordable housing subsidies.”
None of the prior agreements — including two approved general project plans as well as the Community Benefits Agreement that Ratner signed four years ago with several local groups — made the affordable housing conditional on any state or local support. Ratner was required to build the units whether subsidies were available or not.
And such subsidies are in very short supply.
...
If anyone should be upset about the change in language, it should be Bertha Lewis, ACORN’s chief organizer, [Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn's Candace] Carponter suggested. But under the agreement, ACORN and Lewis are contractually barred from saying anything negative about the project, and, as such, both maintained their optimism this week.
Posted by lumi at 7:20 AM
October 21, 2009
Acorn’s Woes Strain Its Ties to Democrats
The NY Times
By Jim Rutenberg
The Atlantic Yards myths persist in this recent article about ACORN's ties with the Dems and the Obama administration, through HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan (emphasis added):
Mr. Donovan included Ms. Speliotis in a group of affordable housing specialists with whom he consulted frequently, current and former city officials said.
...
And she and Ms. Lewis appeared to help Mr. Donovan deliver a coup for Mr. Bloomberg in 2005 when Acorn endorsed a huge Brooklyn development he was supporting in the face of local opposition.Acorn backed the plan in return for an unusual promise from the developer, Forest City Ratner, to make half of the 4,500 rental apartments that it was proposing — along with a new Nets basketball arena — available to poor and middle-class families at below-market rates.
NoLandGrab: As usual, nothing about Bruce Ratner's highly subsidized eminent domain-abusing Atlantic Yards overdevelopment is quite as it seems.
Two years ago, Norman Oder reported on his blog, Atlantic Yards Report, that some of these "affordable" apartments would rent above market rate.
Posted by lumi at 6:37 AM
October 20, 2009
The Times mentions FCR's bailout of ACORN only parenthetically, claims city agreed to help finance AY housing plan
Atlantic Yards Report
In a front-page article last Friday, October 16, the New York Times finally reported that the controversial housing activist group ACORN had been bailed out by a $1.5 million grant/loan from developer Forest City Ratner, a partner with ACORN New York on the Atlantic Yards project.
But that wasn't the point of the article, headlined Acorn’s Woes Strain Its Ties to Democrats.
Rather, the information was presented parenthetically, a variation of "rowback," which former Times Public Editor Daniel Okrent described in his 3/14/04 column as "a way that a newspaper can cover its butt without admitting it was ever exposed."
Beyond that, the article cited "[t]he city’s agreement to help finance the [Atlantic Yards housing] plan."
That overstates the city's commitment, which is no more than conceptual, and should be corrected, given that it could mislead readers into thinking that the affordable housing--the major source of political support for the project--is guaranteed.
Just how long has it taken The Times to get around to reporting on Forest City's bailout of ACORN?
In this case, the Times wasn't publishing an unacknowledged correction, as is typical with "rowback," but providing information it owed its readers months ago--and without acknowledging the delay or that the information had been published elsewhere.
Consider this sequence:
- the bailout occurred in August 2008
- a Times reporter knew about it in September 2008 (and called ACORN's actions "incredible")
- it was reported by me in December 2008
- I sent an open letter to the Public Editor in April 2009
- it was mentioned in a Congressional report in July 2009
- the New York Post mentioned it nearly a month ago
The Times's vague formulation placed the bailout in context of the long Atlantic Yards fight, but did not mention the date it occurred.
NoLandGrab: Better late than never?
Posted by eric at 10:19 AM
October 13, 2009
SCANDAL LEAVES LACK OF SERVICE IN ITS WAKE
Its reputation suffering, ACORN is hampered from delivering needed counseling to lower-income New Yorkers - and it's not clear who will pick up the slack.
City Limits
By Eileen Markey
The ACORN scandal means it just got harder. The New York City office of the national group (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) that advocates for low- and moderate-income people is among the major providers of foreclosure counseling in the city.
In the organization's defense, national CEO Bertha Lewis highlights some of the group's local advocacy:
Lewis points to the New York affiliate's campaign to keep Brooklyn's affordable 5,881-unit Starrett City development from going market-rate; its lobbying in support of the 421-a program used to encourage real estate developers to set aside units for low-income people; and its record securing “economic multipliers” like food stamps and the Earned Income Tax Credit for 150,000 New Yorkers over the past five years as more indicative of the group's contributions to the city. Under Lewis' leadership, ACORN also supported the controversial Atlantic Yards mega-development because it included plans for affordable housing, a move that drew the ire of some usual allies.
NoLandGrab: Lewis betrayed "usual allies" when she got down with some unusual bedfellows.
Posted by lumi at 5:18 AM
October 4, 2009
Washington Post article on ACORN's loss of foundation funding omits Forest City Ratner bailout
Atlantic Yards Report
The Washington Post reports, in an article headlined ACORN Losing Funding From Big Foundations:
The liberal political organizing group ACORN, battered by the release of embarrassing videos and allegations of financial mismanagement and fraud, has also been losing support from several major foundations.The Ford Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, the Marguerite Casey Foundation and Bank of America have stopped funding the group and its affiliates over the past year and a half.
Who's made up the slack?
While not trying to be comprehensive, the Post cites two funders still on board:
One local group said it has no plans to change the terms of a $50,000 grant awarded this summer. The Collaborative for Education Organizing, part of the Community Foundation for the National Capital Region, sponsored a project aimed at organizing parents of District public high school students to advocate for change in the classroom....All of their funders are concerned, Kettenring said, but some have responded by continuing, or even increasing, their support. They include the Needmor Fund, a family foundation based in Toledo that gave about $150,000 a year to local organizations affiliated with ACORN.
Missing: a $500,000 grant and $1 million loan from Forest City Ratner.
NoLandGrab: We don't really think the Post and The Times, those bastions of liberalism, are intentionally burying the link between ACORN and the "do-gooder, liberal" Bruce Ratner, but it is one of those things that make you go hmmmm.
Posted by eric at 9:19 PM
October 2, 2009
What Forest City Ratner told Sheldon Silver (but not the public): affordable condos depend on "appropriate subsidy"
Atlantic Yards Report
As I've written, the affordable rental units planned for Atlantic Yards are not guaranteed but rather dependent on available public subsidies.
The same goes for the affordable condos promised by developer Forest City Ratner upon project approval in 2006.
Though the developer did not mention such caveats in its public announcement, it did offer such caveats in a letter to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver that I recently obtained via a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request. Beyond that, the pledge has never been memorialized in project documents, despite a 2009 update to the Modified General Project Plan.
This is part of a pattern; as I wrote in June, the Empire State Development Corporation, while the Atlantic Yards project approached approval in December 2006, never revealed how project funding depended on scarce housing bonds, and Forest City Ratner's 2005 bid to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority ignored the need for such bonds to build the residential buildings.
Click thru for Bruce Ratner's weasel words.
Posted by eric at 11:54 AM
ACORN's talking points vs. ACORN's reality: how ACORN members are clueless about the actual rents at AY affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
I already pointed out, in my coverage of the July 29 public hearing on Atlantic Yards held by the Empire State Development Corporation, that some people testifying on behalf of ACORN had no clue about the actual terms of the affordable housing agreement.
The written testimony, as I describe below, was equally uninformed.
At the hearing
During the hearing, one ACORN member, George Finley said that the deal with “Forest Ratner” made housing, including private houses, available to those earning $20,000 or less. As the housing chart below shows, very few households earning $20,000 a year would be eligible, and none for private houses.
(From the transcript: Now, in the first beginning, we asked for 50 percent affordable housing, that's rentals and also private houses, two-family houses and one-family houses. And they had to be for people who made $20,000 a year or less, less than $20,000 a year. Now just like Ms. Bertha Lewis got up here and told you that no matter what you hear in the public, we have the original contract with Forest Ratner and the downtown community of Brooklyn. So we going to ensure and assure that we have enough affordable houses and rentals and enough affordable houses that you can buy and you can pay for them before you die. You won't still be paying mortgages, you know, the rest of your life.)
This kind of misinformation misleads ACORN members and the public.
In fact, it's a reminder that, just as the recent subprime crisis involved irresponsible lenders and irresponsible borrowers, the Atlantic Yards affordable housing deal involves obfuscatory and irresponsible sponsors and supporters.
Lewis's testimony
At the July 29 public hearing, ACORN CEO and Chief Organizer Bertha Lewis, in her aggressively theatrical style (at 1:30 of the video above), "And if you quote something, tell the truth and have the facts."
NoLandGrab: Back atcha, Bertha.
Posted by eric at 11:49 AM
September 24, 2009
ACORN’s Advocacy for Poor Fuels Attacks from Right
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
by Raanan Geberer
The Eagle's managing editor defends ACORN from attacks by the Right — with a caveat.
First, let me make it clear that I am by no means a total fan of ACORN. I think that the Brooklyn ACORN chapter’s rah-rah, 100 percent support of Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project is at best unrealistic, at worst self-serving.
Posted by eric at 11:02 AM
September 22, 2009
If Forest City Ratner has breached its deal with ACORN, why has ACORN maintained support?
Atlantic Yards Report
ACORN, we should remember, has stuck by Forest City Ratner even though the developer has likely breached the deal ACORN signed.
A reader points out that, in writing about public comments by the president of New York State ACORN, I left out part of the May 2005 Housing Memorandum of Understanding, agreed to "take reasonable steps to publicly support the project by, among other things, appearing with the developer before the Public Parties, community organizations, and the media."
The ACORN obligation
The preamble states:
As long as the Project will include the ACORN/ATLANTIC YARDS 50/50 Program as described in paragraph 1, ACORN agrees to take reasonable steps to publicly support the project by, among other things, appearing with the developer before the Public Parties, community organizations, and the media.The 50/50 program
What was described in paragraph 1?
Developer shall develop fifty (50%) of the Residential Project as affordable housing in accordance with the ACORN/ATLANTIC Yards 50/50 program. Based on a projected number of units of 4,500 the affordable commitment will be 2,250 units.However, just a week after the press conference announcing that deal, Forest City Ratner announced changes, proposing either an addition of 1500 market-rate condos while maintaining the same amount of office space, or reducing the office space and planning for 2800 condos. Now the number of proposed condos has been reduced to 1930.
As noted in Paragraph 5 of the MOU, if the number of units in the project should increase "for any reason that the Developer determines to be economically necessary," the developer and ACORN would try to follow the 50/50 program.
Have they done so? Forest City Ratner has agreed to build 600 to 1000 affordable for-sale units, not matching the announced 1930 condo units. But that agreement has never been part of documents approved by the Empire State Development Corporation.
Posted by eric at 11:13 AM
September 21, 2009
Is ACORN's Atlantic Yards Connection the Real Scandal?
Gothamist's John Del Signore recaps today's NY Post ACORN article and points out that the story is only "news" if you haven't been paying attention:
Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner's quid pro quo relationship with community organizing group ACORN is public knowledge, but now that the group is on the hot seat for those hidden camera humiliations, the Post takes another look. For years, ACORN has rallied its members to enthusiastically support the construction of Ratner's $4.9 billion NBA arena, and in exchange ACORN would help manage tenants for the 2,250 affordable-housing units still planned for Atlantic Yards, to be built someday in the unforeseeable future.
ACORN also got a $1 million loan and a $500,000 grant from Ratner last September to weather some financial trouble. That's not really news for those who've been following the embattled project closely, but the article does feature a juicy quote from Patti Hagan, a Prospects Heights activist and former operative for ACORN’s political arm. She tells the Post, "ACORN is a corrupt organization that had its silence bought by Ratner." But that's not exactly controversial either, since ACORN's Director Bertha Lewis has herself admitted that Ratner essentially bought ACORN's "political cover."
Posted by lumi at 7:22 PM
The New York Post discovers (and downplays) ACORN's deal with Forest City Ratner
Atlantic Yards Report
Now that the national organization ACORN has been in the news, after a video sting operation exposed some unwise advice from low-level employees, the New York Post mentions, in passing, something far more significant: developer Forest City Ratner's bailout of the national organization, with a $500,000 grant and a $1 million loan.
...The scandal has nothing to do with ACORN's housing management role, and ACORN's role in helping decide who gets to live in the affordable housing units involves running a lottery. (Yes, there are ways lottery marketers can ensure that certain groups are informed about applying, though it's likely Atlantic Yards housing would get much publicity.)
And it's not news that ACORN would earn fees for marketing the units.
...The $1.5 million bailout is much bigger news, because it shows Forest City Ratner stepping in after major foundations, which had previously supported ACORN, stopped contributing after an embezzlement scandal.
Posted by eric at 9:50 AM
Group can $core on Atl. Yards
NY Post
by Rich Calder
Despite a string of scandals that recently led Congress to cut off its federal funding, ACORN still stands to make millions of dollars off its support for Brooklyn’s controversial Atlantic Yards project, The Post has learned.
The left-wing organization -- longtime boosters of the $4.9 billion NBA arena and residential- and office-tower project -- says it expects to be tapped to market and help decide who gets to live in the coveted, but long-delayed, 2,250 affordable-housing units planned for Atlantic Yards.
This, after Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner helped bail ACORN out of financial trouble last September with a $1 million loan and a $500,000 grant, according to memos.
...The work would include community outreach and screening people to determine qualified applicants, and then scandal-scarred ACORN would be entrusted with overseeing a lottery system to choose who gets the housing. Ratner’s firm is expected to manage the housing.
When asked how much ACORN might make off Atlantic Yards, the city’s Department of Housing Preservation & Development referred questions to Ratner, who said via a spokesman it wasn’t the “appropriate time” to make such “decisions.”
NoLandGrab: While Atlantic Yards beat reporter Rich Calder plays it straight, we have to wonder if the Post editorial page's hatred of ACORN will trump its love of Bruce Ratner.
Posted by eric at 9:39 AM
Looking at ACORN's testimony before the ESDC: boilerplate support without any acknowledgment of doubt
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder fact checks and analyzes local ACORN head Pat Boone's testimony in support of Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards project at last week's board meeting of the Empire State Development Corporation:
...ACORN, according to the May 2005 Housing Memorandum of Understanding, agreed to "take reasonable steps to publicly support the project by, among other things, appearing with the developer before the Public Parties, community organizations, and the media.
So that's why Pat Boone, president of New York state ACORN, was speaking. Her boilerplate support deserves closer analysis.
Boone raised no doubts about Bruce Ratner's vague construction timetable, the lack of affordable-housing guarantees if limited housing-construction subsidies are not available, and that only 14% of the planned housing units will be available to ACORN's main constituency, low-income families.
Posted by lumi at 6:00 AM
September 19, 2009
Tough week for ACORN
The Sports ITeam Blog (Daily News)
We now know that there are no guarantees when or if affordable housing in the proposed Atlantic Yards project will be built. This certainly doesn't bother Forest City Ratner or its paid-for ally, ACORN.
It’s been a tough week for ACORN and its chief executive Bertha Lewis: Conservative activists Hannah Giles and James O’Keefe (no relation to I-Team member Michael O’Keeffe), released secretly recorded videos that apparently show ACORN employees in Brooklyn, Baltimore and Washington advising them on how to evade taxes and buy a house to use as a brothel.
To the right-wing crusaders have long accused ACORN of voter-registration fraud and other sins, the videos were proof that the community-organizing group is a pit of corruption. Washington officials moved quickly to cut ties to the organization. The House of Representatives voted to deny federal money to the community organizing group (ACORN’s critics claimed has received an estimated $53 million in federal aid since 1994). The Senate voted to deny ACORN housing and transportation funds. The Census Bureau, which had planned on using ACORN to conduct the 2010 census, cut ties with the group.
But one longtime ally -- Nets owner Bruce Ratner -- will continue to stand with the bruised and battered organization. Forest City Ratner spokesman Joe DePlasco said ACORN has been a forceful advocate for civil rights and working families, and the company isn’t about to abandon its friend simply because of criticism from Fox News.
...
“We like working with ACORN,” a Forest City Ratner executive told the Brooklyn Paper in 2005. “They have that radical feeling, they really fight for what they believe in. We just love their history, how they started, and feel it really represents what we're working to do here.”
The final version of a state plan for the project weakened guarantees that promised affordable housing would get necessary funding, documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Law by Atlantic Yards Report blogger Norman Oder suggest. A draft of the plan said state and city subsidies would be available to fund affordable-house units, but that language was deleted in later drafts. The current plan says the affordable housing is "expected" to be paid for with tax-exempt bonds from city and state housing programs.
ACORN has not protested; Atlantic Yards critics say that may be because the organization, which had been rocked by an embezzlement scandal, received a $1 million low-interest loan and a $500,000 grant from Forest City Ratner last year.
“We’d argue that ACORN has actually sold out its core constituency as there is likely to be very little ‘affordable’ housing if Atlantic Yards is ever built,” Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, Atlantic Yards’ main opposition group, wrote on its Web site this summer, “and what ‘affordable’ housing there may be will nearly all be UNaffordable to those ACORN claims to represent.”
Posted by steve at 10:40 AM
September 3, 2009
Bargaining for Brooklyn: insights into Vito Lopez's influence and how affordable housing lotteries work
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder adds Nicole Marwell's "Bargaining for Brooklyn: Community Organizations in the Entrepreneurial City" to his continuing education on all things Atlantic Yards:
[The book has] become surprisingly relevant to observers trying to understand political power in North Brooklyn and beyond, given the role of Brooklyn Democratic Party Chair Vito Lopez.
Also, as I describe below, the book offers insight into the not always fair lotteries used to winnow applicants for affordable housing--an issue that should be on the Atlantic Yards radar screen.
...
Marwell also describes how housing lotteries work--an instructive example for those watching Atlantic Yards, given that, should affordable housing be built, it would be distributed via lottery.(Actually, there might be multiple lotteries, or parts, given that half of the subsidized units would be reserved for residents of Community Boards, 2, 6, and 8, and ten percent of the total for seniors.)
Marwell writes that lotteries can be gamed somewhat--though, I suspect, given the intense publicity over Atlantic Yards, the chances would be lower.
Still, housing organization ACORN, partner with developer Forest City Ratner, would be under intense pressure from its members--the people who showed up, in many cases clueless and hopeful, at public hearings to tout the projects--to deliver the units to them, or at least to help position them for the best chance at such scarce housing.
Keep in mind that only 900 of the promised 2250 affordable units would be low-income (under 50% of Area Median Income, or about $35,000 for a four-person household), and that only a fraction of those units would be delivered in the first building or two.
Also note that even proponents, like former Empire State Development Corporation CEO Marisa Lago, have said it's highly unlikely that the project would be built in a decade, as officially promised, and that there's no evidence that there are sufficient affordable housing subsidies--or that the ESDC can require the timetable to be met.
Posted by lumi at 6:44 AM
September 2, 2009
An F train express, East Side Access, and affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report goes slightly off-topic to explore the concept that improved subway infrastructure, such as running an F-train express, has an "important side-effect...: increased production of housing, and thus more affordable housing."
In other words, boosting infrastructure might be a better bet to produce affordable housing than unquestioning support for Atlantic Yards, a lesson AY boosters like Bill de Blasio (who also supports the F express) may not recognize.
(Could it be that there's no activist organization like ACORN behind the more generalized benefits of improved transit? Yes, I know the Straphangers Campaign supports the F Express, but they don't mobilize people the way ACORN does.)
Posted by lumi at 5:22 AM
August 31, 2009
Weaker plan to finance Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards housing project
NY Daily News
by Erin Durkin
The final version of a state plan for developer Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards project weakened guarantees that promised affordable housing would get necessary funding, new documents show.
Ratner has pledged to build 2,250 units of affordable housing as part of the proposed Nets arena and 16-tower project, but critics have questioned whether he'll ever come through.
There are many reasons to doubt Ratner's promises, but one of the more recent ones is because — get this — there aren't any guarantees of affordable housing in the state documents approving the project.
ACORN director and Atlantic Yards backer Bertha Lewis said she wished public officials would stop "mucking about" with the plans, but expressed confidence all the promised apartments would get built.
"Bruce Ratner's never wavered," she said. "I never look for anybody else to ensure these guarantees. We look directly to the developer to ensure the guarantees."
The only problem with that is that the only "guarantees" are laid out in the Community Benefits Agreement, which are essentially unenforceable, especially since ACORN is already in hock to Ratner to the tune of $1.5 million.
In an e-mail also obtained by Atlantic Yards Report, ESDC counsel Steve Matlin acknowledged there's no guarantee that funding will be available - but said that's Ratner's problem.
"Forest City will take the risk that adequate housing programs are in effect," he wrote. "The bottom line is that the affordable housing requirements do not go away if housing benefits are inadequate or are not available."
NoLandGrab: "Forest City will take the risk?" "The affordable housing requirements?" Hardly, since essentially, there are no requirements, except in the flimsy CBA. The risk is the public's, in that the state has approved a project largely on the promise of affordable housing that may well not ever materialize.
Related coverage...
Atlantic Yards Report, The Daily News follows up on the housing guarantees, gets quotes out of FCR, ESDC, and ACORN, lets them off easy
Norman Oder follows up on the Daily News's follow-up of his story in greater detail, natch.
Well, it's nice that the Daily News, alone among the press, followed up on my article last Thursday questioning the guarantees for Atlantic Yards affordable housing, but the omissions and errors deserve attention.
The article, headlined Weaker plan to finance Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards housing project, was posted today though, I'm told, was actually in the paper Friday.
...The Daily News asked the ESDC and the developer about the housing and their answers were reminiscent of that old Marx Brothers line, "Who you gonna believe, me or your own eyes?"
Posted by eric at 8:50 PM
August 27, 2009
DDDB PRESS RELEASE: Documents Show Ratner and NY State Provide No Guarantees for Atlantic Yards Affordable Housing
Journalist Norman Oder, on his Atlantic Yards Report, shows today that there are no guarantees that developer Forest City Ratner will build the 2,250 units of affordable housing promised for the Atlantic Yards development proposal in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn. There are no guarantees that the developer will build any affordable units at all.
Based on documents obtained by Freedom of Information Law requests, Oder makes it clear that Ratner is only required to seek funding through subsidies for affordable housing. The documents reveal that if the developer is unable to get the funds he wants he doesn't have to build the number of units he's promised. Ratner is not required to get the funds and there is no understanding by the Empire State Development Corporation whether there will be room for all of those units under the annual allotments of housing bonds for New York City and State.
The General Project Plan, which is the proposal's governing document approved in 2006, originally had provisions that nearly guaranteed Atlantic Yards affordable housing. But those provisions never made it into the final version. The Modified General Project Plan (MGPP) released in late June also does not include those provisions guaranteeing affordable housing.
The public comment period on the MGPP ends on August 31st and, presumably without those guarantees, the Empire State Development Corporation is expected to rubberstamp the MGPP on September 17.
"We've expected all along that Forest City Ratner and New York State have no documented guarantees that Atlantic Yards will include 2,250 affordable housing units. Now the evidence shows it is true: there are no affordable housing guarantees for Atlantic Yards," said Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn spokesman Daniel Goldstein. "There should be a political firestorm over this from all of the elected officials, including Mayor Bloomberg, who've supported Atlantic Yards for the affordable housing, but we won't hold our breath on that."
The Atlantic Yards Report article, "Documents show affordable housing guarantees considered but discarded; no apparent effort to ascertain if housing bonds were sufficient," is at:
http://atlanticyardsreport.com/2009/08/documents-show-affordable-housing.html
Posted by eric at 12:20 PM
Documents show affordable housing guarantees considered but discarded; no apparent effort to ascertain if housing bonds were sufficient
Atlantic Yards Report
Big scoop here!
Norman Oder has been trying to get to the bottom of what assurances were made or discussed about whether or not the affordable housing component of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards megaproject would ever get built and, if so, when.
Documents he received, via Freedom of Information Law request, indicate that provisions that nearly guaranteed Atlantic Yards affordable housing were part of the drafts of the General Project Plan, but never made it into the final version.
These documents show that drafts of the official project documents included a requirement that the bonds for affordable housing be approved, along with a provision guaranteeing a percentage of the affordable housing in Phase II of the project. These requirements were dropped before the official vote to approve the project by the Public Authorities Control Board.
If the volume cap on available housing bonds, administered by the city and state, gets exhausted each year without room for Atlantic Yards housing bonds, the affordable housing component of Atlantic Yards could be jeopardized, or at least delayed well beyond the official decade-long buildout. Oder sought information as to whether this important issue was discussed before the official plan approval. One document shows it was, but the information was redacted. "The bottom line: they discussed it, but we don't know what they said."
So, did the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC), during its approval process for Atlantic Yards, evaluate whether there'd be sufficient tax-exempt housing bonds to meet the ten-year timetable for 2250 affordable units?
Documents received in response to a Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) request suggest no; in fact, the state considered but rejected a General Project Plan provision that stated explicitly that approval was needed for affordable housing financing.
Thus, it's likely the ESDC board approved the project in December 2006--and will re-approve the project next month--without any assurances the affordable housing could be built as promised.
Moreover, the State Funding Agreement signed in September 2007 gives the developer a pass, asserting that a good faith application for housing bonds was expected to lead to their receipt--without evaluating whether such bonds would be available.
Also, it's not clear whether the ESDC can enforce any affordable housing requirements if the funding is not available.
Posted by lumi at 7:19 AM
August 26, 2009
Mystery Downtown Development Going Affordable
Citing a NY Post article, Brownstoner is wondering what Downtown Brooklyn luxury condo building is "in talks with the city to unload their unsold units as affordable housing."
NoLandGrab: Hard times in the luxury condo market don't bode well for Atlantic Yards. Also, if NYC can increase the amount of affordable housing out of unsold inventory, then what is the justification for overspending on Bruce Ratner-built affordable units?
Posted by lumi at 5:26 AM
August 3, 2009
At what Forest City Ratner calls a press conference, the temporary alliance between Bertha Lewis and Marty Golden
Atlantic Yards Report
Only in the surreal parallel universe of Ratnerville will you find Republicans rallying with leaders and members of ACORN:
Though several Atlantic Yards backers (union leaders, Kathryn Wylde of the Partnership for New York City) made speeches for the cameras, the stars, so to speak, were State Senator Marty Golden (R-Bay Ridge) and ACORN Chief Organizer Bertha Lewis.
They make for some strange bedfellows.
The ethically-challenged Golden, for example, has long sided with the real estate industry, not tenant groups, in refusing to support the repeal of vacancy decontrol, which currently allows rent-stabilized apartments to leave the system. ACORN, of course, opposes vacancy decontrol and recently led a rally outside Golden's office.
Posted by lumi at 5:56 AM
ACORN, the disconnect in the crowd, and the absence of facts regarding affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder explore's ACORN's cognitive dissonance, which could be found in spades at last week's public hearings:
The housing advocacy group ACORN sure inspires loyalty in its followers, given that dozens showed up last Wednesday, attired in red, to the public hearing held by the Empire State Development Corporation regarding the Atlantic Yards project.
What ACORN does not do, however, is keep its members informed about details in the Atlantic Yards affordable housing agreement. Nor do those members apparently feel obligated to get their facts straight. Testimony from its members on Wednesday was heartfelt, but often distracting, erroneous, or even pie-in-the-sky.
...
Also unmentioned: ACORN, by virtue of the 2005 Affordable Housing Memorandum of Understanding, is obligated to publicly support the project. Also, ACORN has been bailed out by Forest City Ratner, gaining $500,000 in grants and a $1 million low-interest loan.
Posted by lumi at 5:50 AM
July 29, 2009
Lunch will be served...
Apparently there IS such thing as a free lunch...
ACORN, the Atlantic Yards Community Benefit Agreement (CBA) signatory and receiver of a financial bailout from Forest City Ratner, is calling supporters to rally for the project outside today's public hearing — free food and drink will be provided.
Posted by lumi at 6:04 AM
July 22, 2009
Colbert and ACORN's Bertha Lewis Have a Chat
Via Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
Stephen Colbert has a chat with ACORN National Director and Forest City Ratner partner Bertha Lewis in a segment called Better Know a Lobby - Acorn. (Remember, ACORN is in debt to Forest City Enterprises)
From The Colbert Report:
The Colbert Report Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c Better Know a Lobby - Acorn
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Mark Sanford
Posted by eric at 1:07 PM
July 17, 2009
Would 40% of AY affordable units be above market? Market-rate studios in Brooklyn's tallest building offer evidence
Atlantic Yards Report
Seems like some 40% of Atlantic Yards promised "affordable" housing units are slotted to be more expensive than market-rate rents charged in other buildings. And you can't chalk up the premium to a "Frank Gehry design" anymore.
Three years ago, in July 2006, Forest City Ratner projected that "affordable" studios for the highest "band" (141%-160% of Area Median Income, or AMI) of those gaining access to subsidized units would cost $1861 a month. Given that AMI has gone up since then, the rent would be higher now, and likely would rise when and if units are built.
However, reports the New York Observer, when the 51-story Brooklyner opens next year, studios are expected to start at about $1550 per month. The studios will be small, 350 to 400 square feet. The affordable Atlantic Yards studios would average 400 square feet.
...In other words, a significant slice of the subsidized housing--perhaps 900 of the 2250 units, as I wrote in April--would track or exceed market prices.
Posted by eric at 10:10 AM
NYT Misleads in Editorial on Census and ACORN
NewsBusters.org
By Matthew Vadum
ACORN's deal with Bruce Ratner to promote Atlantic Yards and administer the affordable housing units is cited as one of the reasons that The NY Times has gone soft on ACORN's ties with the Obama administration.
Then there's the newspaper's woefully inadequate coverage of its business partner Bruce Ratner's ACORN-assisted land grab related to the taxpayer-subsized proposed Atlantic Yards project right in the newspaper's own backyard in Brooklyn, but perhaps I digress.
Posted by lumi at 5:12 AM
July 7, 2009
ACORN's Lewis, interviewed unskeptically in journal focused on labor issues, maintains AY deal is a success
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder supplies a little fact-checking for an article devoid of it.
An immersion in the Atlantic Yards story can lead to some hard truths about people we consider professionals:
- Elected officials repeat Forest City Ratner talking points and imaginary numbers ginned up by a paid FCR consultant
- Elected officials miss the chance to pose tough questions to government officials (though they can recover)
- Appointed officials actively mislead the public at an oversight hearing
- A distinguished civil liberties lawyer makes campaign contributions to Brooklyn machine politicians
- Wall Street analysts fail to ask tough questions about an issue that demands skepticism.
- Academics avoid scrutinizing an organization that passes an ideological litmus test
The latter is the lesson of an unskeptical interview in the Spring/Summer 2009 issue of Regional Labor Review headlined ACORN’s Fair Housing Fight in Working Class Communities: A Conversation with ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis.
...The section of the interview regarding Atlantic Yards consists of two open-ended questions and long soliloquies by Lewis, with no interpolation for fact-checking.
NoLandGrab: Lewis talks about how the Atlantic Yards affordable-housing agreements and Community Benefits Agreement "worked," but history, not Bertha Lewis, will be the judge. The project has yet to, and may never, break ground, and the disposition of that affordable housing, certainly 2,250 units of it, is very much in question. But one can't really say that ACORN got played by Bruce Ratner, 'cause they're holding 1.5 million of his dollars.
Posted by eric at 11:57 AM
ACORN’s Fair Housing Fight in Working Class Communities: A Conversation with ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis
Regional Labor Review
by Niev Duffy
Q: Bottom line, why do you think [Atlantic Yards] worked?
BL: I think it worked because, one, we were very clear on what we wanted and we had solutions to what we wanted. We had a way to show this developer by spreadsheets and other stuff, we spoke development language. We actually understood what we were talking about, and we had a concrete proposal. Two, we were valueadded: one, in expertise; two, in political cover – let’s face it – and political might and our ability to fight them.
You know, you make an analysis as if you’re going to lose. But we would have put up a hell of a fight, and they didn’t want to fight with us. So you have to be big enough, deep enough, have the expertise, have a real plan. You can’t come to these folks with vagaries. You know, “We want affordable housing.” “When do you want it?” “Now.” “What does it look like?” “We don’t know. You figure it out.” You can’t do that. You really have to know your shit.
So that’s why I think it worked. I think we were the right group at the right time with the right stuff in the right place, and finally you have to have a willing partner. As I said, we’ve met with developers for 30 years, and they just have contempt. I’m going to give the devil his due. Forest City was willing to sit down, like I say, bring their bean counters, bring their lawyers, bring their experts and actually sit at the table with us and not talk to us like we were children, actually have real conversations. They wanted to find a way to do this.
article [PDF]
NoLandGrab: Bertha Lewis called Bruce Ratner the devil, not us.
Posted by eric at 11:57 AM
June 15, 2009
Affordable housing in Atlantic Yards project could mean just 300 units in 12 years, 120 of them low-income (or ten a year)
Atlantic Yards Report
Over the years, "affordable housing" has become the big selling point for Bruce Ratner's highly subsidized Atlantic Yards megaproject. As evidenced by last month's public hearing, details on how much housing will be built when and for what cost are still pending. However, the picture that's emerging isn't as impressive as Ratner and politicians would have you believe:
One element of the testimony May 29 at the state Senate oversight hearing on Atlantic Yards deserves more attention: a city official acknowledged that Phase 1 might result in only 300 affordable units.
What he didn't say was that Phase 1 could take 12 years--after the delivery of property via eminent domain--and that the 300 subsidized units would include 120 low-income units.
In other words, just ten low-income units a year over 12 years would go to the prime constituency of ACORN, the organization that signed the Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with developer Forest City Ratner.
Of the promised total 2250 affordable units, 900, or 40%, would be low-income, or up to 50% of Area Median Income. The rub is that Area Median Income, which is based not only on New York City but some wealthy suburbs, is a good deal higher than the median income in Brooklyn.
NoLandGrab: Public officials and Ratner don't want to cough up real figures because the inescapable conclusion would be that the same affordable housing resources could be devoted to other projects which would deliver more badly needed affordable units more quickly.
Posted by lumi at 6:34 AM
May 26, 2009
Former Lehman Brothers banker to head New York City’s Housing Authority
World Socialist Web Site
In an article about the new appointee to the NYC Housing Authority, one resident in the Walt Whitman Houses points to Bruce Ratner's eminent domain-abusing Atlantic Yards megaproject as an indication of Mayor Bloomberg's affordable housing priorities.
Robert noted that multimillionaire developer Bruce Ratner’s project to develop a sports arena complex in the neighborhood would evict people from their homes.
“They’re building a big stadium to move the [professional basketball team] Nets to, with new condos all over downtown Brooklyn—look around. They want us gone. If you could look at all the contracts and the plans, you’d see that the developers have blueprints of all the housing in the area, including the developments, and they have this property divided up among themselves. The public doesn’t know what’s going on.
Posted by lumi at 5:40 AM
May 18, 2009
Why Atlantic Yards affordable housing will be long-delayed, and why ACORN can't complain
Atlantic Yards Report
Despite the rhetoric, there are couple of important things to know about the promises regarding Atlantic Yards affordable housing.
First, should the project proceed, the housing will not be built on a schedule close to that originally promised.
Second, ACORN, signatory to the affordable housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) and the Community Benefits, owes Forest City Ratner $1 million and is in no position to complain about delays.
Today Norman Oder examines:
- Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz's statement, claiming that the court ruling issued last Friday "affirms the numerous public benefits" of the project, including affordable housing,
- Bruce Ratner's public statement, claiming that one(!) residential building will be built during the first phase of construction,
- ACORN's impotence to protest or renegotiate on behalf of "the community," and
- the NY Times's deflection of criticism of ACORN.
In bonus coverage, at "considerable agency time and expense" the Empire State Development Corporation FOIL's Norman Oder again.
Posted by lumi at 6:48 AM
May 13, 2009
Whither AY affordable housing: how little can they get away with building? Were promises ever realistic?
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder breaks down the affordability of Atlantic Yards "affordable housing" and the possibility that the government will not be able to deliver the subsidies and that it will take decades to happen.
So the project may have been approved with no inquiry as to whether there would be enough bonds to support Forest City Ratner's plans.
I can't be certain, but several months ago, I filed a Freedom of Information Law request, asking the ESDC if it had considered the availability of tax-exempt bonds in evaluating Atlantic Yards. I haven't gotten an answer. Each month I get a letter telling me they're still looking for responsive records.
Maybe the Senate hearing can get some answers.
Posted by lumi at 6:07 AM
May 1, 2009
Brownstoner double whammy
Prepping for Something Big at City Tech
Brownstoner has got the news that soil testing is underway for "City Tech Tower," a joint venture between the school and Forest City Ratner. According to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, the current plan is for an un-tower-like 350,000-square-foot academic building of eight or nine stories.
Development Watch: Atlantic Terrace Tops Out
While no one can reliably tell you when Forest City Ratner affordable housing will get built at Atlantic Yards, Brownstoner is reporting that the Fifth Avenue Committee just topped out the Atlantic Terrace project, directly across the street from the project everyone loves to loathe.
This place is great news in terms of affordable housing: Roughly 70 percent of the units are earmarked for low- and moderate-earners.
NoLandGrab: Case in point, if Bruce Ratner was truly focused on building affordable housing, his megadevelopment scheme would be well on its way by now.
Posted by lumi at 4:56 AM
April 18, 2009
Quinn, Jeffries, Towns Look to Reverse-Engineer Development Bubble
City Hall
Here's a plan to make use of luxury living units now sitting empty after the housing bubble has burst.
Flatbush Avenue was once a hotbed of development in the new downtown Brooklyn. Glittering towers filled with pricey condos began to dot the landscape, rezoned by city planners ushering in a would-be renaissance.
Developers cheered that vision, rallied by the surging housing market. They even advanced into the heart of Kensington, four miles down the road, where yet another 107-unit luxury project began to take shape.
Now, just three years after ground-breaking, those plans have unraveled. The towers are vacant relics of the housing bubble. The Kensington project, not even complete, faces foreclosure and possible demolition.
Some see the failed projects as nothing more than monuments to a reckless development era. But others have seized them as an opportunity to try and reverse-engineer the city’s housing bubble by paring down the city’s condo glut and adding to its affordable stock.
Housing advocates and policymakers are piecing together plans to convert many of those luxury units into cheaper ones, either through subsidies, affordable housing programs or new tax incentives. Or perhaps even government intervention.
“There are hundreds of units of empty luxury apartments that developers are unable to sell or rent because of the declining housing market,” said Assembly Member Hakeem Jeffries (D-Brooklyn), whose district includes some of the newest high-rises in Brooklyn. “It makes sense to figure out a way to convert those empty luxury units into affordable housing for the community.”
The plan is seen by advocates and even some developers as a creative if untested strategy for easing the city’s housing woes as credit tightens and prices plummet.
NoLandGrab: Maybe - just maybe - there are already enough luxury units on the market and no need to use public subsidies to create thousands of units for the proposed Atlantic Yards development.
Posted by steve at 6:54 AM
April 10, 2009
As AMI climbs, a significant slice of Atlantic Yards "affordable housing" seems to track market
Atlantic Yards Report
How much of the Atlantic Yards affordable housing would be, in the words of a July 2006 Daily News editorial, "real housing for the real Brooklyn"? Only about half.
The newspaper defined that cohort as those "on waiting lists for public housing and Section 8 vouchers." Those seeking Section 8 assistance must earn 50% or less of Area Median Income (AMI). Those seeking public housing can earn up to 80% of AMI. Currently, with the AMI $76,812, that means a four-person household could earn up to $61,540.
Noticing New York's Michael D. D. White recently broke it down, in a post pointing out that the rent for four-person households in the more expensive 900 "affordable" apartments--or 40% of the 2250 total subsidized units--would be $2304 and $2880.
That's at and above many market-rate units in the adjacent neighborhoods. Sure, there are two bedroom apartments that are more expensive, but they may be much larger or with luxury finishes. The Atlantic Yards affordable housing would be (nominally) designed by Frank Gehry, well-located near transit and subject to rent stabilization, but they almost certainly would not have luxury amenities, and they could be as small as 775 square feet.
Posted by eric at 9:59 AM
March 19, 2009
Atlantic Terrace rising
Photo, Tracy Collins, via flickr Atlantic Yards Photo Pool.
 |
Across the street from the footprint of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards arena and high-rise development plan, the Fifth Avenue Committee is building the Atlantic Terrace affordable-housing development, a stark reminder that if affordable housing was a priority for Atlantic Yards, the megaproject would probably already be underway.
Posted by lumi at 4:40 AM
March 5, 2009
Foreclosure Crisis: Q&A with Acorn Home Defenders
Storefront for Art & Architecture
Thursday, March 5, 7pm
Foreclosure Crisis: Q&A with Acorn Home Defenders
Moderated by Jose EsparzaOn Thursday, Feb. 19, ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) members in eight cities kicked off their Home Staying campaign, a new tactic to fight the foreclosure crisis. Teams of ACORN Home Defenders - volunteers from local communities - will employ civil disobedience as needed to help people who have faced foreclosure to stay in their homes until a comprehensive federal solution has been put in place.
A screening of footage from the first Home Defenders actions in NY State and a survey of the current nationwide housing crisis will be followed by an open discussion between ACORN and Home Defenders representatives and the audience on the legitimacy and effectiveness of civil disobedience strategies in this context.
The Storefront for Art & Architecture is located at 97 Kenmare Street in Manhattan.
NoLandGrab: Someone might want to ask ACORN why, when the bank seizes your home in a foreclosure, it's bad, but when the state seizes your home so Bruce Ratner can build a basketball arena, it's good.
Posted by eric at 3:05 PM
February 23, 2009
ACORN's Bertha Lewis Agrees With Community Opposition to Atlantic Yards
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn lets ACORN's Bertha Lewis make an important point:
"It's the most American thing you can do, is protect your home and protect your community."
**Please Note: We do not post this video as commentary on ACORN other than to show that Ms. Lewis takes the same position on homes and community that the opposition to Atlantic Yards takes (YouTube doesn't permit editing the clip). We invite Ms. Lewis and ACORN to join us in defense of homes and community against the community wrecking Forest City Ratner Atlantic Yards onslaught.
Posted by lumi at 4:34 AM
January 21, 2009
Atlantic Yards Report Flasher
While many people are looking forward, AYR today offers a couple of flashbacks.
Flashback: the lack of a schedule for Phase 2 was evident when the CPC considered Atlantic Yards
On 9/25/06, some two years and four months ago, the City Planning Commission considered a proposed minor scaleback in the size of the Atlantic Yards project. That was orchestrated.
So was a cut in the flagship tower Miss Brooklyn. “We really do believe the height it’s proposed at is really appropriate,” the Department of City Planning's Regina Myer said at the time. I wondered if that set the stage for a negotiated trim at a later date, and that turned out to be true.
But what's striking is how officials and critics pointed to the likelihood that the 11 towers of Phase 2 might not be constructed on schedule.
Flashback: four years ago, ACORN's Lewis scoffed at getting paid by Forest City Ratner
Since the beginning, we've wondered why NYC ACORN signed a deal with Bruce Ratner that wasn't in the best interest of most of the group's membership. Revelations last year that Forest City Ratner bailed out the national organization restores our faith that everything happens for a reason.
A little more than four years ago, Bertha Lewis, executive director of New York ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), scoffed when a questioner wondered if the organization was being paid by Forest City Ratner for its support of the developer's Atlantic Yards project.
Today, Lewis is the chief organizer of national ACORN, as it recovers from an embezzlement scandal, and Forest City Ratner has bailed out the organization with a grant and loan worth $1.5 million.
The situation is not exactly analogous: national ACORN is the beneficiary, not New York ACORN, and the Atlantic Yards project is no longer pending approval but has gained state approval.
But Lewis's outrage at the question is belied by the organization's current dependency on the developer.
Posted by lumi at 5:18 AM
Bloomberg A.D.
The Observer
By Eliot Brown
It looks like NYC Commissioner of Department of Housing Preservation and Development Shaun Donovan is a shoo-in for Obama's secretary of Housing and Urban Development. But what are the hurdles for a post-Donovan HPD?
And part of the plan relied on affordability requirements in a few key mega-developments, such as the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn that planned over 6,400 units of housing, more than 2,200 of which would be for low- or middle-income families.
But with financing in short supply and the market for new development at a standstill, affordable housing production is taking a hit across the board. Development in the rezoned areas is expected to proceed far more gradually; demand for the federal tax credits has dropped as banks have no profits on which to be taxed; and large projects including Atlantic Yards are stalled with an uncertain future.
Posted by lumi at 4:56 AM
January 6, 2009
WINTER IN AMERICA...how construction workers should respond to the meltdown
A call for construction workers to unite with tenants, and the rest of the working class
IndyMedia.org
by Gregory A. Butler
Union carpenter/writer Gregory Butler calls upon workers in the building trades to resist a push by contractors for deep wage-and-benefit concessions, and presents a novel affordable-housing plan.
In New York City, we have an easy answer before us – all those abandoned buildings stopped in mid build because the banks cut off the developer’s credit line!
We should demand that the City of New York use eminent domain to seize those abandoned buildings, use public funds to finish building them and turn them over to the New York City Housing Authority to serve as low income housing.
Suddenly dropping thousands of low income units into the housing market will serve to pull down overall rents, opening up housing opportunities for the middle income population.
What about Atlantic Yards, which is pledged to use union labor?
One thing we should absolutely NOT do anymore is to totally subordinate ourselves and our unions to the contractors, the developers and their trade associations.
Louis Colletti is not our friend – neither is Donald Trump – or Larry Silverstein – or Steve Ross – or Bruce Ratner – or any of the other developers… they are our class enemies, the people we have to struggle against to get what we need, both narrowly as construction workers and more broadly as part of the working class.
We and our unions need to stop being shills for their narrow commercial interests and their taxpayer subsidized megadevelopments!
Atlantic Yards Report, Militant union carpenter: unions shouldn't compromise with contractors or support Atlantic Yards
Norman Oder provides some context, and cites some of Butler's earlier writings.
Butler wrote critically in September 2008 about a lack of union militancy:
Although New York developers, building owners, not for profit community groups and governmental entities continued to increase their use of non union contractors over the next decade - and as wages and working conditions sharply deteriorated for those non union tradespeople, the unions made very sparing use of their members power on the jobsites.
...For instance, only 2 union rallies were held in all of Brooklyn (New York City’s most populous borough) during this decaded - and one of them - the larger of the two events - was to support developer Bruce Ratner’s deeply unpopular Atlantic Yards luxury housing/office building/New York Nets basketball arena project in Prospect Heights.
Later, he added:
The general response of the Building Trades has been to tag along behind the bosses - symbolized in New York by all the rallies that have been held to promote unpopular megadevelopment plans - like the Johnson family’s Hudson Yards Stadium for the Jets on the West Side of Manhattan or the Atlantic Yards stadium/office building/luxury hirise development that billionare developer Bruce Ratner and centimillionare music producer Jay-Z want to build in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn.
Posted by eric at 10:15 AM
December 14, 2008
With NYC's Donovan as HUD chief, affordable housing help likely--and for AY?
Atlantic Yards Report
The New York Times reports today:
President-elect Barack Obama has picked the widely respected housing commissioner for New York City, Shaun Donovan, to be the secretary of housing in his cabinet....As chief of New York’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, Mr. Donovan is in charge of the Bloomberg administration’s $7.5 billion New Housing Marketplace Plan to build or preserve 165,000 units for to low- and moderate-income families, housing up to 500,000 residents, by 2013.
It's probably good news for cities and affordable housing. Advocates have called for much more direct federal aid for public housing and other assistance, including tax-exempt financing, to finance affordable housing.
As I reported in June 2006:
...Before Congress, HPD’s Shaun Donovan offered two proposals to increase funds available to the city; one would “allow for 'recycling' or 'refunding' of multi-family bonds after principal repayments or pre-payments of the bonds.” The second would involve “raising the allocation of volume cap for high cost areas” like New York. (As HPD commissioner, Donovan also serves as chairman of the HDC.)New York City needs a lot more "volume cap," an allocation of federal tax-exempt financing for projects like the proposed Atlantic Yards affordable housing, which has been jeopardized by a funding crisis. Such an increase could lessen the expected significant delays in the AY housing (which of course wouldn't get started until the project moves forward).
Posted by amy at 10:43 AM
December 9, 2008
Advocates says housing subsidy too high for CityPoint units, urge HDC to reconsider
Atlantic Yards Report
When the issue is affordable housing subsidies, an applicant shouldn't be asking for more per unit than has been established for other projects.
That was the lesson of a public hearing held yesterday by the New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYC HDC), a first step to consider $400 million in low-interest financing for some 810 units--perhaps 20-25% affordable--at the the CityPoint tower planned at the Albee Square Mall site in Downtown Brooklyn.
Families United for Racial and Economic Equality (FUREE), a fierce critic of the effects of the Downtown Brooklyn rezoning, brought several members to protest the CityPoint plan.
But the most effective testimony came from Paula Crespo, a planner at the Pratt Center for Community Development working with FUREE, who pointed out that the $1.9 million in bonds requested per unit was "extremely high." Some HDC projects have required only $150,000 to $400,000 per unit, she said.
NoLandGrab: Is it any wonder that we have a housing crisis in New York when the taxpayer-subsidized financing for each unit in an apartment building in which 20% of the housing will be "affordable" is equivalent to the mortgage for a prime Brooklyn brownstone?
Posted by eric at 9:24 AM
December 4, 2008
ACORN takes $1.5 Million from Ratner
WNYC Radio
by Matthew Schuerman
The local chapter of ACORN helped get Brooklyn's Atlantic Yards project approved. Now, the developer is helping out the non-profit housing group.
An ACORN spokesman says Forest City Ratner gave it half a million dollars, and is loaning the group another $1 million at a difficult financial time.
Critics of Atlantic Yards say the donation further erodes ACORN's integrity and will limit its ability to stand up to the developer in the future. ACORN's spokesman, Jonathan Rosen, says the assistance won't affect ACORN's independence, and it'll continue to fight for affordable housing around the city.
Rosen's statement prompted Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn to wonder:
Well then, how come not a peep out of ACORN as Ratner halts his work, focuses solely on a frivolous billion dollar arena and rarely even mentions affordable housing, let alone builds any.
Posted by eric at 11:17 AM
November 13, 2008
Willets Point affordable housing offers more moderate-income housing than AY
Atlantic Yards Report
While similar in percentages to the Atlantic Yards affordable housing deal, the Willets Point plan emphasizes housing for low- and moderate-income families, while the Atlantic Yards plan offers a wider range of units, including those aimed at middle income families earning more than six figures.
The Times reported:
The deal requires that 35 percent of the project’s 5,500 housing units be set aside for families who make less than $99,840 a year, or 130 percent of the city’s median income of $76,800. The original plan reserved just 20 percent of the units for families of those income levels.It's hardly clear, as with Atlantic Yards, whether there are bonds and other public funding mechanisms to fulfill the affordable housing promises.
Posted by eric at 2:21 PM
November 8, 2008
Paging Jane Jacobs? Panel takes on where and how to build affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report turns in 2,894 words about Wednesday's panel discussion "Housing New Yorkers in the 21st Century", sponsored by the Municipal Art Society.
HPD Deputy Commissioner for Development Holly Leicht said New York has to be maintain diversity, and pointed out that the city must support not only low-income housing but also housing for those of middle and moderate incomes.(Such “workforce housing” actually would be a majority of the planned Atlantic Yards subsidized housing; the irony is that most members of the low-income group ACORN, which “negotiated” the AY affordable housing agreement, wouldn’t qualify for those units, as those seeking housing discovered at a July 2006 AY affordable housing information session.)
...
Leicht went on to discuss how a more transparent process has emerged in which the public gets a sense of the trade-off between affordability and density--a process, I pointed out yesterday, absent from the Atlantic Yards plan.
Posted by amy at 7:37 AM
November 3, 2008
ACORN: No Business Like Poverty Business
The New American
by Gregory A. Hession
"The essential news source for freedom-loving Americans," aka the house organ of the John Birch Society, concludes a scathing four-part series on ACORN.
The business of harassing business appears to be good business for ACORN. It routinely runs Jesse-Jackson-style corporate shakedowns, which often result in corporate "contributions" or partnerships in which ACORN is paid to provide "education" to the target. One example of many is Household Finance Corporation, which was targeted by ACORN and eventually ended up paying ACORN to run a program to educate people about mortgages and loan terms. It also gets sweetheart deals to join in land development and housing projects such as Forest City Ratner's giant Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, New York, where it will profit from marketing "affordable" housing units.
Posted by eric at 11:54 AM
October 31, 2008
At ACORN, Who IS Paying Attention to Atlantic Yards?
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn explains how, in accordance with a signed contract, ACORN is holding up its end of the bargain, while Forest City Ratner hasn't and can't:
In May, 2005 ACORN partnered with Ratner to build Atlantic Yards' 2,250 "affordable" housing units out of what is now a proposed total of 6,430 housing units. That partnership included the following contractual obligation between ACORN and Forest City Ratner:
As long as the Project will include the ACORN/Atlantic Yards 50/50 Program* as described in paragraph 1, ACORN agrees to take reasonable steps to publicly support the Project by, among other things, appearing with the Developer before the Public Parties, community organizations and the media as part of a coordinated effort to realize and advance the Project and the contemplated creation of affordable housing. (Emphasis added)
Three and a half years later ACORN is still fullfilling that contract to promote the project in the media (albeit not aggressively) despite what is plain for all to see: Forest City Ratner either has no intention or no ability (or both) to fulfill its commitment to that "50/50 affordable" housing program. Ratner doesn't have the money to do it, doesn't have the land to do it, and doesn't even bother to show a model of Phase 2 of the project plan which contemplated the large majority of the "affordable" units. He also has no contractual obligation with New York City or New York State to ever complete Phase 2. Our surmise is that the developer has no intention of fufilling his commitment to ACORN.
Read more about how ACORN chief organizer Bertha Lewis appears to be "unaware of the current status of the project."
Posted by lumi at 6:04 AM
October 16, 2008
FBI investigates ACORN for alleged fraud
Officials say FBI is looking at results of office raids in several states
Associated Press, via MSNBC.com
WASHINGTON - The FBI is investigating whether the community activist group ACORN helped foster voter registration fraud around the nation before the presidential election.
A senior law enforcement official confirmed the investigation to The Associated Press. A second senior law enforcement official says the FBI was looking at results of recent raids on ACORN offices in several states for any evidence of a coordinated national scam.
NoLandGrab: ACORN signed the "affordable housing" memorandum of understanding with Bruce Ratner. Should Atlantic Yards be built, the organization will be under contract to administer the "affordable housing" units.
However, if many of these allegations prove true, then ACORN might become too "toxic" to maintain its major-player status in NYC politics.
Posted by lumi at 8:21 PM
October 13, 2008
ACCUSING ACORN
Newsday.com
The story of irregularities in ACORN's get-out-the-vote drives has been making local news nationwide:
McCain's campaign has demanded Obama's ties to ACORN, an activist organization that runs voter-registration drives, be probed. Registration cards the group submitted prompted fraud investigations in Nevada, Connecticut, Missouri, and at least five other states - and included some with the names of Dallas Cowboys football players. Bertha Lewis, a chief organizer for ACORN who is well known in New York City politics, issued a detailed rejoinder with ACORN leader Steve Kest, saying status quo forces were playing up isolated irregularities to deter voter registration. Lewis has been co-chair of the state Working Families Party. She drew paparazzi-style notice in 2005 by grabbing Mayor Michael Bloomberg's face and kissing him on the lips when ACORN and the city reached a certain participation deal with developer Bruce Ratner on Brooklyn's Atlantic Yards project.
NoLandGrab: For the record, Bertha Lewis kissed Bruce Ratner on the lips at the press conference as well.
Posted by lumi at 5:41 AM
September 27, 2008
In tale of Giuliani influence, insight into the flexibility in size of affordable housing units
Atlantic Yards Report does the math behind the mysterious sizing of affordable housing units - an equation that involves Giuliani, a felon running the HDC, and Judith Nathan:
Harding's tale involves the 80/20 program, involving 80% market-rate units and 20% low-income units, which more closely resembles Forest City Ratner's project at 80 DeKalb Avenue, rather than the Atlantic Yards project, for which the rental towers--though not the ones containing condos--would contain 50% market-rate, 30% middle- or moderate-income units, and 20% low-income units.As I wrote, though the state Housing Finance Agency requires that 20% of the units be affordable, it requires that only 18% of the floor area be devoted to those units, thus allowing for somewhat smaller units. For 80 DeKalb, FCR plans to devote 18.6% of the floor area to affordable units.
For an earlier incarnation of Atlantic Yards, as I wrote 7/15/06, the affordable units, at an average of 675 square feet, would represent about 33% of the total number of units but only 22% of the housing square footage. Now, the 2250 units would represent 35% of the 6430 total units, and, at 675 sf, they'd represent about 24% of the 6.79 million square feet of housing.
Posted by amy at 11:29 AM
September 19, 2008
475 Dean
Photo by Tracy Collins, via flickr Atlantic Yards Photo Pool.
475 Dean Street near 6th Avenue
Prospect Heights
Brooklyn, New YorkThis building would be demolished for Atlantic Yards.
Posted by lumi at 5:51 AM
August 21, 2008
The reality behind FCR's 80 DeKalb deal (and the implication for AY)
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder posits that the stories being written about Forest City Ratner's 80 DeKalb financing are missing the real story.
The FCR project, along with three others, was selected among 14 projects for the state agency's bonds, because "we view [the 80 DeKalb project] as an efficient use of a scarce resource," said Priscilla Almodovar, President and Chief Executive Officer of HFA. "[T]he developer agreed to limit its allocation to $1.5 million per low-income unit--lower than our $1.7 million ceiling--and agreed to permanent affordability for its low-income units rather than for just 30 years.
...The larger question is whether a similar fate awaits Atlantic Yards. Though the financing of Atlantic Yards remains murky, it's reasonable to speculate that, given the significant amount of subsidies and tax breaks for Atlantic Yards, plus the advantage of eminent domain, Forest City Ratner may be able to successfully compete for the scarce pool of tax exempt bonds offered by the city Housing Development Corporation by asking for somewhat less per unit than other 50/30/20 projects that include 50% market-rate units, 30% middle-income units, and 20% low-income units.
And that's an argument for a full accounting of subsidies and public costs for AY, before such a decision is made.
NoLandGrab: As usual, Oder offers up some helpful background, elucidates the subsidies, and wraps it all up in the context of Atlantic Yards.
Posted by eric at 11:11 AM
Ratner announces financing for 80 DeKalb
MarketWatch.com, Forest City Closes $167 Million Financing for Downtown Brooklyn Residential Building
The full press release from Forest City Ratner announces that the company "has closed on $167 million in construction financing for 80 DeKalb, a 335,000-square-foot residential building on DeKalb Avenue in downtown Brooklyn."
The Real Estate Observer, New Glassy Tower to Join Fort Greene Mini-City
The glass building will join the Forte Condo (at Ashland Place and Fulton Street), and the soon-to-be-built Danspace project across the street to form a small mini-city on the edge of Fort Greene, bordering Downtown Brooklyn -- but a taste of the 16-skyscraper-and-arena Atlantic Yards complex to come.
...
[A]ccording to the release."The New York State Housing Finance Agency selected 80 DeKalb to receive $109.5 million in tax-exempt bonds and $27.5 million in taxable bonds. The lending institutions involved in the transaction were Wachovia Bank, N.A., and Helaba (both co-agents providing the credit enhancement to the $137 million in bonds issued by HFA), as well as the National Electrical Benefit Fund, which provided a $10 million mezzanine loan and $20 million of credit enhancement."
Boring as that might seem, it's an achievement to get that sort of financing in this market, in which many of the Wall Street shops have stopped lending, and borrowers are forced to approach more traditional, and more conservative, balance sheet lenders.
NoLandGrab: It's less of an achievement when the state housing authority is backing most of the bonds. Also, the word on the street is that Ratner had to get the bonds from the State because the City of New York is more inclined to provide tax-exempt bond-financing for projects with a higher component of affordable units (50/30/20).
Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Funding Set For Ratner’s First Brooklyn Apt. Building
Unlike most 80/20 developments, 80 DeKalb will remain affordable for 99 years, according to Ratner. For the initial 35 years, 62 affordable units will be made available for households earning up to 50 percent of the area median income (AMI) and 11 units for households with incomes up to 40 percent of AMI. For the remaining years, all of the affordable units will be made available for households earning up to 90 percent of AMI.
NoLandGrab: For those trying to wrap your head around all of the fanfare, this means that after 35 years the income-ceiling for applicants for the "affordable units" will be raised for the remainder of the program. Bottom line, it's less affordability for the long term.
The Brooklyn Paper, Ratner’s first tenants
This head-scratching explanation is probably our favorite bit of spin of day:
Some critics have argued that state affordable housing bonds are too generous. Indeed, the state’s $109.5-million tax-free financing will create just 73 afforable units — a cost of $1.5 million per apartment.
But a spokesman for the Housing Finance Agency said such back-of-the-envelope calculations miss the larger point.
“We don’t finance only the affordable units in a building; we finance the entire building because the developer has committed to having affordable units in it,” said the spokesman, Phil Lentz. “So our contribution is actually $300,000 per unit. We don’t finance buildings that are exclusively market rate.”
NoLandGrab: So NY State justifies its generosity by reminding taxpayers that we are not only helping to finance the affordable units but the market-rate units too!?!
One other note: Chuck Ratner got it right in the press release where he stated, "It's also a tribute to our New York team and the relationships they have built in both the public-sector and private-sector financing community." Though this deal closed in a shaky lending environment, the backbone of the deal, the state-backed tax-exempt financing, couldn't have happened without the Ratners' deep political ties.
Posted by lumi at 5:09 AM
July 24, 2008
FALLING ACORN! HOW FAR FROM THE TREE?
Noticing New York
Michael White digs into the recently unearthed ACORN scandal — and scores points for a witty headline.
Do you know about ACORN’s top-management cover-up of a million dollar embezzlement? The cover-up discovered just a few days ago lasted for eight years. I am figuring our local state and city government officials must now be in a tizzy evaluating what to do about the national housing and advocacy group.
...As with any cover-up, the standard questions need to be trotted out for the standard basic investigative due diligence. Who knew what, and when did they know it?
Who needs to be asking those questions? Any government agency that has been doing business with ACORN, is currently doing business with ACORN, or may have planned to do business with ACORN.
In New York, we’ve definitely got some of those agencies. And in New York, there is another set of impinging questions that must, perforce, be examined concerning ACORN and the proposed $4.4 billion Atlantic Yards megadevelopment which ACORN has complicitly helped design as a subsidy sponge. A bunch of New York State agencies are going to have to ask these questions and the rest of us in the broader New York community are going to be wanting answers too.
Posted by eric at 12:46 PM
July 18, 2008
National ACORN's (episode of) scandal, and NY ACORN's dubious Brooklyn stadium deal (in 2000)
Atlantic Yards Report
ACORN founder [and former national director] Wade Rathke wrote 3/1/07 on his blog about AY:
Surprisingly, we found ourselves on the opposite side of the divide among the Park Slope liberals and others who were unwilling to join us in making the diversity of the community the core issue.
As Norman Oder examines ACORN NYC's role in a previous Brooklyn stadium controversy, you gotta worry that Rathke's head scratching might be genuine; if so, he missed the part about how Bertha Lewis cut a deal and sold out her coalition partners, who, incidentally, fought on.
The result was a win-win for everyone involved: local stakeholders benefitted from the renovation of the Parade Grounds, the Mets built the minor league ballpark in Coney Island (a location much better served by public transporation) and jobs were created.
But Bertha Lewis's penchant for being a solo broker for the community left one journalist a little suspicious. From Oder's interview with Neil deMause:
Q. Was there a parallel with the Atlantic Yards affordable housing agreement signed by ACORN?
A. It just happened much earlier in the Nets deal. She sold out or bought in, depending on how you want to put it, very early. Ok, fine, if you’re going to give me what I want, then I’ll go for it. There are arguments for doing CBAs [Community Benefits Agreements] where, if developer does do enough things for the community, then that’s OK, people buy in.
The problem of course is that Bertha didn’t get together with everybody in the community and say, OK, let’s figure out what the community wants, and let’s present a list of demands to Ratner and, until you make us all happy, we’re not going to go along with it. It’s that I’m going to cut a deal for myself and everybody else is then the enemy.
So, yeah, speaking of people who’ve lost credibility. I mean, ACORN’s done a lot of good things, and I’m sure Bertha has done good things in her time, but she definitely has this capacity for selling her support for projects based more on narrow self-interest of her and the organization rather than what’s good for community or the city. That’s disappointing, to say the least.
NoLandGrab: Keep in mind that ACORN stands to profit financially from Atlantic Yards by acting as the administrator for the project's affordable housing component.
Posted by lumi at 6:04 AM
July 16, 2008
I.R.S. Could Crimp Bloomberg's Big Plans
NY Observer
by Eliot Brown
The Observer's lead real estate reporter takes an in-depth look at New York City's furious efforts to preserve tax-exempt financing for its favorite son, Bruce Ratner.
As the Bloomberg administration scrambles to get its development projects in the ground amid a slowing economy and a waning political term, two major planned initiatives the city has championed face a formidable hurdle: the Internal Revenue Service.
For the financing plan for the Atlantic Yards housing and sports arena complex in Brooklyn, and for one being considered for the planned middle-income-housing mega-complex at Hunter’s Point South in Queens, the city would need a favorable ruling from the I.R.S. or face substantially higher costs for both projects. Negative rulings from the federal agency could result in tens of millions of dollars in added costs, putting up new obstacles to major developments that have already seen ambitions scaled back.
For both projects, the city wants to use tax-exempt financing, a method that lowers costs substantially—perhaps more than 15 percent—with the bulk of the savings coming out of federal tax revenues.
And, at least in the case of Atlantic Yards, the I.R.S. is rather wary, as it has called the financing method a “loophole” that it has ordered closed.
NoLandGrab: We haven't rooted this hard for the IRS since "The Untouchables."
Posted by eric at 11:18 AM
July 13, 2008
Funds Misappropriated at 2 Nonprofit Groups
The NY Times
By Stephanie Strom
NYC ACORN, the group that signed the Atlantic Yards affordable housing pact with Bruce Ratner, and which professes to advocate for the underserved, has been concealing a dark secret for several years. Even after the discovery of the misappropriation of nearly a million dollars by the founder's brother, the national organization decided not to disclose the fact to its own board and continued to keep the brother on the payroll.
NYC ACORN Director Bertha Lewis, who signed the housing agreement with Bruce Ratner, is now interim national director.
A whistle-blower forced Acorn to disclose the embezzlement, which involved the brother of the organization’s founder, Wade Rathke.
The brother, Dale Rathke, embezzled nearly $1 million from Acorn and affiliated charitable organizations in 1999 and 2000, Acorn officials said, but a small group of executives decided to keep the information from almost all of the group’s board members and not to alert law enforcement.
Dale Rathke remained on Acorn’s payroll until a month ago, when disclosure of his theft by foundations and other donors forced the organization to dismiss him.
“We thought it best at the time to protect the organization, as well as to get the funds back into the organization, to deal with it in-house,” said Maude Hurd, president of Acorn. “It was a judgment call at the time, and looking back, people can agree or disagree with it, but we did what we thought was right.”
The amount Dale Rathke embezzled, $948,607.50, was carried as a loan on the books of Citizens Consulting Inc., which provides bookkeeping, accounting and other financial management services to Acorn and many of its affiliated entities.
Wade Rathke said the organization had signed a restitution agreement with his brother in which his family agreed to repay the amount embezzled in exchange for confidentiality.
Wade Rathke stepped down as Acorn’s chief organizer on June 2, the same day his brother left, but he remains chief organizer for Acorn International L.L.C.
He said the decision to keep the matter secret was not made to protect his brother but because word of the embezzlement would have put a “weapon” into the hands of enemies of Acorn, a liberal group that is a frequent target of conservatives who object to its often strident advocacy on behalf of low- and moderate-income families and workers.
Wade Rathke said he learned of the problem when an employee of Citizens Consulting alerted him about suspicious credit card transactions. An internal investigation uncovered inappropriate charges on the cards that led back to his brother.
“Clearly, this was an uncomfortable, conflicting and humiliating situation as far as my family and I were concerned,” he said, “and so the real decisions on how to handle it had to be made by others.”
The executive director of New York Acorn, Bertha Lewis, who has been named director of an interim management committee set up to run the national group’s day-to-day operations, said Dale Rathke was paid about $38,000 a year but that none of that money was used to pay back Acorn.
NoLandGrab: This makes you wonder what else ACORN has been keeping from its constituents and supporters. Keep in mind that ACORN stands to profit financially from Atlantic Yards by acting as the administrator for the project's affordable housing component.
Posted by lumi at 4:28 PM
June 26, 2008
ACORN on Displacing Residents and Businesses ...In Coney Island
This was brought to our attention by Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn:
From Crain's:
...“Here we go again,” said Bertha Lewis, executive director of Acorn. “The administration is proposing yet another mega-project that will displace residents and small business.”...
Ms. Lewis is talking about Coney Island.
Posted by lumi at 4:27 AM
June 12, 2008
As Cranes Fall and People Die
Economic Development for Whom?
CounterPunch.org
by Judith Levine
In an essay decrying the conventional wisdom that in a construction boom, accidents will happen, Brooklyn author Judith Levine fingers a ubiquitous bogeyman.
Developers—like Forest City Ratner, preparing for Brooklyn Atlantic Yards—demolish affordable housing to build “sub-market-rate” housing, which is unaffordable to most New Yorkers. Meanwhile, the City announces that budget cuts will force 15% rent rises in public housing and the closing of community centers and programs.
...Perhaps City Hall has always been a wholly owned subsidiary of the equivalent of Forest City Ratner. Perhaps there’s never been a time when New Yorkers didn’t wake up to the sound of jackhammers, when life here was not noisy, crowded, and chaotic. When workers did not fall to their deaths from skyscrapers and cranes.
But the question is always the same: who benefits?
The job of public officials is to ensure that the answer is the public—not just developers, but the rest of us.
NoLandGrab: Well, we know Bruce Ratner and his cronies benefit. The check for everyone else is in the mail.
Posted by eric at 2:33 PM
June 3, 2008
Elected officials sign development pledge, but the question is money
Atlantic Yards Report
On Saturday, the highlight of the Peoples’ Accountable Development Summit--part of the Fifth Avenue Committee’s South Brooklyn Accountable Development Initiative--was a pledge from elected officials to uphold a list of Accountable Development Principles, listed at right.
Those signing the pledge included City Council Members Letitia James and David Yassky, Rep. Yvette Clarke, Assemblymen Hakeem Jeffries and Jim Brennan, State Senators Velmanette Montgomery and Eric Adams, and City Council candidate (and 52nd A.D. Democratic District Leader) JoAnne Simon. Rep. Nydia Velazquez and Borough President Marty Markowitz sent representatives to sign the pledge. The principles are honorable; while some, such as the goal of accountable process, do not require more money, others do depend on a commitment of funds.
The main component is a redefinition of affordable housing, calling for making units "truly affordable to people in the neighborhood"--a dig at projects like Atlantic Yards, which contains a significant slice of subsidized units--2250 of 4500 planned rentals, plus 200 of 1930 onsite condos--but which are not necessarily affordable to average Brooklynites. While there's a 50/50 pledge regarding the AY rentals, when that pledge was announced, it applied to the project as a whole; now it would be 38%. Note that "truly affordable" is not defined.
Posted by eric at 10:12 AM
May 25, 2008
Affordable housing DOA
The Brooklyn Paper
by Mike McLaughlin
Here is a story that reminds us: although a developer might tell you that he's providing affordable housing, they only get built when, and if, public funds are available to pay for them.
The leaner, meaner real-estate market has forced one of the city’s major developers to eliminate more than 200 affordable housing units from his 660-apartment complex in Downtown Brooklyn.
John Catsimatidis, the billionaire owner of the Gristedes supermarket chain and possible mayoral candidate, told The Brooklyn Paper that he is moving ahead with his project, which was halted in February, and that it is now no longer the mixed-income community he originally proposed.
...
He also couldn’t scrounge up the city and state affordable housing bonds, so he cast off those politically popular below-market-rate units.
The loss of those subsidized apartments provides a cautionary tale for other mega-developments, like Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards, where thousands of affordable units have been indefinitely delayed, that promises of below-market-rate housing are only as strong as the availability of taxpayer subsidies.
Posted by steve at 8:45 AM
May 16, 2008
By the numbers
Bergen Record
The Nets kicked off sales Thursday of a portion of their luxury suites for the proposed Barclays Center, which they hope to open in Brooklyn by the end of 2010. Some seating facts:
64 "Level A" luxury suites, priced at $190,000 to $450,000
54 "Level B" luxury suites, priced at $155,000 to $400,000
12 Court-level "bunker" suites, priced at $540,000
3,200 Premium "club" seats, price not set but probably more than $150 per game
2,000 Upper-level seats for $15
NoLandGrab: Interesting that the Nets also remembered to promote the promised 2,000 $15 seats. Those, of course, won't be on sale for a very long time. Most likely, though, they'll be available much, much sooner than any of the units listed below.
Posted by eric at 12:22 PM
May 6, 2008
DDDB PRESS RELEASE: New Frank Gehry Atlantic Yards Design:
"Ridiculous" Design Has No Impact on Stalled Project
Renderings Only Show Phase 1 of Project
Leaving Out Bulk of "Affordable" Housing
BROOKLYN, NY— Today Forest City Ratner and its architect Frank Gehry released new designs for a portion of the $4 billion Atlantic Yards proposal in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn. The architectural renderings show a new design for the project’s proposed arena and 2 other buildings in Phase 1 of the project. But the developer shows no rendering at all for Phase 2--the larger part of the project--which is planned to encompass about 78% of the 2,250 "affordable" units. A State Funding Agreement provides no timeline whatsoever for Phase 2 and the developer has not provided a credible timeline for Phase 2.
"The new design from Frank Gehry is no better than the last--in reality it has gone from the absurd to the ridiculous aesthetically and programmatically," said Ron Shiffman, Professor, Pratt Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment and a New York City Planning Commissioner [1990-1996]. The fact that there isn’t a new design released for Phase 2 concerns me greatly. It seems like there is no plan for the bulk of the affordable housing, which would be in Phase 2. To destroy buildings of significant quality that could house people and jobs for what looks like an open-ended series of parking lots, rather than housing that could be affordable to low and moderate income area residents, is terrible planning and policy."
The New York Daily News published the Frank Gehry renderings as an exclusive. The paper reports that the so-called "Miss Brooklyn" signature skyscraper, is now called simply "Building 1." The reduction of that tower from 620 feet to 511 feet was announced as a "concession" on December 20, 2006 when the project was approved by the Public Authorities Control Board. Today marks the first time the reduction has been shown in a rendering. The rendering does not show the project’s massive scale as it relates to the surrounding neighborhood; its only context is a dark void explaining nothing about the projects context.
The NY Post published exclusive renderings from the Municipal Art Society (MAS) which show the project fully built out within the existing neighborhood context, as well as built only in part (an arena. and one building) surrounded by newly demolished, blighting parking lots. Apparently the MAS renderings were motivated by the March 21 NY Times interview with Mr. Ratner where the developer described the trouble he was having getting his project off the ground.
"Mr. Gehry and Mr. Ratner can release redesigns of Atlantic Yards’s buildings every week if they’d like, but that wouldn’t respond to the core reasons for the widespread opposition to the project," said Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn spokesman Daniel Goldstein. "The new designs are a fantasy. The project lacks committed financing (including tax-free housing bonds and a bond for the arena), an anchor tenant, and the land needed for the project, while Ratner faces vigorous litigation, a frightening credit market and exponential increases in construction costs. His project is in serious jeopardy. So when he says he ‘anticipates’ it will be completed in 2018, it's simply not credible. It means nothing."
DEVELOP DON'T DESTROY BROOKLYN leads a broad-based community coalition fighting for development that will unite our communities instead of dividing and destroying them DDDB is 501c3 non-profit corporation supported by over 4,000 individual donors from the community.
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Posted by lumi at 4:18 AM
May 2, 2008
Interest groups split after squabble over affordable housing at Willets Point
NY Daily News (Queens Edition)
by John Lauinger
How does the battle over Willets Point differ from the battle over Atlantic Yards? Well, for one thing, ACORN was on the side of those fighting the abuse of eminent domain — or at least they were until 10 days ago.
A Willets Point business association has parted ways with an influential housing advocacy group, claiming it exploited them to wage an affordable housing battle with the city.
The Committee to Save Willets Point, which includes more than 100 small businesses in the so-called Iron Triangle, said they were misled and misrepresented by the nonprofit organization ACORN.
"It has become apparent to our committee that ACORN's goals and ours are not the same, and that it's not useful for us to collaborate in the fight to preserve the livelihoods of the hard-working people of Willets Point," the committee wrote in an April 21 letter to ACORN.
..."They were always trying to put words in our mouths," Olaya said, adding that his members' main concern is to have their businesses relocated.
"If the city wants to negotiate, we want to negotiate," Olaya added, charging that ACORN never told them their line in the sand would be 60% affordable housing or bust.
NoLandGrab: 60%! Is that what ACORN was demanding for Atlantic Yards before they started "negotiating" with Bruce Ratner?
Posted by eric at 10:56 AM
April 29, 2008
Development Watch: Atlantic Terrace
Brownstoner.com
Here's one development near the Vanderbilt Railyard, featuring a lot of affordable housing, that's actually going forward as scheduled.
While the future of affordable housing at Atlantic Yards is unclear, there's been some progress on Atlantic Terrace, the mixed-income development a stone's throw from the AY footprint. There was a ceremonial groundbreaking for the project back (rendered at right) in October, and workers have dug the big hole that'll eventually get filled with 80 co-ops, 50 percent of which will be affordable to low-income families and 20 percent of which will be affordable moderate-income earners. Last year there were stories in the Observer and Post about how plans for solar panels on the building's roof had to be scrapped because the looming shadows of AY high-rises would interfere with harnessing sunshine. Perhaps dark days for AY help that design facet see the light of day.
Posted by eric at 12:34 PM
April 26, 2008
De Blasio claims AY would have 3000 low-income units
Atlantic Yards Report
In an interview in the Spring issue of the Park Slope Reader, City Council Member Bill de Blasio, who's running for Borough President, shows he hasn't improved his due diligence regarding Atlantic Yards.Notably--unless he was misquoted--he claimed that the project would include 3000 low-income housing units, a significant overstatement.
Actually, the plan is to include 900 low-income rental units--at 30-50% of AMI (Area Median Income)--among 2250 affordable rentals, and 600 to 1000 for-sale affordable units, of which a "majority... will be sold to families in the upper affordable income tiers," according to the Housing Memorandum of Understanding Forest City Ratner signed with ACORN. That means households with six-figure incomes, perhaps needing a boost in New York, but hardly low-income.
Posted by amy at 11:03 AM
April 23, 2008
Behind 80 DeKalb, FCR's test run for AY marketing (and, probably, housing bonds)
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder takes an in-depth look at Forest City Ratner's 80 DeKalb project for clues about the company's chances of securing scarce tax-exempt bonds for Atlantic Yards.
Forest City Ratner's plan for a 365-unit rental apartment building at 80 DeKalb Avenue, a new tower at the edge of Fort Greene and Downtown Brooklyn, offers some obvious and not so obvious parallels regarding the housing planned for the Atlantic Yards project.
The marketing of residential real estate--a first for FCR in Brooklyn and one of only three such company projects in the city--presents the obvious parallel.
The less obvious parallel: the developer's success in gaining scarce tax-exempt bonds from the state housing finance agency--in an application that earned praise from the agency's head--shows that FCR may be well-positioned to compete for similar bonds from the city housing finance agency to build AY.
Posted by eric at 9:12 AM
April 18, 2008
Pols: Stop Bruce now
The Brooklyn Paper
By Gersh Kuntzman
Any construction at the Atlantic Yards site must be blocked until developer Bruce Ratner commits — in writing — to building the full state-approved project, three councilmembers said this week.
Bill DeBlasio (D–Park Slope), David Yassky (D–Brooklyn Heights) and Letitia James (D–Fort Greene) made the demand in a letter to state officials this week, just two weeks after Ratner announced that the 16-skyscraper project has been significantly downsized and that most of the promised below-market-rate housing is no longer scheduled to be built.
According to Ratner, the project now only consists of a publicly financed basketball arena and two or three smaller residential buildings around it.
“We need something in writing from Forest City Ratner [that] confirms what will be built when,” DeBlasio told The Brooklyn Paper. “We need to stop until there is a clear plan. The plans have changed, at least according to Ratner himself, so why should demolitions continue?”
Posted by lumi at 5:27 AM
April 16, 2008
Councilman wants Atlantic Yards demolition halted - for now
NY Daily News
by Jotham Sederstrom
The News follows up on comments made to bloggers Monday evening by Brooklyn Beep candidate Bill de Blasio.
Point:
A Brooklyn councilman who has been supportive of the controversial Atlantic Yards project has called for a moratorium on the struggling basketball arena plan.
Councilman Bill de Blasio bashed developer Forest City Ratner for keeping government subsidies hidden and not telling residents about construction delays.
"I've been frustrated in general by the lack of communication by Forest City Ratner for years, and it seems to me it's only gotten worse, not better," said de Blasio, who is running for borough president.
Counterpoint:
Forest City Ratner Executive Vice President Bruce Bender argued in a statement that the project has been transparent but did not address the developer's refusal to publicly reveal aspects of public funding and security concerns involving the plan.
"Atlantic Yards has been reviewed and debated extensively for over five years, including two public hearings before the City Council, multiple other state public hearings and hundreds of public meetings," Bender said in the statement.
"As the Council member knows, all of Atlantic Yards, including all of the affordable housing, will be built, and any delays in the construction phase will result in delays in delivering the thousands of units of affordable housing and thousands of jobs that Atlantic Yards will create."
NoLandGrab: Bruce, you ignorant.... But we digress. Why is Bill de Blasio the last to know that Forest City Ratner couldn't be trusted? If politicians of his ilk had been more skeptical about Atlantic Yards from the outset, we wouldn't be in this mess now. Still, we're glad that de Blasio is speaking up.
As for Bruce Bender: "blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." Is it possible that he's been faxing out the same statement for the past three years?
Posted by eric at 10:35 AM
April 15, 2008
De Blasio blasts Ratner, Calls for Moratorium on Demolitions
Bill de Blasio is mad as hell, and he wants to know why the rug has been pulled out from under Atlantic Yards' promised affordable housing. The Gowanus Lounge and Brownstoner share the scoop from last night's blogger meet-up with the Council Member.
The Gowanus Lounge, De Blasio Calls for Moratorium on Atlantic Yards Demolition
City Council Member and Brooklyn Borough President candidate Bill de Blasio is calling for a moratorium on demolition in the Atlantic Yards footprint. Mr. de Blasio made comments deeply critical of possible changes in the huge project as part of a wideranging discussion last night that covered everything from construction safety as developers race to beat changes in the 421a tax break program to zoning issues in Gowanus and Carroll Gardens.
...On Atlantic Yards, Mr. de Blasio said, "I am livid at the New York Times interview with Ratner" in which the developer announced that the project would be scaled back and that massive amounts of affordable housing would be seriously delayed or eliminated. "There was no discussion with the community before he went on record," Mr. de Blasio said, adding that the changes put "the entire community benefits agreement up for question."
Brownstoner, De Blasio Blasts Ratner on AY Obfuscation
The Councilman also said that he thinks the entire development should be reviewed again by the state if Forest City Ratner is now conceiving of a vastly different project, particularly one that reneges on its promised affordable housing. "I held out hope for the project because of the amount of affordable housing it would create, as well as the number of jobs it would bring," he said. "But I have been constantly disappointed in the lack of community involvement...I've never seen anything that's been mismanaged so fundamentally in terms of community involvement."
NoLandGrab: What Council Member de Blasio is overlooking is that there really hasn't been any discussion with the community ever, and that early support for the toothless and barely enforceable Community Benefits Agreement by him and other politicians has now come home to roost.
Additional coverage:
Curbed, Atlantic Yards Stall: Another Call for a Demolition Moratorium
Posted by eric at 11:58 AM
April 14, 2008
Nicole P. Marwell: Sociology of Brooklyn 11237 + 11206 + 11221
Who Walk In Brooklyn
Here's an interview with Nicole P. Marwell, author of "Bargaining For Brooklyn," about community-based organizations (CBOs). The introduction to the interview notes one well-known CBO, ACORN, and its Executive Director, Bertha Lewis. Lewis signed a memorandum of understanding with Forest City to include affordable housing in the proposed Atlantic Yards development. Given the problems plaguing Atlantic Yards, the affordable housing may not be built until far into the future, if ever.
Enter into this affray Nicole P. Marwell, a Wisconsin-raised, Chicago and New York educated, Bronx-residing sociologist who currently teaches at Columbia University. While the history of Latino Kings County has yet to be written— despite the fact that “Spanish” BK is just as old as, say, the Italian one—Nicole’s book, Bargaining For Brooklyn, will be a substantial resource for whoever does. How so? Because Nicole gets deep into one of the most important & least glamorous aspects of understanding a city of the haves & the ain’t-got-shit, the mysterious—to outsiders— world of “community based orgnanizations” (CBOs). In Brooklyn, the best known of these groups is probably ACORN, & even their notoriety is due more to Bertha Lewis’ failed devil’s bargain with Bruce Ratner on the so-called “Atlantic Yards” project than their any of their other, less disputable initiatives.
Posted by steve at 5:01 AM
April 12, 2008
In need of correction: the AY housing page
Atlantic Yards Report
From the official Atlantic Yards web site, a page in need of significant correction, given the news of the Atlantic Yards stall.
Posted by amy at 9:28 AM
April 4, 2008
Public Hearing Scheduled for 80 Dekalb Financing
Brownstoner
Today the Eagle reports that funding for the affordable housing units in one of Forest City Ratner's Brooklyn projects is looking more promising than it is for Atlantic Yards. The 34-story rental tower, as rendered above, will probably receive tax-exempt and/or taxable multifamily housing revenue bonds for 80 Dekalb's construction “not to exceed $109,500,000” from the Housing Finance Agency, which is having a public hearing about the matter on April 15th. The entire project is supposed to cost around $204 million, and at least 35 20 percent of its 365 apartments are going to be set aside as affordable rentals. As the photo on the jump shows, after a slow period last fall, work on the foundation is in full swing.
Posted by steve at 5:55 AM
March 28, 2008
Why Atlantic Yards depends on a Democratic administration in DC
Atlantic Yards Report
While Bruce Ratner is busy trying to convince reporters that Atlantic Yards is stalled because of the economy, Norman Oder keeps pointing out that it's the supply of affordable housing funding, stupid:
Besides the credit crunch and the lack of a market for office space, both acknowledged by Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner, the project depends crucially on a sufficient supply of tax-exempt bonds, a "crisis"--in the words of city housing head Shaun Donovan--evident well before the downturn in the economy.
And, despite efforts in Washington by top legislators representing New York, the problem likely won't be alleviated until a Democratic administration and a Democratic Congress revamp the rules and allow hard-pressed states like New York additional "volume cap," or the capacity to issue bonds free of federal taxes.
Posted by lumi at 6:17 AM
March 27, 2008
And what about those for-sale affordable units? The fine print is vague
Atlantic Yards Report
Some details surface regarding one of the big outstanding questions about the deal cut by developer Bruce Ratner to gain support for his controversial Atlantic Yards project:
A major question raised about the 600 to 1000 affordable for-sale units, on and off-site, announced by developer Forest City Ratner as part of the Atlantic Yards Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) is why they were absent from the General Project Plan approved by the Empire State Development Corporation. That wasn't cause for confidence.
The recently-unveiled State Funding Agreement does, however, mention the pledge that's contained in the agreement FCR signed with the advocacy group ACORN.
However, as far as I can tell, the document has no teeth, since it asserts no deadlines and no penalties, though it does assign deadlines for other phases of the project and penalties for failure to meet those deadlines.
For one thing, if FCR doesn't build as many market-rate condos--and all housing is now on hold--the MOU appears to give the developer an out. Also, the construction of for-sale affordable units depends on unspecified subsidies.
NoLandGrab: In other words, affordable condos for "families in the upper affordable income tiers" are delayed until further notice.
Posted by lumi at 5:22 AM
March 23, 2008
Bad news for Atlantic Yards...
Community Benefits Agreements
Amy Levine explains how the delays and setbacks in the controversial Atlantic Yards project will affect developer Bruce Ratner's commitments to signatories of the Community Benefits Agreement (CBA):
All of this news suggests that the affordable housing promised in the CBA may not be built until years after the stadium, if ever. Unfortunately, the CBA doesn't give the community any real redress. Consider the following provisions (text of the CBA is available here):
- The term of the CBA lasts until 30 years after construction begins on the first residential building. If Ratner only builds the arena, it might be difficult to show any breach for not building affordable housing since he can claim that the housing is still in the works (pgs. 5-6).
- The CBA also provides that "[t]he Developers may change the Development Phases in their sole discretion prior to commencement of the first Development Phase; provided that they shall provide advance notice...as soon as reasonably practicable" (pg. 11). Again, Ratner has free reign here to change the plans, and significantly postpone construction of the residential units, since construction has yet to begin.
- The affordable housing agreement specifies the percentage of units that will be affordable. It does not set any minimum amount of affordable housing that must be completed, even though the creation of new affordable housing has been one of the key reasons for public support of the project.
- Ratner is required to submit quarterly status reports to the CBA Coalition and the independent compliance monitor, but those status reports focus mainly on jobs--there is no requirement that Ratner report the amount of affordable housing that has been constructed (pgs. 41-43).
- If a new developer takes over the project, it will have no real obligation to continue the CBA. Ratner will still be responsible for the jobs development and local employment provisions (pgs. 49-50).
The problem goes beyond affordable housing though. The CBA also includes provisions that the project will include open space (pgs. 30-31), a community health center (pgs. 26-28), and child care, youth and senior centers (pgs. 28-30). If Ratner postpones construction of most of the project due to financial problems, there's a good chance that these will be postponed too. And that means that the community may end up with a stand alone stadium that causes traffic, noise and crime problems without adding many of the benefits that the developer promised.
Posted by lumi at 4:52 PM
As vows fade in Atlantic Yards, so do housing hopes
NY Daily News
Michael Daly
The Daily News made a comeback from their "Atlantic Yards-free" editions with two articles today. You can read the Errol Louis column here: "Blight at the end of the tunnel," or just skip ahead to Atlantic Yards Report's analysis of the dynamic duo: Daily News columnists Louis, Daly lament AY setbacks, blame NIMBYs, avoid facts.
Some locals fret that without the surrounding towers, the arena will be like other such venues, which are second only to bus terminals in imparting a seediness to the immediate vicinity.The bigger fear is that Ratner will end up selling off property that he acquired via eminent domain with the promise of affordable housing. The new developers would be free to erect more of the obscenely overpriced condos springing up everywhere in Brooklyn.
Unless, that is, the city finds a legal way to make all of Ratner's promises apply to anybody who buys property he acquired on the strength of those pledges.
Posted by amy at 1:19 PM
March 21, 2008
A statement from ACORN: "every confidence" in Forest City Ratner
Atlantic Yards Report
OK, at least somebody's still bullish on Atlantic Yards:
Bertha Lewis, Executive Director of NY ACORN, issued a statement regarding the Atlantic Yards stall:
"Forest City Ratner made a commitment to ACORN and to the people of Brooklyn to deliver on a historic plan for affordable housing. While the credit crunch and the downturn in the economy may lead to some delay, we continue to have every confidence they will live up to their commitment. This commitment was the basis for our support and the support of elected officials at the local, state and federal level.”
NoLandGrab: Given the existence of the "historic" Community Benefits Agreement, we're left to wonder if ACORN is contractually obligated to maintain confidence in Ratner. If not, then one could read this as "we took a lot of heat for supporting this project — don't make us have to take to the streets against you, Bruce."
Posted by eric at 3:33 PM
Favorable Atlantic Yards News For Ratner [a Dreamer]; Will Get Bonds
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
Up there with "Dewey Defeats Truman," Dennis Holt's report that Bruce Ratner has secured scarce affordable-housing bonds has been greatly exaggerated:
If all this wasn’t bad news enough for the Yards opponents, the state housing authorities announced late last week that four developers will receive the state’s allocation for tax exempt bond housing funds. One of those was Forest City for Atlantic Yards.
(This is critical, since it makes it easier for Forest City to honor its housing commitments up front, and those, along with the sports arena, are the project’s strongest political pluses.)
NoLandGrab: The Eagle scooped all other publications with this incredible bit of news, which no one we know has been able to confirm. This makes one wonder if Holt's source wasn't actually the state housing authority — or if maybe he received this exclusive in a dream.
Posted by lumi at 4:46 AM
March 4, 2008
Bizzarro
Photographer Harry J. Bizzarro added some photos to the Atlantic Yards Photo Pool.
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This one is a good reminder to take your umbrella before leaving the house today.
From the National Weather Service:
Rain likely, mainly after 3pm. Patchy fog after noon. Otherwise, mostly cloudy, with a high near 59. South wind between 14 and 16 mph. Chance of precipitation is 60%. New rainfall amounts between a tenth and quarter of an inch possible.
Posted by lumi at 5:27 AM
March 3, 2008
Atlantic Yards Report shorts
From Norman Oder's weekend reading list:
StreetsBlog
Before AY, the necessity of congestion relief
A posting on Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn about gridlock at the intersection of Flatbush and Atlantic avenues led to some serious debate on Streetsblog on the causes, solutions, and the role of DDDB.
Suffice it to say that even Atlantic Yards proponents like Kathryn Wylde of the Partnership of New York City believe the project could work only with congestion pricing.
And even a significantly dense but smaller project like that contemplated under the UNITY plan would require, as its planners suggest, “extensive traffic calming, parking reduction, and bicycle lanes to discourage vehicle use for both local and inter-borough travel.”
Play (NYT)
Why NBA team ownership can be very lucrative
Joe Nocera's article in yesterday's Play, The New York Times Sports Magazine, headlined Big time Losers describes the "Bad Owner" who runs lousy teams:
Why does the Bad Owner seem so impervious to it all?
Actually, there is a reason, a very good one. To own a franchise in any of the three major sports — football, baseball or basketball — is to enter a club in which it is nearly impossible to come away a financial loser.
His case in point is NBA's Los Angeles Clippers; owner Donald Sterling has seen his investment skyrocket from $13.5 million to $300 million.
Nocera points out that the value of the badly-managed New York Knicks has continued to rise, given its stronghold in the nation's major media market.
He doesn't mention the New Jersey Nets, but Bruce Ratner's strategy is consonant with his observation. The Nets are losing money in the Meadowlands and team managers are trying to improve the mix of players. But the key comes in the future: the new arena at Atlantic Yards would prove quite lucrative, thanks to naming rights from Barclays, 130 luxury suites, other sponsorships, and television revenue.
NoLandGrab: In three seasons Bruce Ratner has joined the pantheon of big-time losers. Nothing could feed Brooklyn's historical chip on the shoulder more than his ruining a winning franchise and moving it to "the fourth largest city in the US."
NY Times Real Estate Section
The lottery-like chances for subsidized middle-class housing
A New York Times Real Estate section article yesterday on the chances of the middle-class getting subsidized housing in New York City was headlined Winning That One in a Million.
Atlantic Yards, with 1350 subsidized middle- and moderate-income units and 900 subsidized low-income units, would seem to improve the odds slightly. Then again, if the project takes 20 years, or 30 years--or doesn't get off the ground at all--then the odds improve less and less.
Posted by lumi at 5:16 AM
February 29, 2008
Atlantic Yards Report shorts
Norman Oder posted four short articles on Atlantic Yards Report this morning:
Driving Miss Brooklyn, a troubled Brooklyn condo market?
Apparently Forest City Ratner's decision to shift flagship Atlantic Yards tower Miss Brooklyn from condos to office space was based on discernible trends in the industry. (Then again, things can change, given that Miss Brooklyn was supposed to be office space when announced in December 2003.)
In yesterday's New York Sun, real estate columnist Michael Stoler suggested that many in the real estate community see a growing divide between the luxury market in Manhattan and some of the more speculative projects in fringe areas.
AY affordable housing a myth? Better to call it delayed
It seems that each time the press reports the story about the scarcity of funds for affordable housing and the impact on Atlantic Yards, the stakes get raised:
Like a game of "telephone," in which a message gets mangled as it gets passed from one party to another, the Atlantic Yards affordable housing story grows ever murkier.
The New York Observer's summary yesterday:
Federal funding crunch means Forest City Ratner won't be able to build 3,000 affordable-housing units at Atlantic Yards, fulfilling the prophesies of its opponents. [Brooklyn Paper]
But the Brooklyn Paper article reported only that a federal cash crunch threatens the promised 2250 units of affordable housing, adding some more voices to a story I reported a week ago.
That doesn't mean the promised affordable housing is dead. After all, a Democratic administration in Washington just might allow a state like New York much more capacity to authorize tax-exempt bonds.
The change in the Senate and the stakes for housing
When the balance of power shifts in the State Senate, rent laws in New York may get a second look:
The special election Tuesday to elect a State Senator in the 48th Senatorial district reduced the Republicans margin to 32-30, with several vulnerable Republicans expected to face tough competition in November. Portrayed in the press as a victory for Gov. Eliot Spitzer--and it is--the ramifications for New York City may be felt most sharply in the area of housing.
"The election today may change how we look at the rent laws," Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer said at a housing panel at the New-York Historic Society on Tuesday, when the results of the election had not yet surfaced.
Since 1971, the legislature, not the City Council, has held the most power over rent regulation, thanks to the Urstadt Law. A Democratic legislature, with a Democratic governor, will be far more receptive to maintaining and strengthening rent protections, and restoring "home rule."
The city's pension funds finally take on "predatory equity"
This article covers an existing affordable-housing concern, rather than Atlantic Yards affordable housing:
When in November, I reported on a conference where participants discussed the practice of "predatory equity"--investment funds making speculative investments in rental housing, intending to raise rents significantly--I was astonished that only the grassroots policy publication City Limits had previously covered the story.
After all, housing advocates had discovered that city pension funds had a stake in such investment funds. Politicians like City Council Member Letitia James weren't making a huge case about it, either, apparently waiting to get New York City Comptroller William C. Thompson and the city pension funds on board.
Yesterday, the above parties, as well as other elected officials and housing advocates held a press conference in which they announced a new residential real estate investment principles.
Posted by lumi at 4:50 AM
February 28, 2008
The Brooklyn Paper examines Atlantic Yards affordable housing house of cards
Fed cash crunch threatens ‘affordable’ A’Yards homes
By Dana Rubinstein
Thousands of affordable housing units — including some of the 2,250 rentals that Bruce Ratner promised to included in his Atlantic Yards mega-development — will not be built due to a huge shortfall in federal subsidies available for low-cost housing creation, The Brooklyn Paper has learned.
It would take between $6 and $7 billion in federal grants to build all the proposed affordable units in all of the pending projects in the state — roughly five times more money than is available, according to Mike Slattery, the senior vice president at the Real Estate Board of New York.
Indeed, in 2007, the feds only granted $1.6 billion in such bonds — and those numbers won’t change significantly in 2008.
“There’s a lot more demand for affordable housing projects these days and there’s not enough money available,” said Joe Chan, the president of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, the quasi-governmental group that oversees the redevelopment of the long-languishing area bounded by Tillary, Fulton and Jay streets and Flatbush Avenue Extension.
“We’re at risk of seeing less affordable housing than” originally planned, he continued.
Bonds bombshell killing projects
"The Explainer" rehashes the issue in Q&A form, but gets one thing wrong:
Didn’t Ratner promise 2,250 affordable units at Atlantic Yards?
Yes.What will happen to the units if the bonds aren’t there?
Some of them won’t get built.Can Bruce Ratner really back away from that promise? Yes, if he writes a $500,000 check — a small amount for his $3.6 billion company — to the housing group, ACORN, which signed Ratner’s Community Benefits Agreement in 2005.
In the "discussion" section Norman Oder points readers to one of his Atlantic Yards Report articles which explains that the $500,000 penalty would be for unfulfilled jobs promises, not for breaking affordable-housing targets.
In the weekly editorial, The Brooklyn Paper states:
It is becoming increasingly clear that developer Bruce Ratner will not be able to build much of the below-market-rate housing that he’s promised to include in Atlantic Yards.
...
The affordable housing units at Atlantic Yards remain the project’s principal carrot in the face of widespread community opposition and egregious misuse of public subsidies to a multi-billion-dollar company.But there’s a problem with Ratner’s promised units: If he can’t get the tax subsidies from the state, he can walk away from the deal simply by cutting a check for $500,000 — which represents a tiny .014 percent of the company’s $3.6-billion total value — to one of the signatories of his “Community Benefits Agreement.”
Then again, he could also call his enablers in state government and complain of the shortfall in subsidies. Perhaps they will do what they’ve always done — repeatedly at Metrotech and at Atlantic Terminal Mall — and lavish more taxpayer money on another of Ratner’s white elephants.
Posted by lumi at 5:22 AM
February 26, 2008
DDDB PRESS RELEASE: Ratner’s Atlantic Yards Affordable Housing Would Get Four Times the Subsidy of the City’s Average Per Unit
New York, NY—The Brooklyn Daily Eagle’s Sarah Ryley is reporting today that the cost of subsidizing Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards “affordable” housing with tax-free bonds would require more than four times the funding per unit as the city’s average for all of 2007.
The Eagle article says: Spokesmen for Ratner and project sponsor Empire State Development Corporation declined to comment on why Atlantic Yards’ affordable units require roughly four times the funding as the city’s 2007 average.
The article continues, quoting Ron Shiffman, who did have comment:
Ron Shiffman, professor at the Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment at the Pratt Institute and a former planning commissioner, did say that it would be “political suicide” for HDC to approve such costly apartments while rejecting others who could build more bang for the buck. “It becomes a real untenable argument for [HDC] to give [Ratner] priority over any other project,” said Shiffman, who opposes Atlantic Yards.
“Forest City Ratner is getting an unaccountable, sweetheart deal from our government, at the expense of taxpayers, to build a cost-ineffective project,” said Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn spokesman Daniel Goldstein. “Our elected officials and Mr. Ratner need to explain why his ‘affordable’ housing units require quadruple the subsidy of an average ‘affordable’ unit. We believe there is no explanation for an indefensible sweetheart deal.”
The Eagle article goes into accounting detail to describe the quadrupled subsidy per unit:
[NYC's Housing Development Corporation spokesperson Neill] Coleman said last year HDC issued $659 million in bonds to finance the construction or preservation of 4,786 apartments for low, middle and moderate-income city residents, an average of $137,000 per unit.
According to Ratner’s financial projections, in 2008 the company plans to request $177 million in bonds for 359 below market-rate apartments in two towers, and the following year $344 million in bonds for 680 below market-rate apartments in three towers, an average of $501,000 per unit. Overall, $1.4 billion in bonds for 2,250 units averages $622,000 per unit. (Emphasis added)
Posted by lumi at 5:51 PM
Ratner Will Be Treated Like Other Developers, Says City
Atlantic Yards Hasn’t Applied For Bonds, Units Would Cost Four Times As Much
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
By Sarah Ryley
Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner Companies has not applied for affordable housing bonds, and when the company does, it will not be prioritized over other developers, said a city official. As earlier reported in the Eagle, the state has more than $6 billion for affordable housing projects in its 2008 pipeline, with $960 million for projects located within the city, but only $1.6 billion in bonds to dole out.
According to Ratner’s financial projections, the company will be requesting $1.4 billion in housing bonds over a five-year period for 2,250 apartments.
IMPORTANT comparison of the cost of subsidizing Atlantic Yards affordable housing with affordable housing elsewhere in the city (emphasis added):
[NYC's Housing Development Corporation spokesperson Neill] Coleman said last year HDC issued $659 million in bonds to finance the construction or preservation of 4,786 apartments for low, middle and moderate-income city residents, an average of $137,000 per unit.
According to Ratner’s financial projections, in 2008 the company plans to request $177 million in bonds for 359 below market-rate apartments in two towers, and the following year $344 million in bonds for 680 below market-rate apartments in three towers, an average of $501,000 per unit. Overall, $1.4 billion in bonds for 2,250 units averages $622,000 per unit.
...
Ron Shiffman, professor at the Graduate Center for Planning and the Environment at the Pratt Institute and a former planning commissioner, said it would be “political suicide” for HDC to approve such costly apartments while rejecting others who could build more bang for the buck. “It becomes a real untenable argument for [HDC] to give [Ratner] priority over any other project,” said Shiffman, who opposes Atlantic Yards.
NoLandGrab: Contrary to the headline, Bruce Ratner has NEVER been treated like other developers.
It will be interesting to see how Ratner and his political supporters manage to justify paying more for less and, despite protestations to the contrary, jumping over the backlog of other projects that have already requested financing.
Posted by lumi at 4:59 AM
February 25, 2008
Where’s the Dough for AY Affordable Housing?
Brownstoner asks some tough questions about subsidies for the affordable housing component of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards plan.
...does the project’s “scale” mean the city is giving a free pass for construction on the affordable housing parts of Atlantic Yards to take much longer than other aspects of the development? And what if there’s even less funding available for affordable housing in the future? Finally, is it fair for Forest City Ratner’s mega-development to eat into the creation of affordable units in other parts of the city and state?
NoLandGrab: These questions have been on the mind of affordable housing advocates for some time.
Posted by lumi at 7:10 PM
Ratner to Jump the Pipeline?
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn compares two quotes from Marc Jahr, president of the city's Housing Development Corporation.
One in response to the affordable-housing-funding crisis:
"It's a pity to have good affordable housing projects in a city that desperately needs affordable housing for virtually all income levels, to have them sitting at the starting line with their engines idling."
The second in which Jahr claims that Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards affordable-housing subsidies are NOT in jeopardy despite the backlog of projects that have already applied:
"Given the scale of the project . . . we're not concerned that the money won't be there."
So, either there's a crisis and Bruce Ratner is going to have to wait his turn, or lawmakers in Albany (i.e. the very ones who benefited from a $58,000 soft-money contribution from Ratner) are trying to work out a special deal for their favorite developer (they've done it before).
Develop Don't Destroy posits:
Should we be preparing to watch Mr. Jahr, the city and state put Bruce Ratner's yet to be requested housing bonds at the mouth of the pipe? Is that what's being considered?
NoLandGrab: Given that lawmakers have already fiddled with the "allocation criteria" of the available subsidies, the possibility of another "Ratner Clause" is getting stronger.
Posted by lumi at 5:26 AM
February 24, 2008
Could the Bond Market Hurt Atlantic Yards Affordable Housing?
Village Voice
Michael Clancy
Could the limited pool of affordable housing bonds jeopardize the 2,250 units of subsidized housing that developer Bruce Ratner pledged as part of his Atlantic Yards mixed-use stadium project?Norman Oder, of the Atlantic Yards Report, seems to think so. Ratner seeks $1.4 billion in such bonds, which would allow him to borrow money at discounted rate over the course of the 10-year project. But it's not clear whether Forest City Ratner has applied for those bonds, and there is a lot of evidence indicating that there might not be any money available if Forest City did, Oder wrote. The city's Housing Development Corporation wouldn't say whether the agency received the bond application from Ratner or not.
Either way, sounds like it's gonna be tough to build the affordable housing.
Posted by amy at 1:39 PM
Atlantic Yards Affordable Housing in Jeopardy Due to Housing Bond Cap "Crisis"
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
The proposed "affordable" housing for Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project is in jeopardy.According to information from the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) Forest City Ratner’s (FCR) housing would require subsidization worth $1.4 billion in federally tax-free housing bonds from the New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYCHDC). With the aid of these bonds, FCR proposes that 2,250 rental units out of a total 6,430 units would be deemed "affordable."
The problem is that there is no money now for Forest City Ratner.
New York State has a housing bond cap of about $1.6 billion per year for the entire state, New York City has only a portion of that cap, and there is a long pipeline of applications for this limited amount of financing in front of FCR. It is believed that FCR has not even applied for their housing bonds. According to Norman Oder in a story today on his Atlantic Yards Report, NYCHDC did not respond to a request for confirmation of this.
Posted by amy at 1:25 PM
HDC head curiously unconcerned about AY funding availability
Atlantic Yards Report responds to today's two-sentence NY Post article stating that federal funding shortfalls won't affect Atlantic Yards, because it's bigger than other projects.
Less than two weeks ago, Jahr wrote in City Hall News, as I reported Friday:
It is only February, but over $960 million in private activity bonds are required for affordable housing deals in HDC’s 2008 pipeline alone, while New York State overall has a pipeline of more than $6 billion. Unfortunately, however, New York State’s yearly allocation of cap is only around $1.6 billion.And, as I reported, he earlier this month told the Bond Buyer, "It's a pity to have good affordable housing projects in a city that desperately needs affordable housing for virtually all income levels, to have them sitting at the starting line with their engines idling.”
Simple physics suggests that the scale of Atlantic Yards, which would require $1.4 billion in bonds, should make it harder, not easier to find the funds--even if the scale makes AY "too big to fail."
Until and unless additional volume cap is found, thus allowing the city and state to issue more bonds, a lot of projects are going to be at the starting line.
Posted by amy at 1:19 PM
ATLANTIC YARD$TICK FOR POOR HOUSING
NY Post
RICH CALDER
A federal-funding shortfall that could hamper affordable housing projects in the city likely won't affect the Atlantic Yards project, a top official said yesterday."Given the scale of the project . . . we're not concerned that the money won't be there," said Marc Jahr, president of the city's Housing Development Corporation.
link (NoLandGrab: but really, don't bother clicking. That's the entire article. Read Atlantic Yards Report instead...)
Posted by amy at 1:15 PM
February 22, 2008
AY affordable housing jeopardized not by lawsuits but by funding "crisis"
Atlantic Yards Report
For years, affordable-housing experts have been warning that the availability of housing subsidies for Atlantic Yards is questionable.
Norman Oder explains:
Forest City Ratner has heavily promoted the 2250 units of subsidized housing in the Atlantic Yards project, and that's been cited as a public use by two courts. However, there's no money available for it right now, more than a half year after a city official cited a "crisis" in the provision of affordable housing bonds. ...
Wrote Marc Jahr, president of the New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYC HDC) earlier this month in City Hall News:It is only February, but over $960 million in private activity bonds are required for affordable housing deals in HDC’s 2008 pipeline alone, while New York State overall has a pipeline of more than $6 billion. Unfortunately, however, New York State’s yearly allocation of cap is only around $1.6 billion.
Atlantic Yards would require $1.4 billion in housing bonds, according to information the Empire State Development Corporation disclosed to the Public Authorities Control Board and made public in the lawsuit challenging the AY environmental reviews.
...
So those bonds would be well behind requests made by many other developers seeking to make use of a very limited pool of affordable housing financing, a situation Shaun Donovan, commissioner of the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) told Congress last May was a “crisis” threatening 6700 units in the city’s pipeline.
For additional information on the affordable-housing subsidy supply-and-demand crisis check out Brownstoner's recently posted summary of the press coverage.
Posted by lumi at 5:14 AM
February 14, 2008
Quinn calls for task force to address housing crisis
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder analyzes the affordable-housing segment of City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's State of the City address through the Atlantic Yards filter.
Here are some excerpts from Quinn's speech:
Now, the single biggest complaint I hear from New Yorkers is the syrocketing cost of housing and the devastating impact it’s having on our middle class. The reality is, if you are a teacher and firefighter, raising your kids in Clinton Hill and together make $110,000 a year, it’s hard to find a decent place to live.
Note that, under the guideline that people spend 30% of their income for affordable housing, the annual rent for such a household would be $33,000 and the monthly rent $2750. Also note that $110,000 is within the top range of households eligible for Atlantic Yards affordable housing.
Quinn is right that affordable housing is a challenge to many people. (Still, there are apartments in Clinton Hill well under $2750.) But Atlantic Yards was endorsed by the low-income group ACORN because its members thought it would help them.
Posted by lumi at 5:20 AM
January 21, 2008
On MLK Day, the question of jobs, housing, and infrastructure
Atlantic Yards Report
Well, where do we go from here (to quote the title of a King speech)? On Saturday, in a column headlined Good Jobs Are Where the Money Is, New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, taking off from the observation that the gap between rich and poor is ever-growing, observed:
Forget all the CNBC chatter about Fed policy and bargain stocks. For ordinary Americans, jobs are the be-all and end-all. And an America awash in new jobs will require a political environment that respects and rewards work and aggressively pursues creative policies designed to radically expand employment.
I’d start with a broad program to rebuild the American infrastructure. This would have the dual benefit of putting large numbers of people to work and answering a crying need. The infrastructure is in sorry shape. New Orleans comes to mind, and the tragic bridge collapse in Minneapolis.
The country that gave us the Marshall Plan to rebuild postwar Europe ought to be able, 60 years later, to reconstitute its own sagging infrastructure.
Herbert's point, extrapolated to Brooklyn, is that targeted government investment can turn the tide. The need for jobs and housing is far, far greater than the holy grail of the Atlantic Yards project.
Posted by lumi at 5:10 AM
January 1, 2008
Where's housing (and other urban issues) in the presidential campaign?
Atlantic Yards Report
The citywide issue central to the debate on Atlantic Yards has been AFFORDABLE HOUSING. Does anybody know where the Democratic presidential candidates stand?
No, Norman Oder isn't stalking candidates in Iowa, instead he looks for clues in a City Limits article and the NY Times.
Posted by lumi at 3:08 PM
November 27, 2007
At the "Priced Out" conference, some Atlantic Yards subtext
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder goes all out on the "Priced Out" conference, where, as usual, Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards plan makes a few cameo appearances:
At the “Priced Out” conference on “addressing the pressures of living in NYC,” sponsored by by the New York City Council Black, Latino and Asian Caucus over the first weekend in November at Pace University, Atlantic Yards popped up several times, sometimes not so flatteringly. And it also led to some public diplomacy from both opponents and proponents.
Oder also posted a longer article on the conference in general.
Posted by lumi at 5:43 AM
November 26, 2007
Vacant lots, empty buildings = new opportunity for affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder digs into a report by Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and attends a Drum Major Institute panel on rehabbing vacant buildings to learn if there might be means of creating affordable housing that don't involve seizing private property and tossing big subsidies at mega-developers:
In the 1970s, New York City took over some 100,000 properties abandoned for nonpayment of taxes, and in subsequent decades helped community development groups fix them to create affordable housing. The numbers remaining are few, so the city now practices new tactics--tax incentives or increased development rights--to stimulate affordable housing.
But other solutions remain, notably the utilization of vacant or abandoned properties that are not in tax arrears. Unlike some other cities, notably Boston (as reported on the DMI blog), New York doesn't keep an inventory, nor has it changed any tax policies to incentivize owners.
(Regarding some seemingly stagnant properties in the Atlantic Yards footprint, the state got around the lack of incentives by declaring them blighted. A rezoning, however, might have done the trick.)
Posted by lumi at 10:28 AM
October 29, 2007
Are city housing projects really for sale? Nah, but it's time to "unlock value"
Atlantic Yards Report
In the wake of a Daily News article that spawned rumors that the City was thinking of selling off public housing assests, Norman Oder reports on the panel discussion about the future of public housing at a New School forum, moderated by Oder's most ardent reader, Errol Louis.
The discussion at the forum, A ROOF OVER OUR HEADS: How Will New York Save Its Public Housing?, which involved a variety of experts and opinions, was a lot more nuanced.
It began with moderator Errol Louis of the Daily News suggesting that, “if things worked perfectly, this would be a public hearing organized by government.” (Louis is out front among the city's press in covering public housing--here's a 7/29/07 column headlined A crisis hits home--in contrast with his frothing Atlantic Yards coverage.)
The structural gap in funding the city’s public housing is about $200 million, a little under ten percent of the operating budget, and has accumulated since the late 1990s, according to Douglas Apple, General Manager, New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA). The budget has suffered because of lowered federal funding levels and the strains to provide for units that are not part of the federal system. He acknowledged that “conditions are not as good as they were a decade ago.” (The agency just cut 73 management jobs, the Daily News reported.)
Posted by lumi at 8:02 AM
October 25, 2007
Real Estate Round-Up: October 24, 2007
Brooklyn Daily Eagle rounds up coverage on the affordable-housing project in the shadow of Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards project, and follows up on the 421-a reform bill:
Atlantic Terrace, Brooklyn’s largest green affordable housing development (as reported by Linda Collins on the Eagle’s Brooklyn Space page Sept. 27) will have to go without solar panels on the roof because they would be worthless once cast in the shadows of the Atlantic Yards arena and high-rise development across the street. Yesterday, Michelle de la Uz, executive director of the non-profit Fifth Avenue Committee, which is developing Atlantic Terrace, told the New York Post that solar panels would have led to significant savings for residents, but now they’ll have to pay for a combination of traditional and renewable energy.
In the Eagle’s Sept. 27 article, architect Magnus Magnusson of Magnusson Architecture & Planning, said the solar roof would have been possible if Ratner’s towers had been reduced in height to 20 or 25 stories. “It’s just not an option for a building that will be in substantial shade all year round.”
On 421-a:
The state passed the 421-a legislation yesterday, which expands the areas where developers are required to include affordable housing in their projects to receive property tax abatements. But the legislation includes a controversial provision for Atlantic Yards that allows developer Forest City Ratner Companies to provide fewer units for low-income families.
While the modified version of the bill still gives Ratner tax abatements for the towers without affordable units, the abatement is for a shorter period of time, and are contingent upon the project meeting affordability requirements during each phase of construction. The affordability requirement for Atlantic Yards is the same as other heavily subsidized projects — 20 percent of the units would have to be affordable to those earning, on average, 90 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI), versus the earlier version of the bill that required Atlantic Yards to make 20 percent of the units affordable to those earning, on average, 70 percent.
Read the rest to learn about the comparison with other developers.
Posted by lumi at 8:25 AM
October 14, 2007
What's a Brooklyn real estate bargain? If you ask the Times..
Atlantic Yards Report
The cover story in today's New York Times Real Estate section is headlined Brooklyn: A Bargain Hunter’s Guide and the Times explains that, in between the strong market in brownstone neighborhoods and the foreclosures in struggling neighborhoods, there are bargains--but keyed to the Times's more affluent demographic.
...
And what exactly are the contours of such bargains? Here are the prices of all the apartments mentioned in the article:
--Green Hill Condos, 324 22nd Street, Greenwood Heights; $999,000 (from $1.09 million) and $559,000 (from $599,000).
--Thornton Park, 721 Flushing Avenue, East Williamsburg. Developer pays closing costs, a 5 percent discount on units from $270,000 to $509,000. The article identifies the location as East Williamsburg
--55 Berry Street, Williamsburg. Developer offered $10,000 discount on unit of unspecified price; agreed to build a $3000 walk-in closet on an $815,000 one-bedroom with a home office. --Le Conselyea in Williamsburg, $425,000 (from contemplated $599,000) and $799,000 (from contemplated $995,000).
--Owners of larger free-standing homes in the $2.8-million-to-$3.5-million range may offer a 5 percent discount.
--855 Jefferson Avenue, Bed-Stuy, $950,000, down from $1.1 million."Affordable to who?"--as City Council Member Charles Barron asked scornfully, in another context, at the Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn rally in July 2006. Or, as State Assembly Housing Committee Chair Vito Lopez once said regarding affordable housing, "It's a relative thing."
Posted by amy at 10:54 AM
October 6, 2007
Some on appellate court skeptical of ESDC in AY relocation case
Atlantic Yards Report
While on September 26, a state appellate court appeared unsympathetic to a challenge to the state’s demolition plans posed by rent-regulated tenants of two buildings in the Atlantic Yards footprint, this morning some on another appellate court seemed more sympathetic to the same 13 plaintiffs as they challenged the state’s plan to find them new housing.The state has promised to provide, at minimum, the services of a real estate broker, moving assistance, and a $5000 payment—but that, attorney George Locker argued, will hardly guarantee similarly affordable housing. (Of the 13 plaintiffs at 624 Pacific Street and 473 Dean Street, 12 have rent-stabilized leases, and many pay rents that are $500-$600. The case is known as Matter of Anderson v. New York State Urban Development Corp.)
“Isn’t it reasonable to assume there is some comparable housing” in Brooklyn, asked Justice Robert Spolzino, who was the most skeptical among the four-judge panel of the Appellate Division, Second Department, during the oral argument, which lasted less than 20 minutes.
Locker said it wasn’t. He said state law directs the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) to offer those displaced accommodation into the project, but has not made any offer to his clients. (Actually, state law says the ESDC should do so if "feasible.")
A commenter on Atlantic Yards Report asks, "Can someone explain to me this. If Bertha Lewis and Acorn is so interested in "affordable' housing, why then didn't they come publicly to the defense of these tenants. Yes, this is a rhetorical question. But I would like to hear from others."
NoLandGrab: A quick search on Craigslist for an apartment between $500-$600 in Brooklyn turns up 5 results. Two of them are not for apartments, but for renting a room in an apartment. One of them includes the caveat that you must work as the superintendent. Another has an income requirement of $16,800 - $24,800. That leaves one remaining real apartment, a $600 studio in Canarsie. I would suggest that the 13 plaintiffs hurry to apply, as it seems there will be stiff competition.
Posted by amy at 11:32 AM
September 24, 2007
The departing "middle-class" and AY affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder examines a new demographic report and compares it to the income bands of Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards housing program.
New York City Comptroller William Thompson on Sept. 12 issued a report on New York's 2005 outmigration patterns involving various income groups, and it was quickly used by columnist Errol Louis to argue for projects like Atlantic Yards that would include subsidized housing for the middle-class.
Not so fast. It turns out that moderate-income residents departing the city would not be helped much by Atlantic Yards, given that those in their (approximate) income bracket would be eligible for only 450 of the 2250 affordable units. In fact, when the affordable housing deal was first announced, 900 units were aimed at this demographic; developer Forest City Ratner instead shifted more of the affordable units to higher income brackets.
Thompson's press release, headlined THOMPSON: MODERATE-INCOME HOUSEHOLDS MOST LIKELY TO LEAVE NYC, made some somewhat subtle points: Moderate-income ($40,000 to $59,999 annual income) and higher-income households ($140,000 to $249,999 annual income) were most likely to leave the city, while middle-income ($60,000 to $139,999) and wealthy households ($250,000 and above) were least likely to leave.
Posted by lumi at 9:15 AM
September 16, 2007
Call an ambulance - our middle class is bleeding
NY Daily News
Errol Louis
That means we have to end the zero-sum politics that pits the needs of the poor against those of the middle class. Look at any of the big development projects around the city that include affordable housing - Atlantic Yards, Queens West, conversion of the Domino sugar factory on the Brooklyn waterfront - and there's a fight about whether subsidizing middle-class families amounts to a wasteful "giveaway" of resources best reserved for the very poor.That is outmoded thinking. Communities, and the city as a whole, thrive when we have many different income groups living side-by-side - civil servants near retirees, welfare moms next door to teachers and carpenters.
NoLandGrab: So...if the best communities are a mix of everyone, including welfare moms, why support a project where there will be no welfare moms? Atlantic Yards would produce exactly zero homes for people making less than $21,270/year. Currently 24% of residents within a 3/4 mile radius of the proposed project make less than $21,270/year. So call an ambulance, Errol, affordable housing is bleeding.
Posted by amy at 10:32 AM
September 6, 2007
The paradox of unaffordable ($7313!) "rent-stabilized" Atlantic Yards housing
Atlantic Yards Report
By what stretch of the imagination should an apartment leasing for $7313/mo. be "rent stabilized?" You can thank Bruce Ratner and his affordable-housing partner Bertha Lewis of ACORN for that absurdity.
Initially, Norman Oder was skeptical about Ratner's and Lewis's claim that even units priced above the $2000 "vacancy decontrol" threshold would still be "rent stabilized," but (the reader may want to sit down for this) Oder stands corrected by none other than the "Mad Overkiller" himself:
Would Atlantic Yards rental housing--the 2250 affordable units and the 2250 market-rate units--all be rent-stabilized, as has been promoted?
The answer: sort of, but in a confounding way that somehow would classify a market-rate apartment renting for $7313 as rent-stabilized.
And it would classify middle-income affordable units, some costing well more than $2000 a month, as rent-stabilized, even though such sums generated skepticism about affordability from potential renters last year and, indeed, $2000 is the trigger for decontrol of current rent-stabilized units.
According to the developer's chart of estimated rents, 450 of the 2250 affordable units would rent from $1861 to $3084 a month and another 450 would rent from $1488 to $2467.
Bertha Lewis of ACORN, in a 7/31/06 article in City Limits, described all 4500 Atlantic Yards rentals as rent-stabilized:
Beyond building new affordable units, all 4,500 rental units at Atlantic Yards will be rent-stabilized -- no small victory in an era where thousands of rent-stabilized units return to the free market every year.
...
The rules would be different for Atlantic Yards rental housing, which would be funded via the New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYC HDC). The term sheet for the agency's mixed-income program--50% market, 30% middle-income, 20% low-income units--states:Upon project stabilization, New HOP and Market rate rent increases will be governed by allowable rent stabilization increases with no vacancy decontrol.
So, indeed, there would be rent stabilization, but with a twist. For the 2250 market-rate rental units, it would come after the fact, after the developer works out the rent.
I asked Aaron Donovan, spokesman for the NYC HDC, who confirmed, "The market sets the initial rents and subsequent to that, rent increases are governed by rent stabilization. If Forest City Ratner were to apply for financing under our Mixed-Income Program, these terms would apply."
NoLandGrab: As for the "no small victory" declared by Bertha Lewis, most of the aparments would be well out of the reach of those whom ACORN represents, which may be the first time in history that ACORN has advocated for upper-class housing reform.
Posted by lumi at 10:00 AM
“Affordable” studio would cost more (per square foot) than market-rate studio
Atlantic Yards Report
This is another Norman "The Mad Overkiller" Oder must-read.
In a nutshell, in the top tier of Bruce Ratner's "affordable" housing plan, a studio apartment is more expensive per-square-foot than a market-rate studio:
The fine print--and it is fine--in the Atlantic Yards Financial Projections document unearthed in the lawsuit by Assemblyman Jim Brennan and State Senator Velmanette Montgomery suggests something quite curious: affordable middle-income studio apartments in the Atlantic Yards project would cost more per square foot ($55.83) than market-rate studios ($51.62) in the same building.
The document projects that phenomenon in every rental building. The market-rate units would still cost a bit more on a monthly basis, $2151 vs. $1861, but that’s because they’d be 500 square feet, as opposed to 400 square feet.
...
Not all this is new. The projected monthly rents were revealed last year in the developer's housing chart and the size of the affordable apartments, governed by a New York City Housing Development Corporation (NYC HDC) program, was also publicized last year.But the cost per square foot was not discussed until this document surfaced. Most crucially, the developer had not announced the projected costs and sizes of the market-rate apartments.
The laddering among the affordable units is apparently not triggered by the developer but by the NYC HDC , which would authorize bonds for the market and affordable rental housing.
NoLandGrab: Is the fact that NYC's Housing Development Corporation will be issuing bonds for financing "affordable" units that are predicted to cost more per square foot than market-rate units offensive to anyone other than Atlantic Yards freaks and geeks?
Posted by lumi at 9:22 AM
August 30, 2007
In Case of 421-a Reform, Good Governance Is In Eye of Beholder
State Bill Overhauls Affordable Housing Requirements for Tax Breaks
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
By Sarah Ryley
This article does a pretty good job of explaining the bill, and is worth a read. NoLandGrab is only going to focus on the Ratner Clause today:
Adding to the confusion over the controversial bill — which determines how much affordable housing, if any, developers have to include to receive property tax breaks — few people close to the issue were clear on exactly what the bill says, particularly in regards to the controversial Atlantic Yards “carve out.”
Here's Ryley's explanation of the Atlantic Yards "carve out" (footnotes, ours)
Atlantic Yards would be the only project within the exclusion zone that receives tax breaks for buildings that have only market-rate condominiums, but the tax exemption was changed from 25 years to 15 years, according to Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s office.
[This concession, touted by the Governor's office, appears to have made the carve-out more politically palatable.]
The original bill allowed only Atlantic Yards to average the income level of tenants in the “affordable units” so it would equal 70 percent of the area median income (versus requiring that tenants earn no more than 60 percent of the area median income). After recent revisions, the developer can make 20 percent of its units affordable to those earning up to 120 percent of the area median income, as long as they all average out to 90 percent. The new requirement is the same that other heavily government subsidized projects must adhere to, mainly because those projects were originally conceived to create more middle income housing in the city.
[This is where the benefits to Ratner get really fuzzy. This suggests that Ratner's affordable housing is more of a middle-income than a low-income housing plan. Also, It's not clear what "other heavily government-subsidized projects" refers to, though it's likely that the reference pertains primarily to Queens West, the CIty's favorite project du jour.]
It should be noted that Atlantic Yards was planned under the old legislation, when developer Bruce Ratner promised to include low- and middle-income housing in the project even though he could have built no affordable housing in any of the buildings and still received a 25-year tax abatement.
[This is a reminder that Ratner was planning on reaping even more benefits.]
Although no one will come out publicly in support of the special provisions within the legislation, including developer Forest City Ratner’s own people, privately some are calling it a grandfather clause. Also, Ratner is expecting other subsidies and financing that dictate what percentage of the housing in the project must be made affordable — but none would have given the company tax abatements for the market rate buildings.
[We repeat: the actual benefit is murky because, as we mentioned above, it looks like it's more of a middle-income housing plan, but "Ratner is expecting other subsidies and financing" which will ultimately help "dictate" how many units must be provided to applicants in different income bands (determined by percentage of the area's median income).]
“It’s unfortunate that again, public benefits are again being utilized to subsidize middle-income housing in Atlantic Yards,” says [NYC Councilmember Letitia] James. “So many community-based organizations came out in support of Atlantic Yards primarily because of the alleged affordable housing.”
[James makes the same observation — that it appears that Ratner's "affordable" housing will be directed more towards the middle-income applicants, thus making his "affordable" housing plan more expensive for those who need it most.]
NoLandGrab: There are not a lot of developers who can get personal legislative consideration, especially in a "reform" bill, but there's only one "Bruce."
Posted by lumi at 8:04 AM
August 28, 2007
It's official, Atlantic Yards to get special subsidies under "reform" bill (or something like that)
Either Atlantic Yards is getting special subsidies or is being treated the same as other developers, depending on what you're reading, and Ratner is getting hundreds of millions of dollars or saving the City hundreds of millions of dollars, depending on who's spinning:
City Limits, DEVELOPERS' INCENTIVES: NOW WITH MORE CAVEATS
The state legislature's language also means special provisions for Atlantic Yards, the enormous residential and commercial development under way in Brooklyn.
...
Under the legislature’s bills, Atlantic Yards will be allowed to have tenants with higher incomes in its affordable housing units than generally is allowed under 421-a. The language in the bills also says Atlantic Yards would be allowed to meet the requirements for affordable housing across all of its units, a number that developer Forest City Ratner projects at 6,400. The legislation means – and will mean until the fourth bill passes with amended wording – that the Brooklyn development could receive tax abatements for affordable housing before any such housing is built. Under the proposed fourth bill, A. 9373/ S. 6446, the development will be required to meet the 421-a affordability requirement every 1,500 units, however.
Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Tax Bill Reduces Low-Income Requirement for Atlantic Yards
Sarah Ryley is reporting:
Under the revised bill, Atlantic Yards would have to follow the same requirements as other projects that are heavily subsidized by the city, state or federal government.
Those developers, including Ratner, would now be required to provide 20 percent of their rental units to those earning, on average, 90 percent of AMI, and no more than 120 percent AMI. For-sale units would be capped at 125 percent AMI.
According to a spokesperson for Gov. Spitzer's office, Matt Anderson:
Anderson said Spitzer “shared the city’s concerns over the level of subsidies for the Atlantic Yards project. We believe, however, we’ve reached a fair compromise here.
“At every phase of the [Atlantic Yards] project, 20 percent of housing units for Atlantic Yards must be affordable to receive these abatements. Moreover, the length of the tax breaks was reduced from 25 years to 15 years for the market-rate buildings, which will save the city roughly $100-150 million.”
Anderson was referring to the portion of the revised bill that measures the “affordable” units in the Atlantic Yards project in increments of 1,500 units, versus over the course of the entire 6,400-unit project, as the earlier version had done.
NoLandGrab: If you're confused, then join the rest of us. Hopefully, soon, we'll get this explained to us in plain English so that we can translate it to you in more plain English.
Posted by lumi at 11:09 AM
August 26, 2007
This is Reform?
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
Reform-minded Governor Eliot Spitzer had that reform slip his mind this week when he signed the 421-a property tax "reform" bill with a special provision giving a $200 million tax break exclusively for politically-connected, billionaire developer Bruce Ratner. That's right, under the new bill Bruce Ratner is the only developer who can get a 15-year tax break for constructing buildings comprised entirely of unaffordable units; that's right, a tax break not to build affordable housing. This means that if "Atlantic Yards" is ever built there would likely be 4 entire buildings of luxury condos paying no taxes for 15 years. That is a loss of $200 million as estimated by New York City.Who gains? Bruce Ratner can sell those units at a higher price by passing on those tax savings to the new luxury condo owners. The Ratner Clause also allows Bruce Ratner to segregate residents of the "affordable" units from residents of his unaffordable units. Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries of the 57th District has called this "economic segregation."
Posted by amy at 10:31 AM
August 25, 2007
421-a compromise sent to gov’s desk - Democratic boss says deal will help minimize the impact of gentrification
Courier-Life
Stephen Witt gets points this week for mentioning the Atlantic Yards carve-out in his coverage of 421-A. Then, he quickly loses those points by saying that the carve-out has been completely reformed. In fact, the value of the carve-out to Forest City Ratner was only reduced from $300 million to $200 million.
Also under the compromise, the $4 billion Atlantic Yards project, which was originally excluded from the new 421-a bill, which critics of the project called a “carve-out,” was renegotiated.After talks between the city and the Atlantic Yards developer, Forest City Ratner (FCRC), the original Atlantic Yards component was reformed to ensure that all promised affordable units are completed and integrated throughout the project.
Under the new legislation, FCRC buildings in the project must meet the new affordability requirements in order to qualify for a 25-year tax abatement.
Also FCRC agreed to ensure that their affordable units will be built simultaneously throughout the development of the project.
Posted by amy at 12:18 PM
Who's paying for the affordable housing? New Domino-watchers want to know
Atlantic Yards Report
If one of the lessons of the Atlantic Yards project for developers--like those of the New Domino project proposed in Williamsburg--is that they should hook up with affordable housing advocates to override zoning (or achieve a rezoning), a lesson for critics is that they should follow the money.After all, Atlantic Yards has been touted as "providing" affordable housing without any reference to the public funds behind the units or any analysis of whether they represent a good bang for the buck.
...
There's no guarantee those questions will be answered. Last year, the MAS, in comments filed after the Atlantic Yards Final Environmental Impact Statement was issued, asked:
In order to accurately assess whether the Atlantic Yards proposal will result in a net gain of affordable housing units, there needs to be an accounting of the public expenditures on this project versus the total amount of public subsidies available in the same fiscal year so that decision makers can accurately assess the public costs versus the public benefits. What percentage of the city’s total funds for housing will be required to build the project’s 2250 units?In response, the Empire State Development Corporation offered only generalities. (Only after the project was approved did details emerge.) Will DCP be more forthcoming? The EIS will be written by the same environmental consulting firm, the ubiquitous AKRF.
Posted by amy at 11:19 AM
Governor signs 421-a revision; Times, others ignore "Atlantic Yards carve-out"
Atlantic Yards Report
So Governor Eliot Spitzer has signed the reform of the 421-a tax break, which includes an "Atlantic Yards carve-out" worth up to $200 million for developer Forest City Ratner. When the "carve-out" was worth $300 million, it was criticized by Mayor Mike Bloomberg, ACORN's Bertha Lewis, Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez, affordable housing advocate Brad Lander, Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn (DDDB), the Brooklyn Paper, and others.When it was reduced but not eliminated, the only official to offer measured criticism was Jeffries. (He issued it after I queried him, but he may have been prepared to issue a statement anyway.) DDDB seemingly stood alone in its forceful criticism.
Affordable housing advocates, city officials, state officials, and the public at large all had something to gain in the revised legislation, beyond the "carve-out." So perhaps some critics felt they could only go so far.
But what about those seemingly independent? Good government advocates were silent, as were editorial pages beyond that initial Brooklyn Paper comment. The New York Times, in its reporting, managed to mangle the historical record. No one beyond a few Brooklynites questioned whether signing the bill comports with Spitzer's claim of being a reformer.
Posted by amy at 11:08 AM
New Laws for Housing Tax Break
The New York Times
The Times is very excited that Spitzer signed the 421-a revision. So excited, in fact, that they forgot to add the part about the Ratner Clause, a special little carve-out that makes the "more stringent affordability standards" LESS STRINGENT FOR RATNER.
Gov. Eliot Spitzer signed into law yesterday three bills to revamp a popular tax break for developers and encourage the construction of thousands of apartments for low-income New York City residents.The laws are expected to expand the number of neighborhoods where developers are required to include apartments for residents of limited means in order to receive tax breaks. Advocates for lower-cost housing have long said the laws would mean more housing for low-income residents and fewer incentives for developers to build luxury high-rises.
“This legislation will allow New York City to target its limited tax abatement resources to more effectively promote the construction of affordable housing in the neighborhoods that need it most,” the governor said. The tax program that is being revamped, known as 421-a, was started in the 1970s to spur housing development of any kind. Under it, developers received a 10-to-25-year exemption from increases in property taxes resulting from their work. But government officials and advocates for affordable housing say that given the change in New York’s real estate market since the program’s inception, the tax breaks are no longer needed in Midtown and other thriving parts of the city.
Under the new laws, developers will be required to meet more stringent affordability standards, give priority to neighborhood residents for lower-cost units, and ensure that units remain affordable for at least 35 years.
Meanwhile, the existing affordable housing stock in the neighborhood is quickly disappearing. This in from our neighbors on Bergen:
Block party to support the tenants in 533 Bergen Street (Carleton & 6th Avenue) this Sunday, Aug 26 12pm-6pm. There will also be a press conference at 12:30pm.The residents of this building are rent stabilized tenants who have lived in the community for decades. Their new landlords, Dan Bailey and Felicity Loughrey, are trying to evict four families from the building so that they can create one huge apartment and live in luxury. Join us in supporting the Bergen Street tenants' fight for survival and in telling Bailey and Loughrey that good neighbors don't evict neighbors.
DJs! Art! Food! Games! Balloons! Sprinklers! Support Your Neighbors!! Save Your Hood!!
Posted by amy at 10:57 AM
August 22, 2007
Break Out of the Box
How community input is driving new affordable housing designs
AFFORDABLE HOUSING FINANCE
BY BENDIX ANDERSON
More serious consultation among developers, architects, and the community is becoming the norm. Affordable housing developers across the country are increasingly following [Seattle Housing Authority's] model of inviting the surrounding communities to get involved in their projects’ designs. They’re finding that such involvement can be a recipe for improving their developments as well as for winning local political support.
They're even doing it in NYC:
In New York, the five teams of architects and developers that competed for a 1.4-acre wedge of abandoned rail yard in the South Bronx got an earful from the community at a public meeting before they submitted even the most basic sketches.
“When we were preparing our design, we really used this [feedback from the neighborhood] as a checklist,” said William Stein, principal for Dattner Architects, an architecture firm in Manhattan that collaborated with Grimshaw Architects to create the winning design.
“Getting community feedback is extraordinarily valuable,” said Adam Weinstein, president of nonprofit Phipps Houses. Phipps is developing that rail yard site in the Bronx, which will be known as Via Verde, in partnership with Jonathan Rose Cos.
And guess the name of the posterproject for lack of community input. [Hint: it's the project that's currently being dragged through the courts while other projects have broken ground]:
Developers that attempt to shorten the lengthy process of building consensus have been punished. Forest City Ratner Cos. reached out to local officials and community groups to win support for its plans to build more than 5,000 mixed-income apartments at Atlantic Yards. But it missed an important set of local stakeholders who have filed several highly publicized lawsuits against the developers. The result: The project is more than a year behind schedule and reportedly tens of millions of dollars over budget.
Posted by lumi at 8:59 AM
August 19, 2007
Day 421-a, everything changes? Spitzer slammed for closed-door negotiation
Atlantic Yards Report
Gov. Eliot Spitzer gets slammed in the August 20 issue of the conservative Weekly Standard, in an article headlined Troopergate, New York-Style: Eliot Spitzer's character problem, by New York Daily News columnist Michael Goodwin and historian Fred Siegel.Beyond the current scandal regarding the administration's attempt to discredit Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno, the authors detail a disturbing pattern of Spitzer using family money to fund his campaigns and his lifestyle, without disclosing it.
And, they point out, Spitzer's ethical record as governor is hardly sterling:
The result was gridlock, familiar ground in Albany, but one of the things Spitzer had promised to fix. His campaign motto was "Day One, Everything Changes," and he had cited secret negotiations, higher taxes, and unchecked spending as targets for his new administration. Yet it was already clear that Spitzer no longer saw those practices as problems. His first budget, despite repeated promises not to raise taxes, did just that. He increased spending by close to 8 percent--nearly triple the rate of inflation.Perhaps most troubling, he continued the discredited practice of meeting with legislative leaders in private to make secret deals on laws and spending. When Michael Goodwin confronted Spitzer by noting that not a single public hearing had been held on any major issue before the deals were cut, Spitzer responded icily. "I'm the governor of the state," he said. "I'll be Lyndon Johnson. I'll craft the deals and I'll get the job done. You will write and I will do. That's why you're there and I'm here."
Spitzer has made some progress, but the "compromise" on the revision of the 421-a tax break, which left a significant "Atlantic Yards carve-out" for Forest City Ratner, certainly didn't happen in public.
Posted by amy at 9:48 AM
August 14, 2007
CULTIVATE THE GRASSROOTS: A NEW DEVELOPMENT MODEL
Promises of affordable housing are leading to unexpected alliances in Brooklyn.
City Limits
By Curtis Stephen
Oy, who knew that three years into the Atlantic Yards controversy, we'd still be fact-checking lead sentences?:
As controversial and lawsuit-ridden as it may be, the proposed Atlantic Yards redevelopment program in downtown Brooklyn has one reliable reply to anyone who criticizes the project on the basis that it creates more rather than less inequality in the world – or at least in Brooklyn.
For the record: Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards plan isn't in "Downtown Brooklyn" despite what Ratner's web site says. Whatever Ratner spends on AtlanticYards.com is totally worth it just for perpetuating this myth alone.
The lead paragraph continues:
And that is: the solid backing of poor-people’s advocate ACORN. Now, at least two new development proposals in the borough are mirroring that developer-advocacy group relationship, some say, prompting debate over whether other private developers are taking a page from Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards playbook to win helpful grassroots support for their upscale residential ventures – or whether actively seeking that support may lead to genuine discussions that create greater community benefits than would have been generated otherwise.
Read about how developers are seeking to divide and conquer the community in Greenpoint and Williamsburg.
Atlantic Yards Report follows up ("City Limits sees AY housing echoes in New Domino plan; Yassky, DePaolo differ") on the City Limits article, reporting on City Councilmember David Yassky's defense of the New Domino plan.
Citing the provision of affordable housing, Yassky Friday submitted comments to the Department of City Planning (DCP) fully supporting the New Domino, which would bring some 2200 apartments, including two 30-story and 40-story towers each, to an 11.2-acre site on and near the Williamsburg waterfront.
Posted by lumi at 9:39 AM
August 11, 2007
Cut Out the Ratner Carve-Out
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn
Tell Governor Spitzer that the 421-a "Carve-out" for "Atlantic Yards" is Wrong!Controversy has surrounded the New York State Legislature's 421-a "reform" bill since Brooklyn Democratic Party boss Vito Lopez inserted a special "carve out" bestowing exclusive tax benefits on Bruce Ratner's "Atlantic Yards" project.
Daily News columnist Juan Gonzalez lambasted the backroom deal in a column entitled "A deal so sweet it's sick." State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries called the special clause "economic segregation." Staunch "Atlantic Yards" supporter Bertha Lewis called the carve-out "bad public policy." And Mayor Bloomberg threatened to withhold more than $100 million in city subsidies for the project if the tax giveaway was not removed from the bill.
All that criticism, however, seems to have had little effect. The special treatment for "Atlantic Yards" persists in what several news organizations are calling the final version of the bill. If Governor Spitzer signs the bill into law, Forest City Ratner would receive an exclusive tax break worth some $200 million. Ratner would receive 421-a affordable-housing tax breaks for condo buildings that would contain no affordable units -- the only developer in New York to receive such a break under the tax law.
We call upon Governor Spitzer, who was elected overwhelmingly to office on the promise of reforming Albany, to veto the 421-a "reform" bill as long as it contains special, exclusive and indefensible anti-reform tax breaks for "Atlantic Yards."
Please contact Governor Spitzer today to urge him to reject the Legislature's 421-a bill until the Ratner carve-out is eliminated.
Write:
Honorable Governor Eliot Spitzer
State Capitol
Albany, NY 12224Call: 518-474-8390
Posted by amy at 10:45 AM
A closer look at the 421-a revision; can you figure it out?
Atlantic Yards Report gets out the highlighter and attacks the 421-a tax exemption.
The New York Times on Wednesday reported, the city's party line:
As for Atlantic Yards, city officials said the new agreement represents a fair compromise. To receive the maximum tax break, 20 percent of the units in any building will have to meet the new affordability guidelines, which are more stringent than those that originally applied. And the lower-priced units will have to be built at the same time as the market-rate units, to insure that they are not put off until the end of construction or never completed.This fails to explain that Forest City Ratner would still be eligible for a special tax break. It sets up a false comparison. Yes, the new law is more stringent than that "originally applied," but it would be more stringent for everyone, so that's not the point. The point is that the affordability guidelines would be different for Atlantic Yards. That's why it's still a "carve-out."
Posted by amy at 10:32 AM
Real Estate Round-Up: August 9, 2007
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
Mary Frost
New York City officials and state legislators have reached an agreement to overhaul a popular tax break for apartment building developers, the New York Times reports. The aim is to encourage the construction of tens of thousands of apartments for low- and middle-income New Yorkers. If Governor Spitzer agrees to the revised 421-a program, it will significantly expand the number of neighborhoods where developers will include apartments for low- and moderate-income tenants in exchange for tax breaks.According to the Times, the version of the plan passed by the Legislature in late June expanded the number of neighborhoods where developers would be required to build lower-priced units to get the tax break. In addition, the Legislature’s bill gave an additional $300 million break to the Forest City Ratner Companies, the developer of the Atlantic Yards project.
Posted by amy at 10:11 AM
August 10, 2007
Mayor delivers for Ratner
The Brooklyn Paper
By Ariella Cohen
Mayor Bloomberg agreed this week to give Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner a $200 million bonus.
The tax break is part of a package that purportedly seeks to cut back tax incentives to real estate developers in upscale areas and to encourage the construction of moderate income housing.
This week’s deal, involving Bloomberg and leaders of the state Assembly and Senate — promises to modify legislation passed in June that includes a $300 million bonus to Ratner, now reduced by one-third. The bonus is in the form of a Ratner-only “carve-out” in 421-a tax abatements.
...
The father of the bill, Assemblyman Vito Lopez (D-Bushwick), declined to comment on the Atlantic Yards provision, hailing the larger bill as a long-awaited victory for low and moderate- income city residents.“This is a compromise and a very good bill that will create affordable housing all across the city,” Lopez said.
Affordable housing advocates praised the bill. “It will create more affordable housing around the city,” said Deb Howard, executive director of the Pratt Area Community Council. As for Ratner, she said, “he got lucky.”
NoLandGrab: Uh, we're not experts, but we're pretty sure it took more than luck for Ratner to get special treatment under the 421-a reform bill — we can't imagine Bloomie and Bruce settling the Atlantic Yards carveout with Rock, Paper, Scissors.
Posted by lumi at 10:03 AM
August 9, 2007
Jeffries offers measured criticism of "carve-out" compromise
Atlantic Yards Report
Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries, who two weeks ago called the original iteration of the “Atlantic Yards carve-out” “offensive,” yesterday offered measured criticism of the compromise that would give Forest City Ratner $150 million, or $200 million, of the $300 million bonus it had sought.
...
The original “carve-out” would’ve given four or five Atlantic Yards condo buildings the 25-year tax break with nothing in return—in effect, grandfathering in Atlantic Yards while treating other developments in Jeffries' Prospect Heights district (and beyond) differently. The “compromise” shortens the tax break to 15 years."While the modification of the Atlantic Yards carve-out provision is a step in the right direction, I remain concerned that this project is treated differently than any other in the city,” Jeffries said in a statement. “Given the need for increased affordable home ownership opportunities in our community, I will continue to push the developer to build at least twenty percent of the apartments in each on-site condominium building in a manner that is affordable to working families and moderate income households.” Two weeks ago, he had called it “economic segregation.”
Posted by lumi at 9:49 AM
Meet Shaun Donovan, Affordable Housing’s Man of the Hour
The city’s commissioner of Housing Preservation and Development talks about the Bloomberg administration’s plans for 165,000 new affordable homes, its support of raising the threshold for rent-stabilized apartments—and its pull in Albany on housing issues
The NY Observer
Criticism of the "Atlantic Yards carveout," in Matthew Schuerman's Q&A interview with NYC Housing Preservation and Development head Shaun Donovan, which presumably was conducted before Tuesday's announcement of a deal:
I understand you were unhappy with the state’s 421a tax abatement bill, which changed the popular development incentive. What are your concerns?
We are in continuing discussions over that. The concern, one of the concerns that we have about the bill that was passed, is that it removes all of our flexibility to do moderate-income projects. It would require that every single project that gets 421a benefits, within the exclusion zones, to have a low-income component; and while our focus has been on low-income, we also have a significantly expanded middle-class housing initiative. Queens West is one example.
We’re also concerned about the exclusion zones. The South Bronx, for example, is clearly not an area where we think it’s appropriate to expand the exclusion zone. And then, third, we’re concerned about the level of benefits that the bill would provide to a hand-picked group of developers—the Atlantic Yards provision, which, by our count, gives $300 million in tax benefits to Atlantic Yards.
Now, if we could solve the broader issue around middle-income housing, we could get to a solution that would reduce their benefits but also allow the project to proceed.
Norman Oder comments on his Atlantic Yards Report blog:
That’s a bit of a non sequitur. Yes, some 900 of the 2250 subsidized Atlantic Yards units would be middle-income housing, for families of four earning from $70,900 (100% of Area Median Income, or AMI) to $113,440 (160% of AMI).
But Donovan sounds like he’s saying Atlantic Yards would’ve been stalled without the tax break. If that’s the argument, then: show us the numbers. He still hasn’t justified why Atlantic Yards would get special treatment.
Posted by lumi at 9:35 AM
August 8, 2007
Ratner Clause is coming to town...
Yesterday afternoon's big news was delivered by Crain's NY Business reporter Erik Engquist:
The new agreement also does away with a controversial carve-out that would have allowed developer Forest City Ratner’s planned $4 billion Atlantic Yards project to qualify for 421-a abatements without integrating affordable and market-rate units. The abatements were estimated to be worth about $200 million.
AU CONTRAIRE, MON FRÈRE! Before boasting of the death of the Ratner Clause, other media outlets are reporting differently:
Atlantic Yards Report, AY carve-out shrinks, value halved (?), in city-brokered 421-a reform
Forest City Ratner still gets a deal. Ten days ago, an FCR spokesman had declared a modified carve-out a done deal.
...
First, Forest City Ratner would still get its tax savings in most buildings without having to change the income mix, thanks to an upward tweak in the bill's definition of affordable housing.And the developer would still get a tax break for the condo buildings without having to provide affordable housing. That's the premise of the current law, as applied to Prospect Heights, and certainly part of the developer's economic projections when Atlantic Yards was hatched. But no other similarly-situated developer, who planned a project but then saw the law come up for renewal and revision, would get the same deal.
Four or five AY buildings would contain only condos; the "carve-out," as with the current law, would have allowed them to qualify for a 25-year tax break even without including affordable housing. The compromise allows a 15-year tax break but would allow the 25-year tax break if those buildings included 20% affordable for-sale units--a provision that likely would be applied to at least one of those condo buildings.
NY Post, CITY OKS NEW RATNER DEAL
[The compromise] cuts from $300 million to $200 million the exclusive property-tax breaks for developer Bruce Ratner. And the 1,930 condo units would get tax exemptions for 15 years rather than 25.
NY Sun, Housing Options Added to Development Tax Bill
The exception for Atlantic Yards was reduced in its scope, but not removed, with the added benefit to the development estimated at $150 million, according to a city official. The entire complex, regardless of whether the buildings have affordable units, would qualify for the tax break, though the market-rate buildings would receive the incentive for 10 years less, the city official said. The developer, Forest City Ratner, would be required to build its low- and middle-income units simultaneously with other units in order to receive the tax break.
Opponents of the project said Forest City Ratner should have to abide by the same rules as every other developer in the city.
The NY Times, Bill Aims to Spur Housing for New York’s Poor
The Times highlights the party line, without mentioning that the Atlantic Yards carveout still provides subsidies for Bruce Ratner's controversial project that are not available to other developers:
As for Atlantic Yards, city officials said the new agreement represents a fair compromise. To receive the maximum tax break, 20 percent of the units in any building will have to meet the new affordability guidelines, which are more stringent than those that originally applied. And the lower-priced units will have to be built at the same time as the market-rate units, to insure that they are not put off until the end of construction or never completed.
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, The Ratner Clause Lives
How bad is the Ratner Clause? It is bad enough that those working on pushing it through did not report it accurately to the press . Rather than reporting that this was a new version of the clause still exempting Ratner from providing affordable housing, the press was told that the Ratner provsion had been eleiminated as called for by many elected officials. (see below Crain's article below).
Special catering to Ratner's project has now held the City's housing agenda hostage by resulting in a bill with less positive reform than the the City orginally intended. (see Atlantic Yards Report below).
Either the Ratner provision needs to be eliminated entirely, or the bill must be vetoed by Governor Spitzer
Posted by lumi at 9:52 AM
August 1, 2007
Affordable housing the focus at the New Domino hearing
Atlantic Yards Report compares the concern about affordable housing between the recently announced New Domino plan and Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards plan.
In the post-Atlantic Yards world, will every megaproject be justified because it provides affordable housing? That’s one conclusion after yesterday’s hearing at the Department of City Planning (DCP) regarding the New Domino development proposed for the former Domino sugar factory site in Williamsburg, five blocks along the waterfront north of the Williamsburg Bridge, plus one square block across Kent Avenue.
For starters, the affordable housing for New Domino "is aimed at a lower-income cohort than the AY plan."
NoLandGrab: In the film "Brooklyn Matters," Julia Vitullo-Martin from the Manhattan Institute observed:
"The truth is today, if you’re a developer with a bad project, a large bad project that shouldn’t be built... the smart thing to do is say, ‘Y’know what, I’m going to provide you with some really good affordable housing.’ So affordable housing is the Trojan Horse these days on big bad projects that shouldn’t get done. And neighborhood activists and many of our elected officials become very reluctant to oppose a project, any project, that has a large affordable housing component."
Without casting judgment on the New Domino project, and based on Vitullo-Martin's observation, the answer to the question, "In the post-Atlantic Yards world, will every megaproject be justified because it provides affordable housing?" is yes, at least in the foreseeable future.
Posted by lumi at 8:37 AM
July 31, 2007
The not-so-natural process of Williamsburg gentrification
Atlantic Yards Report
Local ACORN Dir. Bertha Lewis has tried to sell Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards plan as a hedge against the rising tide of gentrification, explaining "If I could stop one iota of gentrification, I’ll do it."
Norman Oder looks at an analysis of gentrification and affordable housing in Greenpoint-Williamsburg, where inclusionary zoning and market forces may give Atlantic Yards watchdogs some clues to whether or not Bertha Lewis has a clue.
So, how well did the Greenpoint-Williamsburg rezoning work in terms of providing affordable housing? How far along is gentrification? Some sobering observations, if not a full statistical analysis, emerge from an analysis by graduate students at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers University. The report, Gentrification and Rezoning, Williamsburg-Greenpoint, was produced in conjunction with The New York City Community Council.
For example, the study concludes that inclusionary zoning—which provides increased development rights in exchange for including affordable housing—has worked well on waterfront parcels, where there is both public land to be used and sufficient space to build back.
However, on smaller upland parcels where there’s less room to build bigger overall, “the inclusionary program does not appear to be enough of an incentive to encourage the development of affordable housing.” Instead, developers have taken advantage of the existing 421-a tax exemption, which, until reforms go into effect next year, does not require affordable units in exchange.
Posted by lumi at 9:03 AM
July 30, 2007
Real Estate Round-Up
Brooklyn Daily Eagle rehashes last week's coverage in the Daily News that the Bloomberg administration has reached a deal with Bruce Ratner on the special carveout clause in the 421-a reform legislation. The Eagle included the claim that the new deal "could save the city $100 million."
The News reports that officials agreed yesterday to reduce the length of time Forest City Ratner is exempt from paying property taxes by 10 years, to 15 years, on the 1,900 market rate condos in the arena and high rise development.
“The tweak” could save the city $100 million.
Ratner spokesman Loren Riegelhaupt tells the News, “As far as we’re concerned, the issue has been resolved.”
NoLandGrab: While Ratner may still stand to gain $200 million from the special treatment awarded by the tweak to the legislation, it is billed as a $100 million savings for New Yorkers — brilliant!.
Posted by lumi at 10:33 AM
July 27, 2007
Bloomy slightly sours Bruce’s sweet deal from the state
The Brooklyn Paper
By Gersh Kuntzman with additional reporting by Ariella Cohen
According to the Daily News, city officials reduced the length of the tax break from 25 years to 15 years, saving an estimated $100 million.
The remaining tax break would still save Ratner $200 million, the Bloomberg administration has estimated.
Bloomberg spokesman John Gallagher declined to comment on the Daily News story, saying only that negotiations were “continuing” between Forest City Ratner executives, city officials and state leaders.
But a source in the administration told the New York Post earlier this week that the Bloomberg administration objects to the “Ratner carve-out” because “pure and simple, it’s a giveaway.”
It’s the first time city officials have publicly objected to any of the billions of dollars in taxpayer-backed subsidies Ratner will receive on the Atlantic Yards project.
Forest City Ratner officials did not return repeated calls and e-mails from The Brooklyn Paper.
Posted by lumi at 7:59 AM
It came from the Blogosphere...
The Albany Project,
Ratner Gets $200 Million Tax Break, City "Saves" $100 Million
Remember that really sweet deal that Ratnerville was able to slip into the 421-A reform bill? The one that was exclusive the Atlantic Yards Project?
...
Now we have a "compromise" that would shave this sweet deal by a third and those who worked it out are telling folks that now the city is "saving" $100 million bucks. It's disgusting.
...
I've said it before, I'll say it again. Everything wrong with New York state politics is represented in the Ratnerville project. Corruption writ large.And yes, Vito Lopez (D-Sleazeville), I'm looking right at you.
Brit in Brooklyn, Ratner Keeps His Tax Break
We like the Daily News' definition of "slash tax break" in their Atlantic Yards story today: Bruce Ratner gets out of paying property taxes for a mere 15 years, rather than 25 years as originally planned.
Brownstoner, Ratner Compromise Still Special Treatment
After the Mayor threatened on Monday to pull $100 million of city financing for the Atlantic Yards project if the sweetheart deal that Vito Lopez inserted into the 421-a legislation was not revised, a compromise is reportedly in the works. According to The Daily News, the city will get its $100 million back by reducing the tax-free period on 1,900 market-rate condos from 25 years to 15 years. Of course, that comes at the expense of the condo owners not Ratner himself. As the Atlantic Yards Report points out, though, the compromise doesn't change the fact that Ratner is getting special treatment by not having to play by the same affordable housing rules as every other developer.
Gothamist, Extra, Extra
Developer Bruce Ratner is closer to getting his tax-break subsidies, after negotiating with Mayor Bloomberg and the state legislature.
Nets Daily, Nets Hopeful on Luxury Box Sales
News that really bores the average Nets fan from the blog that's not an official Nets site:
In an article about a possible glut of luxury boxes at new sports facilities around New York, Crains New York Business quotes Nets president Brett Yormark as saying the team hopes to sell out all the Barclays Center’s 118 luxury suites. The team will begin selling the suites in earnest this fall with the opening of a model box at the New York Times building, which is part owned by Bruce Ratner.
The luxury suites will be part of a larger group of suites that include party suites capable of entertaining up to 60 people. All told, Barclays Center will have 170 suites, compared to 29 at the Continental Airlines Arena.
...
[Forest City Ratner] assumes that approximately 162 of 170 suites will be sold annually through a combination of first ring suites, second ring suites, courtside suites, and loge boxes. The suite price includes the price of tickets to NBA games and approximately 25 percent of other events held at the arena. In addition, it is assumed that three of the four party suites, each with sixty suites, will be sold for all NBA games on an annual basis.”However, the same analysis warned: “Given the competitiveness of the market, both the total number of suites and the average price per suite assumed by FCRC appear to be on the high end relative to other similar arenas. NBA arenas average approximately ninety suites. Facilities in Chicago, Detroit, Los Angeles, Dallas, Toronto, and Philadelphia are the only ones that offer more than 125 suites. Other than the Palace at Auburn Hills in Detroit, all of these facilities host both NBA and NHL teams.”
Posted by lumi at 7:01 AM
July 26, 2007
PRESS RELEASE, Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn:
Behind Closed Doors, a Ratner Conpromise
After "Negotiations," Developer Bruce Ratner Still Set to Reap $200 Million Tax Break from 421-a "Reform" Bill's Exclusive "Atlantic Yards" Clause
NEW YORK, NY -- If a report in today's Daily News is accurate, developer Bruce Ratner and city officials are trying to spin a 33% reduction in a special tax break legislated exclusively for the Atlantic Yards developer as a meaningful "scale back." But it's a "scale back" to a special property tax break for Ratner that should never have existed in the first place. As of three days ago, the Bloomberg administration wanted the exclusive tax provision removed entirely.
The News reports that the city and Forest City Ratner held "negotiations" over the 421-a reform bill's original special provision, reducing the exclusive tax break from $300 million to $200 million. The project's 1,930 condominium units would receive tax exemptions for 15 years rather than the 25 years originally outlined.
"Negotiated behind closed doors, this so-called 'compromise' of the 421-a special tax break exclusively for Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards—a tax break unavailable to any other developer in the city, and one that should never have existed in the first place—is an offensive sham. Unless this indefensible, blatant giveaway to Bruce Ratner, which will cost taxpayers at least $200 million, is removed from the bill, reform-minded Governor Eliot Spitzer must veto it," said Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn's Daniel Goldstein. "Earlier this week, the Bloomberg Administration was all snarl and bluster, threatening to pull $105 million in promised Atlantic Yards cash subsidies, but today, it's apparent that the city was all bark and no bite. There is no fundamental difference between the original sweetheart deal and this negotiated sweetheart deal; the negotiated agreement is a toothless joke."
It is unclear how legislators critical of the special Ratner clause will react to reports of a non-compromise compromise, which does not fundamentally change the original special provision at all or respond to widespread criticism of the Atlantic Yards carve-out.
At a town hall meeting just two days ago, Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries (57th District, which encompasses the Atlantic Yards project site)
It is also unclear how ACORN's Bertha Lewis, a staunch Atlantic Yards supporter, will react to reports of this "negotiation." She has called the special Ratner provision "bad public policy."
Much like the mythical scale-back of the Atlantic Yards project--announce project, increase size of project, return project to original size, claim reduction--this so-called "scale back" of the special 421-a Atlantic Yards "carve-out" plays the same game: propose and pass legislation allowing a large, indefensible tax break that should not exist at all, reduce the size of the large, indefensible tax break that shouldn't exist, and claim it "could save the city $100 million."
Former City Planning Commissioner Ron Shiffman said, "Ratner always asks for more than he needs, but the politicians and bureaucrats always give him more than he expects. In this case of the 421-a special provision, the so-called 'compromise' far exceeds what he deserves."
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DEVELOP DON'T DESTROY BROOKLYN leads a broad-based community coalition fighting for development that will unite our communities instead of dividing and destroying them.
Posted by lumi at 10:03 AM
RATNER CLAUSE CONPROMISE
The NY Daily News got the big scoop today:
Pols slash tax-break on Atlantic Yards
Under pressure from the city, developer Forest City Ratner's sweetheart tax break is getting scaled back by state lawmakers, the Daily News has learned.
Officials yesterday agreed to reduce to 15 years the length of time Bruce Ratner is exempt from paying property taxes on 1,900 market-rate condos slated for the Atlantic Yards project, a tweak that could save the city $100 million.
...
A Bloomberg spokesman declined to discuss details of the negotiations but said Forest City Ratner and city officials had hammered out an agreement this week.
NoLandGrab: Ha, ha — this is a joke, right? After holding "negotiations" with Forest City, the Bloomberg administration has come up with a "scale back" "that could save the city $100 million."
Do they mean saving the city $100 million of the $300 million the previous deal gave away? What's wrong with Ratner getting the same deal as every other developer in NYC?
DEJA VU ALERT:
NEGOTIATED?
In 2005, the MTA "negotiated" with Forest City Ratner to spice up the embarrassingly low $50M offer for the development rights for the railyards. The $100M deal they hammered out was still lower than the $150M competing offer from the Extel development company and much lower than the MTA's original $214M appraisal.
"Negotiations" always seem to end in Ratner's favor, which makes you wonder what kind of superpowers he possesses.
SCALEBACK??
Since Atlantic Yards was announced in 2003, the project continued to grow on the drawing board. In 2006, The New York Times had an exclusive that announced that Ratner decided to "scale back" the project. The Times didn't comprehend that Atlantic Yards was "scaled back" to roughly its original size.
Today's News story had the step on the NY Post's "exclusive."
RATNER-CITY DEAL NEAR ON HOUSING
After threatening to pull $100 million in subsidies from the controversial Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, the Bloomberg administration appears close to a compromise over middle-income housing, sources said yesterday.
The administration, developer Bruce Ratner and state legislators have made significant progress in recent days negotiating changes to an affordable-housing reform bill passed by the Legislature.
NoLandGrab: Though the Post missed the story, it's interesting how the word "negotiating" was used again, as if Forest City is another branch of government or something.
Atlantic Yards Report confirms our suspicions that $100M savings is really just a one-third decrease in the big special gift to Ratner and explains that the special carveout still stands.
Behind closed doors, a "compromise" on the Ratner clause
Because the gist of the exclusive, published unaccountably in the newspaper's Brooklyn section--is this not of citywide interest?--is that the "Atlantic Yards carve-out" would be reduced from $300 million to $200 million because the 1930 condos would get tax exemptions for 15 years rather than 25 years.
...
Missing is the voice of any neutral analyst, but surely such person could point out that, while Forest City Ratner did expect to get tax breaks for all-condo buildings before the law changed, the justification for treating this development differently is hard to get past the average citizen, as noted Tuesday by Jeffries' constituency.
The NY Times is bringing up the rear today with their City Room blog post citing the NY Post article.
Posted by lumi at 9:11 AM
July 25, 2007
Jeffries calls AY carve-out "offensive"--and his base agrees
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder checked out what Hakeem Jeffries had to say at the freshman NY State Assemblyman's first Town Hall meeting and noted:
As a candidate last year, Hakeem Jeffries was a qualified supporter of Atlantic Yards. And as a freshman member of the State Assembly, he still welcomes the project’s affordable housing.
But Jeffries' posture has gotten tougher lately, and last night he delivered an eloquent criticism of the project, declaring that promised affordable housing was easily matched by government support for developer Forest City Ratner and that the “Atlantic Yards carve-out,” a tax break available only to the developer, was “offensive” because it promoted “economic segregation.” And his audience, responding to the notion of special treatment, seemed to agree.
Posted by lumi at 10:30 AM
July 23, 2007
Compromising on Congestion and Campaign Cash
Gotham Gazette
By Courtney Gross and Gail Robinson
An article about the compromises and agreements reached in overtime between the City and State lists a few items that didn't get done, including the 421-a reform bill that contains the "Ratner Clause:"
Tax Credits for Housing: The legislature has approved a version of 421a, a city program that provides tax breaks to housing developers in an effort to encourage construction of affordable housing. The mayor and City Council had proposed their own version late last year. But the version approved by the legislature - and apparently authored by Assemblymember Vito Lopez of Brooklyn -- included a huge tax break for Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards project. And according to the city housing agency, the legislature's bill places additional conditions on developers that would hamper the city's effort to promote building of middle class housing. Bloomberg and Quinn have both urged Spitzer to veto it.
Posted by lumi at 9:23 AM
July 20, 2007
He smells a Ratner
The Brooklyn Paper, Letters to the Editor
A Park Sloper lays the blame at Ratner's feet, but calls on voters to take it out on their elected representatives:
Those newly released Atlantic Yards documents (“Yassky: Stop Ratner gravy train,” July 14) make it very clear that the 2,250 low-cost housing units that are proposed as part of Bruce Ratner’s development may, in fact, never be built.
But if not, blame Ratner. Their future is in doubt due to cost under-estimates, and this should concern every taxpaying citizen. Ratner’s project will ultimately be funded with taxpayer money solely for private use, and in the end will not benefit the community in any way shape or form, but will only further deplete already overtaxed utilities in the area and in nearby neighborhoods.
Moving forward with this project, with the assistance of city officials and planners, violates the terms of Eminent Domain laws, and is unethical. The developer, with government assistance, is knowingly seizing private property for private use under the guise of public benefit.
To add insult to injury, a recent state Assembly vote awarded Ratner a tax break estimated as being worth between $175 and $300 million.
It’s time to stop turning a blind eye to all that’s going on in our own backyards — we need to act.
If the officials we elect to protect our interests are unwilling to do so, they must be voted out of office. We’ve been complacent long enough, Brooklynites — “Wake up! Speak up! Use your vote!”
Robert Segarra, Park Slope
Posted by lumi at 9:56 AM
Amendment of 421-a Bill Could Save City Millions
The NY Sun
By Eliot Brown
A carve-out for the Atlantic Yards project in a housing tax break bill could be removed during a special legislative session, as legislators are pushing to block what has been called a giant taxpayer giveaway.
Last month, the Legislature approved a renewed residential tax break bill, known as 421-a, which contained expanded provisions for “affordable” housing. However the deal-making involved in crafting the bill, which has yet to be sent to Governor Spitzer for his signature, resulted in facets that angered advocates of both housing and development. The mayor has called for a veto of the bill should it not be amended, as has the City Council speaker, Christine Quinn.
The chief focus of criticisms of the bill is an exemption crafted for Brooklyn’s $4 billion Atlantic Yards project, which Mayor Bloomberg has said could cost the city upwards of $300 million. The lead architect of the bill, Assemblyman Vito Lopez, said all parties are talking, including developer Forest City Ratner, and that there seems to be support for at least scaling back the Atlantic Yards provision.
NoLandGrab: Is it possible that Vito Lopez is testing the waters for "at least scaling back the Atlantic Yards provision" to claim a win-win for the developer, politicians and community? "Scaling back" a handout, that's brilliant!
The history of "scalebacks" for Atlantic Yards is deceptive and murky:
In September 2006, Ratner announced a "scaleback" of the project, in a NY Times exclusive that returned the project to roughly the square footage originally announced in 2003.
In December 2006, the height of the project's signature tower, "Miss Brooklyn," was "scaled back" to one foot less than the height of the landmark Williamsburg Savings Bank clock tower. Ratner has yet to release details about the bulk and square footage of the "new Miss Brooklyn," though project critics note that the building will likely be much more massive than the clock tower.
We can hardly wait for details of the next "scaleback."
Posted by lumi at 9:20 AM
July 18, 2007
421a Deal Breaks Down
The Real Estate Observer
By Matthew Schuerman
Here's one we missed from Monday.
NYC Mayor Bloomberg was hoping to add some last-minute amendments to NY State's 421-a reform bill "that would permit the 421a housing tax break to apply to subsidized middle-class housing planned for Queens West."
NoLandGrab: The Mayor has spoken out against the "Atlantic Yards carveout" on grounds that a sole developer shouldn't get special subsidies, which according to the Mayor's office could cost the city $300M. Presumably, the amendments sought by the Mayor included removal of this big gift for Bruce Ratner.
Schuerman cites an un-named real estate exec who reports that negotiations with State Assemblyman Vito Lopez have broken down:
As a result, the executive said, any changes that would undo the problems that the Bloomberg administration sees with the state legislation that passed last month will have to wait until the fall.
Schuerman updated the post with news that the Senate was passing amendments that reflected changes previously passed by the Assembly, which, "do not reflect the alterations the Mayor was seeking."
Posted by lumi at 7:34 AM
July 14, 2007
Hakeem and Velmanette stand up
The Daily Gotham
In the ongoing battle over Atlantic Yards, one central critique of good government advocates has been the abject failure of the legislature to do its due diligence and examine whether this project is indeed in the public interest, and therefore worthy of public dollars.One of the myriad lollipops being thrown at Bruce Ratner is this: a 421-a tax reform bill just passed by the Assembly reformed the 421-a tax break given to developers; now, one must actually build affordable housing to receive tax breaks for it.
...
Mayor Bloomberg has called for a veto of the bill, and now, the two legislators who represent Atlantic Yards in the legislature, Velmanette Montgomery and Hakeem Jeffries, have made their displeasure known in no uncertain terms.
...
It's unacceptable on good government grounds alone to give preferential treatment to any one party. It's even more galling when a developer receives massive tax breaks and subsidies and then doesn't even have to fulfill the same requirements expected of other developers. This is crony capitalism of the Halliburton variety. Governor Spitzer should veto the bill.
Posted by amy at 11:16 AM
On 421-a, Brennan revises stance, FCR’s Bender distorts history
Atlantic Yards Report
As Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries and State Senator Velmanette Montgomery this week called for developer Forest City Ratner to abandon the “Atlantic Yards carve-out” in the reform of the city’s 421-a tax exemption, Assemblyman Jim Brennan, who’s been a critic of aspects of the project, seemed like the odd man out--until now.The State Legislature has passed the revised bill but it has yet to be signed by Gov. Eliot Spitzer. Various forces, including the city administration, are calling for a revision or a veto. Brennan had told the New York Observer’s blog The Real Estate Observer that “It’s not a carve-out… The only thing that happened was that Atlantic Yards got grandfathered in.”
That seemed inaccurate, given that there’s a special provision that could only apply to Atlantic Yards, allowing the requirement of 20 percent affordable housing to be spread over the project as a whole rather than applied to each building, as the law otherwise would require, and also nudging up the income limit for Atlantic Yards affordable units. (Instead of requiring affordable housing at 60% of Area Median Income, at Atlantic Yards the limit would be 70%.)
Revised stance
Brennan told me yesterday he’s revised his stance: “I’ve been thinking through that a lot. The main bill I actually support. I’d still like to see the 421-a renegotiated, because I’d like to see Atlantic Yards back on the table. I had a factual misunderstanding... I would be happy if Spitzer vetoed the bill, because I’d like to see some rethinking of Atlantic Yards and the program. If he didn’t veto the bill, I still think there’s a lot of people who want to see a renegotiation.”
Posted by amy at 11:12 AM
July 13, 2007
Pols speak out (and about) 421-a reform gift for Atlantic Yards
There's general backlash in the political establishment in response to the special "Ratner clause" in the State legislature's 421-a reform bill.
THE REAL ESTATE OBSERVER, Mayor Seeks to Reform 421a Reform
Mayor Bloomberg
The city wants the Legislature to make three changes: extend the abatement to government-supported middle-income housing, such as that planned for Queens West; shrink the so-called exclusion zone; and retract the $300 million additional tax break that Atlantic Yards, alone among new developments in Brownstone Brooklyn, would qualify for.
This article, by Matthew Schuerman, explains the technicalities of how the bill could be changed before the Governor has to decide whether to sign or veto.
NY State Assemblywoman Joan Millman explains that she would have signed on to State Senator Velmanette Montgomery and State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries's letter if she wasn't on vacation:
“This is a developer who has gotten many, many tax benefits from the city and state,” she told The Observer. “This is just another piece.”
State Assemblyman Jim Brennan has an interesting take on the special exception that amounts to an estimated $300M gift to developer Bruce Ratner:
“It’s not a carve-out,” Mr. Brennan told The Observer last week. “The only thing that happened was that Atlantic Yards got grandfathered in.”
NoLandGrab: Hmm... selectively grandfathered in maybe.
THE BROOKLYN PAPER, Yassky: Stop Ratner gravy train
NYC Councilman David Yassky has spent years charting the narrow channel between supporting and criticizing Atlantic Yards. This week, Yassky finds political cover in the financial documents recently obtained and released by Assemblyman Brennan.
Also this on Bloomberg*:
Yassky’s call for an end to Ratner subsidies comes just two weeks after Mayor Bloomberg — himself a strong supporter of Atlantic Yards — finally broke with Ratner, declaring that the developer “doesn’t need” an additional special tax break handed to him by the state Assembly.
Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries (D–Prospect Heights) and Sen. Velmanette Montgomery (D–Park Slope) sent a letter to Ratner asking him to “abandon … the special treatment set forth in the Atlantic Yards carve-out provision.”
BROWNSTONER, Pols Call for Ratner to Abandon 421-a Carve-Out
Local real estate blog, Brownstoner, delivers news of the Jeffries-Montgomery letter to its readers:
the two are teaming up to call out Forest City Ratner in a public letter that states:
"FCRC should publicly comply with the 421-a law, as applicable to everyone else, and build at least 20% of the condominium units in each luxury condominium building in a manner that is affordable to low and moderate income families. Anything short of publicly abandoning the special treatment set forth in the Atlantic Yards carve-out provision would justify a complete re-examination of the project by all appropriate government entities."
Posted by lumi at 9:29 AM
July 12, 2007
Schumer on Starrett City: profit shouldn't depend on government support
Atlantic Yards Report
Last week, Senator Charles Schumer took a strong stance against the use of eminent domain to build an upstate power line, despite his support for increased use of eminent domain for projects in NYC, such as Bruce Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards plan (link to coverage).
This week, Norman Oder notes that Schumer is at it again:
The New York Times reported that, while a potential sale of the Starrett City complex in Brooklyn to one investor seems stymied by federal housing authorities, New York Sen. Chuck Schumer is pressuring the seller, a group headed by Disque Deane, to ask for less money than $1.3 billion so the new owner of the 46-building complex won't significantly raise rents and change the character of the development.
...
Without opining on the fate of Starrett City, I think it's worth noting that Schumer has not extended his concern about the appropriate balance between private profit and public subsidy to the Atlantic Yards project that he supports.
NoLandGrab: We know we ran this photo last week, but who knew it would come in handy again?
Posted by lumi at 9:47 AM
July 11, 2007
Jeffries, Montgomery call for Ratner to abandon 421-a "carve-out"
Atlantic Yards Report
Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries and State Senator Velmanette Montgomery, whose districts include the Atlantic Yards footprint, have publicly called on developer Forest City Ratner to abandon the "Atlantic Yards carve-out" in the 421-a law passed by the Legislature (but not yet signed by Gov. Eliot Spitzer, who has not indicated whether he'd veto it) and adhere to the law as it will apply to every other development in the city.
The two legislators have not typically allied on Atlantic Yards issues. Jeffries has been a cautious supporter of the project, more or less, while Montgomery has stood in staunch opposition. The legislators, in their July 6 letter, note that more than $300 million has been committed by the city and state to the project and criticize the "eleventh-hour, highly secretive deal" that led to the carve-out.
article (official press statement and full text of letter after the jump)
PRESS STATEMENT
ASSEMBLYMAN JEFFRIES CALLS ON BRUCE RATNER TO PUBLICLY ABANDON 421-A CARVE-OUT PROVISION
Brooklyn, NY -- Assemblymember Hakeem Jeffries, joined by State Senator Velmanette Montgomery, today released a letter sent to Bruce Ratner that calls on Forest City Ratner Companies to publicly abandon the 421-a Atlantic Yards carve-out provision and adhere to the law as it will apply to every other development in New York City.
July 6, 2007
Bruce Ratner President and Chief Executive Officer Forest City Ratner Companies 1 MetroTech Center North Brooklyn, New York 11201
Dear Mr. Ratner:
As representatives of Prospect Heights in the New York State Legislature, we write with respect to the Atlantic Yards Project that you plan to build in our community, and recent events connected to the 421-a property tax exemption law.
The City and State have presently committed in excess of $300 million in government subsidies to make the Atlantic Yards development possible, notwithstanding significant public discomfort and outright opposition to the project. In order to justify the substantial government subsidies, Forest City Ratner Companies ("FCRC") has consistently touted the "innovative Atlantic Yards housing program," as you have called it.
Pursuant to this housing program, FCRC will build 4,500 rental units, with 2,250 apartments set aside for low and moderate income families. FCRC also plans to build 1,930 condominium units as part of the Atlantic Yards development. On the eve of the Public Authorities Control Board vote in December 2006, FCRC committed to build 200 of these units on-site, as condominiums that are affordable to working and moderate income families. Please confirm in writing by Friday, July 13, 2007 if this is not your understanding.
The 421-a program, as recently pass by the Legislature, if signed by Governor Spitzer, requires 20% affordability at 60% AMI, in any apartment building that receives a tax exemption. However, because of an eleventh-hour, highly -secretive deal negotiated by the Real Estate Board of New York on behalf of FCRC, an Atlantic Yards carve-out provision will permit you to evade these requirements, unlike any other development in the entire City of New York. This preferential, lobbyist-negotiated treatment is completely unacceptable and undermines the integrity of the entire project.
Accordingly, FCRC should publicly commit to comply with the 421-a law, as applicable to everyone else, and build at least 20% of the condominium units in each luxury condominium building in a manner that is affordable to low and moderate income families. Anything short of publicly abandoning the special treatment set forth in the Atlantic Yards carve-out provision would justify a complete re-examination of the project by all appropriate government entities.
Sincerely,
 |
Posted by lumi at 10:15 AM
"Projects change, markets change"? Actually, Ratner planned condos from the start
We know it's hard to believe, but Norman Oder has discovered that Ratner lied to us (image from "Liar Flyer 2").
Here's the gist of it from another Atlantic Yards Report must-read.
YOU MAY RECALL:
MAY, 2005
FCR scored a public relations coup, signing a 50/50 affordable housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the community group ACORN. The fine print, however, designated the agreement as applying only to rental units.
LESS THAN TWO WEEKS LATER
Forest City announced that the project could add 1500 to 2800 condos, because of a tradeoff with office space and the addition of another building, at Site V.
Then Ratner and ACORN told everyone that it was still 50-50, because the deal only applied to the rentals. It took critics months, if not a year, to convince reporters and the public that the highly touted 50-50 plan really only included something between 31-37.50% "affordable" units, depending upon the version of the plan (there are two).
HERE'S THE BOMB:
SEPTEMBER, 2003
According to p. 17 of a presentation (3.2 MB PDF) to the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) on 9/29/03, six weeks before the project was unveiled, the developer planned nearly 1 million square feet of condos, or about 1000 units at 1000 square feet per apartment.
FEBRUARY, 2004
That condo plan persisted, as shown in the excerpt of a 2/18/04 business plan.
MAY, 2004
...in a 6/28/04 document presented to the ESDC, Forest City Ratner privately repeated its intention to add condos, again citing the recommendation from the Department of City Planning that apparently about 128,000 square feet of condo space would be cut.
APRIL, 2005
However, the condo plan was not just alive, but growing. A 4/28/05 presentation (below) to the ESDC, in which Forest City sketched its version of the General Project Plan that the state agency itself would issue.
It contemplated that four of 16 towers would include condos, encompassing some 1.5 million square feet. (An alternate plan would have had condos in six buildings.) Interestingly, none of the buildings in the project's first phase would have included affordable housing.
BAIT... (MAY, 2005)
Some three weeks later, Forest City and ACORN signed the 50/50 plan to great fanfare, with no public inkling that the project would include any residential component other than rentals.
...AND SWITCH
A week after that Housing MOU press conference, with ACORN on board, Stuckey told City Council that the project plan had changed, and could contain an additional 2800 condos.
Read the full article for more details and supporting documents.
NoLandGrab: Holy prevaricators, no wonder the State and Ratner really tried to keep these documents under wraps!
Though Jim Stuckey wanted people to believe that "projects change, markets change," things between Forest City Ratner and the government remain the same.
One secret that ACORN Director Bertha Lewis will likely take to her grave is whether or not she was blindsided by or complicit in the deception. Either she was aware of the additional condos in advance of signing the Affordable Housing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) or learned about them after the fact when it was too late to protest because, according to the MOU, she was contractually obliged to "publicly support the Project."
Posted by lumi at 8:28 AM
First Atlantic Yards Towers Would Contain Few Affordable Apts.
Most Would Be Built in Project’s Second Phase
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
By Sarah Ryley
Here's the latest news, from the documents recently obtained and released by NY State Assemblyman Jim Brennan, for those looking forward to affordable housing units at Atlantic Yards:
Developer Forest City Ratner’s business plan for the Atlantic Yards arena and high-rise project reveals that of the 1,580 residential units in the first phase of construction, 143 would be affordable for low-income tenants and 216 for middle-income tenants. The rest would be market-rate condos and rentals, with a 500-square-foot studio starting at $2,000 a month.
143 low-income + 216 middle-income = 359 "affordable" units built in Phase 1.
What about the remaining 1,891 (84%) "affordable" units?
The rest... would come during the project’s second phase of construction, which Assemblyman Jim Brennan, who filed a lawsuit to obtain the documents, warns could be delayed or even abandoned if the real estate market slows down.
“[The project’s financials] shows that the project is so expensive that it might fail before we ever get to the bulk of the affordable housing, and it shows that the condos are too expensive, too costly to build, and that the developer has tried to do too much,” he said.
“Many people in the community sort of intuitively saw the problems in advance — that the project was very expensive and that the affordable housing wasn’t locked in appropriately — so that all this information that came out basically just confirms the criticisms of the project,” said Brennan. “A stronger case could have been made about [reducing] the scale of the project had this information been available.”
NoLandGrab: Note that Brennan feels that information in these documents make the case for downsizing the project, not scrapping it all together.
Theoretically, Ratner could make the case that these documents show that the project requires even MORE public subsidy, such as the generous exception given to him in the 421-a reform bill, though that might be politically untenable, even in Brooklyn... right?
Posted by lumi at 7:57 AM
Brennan doubts affordable housing at Yards - Rental, affordable units will show little profit, state assemblyman warns
Courier-Life Publications
NY State Assemblyman Jim Brennan concluded that the Atlantic Yards affordable housing is at risk, based upon analysis of documents obtained by his office.
Courier reporter Stephen Witt says that Forest City Ratner and Bertha Lewis say it isn't so:
But both developer Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC) and ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), which forged the affordable housing component, maintained their deal remains on track for completion.
Posted by lumi at 7:50 AM
July 8, 2007
Tax break debate flares over affordable housing
AP via USA Today
Other critics objected to an exemption in the plan that would preserve a multimillion dollar tax benefit for the developers of Atlantic Yards, a massive project in Brooklyn that will include thousands of new apartments and a new basketball arena for the NBA's Nets.Legislative leaders delayed sending the measure to Spitzer's desk, and talks are now ongoing about possible adjustments.
Posted by amy at 11:11 AM
July 7, 2007
RATNER RUCKUS
NY Press
Official data confirms it—New Yorkers really are paying increasingly obscene prices for apartments. Last week, Reuters reported that in sharp contrast to the majority of U.S. housing markets, Manhattan housing prices rose yet again during the second financial quarter. Unsurprisingly, rent prices continue to climb as well: The NYC Rent Guidelines Board voted recently to increase rents by 3 percent on one-year leases and 5.75 percent on two-year leases. It’s an improvement over last year’s 4.25 percent and 7.25 percent respective hikes, but for the two-thirds of New Yorkers who rent, it’s still a squeeze. In a double-edged reform bill passed last week, the state legislature is both hindering and helping the affordable housing cause. The bill provides tax exemptions for developers who provide lower-cost apartments, though it applies only in certain neighborhoods. A second appendix in that legislation, however, allots $175 million in tax breaks for the controversial Atlantic Yards project. Critics decry the pork barreling, calling it a handout for the construction of apartments that won’t be truly “affordable.” Statistics confirm their outrage: The threshold for affordable housing elsewhere in the city is a $42,600 income, but is $49,700 at Atlantic Yards. Unaffordable affordable housing? Priceless.
Posted by amy at 9:22 AM
July 6, 2007
City Creates More Than 18,000 Affordable Housing Units
NY1
Atlantic Yards gets a boost from a report touting Bloomberg's affordable housing initiative:
Mayor Michael Bloomberg's ten-year plan to boost affordable housing may be paying off.
According to this year's figures, the city has constructed or preserved 18,472 units throughout the five boroughs.
...
Officials hope the numbers will continue to increase with the help of developments, like the Atlantic Yards project.
article/video (dialup/broadband)
NoLandGrab: With the exodus of units leaving NYC affordable-housing programs, there's no word in the article about the NET effect of the mayor's plan, nor a breakdown of how many units have been created versus those retained.
Also, to understand the effectiveness of the Mayor's program, it would help to know how many of these units target low-income households.
Posted by lumi at 8:18 AM
July 5, 2007
At the start, it was 80/20 affordable housing, not 50/30/20
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder is still sifting through the documents obtained by State Assemblyman Jim Brennan, looking for more details to clarify or correct the on-going historical narrative of Atlantic Yards.
Today he looks at affordable housing:
I've previously criticized Bertha Lewis of ACORN for saying that she got developer Forest City Ratner to include affordable housing in the Atlantic Yards development. I noted that that was the plan all along, at least since Atlantic Yards was announced publicly on 12/10/03.
Well, not exactly. Recently released documents offer clues that ACORN indeed had an impact, though not quite the one Lewis has described.
Posted by lumi at 7:07 AM
July 4, 2007
Is a 421-a revision possible?
Atlantic Yards Report
Crain's New York Business reports that "Albany insiders" say city officials have a chance of persuading legislators to change the 421-a program that offers tax breaks for housing construction but requires affordable housing in certain neighborhoods.
Presumably that would mean a veto first by Gov. Eliot Spitzer.
Posted by lumi at 9:25 AM
July 2, 2007
Second thoughts on Downtown Brooklyn rezoning; James, Yassky, Markowitz call for affordable housing
Atlantic Yards Report
Growing dissatisfaction with the direction of the Downtown Brooklyn plan brings together unlikely allies:
The Downtown Brooklyn rezoning was supposed to spur office space and thus office jobs, but instead the increased density has proved lucrative to developers who are building luxury housing.
That wasn't the plan, which has left the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership hoping for "creative industries" and boosters like Errol Louis with blinders.
Now City Council Members Letitia James and David Yassky are calling for the Bloomberg Administration to amend the plan to require affordable housing, reports the Brooklyn Paper. And Borough President Marty Markowitz, who has clashed with Atlantic Yards opponent James regarding the borough's most controversial project, also suggests it's time to revisit the plan.
There's a logic to that; the city increased the value of the land and has an argument that it should get something back in return; if not new tax revenues from jobs, then subsidized housing.
The Downtown Brooklyn Partnership touts 3,000 affordble housing units in the pipeline, only guess where they are... seriously, guess.
Read the rest of the article for the answer. [WARNING: Milk may come out of your nose.]
Posted by lumi at 10:24 AM
July 1, 2007
On the future of Atlantic Yards, the issue is: who decides on profit v. affordability?
Atlantic Yards Report
So what's the bottom line regarding Atlantic Yards, based on today's New York Times article? The issue, to David A. Smith, an affordable housing analyst in Boston who's previously reviewed Atlantic Yards documents (but not the new ones), is the future balance between developer profit and affordable housing, and who gets to decide.As of now, we don't know, since the Empire State Development Corporation has yet to release contract documents apparently still under negotiation. The city's housing program, which provides loans for 50/30/20 mixed-income rental buildings, would seem to require that each rental building have the promised mix. On the other hand, we don't know whether the city and state will require those buildings to be constructed by a certain date.
Lots of volatility
Smith emailed me: Even a cursory review of the financing plan materials released so far reveals that this is an extraordinarily complex undertaking, with many moving parts. The moving parts -- the financing plan, with multiple phases, multiple property uses, and multiple potential sources including subsidy and concessionary government capital -- mean volatility.
It could be a great financial and economic result, or a terrible one. With this much volatility, sequencing is key: what happens in what order, and who decides what changes are made to the development plan? If the developer has all the optionality -- that is, control over the responsive actions taken after unexpected favorable or unfavorable outside events -- and the city has none of the optionality, then it's very likely that the developer can navigate through all the complexity to a successful deal, and achieve this result by adjusting the affordable housing to be fewer apartments, to happen later in the development sequence, and to be redefined upwards. (Anyone who does business with any government agency as a counterparty knows that managing expectations over time is a critical developer skill.)
Posted by amy at 12:27 PM
Official Sees Possible Risk in Big Project in Brooklyn
NY Times
By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE and ANDY NEWMAN
The Times publishes a lengthy article about the recently released (due to a lawsuit) internal documents from the Empire State Development Corporation. Brooklyn assemblyman James F. Brennan was one of the lawsuit participants and he is quoted in the article, calling the Atlantic Yards proposal "risky," and the weak affordable housing aspect "disturbing."
Interviews with real estate developers and brokers not connected to the project indicate that estimates of the construction costs for the project’s 6,430 apartments are low compared with some other developments in Brooklyn, where a residential building boom is pushing up construction prices. And Forest City’s projections for the future sale of the project’s roughly 2,000 condominium apartments seem optimistic, forecasting high volume at prices that have barely been tested in Brooklyn.Mr. Brennan said he worried that Forest City could be forced to scale back or even abandon later phases of the project if the real estate market sours, putting at risk some of the 2,250 units of subsidized rental housing planned. Most of those units are scheduled to be built during the project’s later years of construction, as are most of the market-rate units.
...
The documents also provide a window into the considerable resources Forest City poured into early plans for the project, promoting it to the public, and getting it approved in a city that has proven inhospitable to some recent attempts at large-scale development. Those costs amounted to $19.5 million, according to one document, including money for litigation, public relations and Mr. Gehry’s initial designs.
Posted by amy at 11:53 AM
Extra Extra
Gothamist
Mayor Bloomberg lashed out against special tax breaks that could hand developer Bruce Ratner an extra $300 million for developing Brooklyn's Atlantic Yards. Mayor Mike hopes Gov. Spitzer will quash the "carve-out" benefit.
Posted by amy at 11:26 AM
Yassky and James ask Spitzer and Bloomberg to withhold aid
Atlantic Yards Report
Council Members David Yassky and Letitia James, in a letter to Governor Eliot Spitzer and Mayor Mike Bloomberg, have asked the state and city to withhold previously pledged direct subsidies for the Atlantic Yards project, citing the "Atlantic Yards carve-out" in the state's revision of the 421-a tax break.They write:
The most egregious aspect of the carve-out is the amount it will cost taxpayers. New York City has already approved $205 million for the project, and the State has pledged $100 million. The rewrite of the 421a legislation will cost taxpayers at least an additional $100 million and could reach $170 million in forfeited tax revenue.Because of the size of the 421a tax break for Atlantic Yards, we ask that the money previously set aside for land acquisition aid--$100 million from the City and $100 million from the State—be withheld. This $200 million should not have been allocated in the first place—there is no justification for the government to subsidize a developer’s bottom line—and now, with this latest development, any distribution of this money is inexcusable.
Note that city officials told the Times that the tax break could be worth $300 million.
Posted by amy at 11:15 AM
June 30, 2007
WBAI Radio on 421-A
WBAI
State Senator Liz Kreuger talks about the 421-A bill and its problems, including the Atlantic Yards exception. It comes about 15 minutes into the 6:00 news right after they have Michael Ratner talking about the new Gitmo decision. Which some might find ironical.
Posted by amy at 11:46 AM
GL Analysis: Fun with the 421-a Developer Tax Break
Gowanus Lounge
Not all the changes made in Albany by the special interests and others that attacked the 421-a developer tax break legislation are bad ones. We have always believed that the huge tax abatements that developers receive are a holdover from a 1970s/80s mentality of desperation that fail to reflect in any way, shape or form the reality of New York City--and, especially, Brooklyn, in the 2000s. The tax break both provides an unnecessary giveaway of taxpayer money to developers and affluent buyers, it can serve as a taxpayer-financed tool to promote displacement. Residents in some neighborhoods are, in effect, contributing their taxes to the buildings that will force them out and the affluent buyers who won't have to pay property taxes for years to come.One way to turn some of these lemons into lemonade, however, is to extend the exclusion zones that require developers to produce affordable housing in return for getting the tax breaks as widely as possible. For the Bloomberg Administration to object to the expansion of the exclusion zones pushes the limits of credulity. There are things in the bill to object to (keep reading), but the bigger exclusion zones are to be applauded. If you're not going to kill the developer welfare turkey known as 421-a, affordable housing should be a minimum requirement in every building anywhere in the city that gets one of these generous tax breaks. Failing that, the exclusion zones should be as big as possible. If anything, the bill in Albany still doesn't go far enough in adding gentrifying neighborhoods to the exclusion list. If the Bloomberg Administration succeeds in killing the added exclusion zones, it will be just as scandalous as the special tax breaks that Atlantic Yards supporters got written into the law.
Posted by amy at 11:37 AM
Bloomy slams “Ratner carve-out”
The Brooklyn Paper
By Ariella Cohen
Bruce Ratner “doesn’t need” the massive public subsidy handed to him by the state Assembly last week, Mayor Bloomberg said on Friday — and called for Gov. Spitzer to block the legislation.In slamming the Assembly handout — which the mayor estimated would cost taxpayers $300 million, not the $175 million originally estimated by government watchdogs — Bloomberg has joined the chorus of advocates, legislators and Atlantic Yards opponents condemning the amendment that would give special treatment to the mega-developer.
“[The bill is] going to hurt the very people that everybody talks about helping and gives some tax breaks to a developer that doesn’t need them and which we didn’t have to do,” Bloomberg said on his weekly WABC radio show on Friday morning.
...
Bloomberg has been an outspoken supporter of the $4-billion residential, arena, office and retail complex. His criticism of the subsidy handout is the first time he has publicly opposed a proposed tax break for the powerful developer, a former city bureaucrat and a college buddy of former Gov. George Pataki.
More coverage from Atlantic Yards Report: Bloomberg calls for 421-a veto, says Ratner "doesn't need" tax break
Posted by amy at 11:31 AM
358 Grove, Bushwick gentrification battles, and the 421-a map
Atlantic Yards Report
If you want an example of a development that probably pushed Assemblyman Vito Lopez to add all of Bushwick to the "exclusion zone" where affordable housing would be required in exchange for the 421-a tax break, look no farther than 358 Grove, a much-hyped 14-story condo tower. The building also serves as the jumping off point for a Village Voice investigation this week into landlords unscrupulously pushing gentrification in Bushwick.In promoting 358 Grove, the developer generally plays down its location. The image at right, for example, comes from the Halstead web listing, which states "358 Grove is located in one of Brooklyn's fastest growing neighborhoods; just one block from the L train and 15 minutes into Union Square Station."
...
The Prospect Heights/Crown Heights area, as Brooklyn College sociologist Aviva Zeltzer-Zubida pointed out, is ripe for displacement. Maybe that's why Lopez's bill, however flawed, extended the 421-a exclusion zone to Crown Heights. His argument was the public should not, as with 358 Grove, subsidize luxury development without getting something in return.The new 421-a map certainly does not, as the Observer suggests, represent the best balance to nudge the housing market along. Then again, the City Council reform, with a more modest "exclusion zone," isn't necessarily the solution.
Posted by amy at 11:21 AM
June 29, 2007
PRESS RELEASE:
Former Congressman Calls For Resignation of Brooklyn Democratic Party Leader
"The unholy alliance of money and political power can no longer be supported."
Brooklyn, NY – Former Congressman Major R. Owens today called for New York State Assemblymember Vito Lopez to resign as Chairman of the Kings County Democratic Committee, Brooklyn's Democratic Party organization, or resign from the Assembly – where Lopez has seniority and a significant chairmanship.
Owens, in conjunction with his, son, Chris Owens, President of New Brooklyn Leadership, issued a statement, entitled "Veto Vito," attacking recent actions by Lopez regarding state housing legislation and a judicial campaign in Brooklyn. The younger Owens joined with approximately 30 people in a demonstration outside of the Kings County Democratic Party's annual dinner on Thursday, June 28 to call attention to Assemblymember Lopez's actions and their implications.
In addition to demanding Lopez' resignation, the Owens statement specifically calls upon Governor Spitzer to veto the housing legislation, for Civil Court Judge Shawndya Simpson to voluntarily terminate her candidacy for the Surrogate Court position, and for legislation that bars public elected officials from holding significant party positions.
Last week, Lopez, who chairs the State Assembly's Housing Committee, orchestrated last-minute passage of a modified version of an affordable housing bill that included a windfall provision for developer Forest City Ratner's controversial Atlantic Yards project.
Lopez is also suddenly supporting a candidate for Surrogate Court judge who has little experience on the bench and has little support from local leaders, but has a large campaign warchest. Judge Simpson is now challenging Judge Diana Johnson, who has eight times as much experience as Simpson – but less money -- for the Surrogate Court seat left vacant by the resignation of the ethically-challenged Frank Seddio earlier this year.
Judge Johnson, who narrowly lost a Surrogate Court primary election in 2005, has the support of Major Owens, Chris Owens, approximately 90 percent of Brooklyn's Black elected officials, and the "reform" Democratic organizations -- Central Brooklyn Independent Democrats (CBID), the Independent Neighborhood Democrats (IND), and the Lambda Independent Democrats of Brooklyn (LID), amongst others. In addition, endorsements of Johnson have been received from many other Brooklyn political organizations.
The Owens statement links Lopez's actions as "cynical," "oppressive" and examples of the "unholy alliance of money and political power" that can no longer be supported. "If we change the institutional dynamics, we can change the politics of our county and City – and it needs to happen."
The full Owens statement is available at http://campaignwindow.com/stopvitohttp://campaignwindow.com/stopvito.
Posted by lumi at 2:17 PM
Yassky and James protest "egregious" Atlantic Yards carve-out
From City Councilman David Yassky latest e-newsletter:
Last December I was delighted when the City Council passed a version of my bill to limit unjustified subsidies for developers (the 421a program). This week, unfortunately, Albany passed their own version of this legislation which included an earmark provision with special tax breaks for the Atlantic Yards project. This is estimated to cost taxpayers $100-$170 million. In response to this egregious exception, Council Member James and I sent a letter to the Mayor and Governor asking them to withhold $200 million in land-acquisition aid that was promised by the City and State. Click here to view that letter.
Posted by lumi at 1:11 PM
Who dunnit?
There are three theories about who is responsible for the Ratner clause, which created a special loophole for the sole benefit of Forest City and its Atlantic Yards development plan in the State's 421-a reform bill.
VITO?
The prevailing wisdom during the past week was that it was State Assemblyman Vito Lopez's fault. Lopez is the Chairman of the Assembly's Housing Committee, which drafted the bill, is a project supporter, and has received campaign contributions from Bruce Ratner's brother and sister-in-law.
What the apparent contradictions in the bill represent are a series of horse trades that Mr. Lopez, a loping giant of a man who carries power like a running back headed to the end zone, brokered with fellow legislators.
SPINOLA & THE SENATORS?
Todays' NY Times advances a separate theory, which fingers the State Senate and the head of the Real Estate Board of NY (REBNY):
But many advocates, city officials and even some Senate Republicans are saying that Steven Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, betrayed the city’s effort. By all accounts, Mr. Spinola, the leading industry lobbyist, played a major role in negotiating the compromises and the tax deals for Atlantic Yards and other developments that led to Senate approval.
"SHILLY" SILVER?
There's a third theory that starts with Lopez and leads to Sheldon Silver's office. This week's Brooklyn Paper explains:
Lopez’s motivations for slipping in the Ratner-favoring clause are unclear. One source said that the Brooklyn Democratic Party boss might have done it as a favor to Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver. “Silver and [Forest City Ratner lobbyist] Bruce Bender are old friends,” said the source.
The exception is so outrageous that no one seems to have the guts to stand up and take credit.
Taxpayers are sadly used to Albany backroom dealing, only the difference here is that no one seems to know in which backroom the deal was struck.
Posted by lumi at 12:43 PM
Bruce boost: Assemblyman gives Ratner a clause for celebration
The Brooklyn Paper
By Ariella Cohen
Bruce Ratner’s sweetheart deal got a cherry on top last week after a state lawmaker slipped in a last-minute amendment to a housing reform bill that will shave $175 million off the developer’s costs.
The so-called “Ratner carve-out” was slipped into a tax-break bill passed by the Assembly last Friday, in the rush to close the legislative session. The amendment didn’t mention Ratner’s development by name, but referred to it as a “multi-phase project that includes at least 2,500 dwelling units and is being implemented pursuant to a General Project Plan” — a description that fits only one development in the state: Atlantic Yards.
The full article has quotes from politicians who are stunned, and affordable housing advocates who are speaking out. As for Marty, Vito, and Bruce, they had no comment.
City Councilman David Yassky wants NY City to rescind its direct cash contribution. State Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries is asking the Governor to veto the bill.
You can guess what Ratner thinks about the bill:
Ratner has been lobbying the legislature for several years, state records show, and has, in fact, been banking on the exemption.
A consultant report commissioned by the developer last year showed that Ratner’s cash flow projections assumed the state would grant him the 25-year tax break on all 16 Yards towers.
The “carve out” will also allow Ratner’s project to charge more for his “affordable” units than other developers who receive the tax credit.
Posted by lumi at 12:24 PM
The Ratner Clause
The Brooklyn Paper, publishes the first editorial that dares to mention the Atlantic Yards exception to the 421-a reform bill:
So how bad is the latest handout to Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner?
The punch line to this joke is as long as your arm:
It is a handout to only one developer.
It allows Ratner to charge more for units that he designates as affordable.... So now Ratner is not only picking taxpayers’ pockets, he’s making the lower middle class pay more — while the most needy are locked out altogether.
It reveals the worst excesses of our insider-run, morally corrupt legislature in Albany.
It comes on the heels of hundreds of millions of dollars in handouts that line Ratner’s pocket.
Brooklyn Papers asks:
Will the government’s bailout of Ratner ever end?
That might be a joke too, only it's not funny.
Posted by lumi at 12:18 PM
Grinding Sausage Late at Night: Albany Reforms 421a Program
The NY Observer
Real estate reporter Matthew Schuerman tries to sort through the mess that resulted in a 421-a reform bill that managed to piss off nearly everyone, except Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner:
Finally, four days before the Assembly adjourned on June 22, [Vito Lopez, the head of the State Assembly’s Housing Committee] submitted a compromise bill. It had grown from two pages to 19, and outlined a dizzying array of mind-twisters.
Real-estate developers of the future will find it cheaper to build market-rate housing in Riverdale, for example, than in East New York. A middle-class village that the Mayor envisioned for Queens West will get no help from the taxman, while full-amenity condominiums in Tribeca will, as long as they get into the ground in the next 12 months.
...
One provision permits Atlantic Yards, a 22-acre development in central Brooklyn, to receive tax abatements on all of its residential buildings so long as the overall percentage of low-income apartments in the proposed 6,400-unit complex reaches 20 percent. Steve Spinola, the president of REBNY, said that he advocated in favor of the clause because it was similar to a recent rezoning in Greenpoint-Williamsburg which allowed developers to put the low-income units in a separate but adjacent building and still receive the tax break.
Vito Lopez, who has been ducking the press for days, finally speaks:
Mr. Lopez defended the carve-out because the Atlantic Yards complex devotes an unusually large proportion of its units—about 35 percent—to low- and middle-income apartments. But the City Council legislation would have forced the developer, Forest City Ratner, to pay full taxes on the condominium buildings that were entirely market-rate.
Brad Lander, the director of the Pratt Center for Community Development, calculates, based on conservative estimates, that Forest City will save more than $100 million as a result of the State Legislature’s actions.
Posted by lumi at 11:34 AM
City’s Plans for Housing Flop in Albany
The NY Times
By Charles Bagli
The real estate reporter for The Times explains how the Ratner clause contributed to sidetracking a carefully negotiated reform bill:
The bill looked like a shoo-in to pass.
After nearly a year of painstaking analysis and tough negotiations, the Bloomberg administration, the City Council, housing advocates, lenders and real estate developers had hashed out a measure intended to revamp a popular tax-break program so it would generate more relatively affordable housing while restricting subsidies to luxury high-rises like Trump World Tower. It was all done with a minimum of grousing.
Then the bill governing what is known as the 421-a program went to Albany. And suddenly, on the Legislature’s last day in session last week, an amended version passed both houses, extending special tax breaks to the Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn and scuttling the city’s efforts to build middle-class housing at Queens West on the East River and other areas. Critics say it could also undermine efforts to build apartments for residents of the city’s most impoverished neighborhoods.
Most are blaming things on State Assemblyman Vito Lopez, but now some fingers are pointing at the Senate version:
But many advocates, city officials and even some Senate Republicans are saying that Steven Spinola, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, betrayed the city’s effort. By all accounts, Mr. Spinola, the leading industry lobbyist, played a major role in negotiating the compromises and the tax deals for Atlantic Yards and other developments that led to Senate approval.
...
But the bill would also provide what the city estimates are an additional $300 million in tax breaks for the vast Atlantic Yards complex being developed by Forest City Ratner Companies, the development partner with The New York Times Company in the Times’ new Midtown headquarters, without getting any additional affordable units in return. Mr. Lopez said it was a concession sought during negotiations with Mr. Spinola and the Senate over his bill.
Atlantic Yards Report, City says "Atlantic Yards carve-out" worth $300 million; will Spitzer veto?
Norman Oder highlights Bagli's reporting that the city claims that the special Atlantic Yards exception will cost the city around $300 million, a figure that's higher than the estimated $100-to-$170 million-dollar figure provided by Brad Lander of the Pratt Center and quoted in last week's Daily News column by Juan Gonzalez.
Posted by lumi at 11:19 AM
REDRAWING THE 421-A FORMULA FOR TAX BREAKS AND HOUSING
City Limits breaks down the 421-a reform legislation just passed by the State Assembly, and offers this brief explanation of the Ratner clause:
One attention-getting feature of the legislation gives the already controversial Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn additional tax breaks. It also allows potential tenants who earn up to 70 percent of the Area Median Income (AMI) of $70,900 to apply for "affordable" units there (up from a proposed 60 percent); setting that rate also raises the rent amount that qualifies as “affordable." But Lopez said Monday that the Senate has yet to vote on this aspect.
Posted by lumi at 10:56 AM
Two Trees tries tower — again — on Water St.
The Brooklyn Paper
By Harry Cheadle
Dave Walentas is learning from Bruce.
For his second at-bat on Water St., he's added affordable housing, room for a school and a four-color glossy brochure with a pre-paid postcard for supporters!
Anticipating controversy, Two Trees has already begun a mass-mailing campaign in DUMBO and Brooklyn Heights, sending out a glossy, full-color pamphlet asking for support — much in the style of developer Bruce Ratner, who courted support for Atlantic Yards by sending out hundreds of thousands of such pamphlets.
The Two Trees mailer includes a pre-paid postcard petition in support of the project.
The petition is addressed to Councilman David Yassky. The Brooklyn Heights Democrat, who was criticized by some groups for not opposing the 2004 project fast enough, said this week that DUMBO does need a middle school, but not another gigantic development.
He called the mailings “a page from the Forest City Ratner playbook.”
NoLandGrab: It's amazing how developers think they are using the "Ratner playbook," when they are in fact only cribbing from a couple of pages. Unlike Walentas, Bruce Ratner would never overtly target a politician in a four-color brochure. Thor Equities chief Joseph Sitt similarly went after the NYC Planning Commish in the press, only to have to come up with another plan.
WWBD? Bruce would gets his political ducks in a row FIRST, send out brochures showing he has support (never "asking for support"), create a few astroturf groups to support the plan, sign up a powerful housing group, lop off one floor and "say he's been merciful."
Posted by lumi at 8:25 AM
June 27, 2007
421-a reform map
Though we generally focus on Atlantic Yards-related stuff, readers who have been closely following the 421-a reform bill, which contains the "Atlantic Yards exception" (aka Ratner clause), may want to follow up on today's news of Pratt Center's map, which illustrates the areas affected by the legislation passed by the State Assembly.
The Real Estate Observer, Introducing the Full-Color, Five-Borough Tax Break
The areas in maroon, rust and mustard (what a palette, lads!) will force residential developers to incorporate low-income housing into new buildings if they want to qualify for the popular tax-abatement program. (It can cut up to $200,000 off your tax bill.) The gray areas are places where developers can get 15 years or more of property-tax discounts even if they put up market-rate condos.
Atlantic Yards Report, The 421-a map emerges--shocker?
Several members of City Council wanted the so-called "exclusion zone" expanded citywide, and Assembly Housing Chairman Vito Lopez, who also chairs the Brooklyn Democratic Party, also wanted the zone expanded.
It's notable that Lopez did not expand the zone to middle-class neighborhoods in central Queens, southern Brooklyn, and Riverdale, where 421-a probably distorts the market. Clearly he was particularly concerned about the areas around his Bushwick/Williamsburg base.
As I wrote, I think it's a victory to have continued to expand the zone. Still, critics who point to the absence of transparency--on both the boundaries and the "Atlantic Yards carve-out"--deserve attention from Gov. Eliot Spitzer before he signs the bill. It's not too late to order a revamp.
Posted by lumi at 8:47 AM
June 26, 2007
Dear Governor Spitzer
Jo Anne Simon, 52nd Assembly District leader, penned a letter to Governor Eliot Spitzer, explaining why a reform-minded leader would hesitate to support Atlantic Yards, especially in light of the amendment to the 421-a reform bill.
From her letter (full text after the jump):
The last minute amendment to this bill (A. 9293) providing yet more sweetener for Atlantic Yards is totally beyond reason. You may recall meeting with me and my co-leader Alan Fleishman following a campaign appearance with former Governor Carey last summer. You were very gracious and listened closely to our concerns about the Atlantic Yards, many of which were rooted in what we viewed as bad public policy and the desperate need for public authority reform. Even ACORN, one of the biggest supporters of the Atlantic Yards project, has called this recent amendment bad public policy.
What’s wrong with the above amendment? It:
reduces the affordable housing by raising the percentage of the poverty line amount to be used in considering low income beyond that provided for in any other development in New York City;
all but ensures, as the developer has indicated, that as much as 10% of the affordable housing would be built off-site, further reducing the promised affordable housing benefits;
provides hundreds of millions of tax dollars for luxury housing beyond the $205 million that New York City Council recently approved ($100 million of which the developer testified would go to unspecified land acquisition costs, in addition to its anticipated costs if it successfully utilizes eminent domain to acquire other properties), and the hundreds of millions of dollars from state coffers;
will use $1.4 billion of low interest tax free bonds–sapping the market and foreclosing other, arguably more worthy, projects to create a density twice that of Battery Park City; and
it is the only project to which ESDC did not require changes when your administration took office.
Enough is enough. The legacy of Atlantic Yards will be one of fiscal and social irresponsibility.
Governor Spitzer can be reached by:
PHONE: 518-474-8390
EMAIL: http://161.11.121.121/govemail
SNAIL MAIL: Governor Eliot Spitzer, State Capitol, Albany, NY 12224
June 25, 2007
Governor Eliot Spitzer
State Capitol
Albany, NY 12224
Dear Governor Spitzer:
I support the expansion of the 421- a exclusionary zone beyond that agreed to by the New York City Council earlier this legislative year. Indeed, I testified to that effect at a hearing held by Assemblyman Vito Lopez in March of this year. I enclose a copy of my written statement for your review.
Nevertheless, the last minute amendment to this bill (A. 9293) providing yet more sweetener for Atlantic Yards is totally beyond reason. You may recall meeting with me and my co-leader Alan Fleishman following a campaign appearance with former Governor Carey last summer. You were very gracious and listened closely to our concerns about the Atlantic Yards, many of which were rooted in what we viewed as bad public policy and the desperate need for public authority reform. Even ACORN, one of the biggest supporters of the Atlantic Yards project, has called this recent amendment bad public policy.
What’s wrong with the above amendment? It:
reduces the affordable housing by raising the percentage of the poverty line amount to be used in considering low income beyond that provided for in any other development in New York City;
all but ensures, as the developer has indicated, that as much as 10% of the affordable housing would be built off-site, further reducing the promised affordable housing benefits;
provides hundreds of millions of tax dollars for luxury housing beyond the $205 million that New York City Council recently approved ($100 million of which the developer testified would go to unspecified land acquisition costs, in addition to its anticipated costs if it successfully utilizes eminent domain to acquire other properties), and the hundreds of millions of dollars from state coffers;
will use $1.4 billion of low interest tax free bonds–sapping the market and foreclosing other, arguably more worthy, projects to create a density twice that of Battery Park City; and
it is the only project to which ESDC did not require changes when your administration took office.
Enough is enough. The legacy of Atlantic Yards will be one of fiscal and social irresponsibility. The current public financing picture is so extreme that the State and City could pay for an arena, give it to the developer, and still save untold millions of dollars.
I strongly urge you to veto this bill. When the legislature returns, it can and should pass it the expansion of the 421-a program’s exclusionary zone without this boondoggle. The time for change in Albany is now. We need transparency and accountability, not back door deals at the public’s expense.
Very truly yours,
Jo Anne Simon
Posted by lumi at 9:28 AM
City Limits explains the 421-a changes
Atlantic Yards Report considers City Limit's examination of the 421-a reform bill that contained the exception for Atlantic Yards, dubbed "the Atlantic Yards carve-out."
There's no map (yet) of the exclusionary zones added to the 421-a reform legislation passed by the State Legislature last Thursday (but not yet signed by Governor Eliot Spitzer), but City Limits has a good article, headlined REDRAWING THE 421-A FORMULA FOR TAX BREAKS AND HOUSING, summarizing the law's multiple factors.
Along with the expansion of the zones where developers would be required to build affordable housing in exchange for a tax break, the bill features the notorious "Atlantic Yards carve-out" and, crucially for the real estate industry, an extension of the current law for six months--which should spark a frenzy of building, especially in Manhattan north of 96th Street and south of 14th Street, boundaries of the current exclusionary zone.
Posted by lumi at 8:45 AM
Downtown Change Continues, From 16 Court St. to Albee Square
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
In an editorial about real estate activity in Downtown Brooklyn, Dennis Holt contends:
The Atlantic Yards development is really several different projects, will be built like several projects, and should be known as several projects.
NoLandGrab: Holt's assertion is creative, but runs counter to the justification for the extraordinary exception for Atlantic Yards in the 421-a reform bill, passed by the State Assembly late last week.
This controversial exception, added to the bill by State Assemblyman and Chairman of the Brooklyn Democratic Party Vito Lopez in the last few days of the legislative session, allows for affordable housing to be calculated for the ENTIRE Atlantic Yards project in order to satisfy the 20% eligibility requirements for tax exemptions.
For any other development project in the State of NY, the percentage of affordable housing must be met for EACH building in order to qualify. Buildings such as those to be built in the first phase of Atlantic Yards, which will have little in the way of "affordable" units, would not qualify were it not for the special exception.
If, as Holt argues, the separate phases of Atlantic Yards should be considered as different projects, then shouldn't, at least, each phase be required to qualify individually for subsidies, instead of in aggregate, as the developer Forest City Ratner would prefer?
Holt is an ardent champion of Atlantic Yards, but on this point, developer Bruce Ratner probably would prefer that the chatty editorialist keep quiet.
Posted by lumi at 6:29 AM
June 25, 2007
Development Tax Break Bill Faces Calls for Veto
NY Sun
By Eliot Brown
Atlantic Yards critics are not the only ones who are calling for Governor Spitzer to veto the 421-a reform bill, which included the Ratner clause, a unique exception to many of the reform proposals intended to benefit Bruce Ratner's Atlantic Yards development plan by carving out the project area from the exclusion zone, providing tax exemptions for buildings that do not include affordable housing, and hitting low-income tenants with higher rents.
Much of the flurry of criticism has been directed at the bill’s primary architect, Assemblyman Vito Lopez, a Williamsburg Democrat who chairs the Assembly’s housing committee.
...
But in ceding ground to the real estate industry, Mr. Lopez said he created an exception for the $4 billion Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn, a move that has infuriated a base of affordable housing advocates who would likely have come out supporting the bill.Instead, they have attacked the exception, which extends the tax break to the entire 6,000-unit complex — only part of it would have qualified under the council’s bill — though the overall income requirements for the complex were reduced.
Others who are criticizing the bill include supporters of New York City's version of 421-a reform.
NoLandGrab: Caveat.
Overall, income requirements were "reduced" in the bill at large, but the reduction does not apply to Atlantic Yards.
According to the Ratner clause, the income requirements are capped above those in the overall bill, and match the requirements the developer and ACORN already proposed. Ratner gets to average 70% AMI while all other developers are capped at 60% AMI.
It wouldn't be a surprise if, behind the scenes, other developers were quietly working to encourage Spitzer to eliminate the special exception for Atlantic Yards.
Posted by lumi at 11:23 AM
June 24, 2007
Critics Say Affordable Housing Bill Amounts To Sweetheart Deal For Ratner
NY1
The 421-a Ratner clause passed by the New York Legislature turns potentially good reform into something bad.
On paper, it seems like it has good intentions: a measure to greatly expand a law giving tax breaks to developers who build housing for low income and working class New Yorker City residents, but critics say beware the fine print.
"In addition to broadly creating more affordable housing around the city, the bill contains sub paragraph 13, which says for the Atlantic Yards project that Forest City Ratner is developing, even the market rate buildings can get a tax break, and our estimates are that could be a tax giveaway of as much as $100 million,” says Brad Lander of the Pratt Center for Community Development.
That’s $100 million dollars on top of $300 million in direct city and state subsidies, plus another $1.4 billion in tax exempt bonds Ratner is expected to seek to finance his mega project, which calls for 16 high-rise residential and office towers, plus a new arena for the Nets Basketball team in Prospect Heights.
NoLandGrab: You don't really need to be a critic of Atlantic Yards to see what's wrong here. The Sweetheart Deal (can't you just smell the pork?) is simply a matter of fact.
Posted by steve at 7:32 AM
Jeffries Turns on Atlantic Yards
The New York Observer
Matthew Schuerman gives his take on Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries' position on the 421-a Ratner clause.
Hakeem Jeffries, the freshman Assembly Member, was once accused of being a toady for the developer of Atlantic Yards, Forest City Ratner. But he had gradually become more critical, and the last minute carve-out in the 421a housing incentive bill that The Observer reported on Wednesday made him fairly seethe at the project's cost to taxpayers.
Posted by steve at 7:21 AM
Hakeem Jeffries explains his 421-a vote
Atlantic Yards Report
Here's some clarification on Hakeem Jeffries' position on the 421-a Ratner clause. He was in favor of the 421-a reform, but voted against a chapter amendment in order to reject the exemptions for Atlantic Yards.
Assemblyman Jeffries did not get the opportunity to vote on 4408-A since he was in the district that morning attending graduations for P.S. 11 and P.S. 20, and serving as the keynote graduation speaker for P.S. 9 and M.S. 353. He returned to Albany that afternoon, but the vote had already taken place. Assemblyman Jeffries supports the bill since it dramatically expands the 421-A affordability requirements to low and middle-income neighborhoods throughout New York City.
On Friday, June 22, a chapter amendment, A.9293, that clarifies the Atlantic Yards 421-A carve-out provisions, came to the floor. Assemblyman Jeffries voted against this bill, and was joined by at least two colleagues from Brooklyn, Joan Millman and Rhoda Jacobs. He could not support a bill that related solely to treating the Atlantic Yards project in a more favorable way than any other development in New York City, without justification.
Posted by steve at 7:07 AM
Spitzer and Legislature Sprint to Finish Line
The New York Times
The Times includes Assemblyman Vito J. Lopez's 421-a Ratner clause in its coverage of the end of the legislative session.
Under current plans, the 16 Atlantic Yards buildings are to include 2,250 subsidized rental apartments among more than 6,000 condominium and rental units. Several of the buildings contain no subsidized housing at all, but Mr. Lopez’s bill would allow those buildings to qualify for the tax break so long as the overall complex contains 20 percent subsidized housing. It also would allow Forest City to offer some subsidized apartments to families with higher incomes than would otherwise qualify under the new law. Together, the changes have drawn concern from some housing advocates and city officials. But the Senate approved the measure on Thursday night.
“The city contemplated whether it needed to do this and concluded that it did not, that Atlantic Yards should get a tax break for a building that has 20 percent affordable, but that the condo buildings should pay property taxes,” said Brad Lander, director of the Pratt Center for Community Development. “It achieves no additional affordability at Atlantic Yards but costs the taxpayers $100 million.”
Posted by steve at 6:48 AM
June 23, 2007
Tell the Governor - Veto 421a
Tell Governor Spitzer that the 421-a property tax exemption reform bill is unacceptable in its present form:
A special provision would grant Forest City Ratner a property tax exemption for all of the market rate condominiums in Atlantic Yards—a break that could total up to $170 million in lost tax revenue for the city. No other developer or project is allowed to receive this lucrative tax break unless they include 20% affordable housing in each building constructed. Furthermore, the special provision allows Forest City Ratner to charge higher rents for its “affordable” units. This exclusive benefit is in addition to the developer’s request for an extraordinary $1.4 billion in tax-free housing subsidies.
Contact Governor Spitzer.
Call: 518-474-8390
or
Email: http://161.11.121.121/govemail
Posted by steve at 10:23 AM
"Horrendous" Pork in Albany!
Gothamist
The Gothamist includes reaction to the 421-a Ratner clause as part of a post-legistlative session round-up:
One bill that did pass was a revision of the 421-a tax break. The bill expanded the areas where builders must offer 20% of its apartments as affordable housing in order to get a tax break, but it turns out that the Atlantic Yards project is getting a deal and we think it goes something like this: The entire complex's housing stock will be taken into consideration, versus looking at it on a building by building basis, so some buildings won't have affordable housing in them, and the average affordable income number will be raised, offering the units to "higher-income" families who need affordable housing. The Daily News' Juan Gonzalez has a withering column about it.
Posted by steve at 10:05 AM
Assemblyman Jeffries Votes “No” Against Atlantic Yards
Press Statement from Assemblyman Jeffries
Assemblyman Jeffries Votes “No” Against Atlantic Yards 421-a Carve-out Provisions
Assemblyman Jeffries today voted “No” on A.9293, legislation introduced by Vito Lopez that would treat the controversial Atlantic Yards project more favorably than other developments as it relates to the 421-a tax abatement program.
“The Atlantic Yards project has feasted on government funds for far too long. Enough is enough. There is absolutely no justification for treating Atlantic Yards better than any other development project in New York, when Forest City Ratner has already received $300 million in government subsidies.”
Joining Assemblyman Jeffries in voting against the bill is Assemblywoman Joan Millman, who represents the neighboring assembly district. The legislation passed 105-6 on the floor of the Assembly. It will now be sent to the Senate for consideration.
Assemblyman Jeffries (D-Brooklyn) represents Prospect Heights (the site of the Atlantic Yards project), Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, parts of Crown Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant.
Contact: Daisy James
(917) 640-0280
assemblymanjeffries@yahoo.com
Posted by steve at 8:46 AM
June 22, 2007
Ratner sticks low-income renters with bill for Atlantic Yards
One detail about the Atlantic Yards exception that most bloggers and reporters are overlooking will likely eventually generate considerable outrage.
Atlantic Yards "affordable" housing isn't just going to cost taxpayers more money than other developments that qualify under the 421-a program. It will hit lower-income tenants in the pocketbook as well!
The very people who are supposed to benefit from 421-a reform will get to kick in a higher percentage of their income toward rent, just for the privilege of living at Atlantic Yards. In the most simple terms, Ratner will get to make more off the poor than all other developers receiving the same tax breaks.
The only voices in the media that have even tried to tackle this issue are Norman Oder, in his first post on Atlantic Yards Report, and Brad Lander, in Juan Gonzalez's Daily News column.
Oder does a great job of overexplaining it (we've already complained):
But how could Atlantic Yards have 20 percent of its units affordable to families earning 70 percent of AMI [Area Media Income]? As currently configured, Atlantic Yards would have 4500 rentals, with 20 percent of them low-income, up to 50 percent of AMI, and perhaps another 5 percent up to 70 percent of AMI. But the 1730 market-rate condos, and 200 affordable for-sale units, would skew the balance upward.
So the project, and the bill, may undergo some adjustment, but one way of meeting the new goal would be to rent apartments to tenants whose incomes are 70 percent of AMI but to charge them more. The bill states that “the rent for such units does not exceed thirty percent of eighty percent of the area median incomes adjusted for family size.”
Translation. If you earn 70 percent of AMI, you might get an apartment, but you'd have to pay rent as if you earned 80 percent of AMI.
Lander, a veteran affordable housing advocate, explains it more clearly in Gonzalez's column:
The special provision, says Brad Lander, director for the Pratt Center for Community Development, will let Ratner charge an average of more than $350 per month in additional rent for the "affordable units" in Atlantic Yards.
A cynical public has grown used to shrinking or non-existing benefits years after a project's completion, but to watch public benefits unravel even before a project has broken ground is surreal, and is an indictment of the total absence of effective political leadership where Atlantic Yards is concerned.
Without knowing the complete financial picture — financial projections have never been released, despite nearly $2 billion of public subsidy — one can only come to two conclusions:
1) Bruce Ratner is a greedy devil who would shake down his own mother for her bottom dollar, or
2) the financial viability of Atlantic Yards is so precarious that Ratner has to extract income in every conceivable manner, including jacking up the rent for the low-income housing even before a single unit is built.
Posted by lumi at 10:51 PM
It came from the Blogosphere...
Here's the PM roundup of today's blog coverage of the Ratner exception in the State's 421-a reform bill. We're still looking for someone who has something nice to say about it — you'll be the first to know.
The Real Deal, Economic segregation at Atlantic Yards?
The local real-estate industry blog calls it "economic segregation:"
Forest City will be able to put its 20 percent affordable housing anywhere in the 16-building complex and still receive tax abatements for market-rate condominiums. The exemption, therefore, opens the door for economic segregation at Atlantic Yards, since it will allow Forest City to build most of its buildings with market-rate units while designating some of them specifically for affordable housing.
Brownstoner, Outrage Mounting over Ratner's 421-a Carve-Out
The provision of the bill (which was approved yesterday) is so shocking that both Bertha Lewis of ACORN, which is contractually obligated to say nice things about the project, called it "bad public policy" and The Daily News, whose usual coverage of the project is limited to the shilling of Errol Lewis, ran an editorial this morning calling it "sick." The person to thank for the Ratner provision is Vito Lopez, who is the top dog on the State Assembly's Housing Committee. He slipped the wording in over the weekend, according to The Daily News. Hakeem Jeffries, who voted for the bill anyway, says he found out about the Ratner provision only the night before the vote. The Daily News editorial cites one estimate of the hand-out being worth as much as $270 million.
NoLandGrab: The Daily News piece was written by a columnist and wasn't, technically, an editorial.
Gotham Gazette, Doing Ratner’s Bidding
Gail Robinson sums up the Atlantic Yards exception in the State's 421-a reform bill:
People in government cannot seem to help themselves when it comes to doing favors for Bruce Ratner, developer of Atlantic Yards — whether it’s ousting members of community boards who don’t endorse the megaproject or upping the government subsidy for it.
Gumby Fresh, Tax And Rend
Have we now reached the tipping point where we see the entire ugly Atlantic Yards mess not as an intricately poised balance of various economic, social and political interests and more as a lumpy grab-bag of foul-smelling pork?
Posted by lumi at 9:41 PM
Atlantic Yards gets a deal so sweet it's sick
NY Daily News
Columnist Juan Gonzales spells out Ratner's latest "special" "secret" "sweetheart deal":
How special is it?
Over the weekend, Vito Lopez, the powerful Brooklyn Democrat who heads the state Assembly's Housing Committee, quietly inserted wording tailored for the Ratner project into a new state property tax exemption bill.
How sweet is the deal?
It's worth at least $100 million in real estate tax exemptions and possibly as much as $170 million for the market-rate condos Ratner plans to build on the site, one housing expert estimates. It also allows Atlantic Yards to charge hundreds of dollars more in rent per month for "affordable" units than any other other developer of similar housing.
How secret was the deal?
Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries (D-Brooklyn) says he did not learn of the provision until the eve of the vote, even though Atlantic Yards is located in his district. Bertha Lewis, the head of NY ACORN, says the same thing. ACORN has been a huge backer and partner of Ratner because of his promise to build 2,200 affordable units out of the proposed total of 6,400. But yesterday even Lewis branded this "special carve-out" for Atlantic Yards "bad public policy."
And that's on top of the enormous amount of subsidy already going Ratner's way:
The new tax exemptions are on top of the $300 million in direct subsidies that city and state officials have already showered on Atlantic Yards.
There's more coming. Ratner has applied for $1.4 billion in stateauthorized tax-exempt bonds to finance his 16 high-rise towers.
Yesterday, Norman Oder of Atlantic Yards Report explained that the special Atlantic Yards legislation would end up costing low-income tenants even more. Brad Lander elaborates in Gonzalez's column:
The special provision, says Brad Lander, director for the Pratt Center for Community Development, will let Ratner charge an average of more than $350 per month in additional rent for the "affordable units" in Atlantic Yards.
Lander also explains that taxpayers also lose, thus shrinking the public benefit:
Depending on the number of units, it could mean from $100 million to $170 million in lost real estate taxes to the city, Lander says.
Gonzalez concludes by pointing out that only Governor Spitzer can intervene.
Atlantic Yards Report, On 421-a: FCR won't comment, ACORN calls it "bad public policy," & Lopez gets cover
Norman Oder posts that Brad Lander's estimates beg some real official number crunching and notes that ACORN director Bertha Lewis's quote in Gonzalez's column marks "ACORN's first public criticism of the developer's machinations."
Posted by lumi at 8:48 AM
$100 million (?) for Ratner as Assembly passes 421-a bill
Atlantic Yards Report reports that the Times blog reports that the legislation passed:
HOW MUCH WILL THIS REALLY COST THE TAXPAYERS?
To the Times, Brad Lander of the Pratt Center for Community Development estimates that the tax break, which could exempt four buildings with condos from including onsite affordable housing. would cost taxpayers $100 million. (The other 12 Atlantic Yards towers would have mixed-income housing.)
That's just an estimate, however, and a closer accounting would be worthwhile. Developer Forest City Ratner saves by not having to provide another 380-plus units of very affordable housing. (The 1930 condos would have to be matched by 20 percent affordable housing.)
THERE'S MIXED-INCOME HOUISNG AND THERE'S ATLANTIC YARDS
There's another benefit for the developer. Condo owners won't have to share their buildings with their poorer brethren. The condo buildings at Atlantic Yards, like other ones under construction (or recently opened) in the Brooklyn "renaissance," are for one-class only. (That should help with pricing, right?)
Posted by lumi at 8:11 AM
How the 421-a reform is being tailored for Forest City Ratner
Atlantic Yards Report explains how:
The special clause for developer Forest City Ratner benefits the Atlantic Yards project in two ways (updated): 1) the obligation to provide 20 percent affordable units in the same building will be lifted and instead can be met in the aggregate 2) the obligation to provide 20 percent of the units at 60 percent of AMI will be changed so that the developer must provide 20 percent of the units at an average AMI of 70 percent, so as not to disturb the current plans for Atlantic Yards.
Norman Oder also proofreads the legislation (no idea if the mistakes made it into the final bill).
Atlantic Yards Special Legislation for Dummies:
1. Bruce Ratner will receive tax-exemption for the entire project, not just the buildings with "affordable" units.
2. Units to be rented to households whose income is 70%, instead of 60%, of the Area Median Income would be included in order to qualify the project for the tax exemption, so that Bruce's current plans to reap larger profits than other developers at the taxpayers' expense would not change.
Posted by lumi at 7:57 AM
It came from the Blogosphere...
Were's still looking for a blogger who thinks that it's a good idea to give a special bonus to Bruce Ratner, in a reform bill, that will not only reduce the benefit to the public, but also cost more to the low-income tenants.
We'll keep looking. Meanwhile, here's what they're saying:
The Gowanus Lounge, Atlantic Yards to Get Custom-Made Developer Tax Break?
We believe the 421-a program is a tax giveaway to the wealthy that should have been killed off and that the reforms, while worthwhile, are the equivalent of rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. That being said, it's fascinating to see an Atlantic Yards Exception actually being written into law.
City Room, A Special Break for Atlantic Yards
Extraordinary special reward bonus-exceptions for Ratner in a major housing subsidy-reform bill isn't newsy enough to make the Times, but reporter Nicholas Confessore posted an item on the paper's latest blog:
That allows the developer to get the tax abatement even on the four buildings that include no subsidized housing. The provision would also allow set the Atlantic Yards’ area median income level at 70 percent instead of 60, again averaged out over all the buildings. That allows the developer to maintain the existing distribution of subsidized housing in Atlantic Yards, which is skewed to a somewhat higher income range than buildings that traditionally qualify for the city’s program.
Assemblyman Vito J. Lopez, who runs the Housing Committee, said the developer, Forest City Ratner, had asked the Assembly to set the income requirement at 100 percent of area median income, and that the compromise they arrived at was 70.
NoLandGrab: Are we supposed to believe that Lopez, though spineless, isn't gutless?
The Politicker, Elsewhere: Bloomberg, Edwards, Spano
Yesterday, the Atlantic Yards Project special exemption made it into Politicker's daily political news roundup.
NoLandGrab: The joke in Ratnerville is "WWSD?" (What will Spitzer do?).
The Albany Project, Ratnerville Gets Sweet Tax Break in Bill To Eliminate Sweet Tax Breaks
here is a perfect illustration of... how we give sweet deals to those with enough money to buy a couple legislators to slip this stuff in. In an ironic twist, we are giving tax breaks to a billionaire real estate developer, and him alone, in a bill to eliminate tax breaks to billionaire real estate developers.
Nice work if you can get it...
...
As I and many others have been saying for quite some time now, everything wrong with New York City and New York State politics is represented in the Ratnerville project. Influence peddling, crony capitalism, back room deals, shady legislation, lack of any meaningful public participation, overt favoritism to monied interests - it's all there.
Posted by lumi at 7:56 AM
Give Us a Break!
From Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn:
What will reform-minded Governor Spitzer do with this bill? We say he should veto it until the inexcusable exclusive gift clause to Bruce Ratner is excised, or he should negotiate it out of the bill.
The 1,700 to 1,900 market rate condos Bruce Ratner intends to build in his Atlantic Yards project will pay no property taxes. This could lead to a loss of somewhere between $100 million to $190 million in tax revenue for New York City, while enabling the developer to sell his units at higher prices because buyers won't have to pay taxes. Bruce Ratner is the only developer in the newly described 421-a zones in the City to receive this huge benefit. Why? There is no answer--not from us, not from the developer and not from the Assemblymembers who wrote a special clause for Bruce Ratner into their reform bill.
...
We ask, why? All we know is that Forest City Ratner spent more on lobbying this past year than any other developer in the state.
NoLandGrab: Even more simply, the Ratner market-rate condo exception means less public benefit and more money for Ratner.
Posted by lumi at 7:40 AM
Would You Like Fries With That, Mr. Ratner?
When Dope on the Slope gets pissed, he turns to verse. Here's his homage to the latest Atlantic Yards revelation that Bruce Ratner is the exception to the rule when it comes to 421-a housing-subsidy reform:
All you 70s kids will remember this jingle well:
Two Albany patsies.
Special clause
lets us
cheat.
Prickless
minions
want no taxes. Accede. Bunk!Mmmmmm, mmmmm. That's 100% Grade-A privilege.
Over 1 Billion given away.
Posted by lumi at 6:50 AM
June 21, 2007
DDDB PRESS RELEASE:
Albany 421-a Reform Bill Hands One-of-a-Kind, Special Favors to Forest City Ratner
Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards Project Would Be The Only Project to Receive Tax Breaks for Luxury Condos Under Bill
Where Does the Favoritism and Backroom Dealing End?
BROOKLYN, NY— Bruce Ratner is about to join his own exclusive developer’s club, once again at taxpayer expense.
Forest City Ratner has often claimed that it’s not getting anything that any other developer can’t get. That was never the case, but now the development firm has positioned itself to get something that no other developer is getting.
Albany is creating a special loophole exclusively for Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project as part of its bill “reforming” the 421-a tax breaks for development originally enacted in 1971. With this special legislation Forest City Ratner’s market-rate luxury condominiums will be the only such units in the entire reform zone receiving the 421-a tax break, saving the developer untold millions.
“This is the cherry on top of all of the special treatment and sweetheart deals Forest City Ratner has been gifted for its Atlantic Yards project. This exclusive clause in the 421-a reform bill, benefiting Bruce Ratner alone, is an astounding example of absolute governmental favoritism, at odds with the very principles for which the reform bill is supposed to stand,” said Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn (DDDB) spokesman, Daniel Goldstein. “There is no valid justification for this favoritism, and clearly there has been an utter lack of transparency in the decision to award one developer a special corporate-welfare package. Is there any end to the favoritism and backroom dealing that consistently benefits Bruce Ratner? Will Governor Spitzer choose to allow passage of such backroom special dealing?”
The special clause within the reform bill does not specifically name the Atlantic Yards project but rather describes “a multi-phase project that includes at least 2,500 dwelling units and (i) being implemented pursuant to a General Project Plan adopted by the New York State Urban Development Corporation and approved by Public Authorities Control Board.” There is only one such project in the state fitting that description, and that’s Atlantic Yards. Forest City Ratner is also seeking an extraordinary $1.4 billion in government backed, tax-exempt housing bonds.
"There should be an immediate Independent Budget Office (IBO) evaluation of all of the financial and tax benefits flowing to Forest City Ratner for affordable housing to determine the cost per unit, how many units are being deferred from other areas of the city, and how many units this level of funding could provide if it were dispersed without favoritism," said former City Planning Commissioner and DDDB Advisory Board member Ron Shiffman.
On his Atlantic Yards Report, watchdog journalist Norman Oder wrote, “The final version of the bill apparently came down to two men in a room, Brooklyn Assemblyman Vito Lopez (and surrogates) and Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) executive Steve Spinola (ditto). And in those backroom negotiations emerged a nice plum for Forest City Ratner's Atlantic Yards project. (The lack of an obligation to build affordable housing in [Atlantic Yards] condo buildings adds to the developer's bottom line in multiple ways.)”
To make matters worse, this special legislation granting exclusive and extraordinary tax breaks to Forest City Ratner would force lower-income residents of the proposed Atlantic Yards subsidized “affordable” housing to shell out at least 35% of their incomes for rent. This runs completely counter to accepted standards for “affordable housing,” which typically involves a resident paying 30% of income towards rent – the very principle behind the “Atlantic Yards” housing deal negotiated privately between Forest City Ratner and ACORN.
“With all due respect to ACORN, it’s confounding that they are supporting this special benefit to Ratner, making a mockery of the very reform bill they fought so hard to push forward,” Goldstein said. “It makes no sense for ACORN to support tax breaks for luxury condos when that is precisely what the reform bill was supposed to eliminate. Also, ACORN and Forest City Ratner had promised that each Atlantic Yards building would be mixed affordable and market-rate, but that is another broken promise by Ratner that ACORN appears willing to overlook.”
On the Atlantic Yards Report Brad Lander, the director of the Pratt Center for Community Development and an appointee on the mayoral task force that recommended reforms last year, said, “There shouldn't be special side deals for particular developers. Buildings that include 20 percent affordable housing should get a tax break and all market-rate buildings should pay their taxes.”
On December 20, 2006, the City Council’s 421-a reform bill increased the Geographic Exclusion Area (GEA), in which developers would be required to build 20% affordable housing in exchange for the subsidy, extending it to Brownstone Brooklyn and including the proposed “Atlantic Yards” project site, among other locations. This bill, along with the forthcoming Albany bill, requires that each building include a percentage of affordable units in order to qualify for the lucrative tax breaks called “corporate welfare” by State Senator Liz Krueger in May. Only Bruce Ratner would receive the tax breaks for his mixed income buildings and his market rate buildings.
“It takes a special developer, with special lobbyists, to get special legislation. This exclusive ‘Ratner clause” benefits only Forest City Ratner’s bottom line, while keeping intact the exact breaks the bill was meant to eliminate,” DDDB’s Goldstein concluded.
Posted by lumi at 10:39 AM
Atlantic Yards is the exception in NY State's 421-a reform
It's GOVERNMENT GONE WILD in RATNERVILLE, folks!
This is the big news — late yesterday Atlantic Yards Report and The Real Estate Observer broke the story that NY State's 421-a reform bill had a gigantic exception for Bruce Ratner's controversial 22-acre, arena-and-16-high-rise Atlantic Yards plan.
WHAT'S IN A NAME?
Only the bill didn't call it "Bruce Ratner's controversial... Atlantic Yards plan." The official designation is:
"a multi-phase project that includes at least 2,500 dwelling units and (i) being implemented pursuant to a General Project Plan adopted by the New York State Urban Development Corporation and approved by Public Authorities Control Board.”
Norman Oder of Atlantic Yards Report concludes, "There’s only one such project that would qualify," and Matthew Schuerman of The Real Estate Observer notes, "to people who have been following the project in central Brooklyn, [that] can mean only one thing: Atlantic Yards."
HOW AFFORDABLE?
For a while now, behind the scenes, affordable housing advocates have voiced concerns that Atlantic Yards "affordable housing" would cost more to build than affordable housing created by other groups and developers. In addition, the housing subsidy pool has a volume cap set by the Federal Government. This cap has already been reached for 2007 by projects already in the pipeline. The concern is that Atlantic Yards will suck up the available financing in the future, precluding projects elsewhere in the city.
THE POOR PAY MORE
As if affordable-housing advocates didn't have enough to worry about, Norman Oder uncovers a dirty little secret buried in the 421-a reform bill: "affordable housing" at Atlantic Yards would cost more to the poor.
The bill states that “the rent for such units does not exceed thirty percent of eighty percent of the area median incomes adjusted for family size.”
Translation. If you earn 70 percent of AMI, you might get an apartment, but you'd have to pay rent as if you earned 80 percent of AMI.
One caveat:
Some of those numbers may change before the bill passes Thursday.
BIG QUALIFICATION LOOPHOLE
The State's reform bill has a loophole that would benefit Ratner. According to Matthew Schuerman's post:
In such “multi-phase projects,” according to the state bill, the whole development can qualify for the tax abatement so long as one-fifth of the apartments in the entire complex are affordable to people who make 80 percent of the area median income. (The AMI is roughly $70,000 for a family of four.) Under the City Council version, only those buildings that had affordable units in them would qualify, while developer Forest City Ratner would have had to pay full taxes on their condominium towers.
Therefore, Forest City may be able to qualify some of its market-rate buildings for the tax break and save itself millions of dollars.
COVERAGE:
Atlantic Yards Report, The Atlantic Yards gift slipped into the 421-a reform
The Real Estate Observer, 421a Bill Gives Special Treatment to Atlantic Yards
WHO'S RESPONSIBLE (OR NOT RESPONSIBLE, DEPENDING)? And if you're wondering how this happens and how you can get your own special exception to legislation, check out this morning's article on the political process, which include choice quotes from ACORN Director Bertha Lewis and Former Atlantic Yards Development Group President Jim Stuckey: Atlantic Yards Report, Two men in a room, no transparency, and a bonus for Forest City
The final version of the bill apparently came down to two men in a room, Brooklyn Assemblyman Vito Lopez (and surrogates) and Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) executive Steven Spinola (ditto), each deputized by the two men who control their respective legislative bodies, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno.
And in those backroom negotiations emerged a nice plum for Forest City Ratner's Atlantic Yards project. (The lack of an obligation to build affordable housing in AY condo buildings adds to the developer's bottom line in multiple ways.)
You had to know something was brewing when Jim Stuckey protested to much:
And, in a May 2005 City Council hearing, FCR executive Jim Stuckey stated: ...it qualifies for 421A tax abatements for residential projects. So, if anyone else, anybody, not us, any developer, developed on this site as of right, they would be entitled to 25 year tax abatements...
Puhleeze, since when does Forest City get treated as "any developer?"
STAND BY FOR MORE?
It remains to be seen if any of the daily newspapers pick up this story as the benefits of Atlantic Yards continue to unravel.
Posted by lumi at 8:50 AM
Six-month check: FCR's "initiatives" still murky, but parks funding's a fudge
Atlantic Yards Report
On the six-month anniversary of the Public Authorities Control Board's approval of Atlantic Yards, Norman Oder tries to check up on the status of the "additional community initiatives and enhanced housing program" which were wrested from developer Bruce Ratner during "last-minute negotiations."
PARK FUNDING?
When FCR pledged to "invest $3 million to improve existing parks in and around the project," the developer was overstating the case by calling it an "additional" initiative.
After I queried the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC), the agency confrimed that the sum includes the $1.25 million-plus announced in November to add a comfort station to the Dean Street playground, a partial mitigation for increased noise.
However, a mitigation neither constitutes an enhancement nor an initiative, especially since it surfaced more than a month earlier.
MISS BROOKLYN?
FCR announced a reduction to the height of the proposed Miss Brooklyn building, ensuring that no building at the site will be taller than the 512-foot Williamsburg Savings Bank.
What will be that building's revised height and square footage? That has yet to be finalized, according to the ESDC.
"AFFORDABLE" HOUSING?
FCR announced it will seek to build at least 200 affordable home-owner units on site rather than offsite, making them part of the proposed 6430 units of housing already approved.
When would they be built, and for what income brackets? How is that memorialized? Such details, the ESDC said, will be part of a funding agreement due within the next few weeks and later formalized in project documents before site acquisition.
BROOKLYN TECH?
And what about the "new 21st Century Brooklyn Tech High School"? Would Forest City have any option to acquire the existing Brooklyn Tech building? (Remember, according to the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, any plan to convert the current Brooklyn Tech is off the table.) The ESDC said only that the issue is under discussion.
Posted by lumi at 8:23 AM
State revision of 421-a "corporate welfare" subsidy repudiates Doctoroff’s “nothing gets built” warning
More catching up with Atlantic Yards Report: yesterday, Norman Oder posted a thorough (read: lengthy) article about State reform of the 421-a housing-subsidy program:
The New York State Legislature had to approve its own reform and legislators, as Crain’s New York Business reported yesterday, have apparently agreed on a bill demanding more from developers. The state revision, to be finalized on Thursday when the legislative session ends, apparently adds a dozen more outer-borough neighborhoods to the GEA.
...
Note that the affordable housing provided by the 421-a revision would go to families with household incomes up to 60% of Area Median Income, or $42,540. Most of the Atlantic Yards affordable units—1350, or 60%—would go to families above this level, as the affordability scenario has already been tweaked upward.
Read the full article to follow the progress of reform of the 421-a program.
Posted by lumi at 8:06 AM
June 16, 2007
HDC Provides $320 Million For Affordable Housing, $76 Million for Brooklyn
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
Linda Collins
$320 million in financing would be used to build or preserve 2,285 affordable apartments in 36 buildings in the Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens.
Fun with math! $320 million for 2,285 apartments = approx. $140,043 per apartment. Ratner is asking $1.4 billion for 2,250 units. This is approx. $622,222 per apartment. They must all have subzero refrigerators or something...
Posted by amy at 10:15 AM
June 12, 2007
The battle over Queens West: the developer, the process, and the income mix
Atlantic Yards Report
Are you struggling to follow the affordable housing debate over Atlantic Yards and how it relates to or infoms development of affordable housing across the city?
Norman Oder has been giving readers an ongoing crash course on the issue. Here's his latest installment:
The process behind a huge affordable housing development planned for Queens West, a 24-acre site the city plans to buy from the Port Authority, presents some interesting contrasts to Atlantic Yards, as well as some potential portents.
First, the city announced plans for the project without anointing a developer, though it has had "secret talks" (in the Times's phrase) about a sole-source process regarding a nonprofit arm of the powerful Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY).
Secondly, the city's initial plan for an all-subsidized project geared to moderate- and middle-income families was criticized for bypassing low-income families. Now the city is considering making 40 percent of the project market-rate.
It's another sign that the numbers behind an affordable housing project are constantly shifting; if costs (or pressures for profit) go up, something has to give, and it can be the amenities in the project or, most easily, the income mix, as has already occurred with Atlantic Yards.
Posted by lumi at 7:29 AM
June 11, 2007
The income mix for AY affordable units already changed; could it change again?
Atlantic Yards Report
The inaugural issue of City Limits Investigates, which focuses on affordable housing, points out that, with some construction costs rising 1% a month, a lack of cheap land, and limits on governmental contributions, Mayor Mike Bloomberg's New Housing Marketplace Plan may "never get to 165,000 units--or if it does, that the housing produced will not meet the most pressing needs."
Indeed, to get there, city housing officials acknowledge, the cost pressure "could change the complexion of the affordable housing they are delivering." (Or, perhaps, more funds must be sought from other sources, including borough presidents.)
Does that mean that the complexion of Atlantic Yards--the profile of the affordable units--might change? Maybe, but the important thing to realize is that it has changed already.
Norman Oder analyzes the Atlantic Yards affordable housing proposal, how it has already changed, and where there might still be wiggle-room:
The most stringent requirement is that 20% of the rentals go to low-income households earning under 50% of the AMI. Perhaps the upper income bound will be adjusted to 175% of AMI, which is permitted under city subsidy programs. Even though that would seem to violate the Housing MOU, it's hard to imagine that ACORN, which hasn't criticized delays in the project and other impediments to affordable housing, would raise a stink.
Still, if we don't have an inkling for Forest City Ratner's development fees, costs, and profits, it's hard to tell whether a tweaking of the income mix is needed to get the project built or just to drive the return FCR's parent company wants for its shareholders.
Posted by lumi at 10:19 AM
June 10, 2007
The moving target of affordable housing, and a borough president's boost
Atlantic Yards Report
Note that, despite Markowitz's fervor for the Atlantic Yards project, his budget is way too small to boost the project, more than one-third of which would be financed by scarce--at this point, too scarce--tax-exempt bonds.It might seem that nonprofit developers have the edge over for-profit developers because they don't have to deliver a return to shareholders. Indeed, for-profit developers are hardly clamoring to build projects that contain only affordable units.
Then again, for-profit developers often build mixed-income housing--as planned for Atlantic Yards--rather than 100% affordable housing. And for-profit developers might argue that nonprofit organizations would have trouble building at a site as complicated as the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's Vanderbilt Yard; indeed, the only competing bidder after Forest City Ratner had been anointed was another for-profit developer, Extell.
On the other hand, were Atlantic Yards footprint, or simply the Vanderbilt Yard, divided into several parcels, and different goals were set, for-profit and nonprofit developers might compete for different projects.
Posted by amy at 11:11 AM
June 6, 2007
Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn Press Release:
DOCUMENTS SHOW MORE THAN HALF OF THE FINANCING FOR FOREST CITY RATNER'S ATLANTIC YARDS PROJECT IS GOVERNMENT BACKED
Project Seeks At Least $1.4 Billion in Tax-Exempt Housing Bonds Gobbling Up Available Housing Funds From All Over New York City
BROOKLYN, NY— Atlantic Yards has always been sold as basically a privately funded project by its developer Forest City Ratner and government officials from Mayor Bloomberg to former Governor Pataki. The reality is that more than half of the project will be government backed.
Documents from lawsuits and elsewhere, uncovered and analyzed today by journalist Norman Oder on his Atlantic Yards Report, reveal that including a Ratner request for at least $1.4 billion in tax-exempt housing bonds, at least $637 million in tax-exempt arena bonds, at least $205 million direct cash subsidy from New York City and $100 million direct cash subsidy from New York State, at least $2.34 billion of the $4 billion project has government backing.
"Despite the developer's and government's claims to the contrary, we've always known that the taxpayer would shoulder the lion's share of the cost of Ratner's Atlantic Yards project; now it has been confirmed in government documents," said Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn spokesman Daniel Goldstein.
The trouble with Forest City Ratner’s extraordinary $1.4 billion housing bond request to New York City’s Housing Development Corporation (HDC), is that New York City is facing an enormous deficit in the tax-exempt bonding the developer is seeking. The impact this deficit will have on “affordable” housing development in New York City and in the Atlantic Yards project could be devastating. The delay in constructing affordable housing in Atlantic Yards that the deficit is likely to cause was also broken in a story on the Atlantic Yards Report today. On his blog, Mr. Oder wrote that on May 24, city Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) Commissioner Shaun Donovan drew a stark picture in his testimony in front of the House of Representatives’ Ways and Means Committee. Mr. Donovan said: “New York City is facing an immediate crisis in private activity bond volume cap, which we expect to deplete before the end of June. Without additional volume cap, 6,700 units of housing in our pipeline will not be built.”
Those 6,700 units precede the 2,250 “affordable” units promised for Ratner’s Atlantic Yards, involving $1.4 billion in scarce tax-exempt bonds. As Oder points out, neither the developer nor government officials revealed this total until after the project that was approved.
Former City Planning Commissioner Ron Shiffman said, “Forest City Ratner’s project, with already inflated construction costs, would suck up and take away so much funding from other affordable housing projects in New York City. It’s time for Mayor Bloomberg and Governor Spitzer to rethink the Atlantic Yards project, or the Mayor’s PlaNYC 2030 and the City’s housing goals will be seriously jeopardized for years to come even if the bonding volume cap is raised."
“Forest City Ratner would be getting at least $2.34 billion in taxpayer backed government assistance, which is more than half the price tag for Atlantic Yards. At the same time it is now starkly clear that Ratner’s project, with its overly expensive per unit construction costs, would hoard scarce housing subsidy resources from all over New York City,” Goldstein said. “If the project is not rethought, something will have to give, and it seems likely that something will either be massive delays in construction of affordable housing for Atlantic Yards or withdrawn funding for more streamlined affordable housing projects throughout the City.
Posted by lumi at 9:47 AM
Huge deficit in tax-exempt bonds suggests Atlantic Yards delay
Atlantic Yards Report
What are the implications of Bruce Ratner's attempt to finance over half of the Atlantic Yards project through tax-exempt bonds (see AYR, "Privately financed? Court documents finally specify the housing bonds behind Atlantic Yards funding") and why are government officials and affordable housing advocates concerned?
Atlantic Yards may have been approved by the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) and the Public Authorities Control Board (PACB) last December, but the project faces a significant hurdle over which the agencies had no control. Nor did they apparently consider it in their deliberations.
...
The city and state agencies that fund affordable housing are drastically oversubscribed with developers seeking to draw on a limited pool of tax-exempt bonds. Testifying on May 24, city Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) Commissioner Shaun Donovan drew a stark picture before the House of Representatives’ Ways and Means Committee:New York City is facing an immediate crisis in private activity bond volume cap, which we expect to deplete before the end of June. Without additional volume cap, 6,700 units of housing in our pipeline will not be built.
And those units precede the 2250 units promised for Atlantic Yards, involving $1.4 billion in bonds, a figure developer Forest City Ratner and government officials didn't reveal until after the project was approved.
Congress is considering proposals that would increase the “volume cap,” which limits the amount of bonds that can be authorized by state and city agencies around the country.
For now, a warning from Forest City Enterprises, parent of Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner, grows in importance. In its latest annual report, the developer acknowledged several factors contributing to potential “increased costs and delays to the project,” including “our inability to obtain tax exempt financing or the availability of financing generally.”
...
In the city’s pipeline alone, there’s $1.8 billion in projects, which precede the yet-unrequested $1.4 billion for Atlantic Yards. Given the scarcity of city funding for such developments, some affordable housing supporters have begun to express dismay that Atlantic Yards would suck up a significant portion of the pool.
Posted by lumi at 9:31 AM
June 5, 2007
The (non-inclusionary) Fourth Avenue rezoning, affordable housing, & CB 6
Atlantic Yards Report
Norman Oder analyzes the shifting political and public awareness for the need for affordable housing in NYC. Disappointment felt by politicians and affordable housing advocates in the wake of Brooklyn's Fourth Avenue rezoning may have affected the Greenpoint-Williamsburg rezoning, Forest City Ratner's deal with ACORN for Atlantic Yards and cleaning house at Community Board 6.
Posted by lumi at 9:10 AM
June 4, 2007
Would rising costs delay affordable housing? Ratner won't say
Atlantic Yards Report
From City Limits Investigates:
The development by Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC) is supposed to make 50 percent of its rental units affordable, but the first phase of project--scheduled for completion in 2010--is only required to designate 30 percent of the units that way. Members of Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn and City Councilmember Letitia James claim rising costs could postpone or derail the second phase of the project, which is due to end in 2016, thus endangering the unusually high affordable housing benefits that the construction promised to provide. Loren Riegelhaupt, a spokesman for FCRC, wrote in an email that he would not comment on "ridiculous speculation by opponents whose only goal is to stop the project."
CLI could have gone beyond the "opponents" and pointed out that much milder critics have questioned the promise, and representatives of the developer have given fuel to doubts.
Posted by lumi at 8:53 AM
May 30, 2007
Developmentalism in the Big Apple
Cost of living has skyrocketed in New York, but under fatcats Giuliani and Bloomberg, the working man’s wage has not
In These Times
By Steven Wishnia
NYC Mayor touts his program to build affordable housing, meanwhile more affordable units are leaving the system than are being built and real wages lag far behind.
Thirty years ago, you could easily find a one-bedroom apartment in a middle-class neighborhood in New York City for $150 a month. Today, it would cost more than $1,500—more than what Yankees slugger Reggie Jackson, then baseball’s highest-paid player, paid in 1977. His Fifth Avenue apartment with a balcony overlooking Central Park cost $1,466 a month. And the minimum wage hasn’t gone up to $27.82 an hour.
How we got to this point is the subject of Kim Moody’s From Welfare State to Real Estate: Regime Change in New York City, 1974 to the Present (The New Press). Moody analyzes how New York’s business elite exploited the ’70s fiscal crisis to destroy the city’s “social-democratic polity” and impose the neoliberal agenda that has dictated “restraint on social spending, privatization, deregulation, and most importantly, the reassertion of class power by the nation’s capitalist class.”
The result is a city where inequality has grown to extremes far beyond those in the rest of the country, where a small but growing cabal of the spectacularly rich uses government as a vending machine and lords it over a hollowed-out middle class and millions of low-paid, increasingly immigrant service workers.
Unlike many politicians, Moody hasn't fallen for the myth of "affordable" housing at Atlantic Yards:
Bloomberg has made some grand-sounding promises about building affordable housing, but Moody dissects the formulas used to determine what’s deemed “affordable.” Based on the median income for the metropolitan area, apartments that go for as much as $1,800 a month are classified as “middle income,” such as those in the planned Atlantic Yards sports arena/housing complex in Brooklyn.
Posted by lumi at 7:41 AM
May 28, 2007
St. Mary's Hospital is off the AY affordable housing block
Atlantic Yards Report
It was never a given, and the news is late, but it's worth noting that St. Mary's Hospital in Crown Heights no longer seems the likely home of affordable for-sale apartments connected to the Atlantic Yards project.
The 600 to 1000 affordable for-sale units are promised in the Memorandum of Understanding regarding housing signed in May 2005 by Forest City Ratner and the housing advocacy group ACORN. Unlike with the 2250 affordable rentals planned at the Atlantic Yards site, the plan has not been memorialized in any Empire State Development Corporation documents.
...
Forest City has not made any public statements recently about plans for the for-sale affordable units, which would be dependent on currently scarce public subsidies. Perhaps the developer has other sites in mind, or in hand. Perhaps it's prudent to wait.However, given FCR's deep pockets, and the relatively small cost for the acquisition (though not the renovation) of the hospital building, it would be interesting to learn why the developer passed on the opportunity.
Posted by lumi at 8:37 AM
May 25, 2007
Fighting the ravages of luxury towers
People's World Weekly
By Daniel Rubin
An article cautioning New Yorkers about the current luxury housing boom includes Atlantic Yards with a curious wrinkle in the narrative (emphasis added):
Billionaire developer Bruce Ratner plans to build the Atlantic Yards Project at the busiest intersection in Brooklyn. It would bring 17 towers, some up to 60 stories high, for housing, offices, a hotel and a basketball arena for 19,000. It would be the most densely populated complex in the United States.
A large community movement against it, supported by several African American progressive public officials, has fought for the last three years. As a result, 30 percent “affordable housing” (but possibly offsite) was promised. There would be 225 units available for those with incomes below the area median income of $28,800 for a family of four. But 3,000 families are expected to be displaced from the community as a result of the project, driving up rents and real estate taxes. The rest of the “affordable housing” goes up to $113, 400.
NoLandGrab: It would be more correct to say, "ACORN sided with the developer and announced a 50/50 affordable housing plan. Ratner soon added more luxury condos to the project, diluting the overall percentages to 30-percent 'affordable,' a majority of which would not be available to those making less than the Brooklyn median household income."
Posted by lumi at 6:48 AM
May 24, 2007
OK, B63 Reroute Plan Won't Happen as Announced
Brooklyn Downtown Star
By Norman Oder
Yup, you heard it right, public agencies are taking their orders from Atlantic Yards developer Bruce Ratner, that is, until people started asking questions. Norman Oder first broke this story on his blog, Atlantic Yards Report.
Last month, the Star reported plans by New York City Transit (NYCT) to revise service on the northbound B63 bus route in response to the demapping of Fifth Avenue between Flatbush and Atlantic avenues for the Atlantic Yards project. The change would happen "in the near future," according to NYCT's Lois Tendler. Because the street would be closed, Tendler said in a letter to Brooklyn Community Board 6, the bus would not continue to Atlantic and make a left to go downtown, but instead make a left on Flatbush. It was supposed to be implemented this Sunday, May 27.
Well, it's not happening this week, and from what officials have said so far, it seems that the transit agency was paying more attention to Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner than to other involved agencies.
Posted by lumi at 9:33 PM
May 22, 2007
CITY LIMITS INVESTIGATES HOUSING: HIGH COSTS INTERFERE WITH PLAN
In its inaugural issue, CLI examines how fiscal realities are shaping the city's affordable-housing buildout. This synopsis points to some of the ways new units' size, quality and genuine affordability could be affected.
By Jarret Murphy
This article was summarized in yesterday's edition of amNY (link and our comments here).
In December of 2002, when Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced his first affordable housing plan, the new Yankees and Mets stadiums existed only in the dreams of owners George Steinbrenner and Fred Wilpon. A walk along the Greenpoint-Williamsburg waterfront would show plenty of development potential – but no new high rise apartment buildings. The phrase "Atlantic Yards" had yet to enter the city's popular lexicon. And it wasn't until eight days after the mayor unveiled his five-year, $3 billion, 65,000-unit housing plan that the first designs for the Freedom Tower were released.
...affordable housing developers, designers, and analysts say that, coupled with swelling land prices, the rising cost of construction threatens the Bloomberg plan. "Construction costs are killing us," says Paul Freitag, an architect with Jonathan Rose Companies, a builder developing several affordable housing projects in Harlem and the Bronx. "I think it's particularly tough in the case of affordable housing where you're looking for public subsidies to fill the gap."
NoLandGrab: "Atlantic Yards" is not only entering the popular lexicon, it has become the prime example for nearly everything bad and bloated in the current wave of development in NYC.
Forest City is known in the industry as one of the few development companies that can wait out unfavorable market conditions. A large majority of Atlantic Yards's affordable housing component remains in Phase II of the development, making it vulnerable to substantial delays.
Posted by lumi at 9:28 AM
May 21, 2007
Can NYC afford affordable housing?
amNY
By Jarret Murphy
Paragraph 2:
Steep prices for materials, like steel, and fierce demand for building contractors, are pushing up construction costs by as much as 1 percent a month. Global forces like the growth of China and labor unrest in Chile have caused costs to climb, but New York's own development craze — from Ground Zero to Atlantic Yards to the new Mets and Yankees ballparks — is pushing up prices.
NoLandGrab: What are the implications for the projected cost of Atlantic Yards and its affordable housing component?
Posted by lumi at 8:08 AM
May 7, 2007
Columbia's Exceptionalism
Neighborhood Retail Alliance
Richard Lipsky borrows one of the many arguments against the controversial Atlantic Yards plan, for his attack on Columbia University's expansion plans.
What is clear, however, is that Columbia's aim to upscale the West Harlem neighborhood that it is looking to build in, will create an unstoppable gentrification wave that will sweep through the surrounding working class neighborhoods. That is, unless the mayor and his planning minions intervene to alter the university's monolithic, Columbia-centric vision.
NoLandGrab: Richard Lipsky is a consultant for Forest City Ratner and the development company's bid to build Atlantic Yards.
Posted by lumi at 8:14 AM
Tenants Fight McMansions, Challenging Landlords to Keep Their Homes
Brooklyn Rail
By Eleanor Bader
An article about tenants' fight to save their rent-stabilized aparment a block from Ratnerville notes that Atlantic Yards isn't making things easier for those living in rent-stabilized aparments:
Dave Powell, a tenant organizer at the Fifth Avenue Committee, already sees this happening and blames the increase in owner use cases on the city’s seemingly-endless real estate boom. “We’ve seen the rapid gentrification of Ft. Greene and Park Slope in the last 10 to 15 years and certainly Atlantic Yards is serving to exacerbate that. Rent Stabilization laws are supposed to act as a regulatory force against displacement and eviction,” he says. “The owner use provision was not meant for landlords to create mansions in tenements. I have no empathy for people who are trying to circumvent these laws and remove desperately needed apartments from the affordable housing stock.”
William Whalen of Municipal Employee Legal Services, a group that provides free legal representation to city workers unionized by District Counsel 37... says. “I’ve recently noticed a tremendous change in the nature of our practice. A few years back, landlords wanted their money. It was, ‘how much can you pay and when are you going to pay it?’ Now landlords no longer want the rent money. They want the tenan