Pratt Center for Community Development

Planning, Building, & Educating for Change.

Pratt Center eNews, Spring 2005

Don't Forget:
Association for Community Design National Conference

"Visualizing Change"
March 30 - April 1, 2005
New York, NY

Co-hosted by PICCED &
Common Ground Community

Spring 2005
In this Issue:

Brooklyn Arena: Slam Dunk or Air Ball?


Brooklyn Atlantic Yards Site
Since its unveiling last December, the proposed Brooklyn Atlantic Yards (BAY) project has been hotly debated. Some see the large-scale development (featuring a 19,000 seat arena, as well as market-rate and affordable housing, office and retail space) as a model of mixed-income development. Others claim it is over subsidized, out of character for the neighborhood, and will bring an onslaught of traffic.

To help inform public discourse, the Pratt Center released Slam Dunk or Air Ball? A Preliminary Planning Analysis of the Brooklyn Atlantic Yards Project. The report reveals four key findings:

  • The process through which this development has been advanced has not been sufficiently fair or accountable. It should be opened up for consideration of real alternatives, to ensure the public is getting the best deal for its land and money.
  • There is insufficient information on two key issues: traffic impacts and public subsidies. It is impossible to render informed judgment on the project until this information is provided.
  • For a large-scale, private real estate development project in New York City, the proposed project does better than most in making a place for low- and moderate-income people by providing affordable housing and some good jobs.
  • Finally, if the BAY project does move forward, agreements surrounding community benefits must be dramatically extended to address critical issues of public schools, public safety, job quality, and neighborhood quality-of-life.

To read the executive summary or full report, visit: www.prattcenter.net/publications.php

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Inclusionary Zoning Builds Momentum


Greenpoint-Williamsburg Waterfront up for Rezoning
In October 2004, the Pratt Center and PolicyLink released Increasing Housing Opportunity in New York City: The Case for Inclusionary Zoning . Following organizing by community groups and citywide advocacy by the Campaign for Inclusionary Zoning, the City has taken some meaningful steps to apply inclusionary zoning to guarantee affordable housing in areas of new development.

In January, the City Council and the Bloomberg Administration substantially altered the plan for Manhattan's Far West Side in response to community pressure for more affordable housing. The revised plan includes an expanded inclusionary zoning program and other means that will result in 3,400 affordable units, more than 25% of the total units. Although not mandatory (as our report recommended), the program offers attractive incentives for developers to include affordable housing.

Now attention turns to the Greenpoint-Williamsburg rezoning, which will be considered by the City Council in April. Community groups including Los Sures, St. Nicholas NPC, and Churches United for Fair Housing argue that the Bloomberg Administration's current proposal does too little to create and preserve affordable housing in a neighborhood where new waterfront condos will sell for over $1 million, and where landowners are receiving an enormous windfall as a result of the rezoning. They are calling for significant changes to the Administration's rezoning plan.

Community groups and housing advocates are also calling for a more citywide approach. On February 2nd, more than 5,000 people rallied at City Hall for affordable housing (see www.housinghereandnow.org). As the Bloomberg Administration moves on to rezonings in West Chelsea, Bedford- Stuyvesant, Sherman Creek, South Park Slope, Flushing, and Jamaica - and as land prices continue to rise throughout the region - inclusionary zoning offers a tool to insure that working families can find a place to live.

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Public Housing Residents Challenging Displacement


Markham Gardens Houses West Brighton, Staten Island
Following years of uncertainty, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) recently announced plans to demolish 360 low-rise row houses at Markham Gardens on the north shore of Staten Island. While several hundred families have already been relocated, over 100 families remain in the 61-year-old garden apartment complex. They are being pressured by NYCHA to move by April 1. Many tenants -- who value Markham Gardens' front stoops, backyards, and tight-knit community -- want to stay.

While 270 new housing units will replace the deteriorating public housing, the new complex will be a public/private partnership with fewer units, without the security public housing offers low-income tenants. Thus far, NYCHA has not guaranteed that the residents will be able to return to their homes, or what rents they would have to pay.

The Pratt Center has recently partnered with the Markham Gardens Resident Association to help them propose an alternative to the City's plan and to examine whether the buildings could be preserved. If saving the existing buildings - which were originally built in 1943 as temporary housing for laborers in nearby shipyards - proves unfeasible, the "essence" of Markham Gardens can be preserved by replicating the scale and layout in the new development, and by ensuring the return of all residents who wish to keep Markham Gardens their home. This project is an opportunity to demonstrate a new form of historic preservation which incorporates history, quality of life, and equity to the benefit of low income people.

For more information and related news articles visit:
www.prattcenter.net/arch-markhamgardens.php

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A Rail Link to the Future


Proposed Rail Freight Tunnel
Over 95% of all goods (from food to furniture, construction materials to consumer goods) come in and out of New York City on trucks over the George Washington Bridge. That means wear and tear on our streets, major traffic congestion, high rates of asthma in many of our neighborhoods, an extremely high cost of doing business, and more expensive consumer goods.

The Cross Harbor Rail Freight Tunnel project, which seeks to build a tunnel under the Hudson River between New Jersey and Brooklyn and improve rail freight infrastructure, would solve these problems, and many more that our City will face in the near future. Despite Mayor Bloomberg’s recent opposition to the Cross Harbor Tunnel, the benefits of this project are overwhelming for every Borough in New York City, and the metropolitan region, as was recognized recently in strong editorial endorsements in The New York Times, the Daily News, and Newsday. The tunnel will allow freight to move more easily through the region, increase our capacity for economic growth, reduce lost productivity due to travel times, minimize air pollution, and move us toward a greener future.

MoveNY&NJ, housed at the Pratt Center, is a coalition of community, labor, environmental, and business organizations along with elected officials who are dedicated to improving the region’s freight transportation system through the creation of the Cross Harbor Rail Freight Tunnel.

Find out more about the Cross Harbor project and MoveNY&NJ at www.movenynj.org.

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Remembering Yolanda Garcia

PICCED mourns the passing of our friend and ally, Yolanda Garcia, founder and executive director of the Nos Quedamos/We Stay Committee on February 17. Yolanda was a visionary community planner-developer, and a pioneer in New York City's environmental justice movement.

In the early 1990s, Yolanda led her South Bronx community in their fight against a plan that would have demolished their homes to build low-density townhouses, unaffordable to the families they would have displaced. Instead, Nos Quedamos took the lead in re-writing the Melrose Commons Urban Renewal Plan, and then in building the affordable housing and community facilities that are transforming the 60-block area.

Yolanda was an inspiration and a voice of conscience to countless individuals, organizations, and political leaders in New York and around the world.

You can send donations to support the education of Yolanda’s five grandchildren to:
c/o Yolanda Gonzalez, P.O. Box 542369 Stadium Station, Bronx, NY 10452

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PICCED's Strategic Plan Complete

PICCED is proud to announce the adoption of a strategic plan that will guide our work through 2010. We have confirmed our commitment to work for a more just, equitable, and sustainable city for all New Yorkers and developed three strategic initiatives to guide our future efforts:

  1. Helping Communities Build
    We will help community- based organizations in low-income neighborhoods build physical development projects that address unmet needs and leverage innovation.
  2. Planning for Equity
    We will work to ensure that low-income communities get a fair share of the benefits of physical and economic development, and are not burdened with a disproportionate share of the costs.
  3. Promoting Sustainability and Environmental Justice
    We will support and advance grassroots organizations and movements that push the New York City region toward environmental sustainability and equity.

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Coming Soon...

New Name for PICCED!

With the help of a service grant awarded by the Taproot Foundation, we are planning to adopt a new name for the Center. We are hoping for something that is more mellifluous, easier-to-remember, and conveys what we do a bit better than "PICCED." If you have ideas, there is still time to submit them to [Sorry, display of this email address requires a Javascript-aware browser, in order to deter spam. Please use the general contact page instead.]. Otherwise, look out for the launch of our new name later this spring!

Upcoming Event:

Join us for a screening of the remarkable documentary, The Rural Studio Film, which explores the vision of architecture as a social art form capable of raising the human spirit. A panel discussion and reception will follow.

Thursday, April 14, 2005, 5 PM
Memorial Hall, Pratt Institute
For more information email: [Sorry, display of this email address requires a Javascript-aware browser, in order to deter spam. Please use the general contact page instead.]

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