Met Council’s Annual Builder’s Luncheon Raises One Million Dollars

August 18, 2008 (New York, NY) –Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty (Met Council) netted more than one million dollars this past week, during its annual Builder’s Luncheon honoring Bruce Ratner, Chairman and CEO of Forest City Ratner Companies.

The nearly 500 guests spanned the real estate, political and communal spectrum. City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Congressman Anthony Weiner and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz praised Mr. Ratner for his work in developing New York City. The keynote speaker, Speaker of the Assembly Sheldon Silver, presented Mr. Ratner with a beautifully decorated charity box.

Speaker Silver commented in his address, “Bruce is responsible for much of the development and growth that’s gone on in Brooklyn and in Manhattan. He is a major force in New York City for the good.”
...

Full article

Yards ‘domain’ case has some eminence

BY MIKE MCLAUGHLIN The Brooklyn Paper

Legal experts agree on one thing about the latest lawsuit to block the Atlantic Yards project — the plaintiffs have put together a crafty argument to combat the project.

Law professors are intrigued by the argument, filed on Aug. 1 in state court by soon-to-be-displaced residents, that the state’s use of its eminent domain power to clear land for Bruce Ratner’s mega-project violates a little-known and never-tested provision of the state Constitution that prohibits public subsidies from underwriting any urban renewal project whose occupancy is not restricted “to persons of low income.”

Ratner’s development is slated to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in direct public subsidies and tax breaks despite the fact that it includes thousands of units of market-rate housing.

The plaintiffs claim that the luxury housing would violate Article 18, Section 6 of the state Constitution.

“It’s a very good, well-written complaint. They’ve got a hook,” said James Gardner, a law professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo.
...

Yards opponents have another glimmer of hope, experts said, namely that the state court is presiding during an ongoing backlash against the 2005 Kelo verdict.

“The New York court is one of the most activist in the country,” Gardner told The Brooklyn Paper.

Full article

Developer Bruce Ratner Is Honored at Gala
By Abraham Riesman Special to the Sun

Developer Bruce Ratner may be facing challenges to his Atlantic Yards project, but he received nothing but support from top New York politicians at a gala in his honor yesterday.

Rep. Anthony Weiner and the speaker of the City Council, Christine Quinn — both likely 2009 mayoral candidates — as well as Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and the President of Brooklyn, Marty Markowitz, all lauded Mr. Ratner at a luncheon held by the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty.

"Bruce Ratner is someone who reminds us all the time that, even in difficult financial times, we need to be a city that continues to grow," Mr. Weiner told an audience of more than 450 on the Upper West Side.
...

... "How this man looks every day in a positive way at all the hate that's been directed to him, I will never know," Mr. Markowitz said of Mr. Ratner yesterday.

Well, if ever there were any doubt, we now know where Anthony Weiner, Chris Quinn and Shelly Silver stand vis-a-vis Bruce Ratner and Atlantic Yards. As for Mr. Markowitz and his "Saint Bruce" routine, he just doesn't get how people might think this project and the rigged process behind it could maybe rub people the wrong way. It ain't personal, Marty — it's a BAD IDEA.

..."This is our property. It’s been in my family 75 years,” said Willets Point business owner Jake Bono. “And basically, the mayor and [Economic Development Corporation] are trying to rape and rob our land from us."

But Bloomberg said eminent domain will be used if necessary.

"We can't have a situation where one building owner sits there and sticks it to the whole city," said Bloomberg...
(Emphasis added)

Bloomberg continued:
In the case of eminent domain, it is--we have to keep changing our cities, and build the infrastructure and have the jobs and the housing, and you can’t just let one person stop all of that. I’m not in favor of, when most people are against something, doing it. But, for example, the Nets development, which is what you’re talking about, Daniel, out in Brooklyn, overwhelmingly favored by people in Brooklyn and throughout the city, and I think that’s an appropriate thing for use of government powers. A handful of people, I’m sorry for them, but they will get fairly compensated, but you can’t just let any one person stop all development, and that’s when eminent domain comes in.
(Emphasis added)

..."There is a place for eminent domain. What the city is trying to do is negotiate a fair deal with everybody there," Mayor Michael Bloomberg said...

"This is America. The America that I know protects property rights of American citizens. New York City is still part of America," Councilman Hirman Monserrat said.

We applaud the efforts and actions of the Councilmembers who've taken a stand against eminent domain abuse, but we're compelled to point out a couple of things.

First, the "dangerous precedent for large-scale development projects citywide" has already been set by Atlantic Yards. In fact, had the Atlantic Yards plot never been hatched by Forest City Ratner, it's likely that the Willets Point plan, however heinous it may be, wouldn't have encountered such significant — and well organized — resistance.

Second, we have to admit we're curious about ACORN's role. Sure, their interest in the affordable housing makes sense, but based on their track record with Atlantic Yards, we have a hard time believing that they give a hoot about the use of eminent domain. Left to ACORN, that would surely be a bargaining chip happily traded for a richer mix of affordable units.

Lastly, we won't belabor the silliness of the city claiming that eminent domain will only be used "as a last resort." It was already put into use long ago as a negotiating bludgeon. We'll focus instead on the $5 million traffic mitigation fund. Shouldn't the mitigation of traffic be a pre-development requirement? The time to fix traffic problems is before they materialize.

Three birds, one stone

Some of most controversial projects being jammed into a session

Public participation was the justification 30 years ago for the city’s land-use approval process known as ULURP.

Development and zoning plans would now have to go through community boards, a borough president, the City Planning Commission and the City Council — all on a rigid timetable lasting a bit more than six months. Critics have since complained that this timetable is more appropriate for a railroad.

Two elected officials pleaded with the Bloomberg administration yesterday to slow down. Tomorrow the City Planning Commission will hold public hearings on three controversial projects: Lower East Side Rezoning, Hunters Point South and Willets Point redevelopment.

“Each of these deserves a stand-alone hearing,” said Queens Councilman Hiram Monserrate, who has vowed to defeat the Willets Point deal unless displaced businesses and workers are “fairly compensated.”

“I can’t see how anyone, in good conscience, could put three major projects on the agenda for the same exact time,” he said. “It speaks volumes to many people who think the plan is already in the works and the community’s input is really not that important. Is this just a dog and pony show?”
...

Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden said the date has already been advertised and a 450-seat theater is available at NYU’s School of Law. Any delay “would be unfair to these constituents,” she said.
...

...Tomorrow’s meeting of the City Planning Commission promises to be a doozy, with a full agenda including public testimony on three major projects:

Lower East Side Rezoning
Massive 111-block rezoning would limit how tall new buildings can be in the East Village and Lower East Side, but opponents claim the plan would push luxury housing into Chinatown and the Bowery.

Hunters Point South
City’s 30-acre housing development in Long Island City is meant for the middle-class. Critics say most of the units will be out of the reach of the average Queens resident.

Willets Point redevelopment
Major development would use eminent domain, if necessary, to turn 61 acres of auto-body shops and scrap yards into a mixed-use neighborhood, with housing, a hotel and convention center, plus office and retail space. Businesses there complain about a lack of fair compensation.

August 13, 2008
CITY PLANNING COMMISSION
PUBLIC HEARING

Hearing Procedures

On Wednesday, August 13, 2008, at 9:00 a.m., at Tishman Auditorium of Vanderbilt Hall, New York University School of Law, 40 Washington Square South, New York, NY 10012 in Manhattan ( view map and subway directions), public hearings will be held by the City Planning Commission on:

1. East Village/Lower East Side Rezoning - land use applications for a change to the zoning map (C 080397 ZMM, C 080397(A) ZMM) and zoning text amendment (N 080398 ZRM, N 080398(A)) and a related Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) (07DCP078M) submitted by the Department of City Planning.
   
   
2. Hunter's Point South - land use applications for a change to the City Map (C 080276 MMQ), a zoning map change (C 080362 ZMQ), a zoning text amendment (N 080363 ZRQ), acquisition of property (C 080364 PQQ), and UDAAP designation, plan and disposition (C 080365 HAQ) and a related DEIS (08DME006Q) submitted by the departments of Housing Preservation and Development and Parks and Recreation and the Economic Development Corporation. THIS HEARING IS NOT LIKELY TO BEGIN BEFORE 12 NOON.*
   
   
3. Willets Point Development Plan - land use applications for a change to the City Map (C 080221 MMQ), a zoning map change (C 080381 ZMQ), a zoning text amendment (N 080382 ZRQ), urban renewal designation and plan (N 080383 HGQ, C 080384 HUQ) and disposition of city property (C 080385 HDQ) and a related DEIS (07DME014Q) submitted by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development and the Economic Development Corporation.  THIS HEARING IS NOT LIKELY TO BEGIN BEFORE 1 PM. *

Walk with NYC planner Amanda Burden as she rezones the lower East Side
NY Daily News. By Jason Sheftell.

..."This wasn't here two weeks ago," Burden says, sneering at a vacant lot. "There was a building. Once you lose a building, you lose character and history. The Bloomberg administration is about growth and preservation. This is why we have to act fast to change the zoning, so developers aren't allowed to come in here and build whatever they chose. I don't mind a building that is in context with the others, meaning the same height with architectural guidelines, but small streets shouldn't have large development."

Readers of The Brooklyn Paper are well aware that Bruce Ratner has broken promises over the years. Here’s Ratner’s ever-changing timetable for the arena.

It’s unconstitutional! Yards foes pull out new ace in the hole
By Gersh Kuntzman

Lawyers for a declining number of holdout residents of the Atlantic Yards footprint may have found the silver bullet in their ongoing battle against state plans to condemn the remaining few properties still not owned by developer Bruce Ratner: the state Constitution.

Though the United States Supreme Court opted last month not to hear the tenants’ and property owners’ challenge to the state’s use of eminent domain power to facilitate the Ratner mega-project, lawyers filed suit last week in New York State Supreme Court citing a clause in the state’s bylaws that bars public money from underwriting any urban renewal project unless “the occupancy of any such project shall be restricted to persons of low income.”

Ratner’s development, which is slated to receive hundreds of millions of dollars in direct public subsidies and tax breaks, includes thousands of units of market-rate housing. That appears to be a violation of Article 18, section 6 of the state Constitution, which was adopted during the Depression.
...

“The language is plain,” [plaintiff’s lawyer Matt Brinckerhoff] said. “That clause was written during the Depression for the clear purpose of clearing slum conditions with state subsidies and that any subsidized slum replacement must create low-income housing and nothing else. That is what the law says. There is no nuance.”
...

Briefs are due in November and arguments in the case are expected in January, 2009. That timeline would throw a monkey wrench into Ratner’s stated goal of beginning construction this fall, though that schedule is already in jeopardy due to the economic downturn (see main story).

FULL article.

Vonage makes deal with Izod Center
Newark Star-Ledger

The internet phone company Vonage Holdings will pay more than $1 million to put its name on the concourse of the Izod Center, the Nets and the sports authority announced yesterday.

The four-year deal makes the Holmdel-based firm a "legacy sponsor," with naming rights to the concourse and signs along Routes 3 and 120, according to the Nets. The team brokered the deal for the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, which operates the Meadowlands Sports Complex.
(Emphasis added.)

So the Nets brokered the deal on behalf of the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, and it runs for four years, or through 2012, which is well beyond when the Nets claim they'll be all snuggled in in Brooklyn. Would you pay to have your name on the Concourse of an arena that wouldn't have any tenants during part of the term of your sponsorship? Would you pay to sponsor a Concourse period?

New York City has a variety of projects, both public and private, which when completed will improve the quality of life for all New Yorkers. Whether it's new building construction, road repairs, or park improvements, each effort will make new York a better place to work, live, and visit. here at Columbus Circle a station rehabilitiation is being completed that will improve accessibility and architectural enhancement.

WCBS: "With the state in such dire fiscal straits why are you supporting this costly project, which according to this writer may end up costing the state and New York City about 2 billion in subsidies and tax breaks?"

Governor Paterson: "There is a point that the listener correctly has addressed, that if it starts to become too costly, a lot of these projects that we were for, we might have to change our mind. To this point we don't think that we are there with the Atlantic Yards and continue to try to help them."

It is encouraging to know that the Governor agrees, especially in this economic environment, that megaprojects that become too costly require re-evaluation. But we'd argue that we are there with Atlantic Yards and have been for quite a while. With no evidence at all that Forest City Ratner can build its project, let alone bring its pruported benefits to fruition, the city and state have committed substantial subsidies, breaks and other special support to the project.

Clearly during this dire fiscal crisis—so dire the Governor himself presented a rare broadcast speech about the situation just two weeks ago—the construction of a One Billion Dollar and Counting Arena is a frivolous and risky endeavor which is too costly. The city and state will, if not legally then effectively, be on the hook for the $800 million tax-exempt bond Forest City Ratner has stated it is pursuing.

Then we must look at some of the rest of the accounting:
- $100 million direct cash subsidy from the state.
- $205 million direct cash subsidy from the city.
- A blank check promised by the city for "extraordinary infrastructure costs."
- An estimated $1.4 billion worth of tax-exempt housing bonds from the state.

Though the NY Post's $2 billion in government back financing is debatable, the developer claimed three years ago that the public investment in the project would be $1.1 billion. Either figure is too costly considering neither the city or state have shown that there would be a meaningful financial return for the taxpayers—especially seeing as how Ratner has provided the public and government with no confidence whatsoever that the project can be built.

Ratner's land speculation—speculation on private and public land (the rail yards and city streets)—is too costly.

And while the MTA threatens successive fare hikes, the agency which is largely controlled by the Governor, can make a choice:
Does it close its $100 million deal with Ratner to sell the 8-acre Vanderbilt rail yard to the developer well below the $214.5 MTA appraisal of the property? Or does it pull out of that deal (the deal has not closed yet and no money has been exchanged), divide the yards into multiple parcels and put the parcels through a genuine bidding process which would be likely to bring in something around the appraised value or even higher?
----------------

Norman Oder gives his take on the Governor's response on his Atlantic Yards Report.

...“A neighborhood changes incrementally,” said Scott Levitan, Forest City senior vice president and development director for the project. “It’s filled with people who’ve owned their house, meticulously maintained it, and you wake up one morning and the neighborhood has disintegrated around it. It’s not anyone’s fault. Hopefully, this is the last time we’ll have to demolish a neighborhood in order to save it.”... (Emphasis added.)

From the newspaper that has never seen a Forest City project it didn't like, today The New York Times ran a fairly uncritical story about how the development company and Johns Hopkins Hospital "have joined forces to demolish a neighborhood to save it." [No joke!]

Though the article contained this disclosure, "One of its affiliates, Forest City Ratner, was the development partner for the new Manhattan headquarters of The New York Times Company," it doesn't mention that the Times Company and Forest City Ratner (FCR) now co-own the building.

Also absent from the article is any mention of "eminent domain," a controversial component of the plan to build The Times's headquarters and FCR's Atlantic Yards project. Instead, The Times dances around the topic:

To accumulate land for the site, the city, state and Johns Hopkins in 2003 created East Baltimore Development Inc. to acquire buildings, tear them down, and then sell the land to developers.

[Read: In order to acquire enough land, the government and Johns Hopkins created a public-private corporation empowered with the use of eminent domain to force people to sell their homes and/or businesses.]

...State Constitutional claim

The novel state claim relies on Article 18, section 6 of the New York State Constitution, which provides that no loan or subsidy shall be made to aid any project unless the project contains a plan for the remediation of blight and the “occupancy of any such project shall be restricted to persons of low income as defined by law and preference shall be given to persons who live or shall have lived in such area or areas.”

However, the suit states, the project is not “restricted to persons of low income” and no preference has been given to “persons who live or shall have lived in such area,” the petition claims. Actually, residents of the three adjacent Community Board districts would be given preference in access to the project’s affordable housing.

Article 18 concerns housing; its text:
§6. No loan, or subsidy shall be made by the state to aid any project unless such project is in conformity with a plan or undertaking for the clearance, replanning and reconstruction or rehabilitation of a substandard and unsanitary area or areas and for recreational and other facilities incidental or appurtenant thereto. The legislature may provide additional conditions to the making of such loans or subsidies consistent with the purposes of this article. The occupancy of any such project shall be restricted to persons of low income as defined by law and preference shall be given to persons who live or shall have lived in such area or areas. The defense on this will be interesting. The ESDC may argue that the $100 million, is directed at the arena alone. However, section 6 seems to contemplate that eminent domain used for recreational and other facilities can include housing. Perhaps the ESDC will argue that other sections of the state constitution may offer different guidance.

Any precedent?

I asked plaintiffs' attorney Matthew Brinckerhoff if there were any precedent regarding section 6. He responded that there was no precedent, which (to me) makes the claim dicey, despite what might seem a strong argument on its face:
If your question is whether or not ESDC/UDC has used its powers in the past to condemn land and provide bonds/loans/subsidies and the like to developments that were not restricted to aiding persons of low income, the answer is, of course, yes. So, in a very narrow sense, there is precedent that ESDC/UDC has done this in the past, which to me only means that it has violated this provision of the NY Constitution in the past.

There is no legal precedent that I know of that addresses the issues raised by this particular claim. Article 18 of the Constitution was enacted in 1938 after the constitutional convention of that year (the last one to be enacted by a vote of the people). Section 2 grants the legislature the power to delegate its eminent domain power to local governments and "public corporations." Section 6 restricts loans or subsidies to projects that are (or presumably will be) occuppied by low income persons who live or have lived in the area. Section 10 says that nothing in this Article 18 "shall be deemd to authorize or empower the state, or any city, town willage or public corporation to engage in any private business or enterprise other than the building and operation of low rent dwelling houses for persons of low income as defined by law, or the loaning of money to owners of existing multiple dwellings as herein provided."

I read Article 18, sec. 6 as a substantive restriction that attaches whenever the government seeks to both (1) clear slums or blighted areas and (2) replace slums with housing for persons with low incomes by providing loans or subsidies. If both condition are met, as ESDC alleges they here are when it claims that the purpose of the project is to remedy blight and provide affordable housing, than sec. 6 requires, that the housing be restricted to low-income (which presumably cannot include luxury condos and corporate sky boxes) with preference given to residents who lived in the footprint in the first place.

"It is not a new schedule. I think Bruce was just stating that the schedule in place is in fact very aggressive. We plan to break ground this fall and are working to open in calendar year 2010. While that's the goal, if it is not met then it would end up being calendar year 2011."

Bender's statement is about as trustworthy as Chuck Ratner's clarification last year, when, after slipping and indicating the arena would open in 2010, insisted that he meant 2009.
http://atlanticyardsreport.blogspot.com/2007/03/fcr-offers-clarification-on-ay.html

Bruce Ratner makes it official: AY arena would open in mid-2011 (best-case scenario)

Despite public statements to the contrary, as on the Barclays Center web site (right), the New Jersey Nets have three, not two, more years at the Izod Center in the Meadowlands--and that's in a best-case scenario.

The word comes directly from Forest City Ratner president (and Nets majority owner) Bruce Ratner, who indicated to shareholders in June that construction would start in January and take two-and-a-half years--a timetable far different from the developer's and team's public statements, including to season ticket-holders.

Indeed, just last week, during a July 30 Fox Business Channel segment (go to 3:43), Nets Sports & Entertainment President CEO Brett Yormark claimed, "We plan on breaking ground in November and being there for the '10-'11 season."

In May, claims of 2010

Yormark was consistent with the developer's rhetoric. Remember, in a May 4 op-ed in the Daily News, Bruce Ratner stated that the developer aimed "to break ground on the Barclays Center later this year," then "break ground on the first residential building," complete and open both at the same time, then "break ground on the next residential tower in 2010."

That sequence suggests a 2010 arena opening; indeed, the accompanying Daily News article reported 2010 as the arena opening date. (Note that the FAQ on the Atlantic Yards web site leaves some wiggle room, because it does not indicate that construction on the second residential tower would begin after the arena and first tower were completed.

Governmental officials buy the 2010 opening date. In a 5/8/08 letter to the Internal Revenue Service and U.S. Treasury Department, arguing that the AY arena deserves tax-exempt bonds under a more lenient standard, the New York City Industrial Development Authority and the Empire State Development Corporation repeated the claim that the arena was anticipated to open in 2010.

In the May 12 Sports Business Journal, Yormark said the arena would open in time for the 2010-11 season.

However, a May 15 press release announcing the sale of luxury suites promised an opening in "calendar year 2010," which I suspect might mean New Year's Eve, given that the three-year bridge reconstruction schedule ends in January 2011.

In June, candor about 2011

A month later, at the June 19 annual meeting in Cleveland of Forest City Enterprises, parent of Forest City Ratner, Bruce Ratner revised his prediction by one year, to mid-2011, which means the arena would open for the 2011-2012 season, three seasons from now.

While the webcast of the meeting has expired, the transcript is available (for sale) and has not been corrected, so I'm assuming this segment is correct:

WILBUR BLACK: I'm [Wilbur Black], and I've been attending for many years. We were wondering, my grandson, was wondering about your New York Nets -- or New Jersey Nets, the situation on that...

ALBERT B. RATNER: Okay. Bruce, do you want to answer the Nets question?...

BRUCE RATNER: I don't know whether your grandson is a Nets fan or a Brooklyn fan or both so I know how to answer the question. But we're doing very well on the Atlantic Yards project. Our hope is that we can close our loans and close the transaction by the end of the year. And then it will be about two and a half years to build our arena, and then the Nets will move from New Jersey to Brooklyn. So, we're working hard at it, and I think we're finally close to a closing.
(Emphasis added)

If it takes 2.5 years to build the arena, and construction starts in January 2009, the arena would open in July 2011. Still, keep in mind that the Nets have extended their lease in their current facility to 2012-13, just in case.

Also keep in mind that there's no certainty that groundbreaking for the arena would occur in January--legal cases, including the just-filed state eminent domain lawsuit, may still be pending.

Misleading the public and ticket holders

Beyond the regularly misleading statements to the public, Forest City Ratner has been deceiving season ticket-holders. On July 8, NetsDaily reported, some 40 such supporters were told at an event in Manhattan that the team “anticipates” playing in the Barclays Center during the 2010-11 season.

That was more than two weeks after Bruce Ratner told shareholders in Cleveland something very different.

As noted, Yormark repeated that timetable during the July 30 Fox Business Channel segment.

This week in history...

Although Marty Markowitz is big on unions now, this was not always the case. Before becoming the illustrious Brooklyn Borough President, Markowitz was the State Senator that the Times described as "the only politician in the city who deliberately seeks to entertain." His favorite form of flamboyance, then as now, was free concerts. And what better way to keep costs down for the corporate sponsors?

To keep costs down, Mr. Markowitz persuaded the state to dispatch prison inmates to set up the stage for each concert.

Perhaps this practice would have gone unnoticed, until tragedy struck in 1990:

At Wingate Field six years ago, the rhythm-and-blues singer and composer Curtis Mayfield, best known for the hit title track from the movie "Superfly," severely injured his spine when a windstorm blew over a lighting tower and part of the stage collapsed.

But the important thing is that no egos were injured in the incident:

Mr. Markowitz said attendance did not suffer at concerts after the incident, but added that he lost a corporate sponsor and that Mr. Mayfield, who is paralyzed from the neck down, sued his insurance company...

Continue reading.

News Highlights of the Week: July 26 – August 1, 2008
Architectural Record. Jenna M. McKnight and Alanna Malone

In mid-July, Frank Gehry pulled out of his first major venture in England: King Alfred Development, a seafront mixed-use project in Brighton that has been mired in controversy since it was unveiled. Now, the developer, Karis, says the Canadian-born architect is considering getting back on board, according to The Architects’ Journal. Karis managing director Josh Arghiros told the UK-based publication that he thinks Gehry would consider returning for the chance to “tweak it the way he would want it to be.” His statement came a day after Dutch Bank INC, the project’s main investor, pulled its support—an announcement that prompted World Architecture News to declare that the “King Alfred Project is dead.” The half-billion-dollar project has encountered fierce resistance from the get-go, much like Gehry’s Atlantic Yards in Brooklyn (RECORD, May 2008). It remains to be seen whether Karis will be able to secure the necessary funding before the King Alfred Development becomes a lost cause.

• Rep. Dennis Kucinich, chair of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee
  
• Bettina Damiani, Project Director of Good Jobs New York
  
• Neil deMause, Author of Field of Schemes: How the Great Stadium Swindle Turns Public Money into Private Profit. His website is Field of Schemes

... REP. DENNIS KUCINICH: Well, I could say that my subcommittee staff—and again, I’m the chair of the Domestic Policy Subcommittee, which has jurisdiction over this matter—and our subcommittee staff is in contact with officials of both the City of New York and the New York Yankees to discuss their potential appearance in front of our congressional subcommittee.

I think that it’s very important to understand that we’re looking at a public policy matter here that relates not only to New York and not only to the Nets and the Atlantic Yard project, but it also relates to the whole country, as your other guests have said, because it’s quite possible that there are billions of dollars in tax benefits that should be going to municipalities for the purposes of repairing their infrastructure and for schools and other things and that are instead being diverted for these private sports complexes.

And the question is one of public policy, one of the IRS, and in the case of the New York Yankees, questions of securities law, because of the various amounts of the appraisal, $45 a square foot versus $275 a square foot, which have a bearing on the overall cost of the project. And if the cost of the project is inflated, that’s going to be of interest to the SEC, as well as the IRS.

(Emphasis added)

Since not everyone has the time to visit the office during the day, for the second consecutive year, Assemblyman Jeffries will bring his office to a location where many community members find themselves at some point when returning home from work: The subway. Please refer to the schedule below for locations and times:

A modest proposal: Bruce Ratner should bunk on Dean Street

If, despite noise and disruption experienced by residents, daily life is sufficiently tolerable in the Atlantic Yards footprint, as per the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC), perhaps some ESDC officials, joined by representatives of the Bloomberg administration and developer Forest City Ratner, can spend a few nights on Dean Street.

After all, then-Chicago Mayor Jane Byrne and Newark City Council Member Cory Booker lived in housing projects to show their solidarity with residents and to point to conditions that needed improvement. So Brooklyn booster Bruce Ratner could take a field trip from his $7 million Upper East Side mansion and host a sleepover in one of the residential buildings his company owns.

FEIS Noise Receptor Locations: The noise impact on the "footprint" [heavy black outline] residents was not studied.

Glaring gap: AY EIS ignored noise, vibration, disruptions faced by footprint residents

Grating, honking noise from construction equipment. Vibrations that shake buildings, enforcing a 7 a.m. wake-up call. Cracks in building walls and steps. Dust and dislodged paint in the house. Unsavory diesel and sewer aromas. Surprise cutoffs of water and gas. Long waits for restoration of utilities.

That’s life some days for the people--fewer than two dozen--living on the north side of Dean Street between Flatbush and Sixth Avenues in the Atlantic Yards footprint, as massive construction equipment is used to upgrade water and sewer connections destined to help service an 18,000-seat arena and thousands of apartments. (Click on graphics to enlarge.)

(See The Footprint Gazette blog for video here and here. On 7/25/06, the New York Times, in an article skeptical about AY blight claims, focused on this block.)

The AY catch

Here’s the catch: the Empire State Development Corporation’s (ESDC) voluminous environmental review, required to disclose the potential impacts of the project, said nothing about the impact on those in the footprint, whether residents or those working at or visiting Freddy’s Bar & Backroom, on the corner.

The Final Environmental Impact Statement (FEIS), which detailed the potential impact of the project, did acknowledge that construction activities might be “perceptible and annoying in buildings very close to a construction site.” But it didn’t acknowledge that some “very close” buildings might be on the north side of Dean Street, destined to be demolished for the project.

As the graphic [above] shows, construction noise receptors were placed only at locations across the street from construction activities. (I've highlighted some--but not all--areas on Dean and Pacific Streets where there are residents, as well as a business open to the public. For example, I left out P.C. Richard/Modell's at Site 5 in the far west of the footprint.)

Two excavators have been working on the block, models 345C and 315D, equipment that in Caterpiller’s own brochures is shown by itself at a non-urban construction site, not in a residential street. (The current 345D model is similar to the 345C model.)

Some residents consider it a form of harassment, an effort to wear them down and choose buyouts rather than remain in lawsuits challenging the project. While there’s no evidence that’s the motivation, project planners’ effort to get the work done sooner rather than later certainly makes people uncomfortable.

Legal recourse?

It's hardly clear that there's legal recourse. "As there was no construction or infrastructure work going on when we filed the EIS suit in April 2007, this situation is not something we could have considered in that suit," Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn spokesman Daniel Goldstein told me, after I queried him. (The dismissal of the case is under appeal, with a state appellate court expected to hear oral arguments in September. Success would not necessarily block the project but could require an additional and expanded environmental review.)

"But now that the intolerable situation for residents in the footprint—impacts which were not contemplated or reviewed by the ESDC in the environmental review process—continues to worsen we are reviewing and considering what legal avenues are available to us," added Goldstein, who lives on the south side of Pacific Street, abutting the north side of Dean Street. (At right, new larger pipes destined for installation are stored in a Dean Street lot, with Goldstein's building in the background.)

"Additionally we are advocating politically along with those residents, and doing our best to assist them," Goldstein added. "We urge our elected officials to bring relief to the residents in the footprint from the noise, vibrations and near round the clock disruptions impacting their lives in an unacceptable manner."

Residents, however, have told me that sympathetic elected officials have said there's not much they can do and less-sympathetic officials have pretty much passed the buck to the ESDC, the agency in charge.

ESDC punts

So, why were these residents left out? I suspect that planners assumed that, by the time construction activities began, no one would be there.

But I don’t know for sure, because, when I asked the ESDC why the impact on footprint residents was left out and whether that was standard operating procedure, the questions were ignored.

Similarly, I didn’t get an answer to the question of whether there’d been any attempt to measure noise or inspect for vibratory impacts for these residents.

ESDC avoidance of public policy issue

Goldstein told me that, as a footprint resident, rather than as a DDDB representative, he queried ESDC ombudsman Forrest Taylor, pointing to the FEIS graphic that omitted the footprint and stating that “the FEIS never contemplated people living in the project site while work was going on, so that needs to be reconsidered.” (Goldstein in February posted videos on YouTube showing late night construction work that interfered with his sleep.)

Taylor wrote back, “Since your attorneys have brought suit against ESDC with respect to the EIS, I have been instructed not to discuss your allegations with respect to the EIS, as these issues are being handled by the attorneys.”

Actually, Goldstein as an individual has not sued ESDC; DDDB has funded and led a challenge to the EIS joined by 25 groups, though that lawsuit, as noted, did not address the situation of footprint residents.

Residents of 473 Dean Street, home to the Footprint Gazette blogger, are plaintiffs in three suits filed by attorney George Locker against the ESDC and other defendants.

But putting the issue of plaintiffs aside, this public policy question deserves an answer...