Reluctant supporters say the 82-block upzoning proposal is flawed, but will nonetheless create thousands of below-market rate apartments. Others are demanding the plan includes funding for nearby NYCHA demands, while a third group of critics is against the rezoning altogether.
‘The city, public officials, and developers have all built an increasingly fevered false sense of urgency that shows just how desperate they are to ram through the rezoning while the public is sidelined by the pandemic, economic crisis, and weak sauce virtual hearings.’
The shift to remote-only civic meetings during the pandemic is impacting how communities get to weigh in on important city proposals, like rezonings. It’s led to more people attending — but there have also been problems, and criticism.
The New York Court of Appeals declined to hear an Inwood community group’s appeal to a July court decision, which reversed an earlier ruling that would have annulled the controversial rezoning plan.
The entire City Council is due to vote on the private rezoning application for the Queens project, which would create a 29-acre waterfront special district with nine new buildings, including 1,725 apartments and other facilities.
The rezoning could lead to a total increase of an estimated 3,200 housing units, including 600 to 900 affordable units, plus an additional 3,181 residents over a 10-year period, according to a key document released this week.
The lawsuit argues the city’s environmental review process for the rezoning failed to examine how it would impact the socio-economic demographics of the Inwood community, including race, income and language.