Progressive Democrat Issue 41: NYC FOCUS
Once again I am amazed at how bad Bloomberg is for NYC and how development in NYC is being approached exclusively for the benefit of rich developers. Many Bloomberg apologists try to claim that either he has nothing to do with the horrible development plans that are sweeping NYC, or that the process is all open to the public and hence people MUST be happy with these development plans. But the truth is very different. The process is NOT an open one. Instead, community-developed plans are ignored and secret deals are made behind closed doors between representatives of Pataki and Bloomberg and Bruce Ratner.
Let’s start with an August 20, 2005 article in the Park Slope Paper (note: the link is a PDF). The lead paragraphs:
First of all, notice the first sentence: “a widely publicized agreement” signed by “top officials of the Pataki and Bloomberg administrations…” What about all those Bloomberg apologists who have in the past claimed that Bloomberg has nothing to do with these development plans? They claim that it is all just the “free market.” Well, apparently it isn’t. Republicans just sign deals with developers and that is that. We know from the maneuvering over the West Side Stadium and the Atlantic Yards project that rival bids that give more money to the city are often flat out ignored. Where is the “free market” in that? Again, Republican politicians sign a deal with a developer and that is that…until the public starts to get angry and organized or, as in the case of the stadium, a City Councilman gets pissed.
The second part of the above quote says that a SECOND agreement, was kept secret until a neighborhood group went through the Freedom of Information process. Here is the next sentence:
So, let’s summarize: representatives of Pataki and Bloomberg are SECRETLY signing over development rights covering our homes and businesses to a private developer without the full review required by law. This is colonialism! Our homes and businesses are being treated like colonial land to be secretly divided up among rich developers, sometimes without our knowledge and without proper review. I don’t know about anyone else, but I am not alright with this! It is NOT good for the community, it is NOT a public process and it is NOT free enterprise. To all Bloomberg apologists: your man is excluding the public from discussions of what to do with their own neighborhoods and he is not allowing the free market to work by going through a bidding process.
In a Daily Gotham diary I wrote regarding development in NYC, someone argued that the communities already have a way of directing development through a 197-a plan. This is something, written into the city charter, that allows, through a lengthy process, a community to define its own development goals. Hey! Great idea! But there is a problem. There is no enforcement mechanism, making the 197-a plan meaningless. For example, 197-a plans for Williamsburg and Greenpoint were ignored in recent development plans. And Bloomberg’s West Side Stadium plan completely ignored a stipulation in the community’s 197-a plan OPPOSING the stadium. Clearly Bloomberg is ready and willing to ignore community input regarding development even when people have gone through the official channels and filed a 197-a plan. A discussion of this can be found in the Livable Neighborhoods Report by the Municipal Art Society Planning Center (warning: the above link is another PDF).
So what’s my point? My point is NOT to be anti-development. Practically no one who weighs in on this issue is anti-development. Check out the website of Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn (the group that filed the freedom of information act that revealed the secret deal Ratner got from Pataki and Bloomberg). They offer a community generated development plan and economic studies comparing the plans. They, like myself, want development plans that take into account the needs of the communities—including infrastructure, traffic patterns, affordable housing, small businesses and jobs—rather than focusing on the needs of private developers and including token benefits to labor and communities just to minimize opposition. In the past Bloomberg apologists on this site have told me that Ratner’s plan is all about affordable housing. Well, they left out the fact that a.) the offered affordable housing was minimal until community opposition forced a compromise an, b.) there is no definition of what “affordable” means in the agreement, nor is there any enforcement. “Affordable” housing promises and promises of job creation seldom come to pass when a developer’s plan is completed. Affordable housing is either not that affordable or is only guaranteed for a short period of time (e.g. 5 years), after which the restrictions no longer apply. Job creation, especially by arena projects, and are almost never long term, almost never local, union jobs.
I do not oppose development. I oppose secret, back room deals that carve up our city so that developers can make a profit. I oppose the lack of fair bidding procedures. I oppose the exclusion of neighborhood groups in the early phases of the process. I oppose promises to the community that are never kept.
In another Daily Gotham diary I wrote on development I discuss in a more emotional way the “loss of Home,” the loss of community, that New York is going through thanks to Bloomberg’s large-scale development plans. (Note: in this diary I do something I DON’T do in the newsletter, which is plug a specific candidate. If any rivals or supporters of rivals to the candidate I plug want to have their say, I will give you equal time). New York is losing its uniqueness, losing its soul. Our small businesses are unique neighborhoods are not being developed, they are being replaced by malls, luxury housing and hotels, and giant skyscrapers. But worst of all, the process begins in a back room without even our knowledge, let alone our input. Community input only comes AFTER a developer has gotten his plan approved by Bloomberg, so communities are always REACTING to existing, signed plans that don’t have to go through the official channels. Notice that: if we go through the official channels and file a 197-a plan, it may get ignored. But the developers are OFFERED deals that avoid the official channels of bidding and community review.
What can we do? Here is where we need to build a coalition. Not JUST a coalition of neighborhood groups like Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, but a coalition that includes neighborhood groups, community leaders, labor and small business owners to stand up for our neighborhoods. We need to bring all of these groups together to initiate a dialogue on how to create a more "Livable NYC". Since we all need jobs AND livable neighborhoods with open space, good schools and adequate infrastructure, there is no reason why labor, small business groups and neighborhood groups can't come together and create a vision for the city to rival the unpleasant Bloomberg/Ratner vision that destroys neighborhoods, destroys small businesses and brings in mostly low paying, non-union jobs. I am working with a number of progressive groups and neighborhood organizers to create a Livable NYC Initiative that will allow communities to be more proactive, less reactive, and more united when facing secret done-deals that are cooked up by Pataki, Bloomberg and developers. Because let’s face it, even the affordable housing clauses and the promises of job creation are only included BECAUSE of the need to minimize community opposition. United we can defend NYC neighborhoods. But if we remain divided, Bloomberg, Pataki and developers can continue to carve up our neighborhoods in back room deals and our neighborhoods will no longer be ours.
We also need to focus on getting rid of Bloomberg and have a strong Public Advocate for NYC. So, I will not endorse. But I will STRONGLY urge everyone to work hard against Bloomberg and I would suggest taking a strong interest in the Public Advocate race. We have to stop the back room deals and the selling of our neighborhoods to rich developers.
Let’s start with an August 20, 2005 article in the Park Slope Paper (note: the link is a PDF). The lead paragraphs:
The same day they signed a widely publicized agreement setting aside land for developer Bruce Ratner’s proposed Atlantic Yards project, top officials of the Pataki and Bloomberg administrations signed a separate pact with the developer, granting him the right to build up adjacent urban renewal sites without city review.
That second agreement was never made public, but it turned up this week in the state’s response to a fairly broad Freedom of Information Act request made by a neighborhood group opposed to the Atlantic Yards plan.
First of all, notice the first sentence: “a widely publicized agreement” signed by “top officials of the Pataki and Bloomberg administrations…” What about all those Bloomberg apologists who have in the past claimed that Bloomberg has nothing to do with these development plans? They claim that it is all just the “free market.” Well, apparently it isn’t. Republicans just sign deals with developers and that is that. We know from the maneuvering over the West Side Stadium and the Atlantic Yards project that rival bids that give more money to the city are often flat out ignored. Where is the “free market” in that? Again, Republican politicians sign a deal with a developer and that is that…until the public starts to get angry and organized or, as in the case of the stadium, a City Councilman gets pissed.
The second part of the above quote says that a SECOND agreement, was kept secret until a neighborhood group went through the Freedom of Information process. Here is the next sentence:
The document stipulates that Ratner would be able to obtain the development rights to build nearly 1.9 million square feet of residential and commercial space on properties north and west of the Atlantic Avenue rail yards, exceeding the current zoning for those sites, without having to put the proposal through the city’s lengthy land use review process.
So, let’s summarize: representatives of Pataki and Bloomberg are SECRETLY signing over development rights covering our homes and businesses to a private developer without the full review required by law. This is colonialism! Our homes and businesses are being treated like colonial land to be secretly divided up among rich developers, sometimes without our knowledge and without proper review. I don’t know about anyone else, but I am not alright with this! It is NOT good for the community, it is NOT a public process and it is NOT free enterprise. To all Bloomberg apologists: your man is excluding the public from discussions of what to do with their own neighborhoods and he is not allowing the free market to work by going through a bidding process.
In a Daily Gotham diary I wrote regarding development in NYC, someone argued that the communities already have a way of directing development through a 197-a plan. This is something, written into the city charter, that allows, through a lengthy process, a community to define its own development goals. Hey! Great idea! But there is a problem. There is no enforcement mechanism, making the 197-a plan meaningless. For example, 197-a plans for Williamsburg and Greenpoint were ignored in recent development plans. And Bloomberg’s West Side Stadium plan completely ignored a stipulation in the community’s 197-a plan OPPOSING the stadium. Clearly Bloomberg is ready and willing to ignore community input regarding development even when people have gone through the official channels and filed a 197-a plan. A discussion of this can be found in the Livable Neighborhoods Report by the Municipal Art Society Planning Center (warning: the above link is another PDF).
So what’s my point? My point is NOT to be anti-development. Practically no one who weighs in on this issue is anti-development. Check out the website of Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn (the group that filed the freedom of information act that revealed the secret deal Ratner got from Pataki and Bloomberg). They offer a community generated development plan and economic studies comparing the plans. They, like myself, want development plans that take into account the needs of the communities—including infrastructure, traffic patterns, affordable housing, small businesses and jobs—rather than focusing on the needs of private developers and including token benefits to labor and communities just to minimize opposition. In the past Bloomberg apologists on this site have told me that Ratner’s plan is all about affordable housing. Well, they left out the fact that a.) the offered affordable housing was minimal until community opposition forced a compromise an, b.) there is no definition of what “affordable” means in the agreement, nor is there any enforcement. “Affordable” housing promises and promises of job creation seldom come to pass when a developer’s plan is completed. Affordable housing is either not that affordable or is only guaranteed for a short period of time (e.g. 5 years), after which the restrictions no longer apply. Job creation, especially by arena projects, and are almost never long term, almost never local, union jobs.
I do not oppose development. I oppose secret, back room deals that carve up our city so that developers can make a profit. I oppose the lack of fair bidding procedures. I oppose the exclusion of neighborhood groups in the early phases of the process. I oppose promises to the community that are never kept.
In another Daily Gotham diary I wrote on development I discuss in a more emotional way the “loss of Home,” the loss of community, that New York is going through thanks to Bloomberg’s large-scale development plans. (Note: in this diary I do something I DON’T do in the newsletter, which is plug a specific candidate. If any rivals or supporters of rivals to the candidate I plug want to have their say, I will give you equal time). New York is losing its uniqueness, losing its soul. Our small businesses are unique neighborhoods are not being developed, they are being replaced by malls, luxury housing and hotels, and giant skyscrapers. But worst of all, the process begins in a back room without even our knowledge, let alone our input. Community input only comes AFTER a developer has gotten his plan approved by Bloomberg, so communities are always REACTING to existing, signed plans that don’t have to go through the official channels. Notice that: if we go through the official channels and file a 197-a plan, it may get ignored. But the developers are OFFERED deals that avoid the official channels of bidding and community review.
What can we do? Here is where we need to build a coalition. Not JUST a coalition of neighborhood groups like Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn, but a coalition that includes neighborhood groups, community leaders, labor and small business owners to stand up for our neighborhoods. We need to bring all of these groups together to initiate a dialogue on how to create a more "Livable NYC". Since we all need jobs AND livable neighborhoods with open space, good schools and adequate infrastructure, there is no reason why labor, small business groups and neighborhood groups can't come together and create a vision for the city to rival the unpleasant Bloomberg/Ratner vision that destroys neighborhoods, destroys small businesses and brings in mostly low paying, non-union jobs. I am working with a number of progressive groups and neighborhood organizers to create a Livable NYC Initiative that will allow communities to be more proactive, less reactive, and more united when facing secret done-deals that are cooked up by Pataki, Bloomberg and developers. Because let’s face it, even the affordable housing clauses and the promises of job creation are only included BECAUSE of the need to minimize community opposition. United we can defend NYC neighborhoods. But if we remain divided, Bloomberg, Pataki and developers can continue to carve up our neighborhoods in back room deals and our neighborhoods will no longer be ours.
We also need to focus on getting rid of Bloomberg and have a strong Public Advocate for NYC. So, I will not endorse. But I will STRONGLY urge everyone to work hard against Bloomberg and I would suggest taking a strong interest in the Public Advocate race. We have to stop the back room deals and the selling of our neighborhoods to rich developers.
posted by mole333 | 5:54 AM
|
0 comments
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home