Councilmember Julie Won issued a list of “land use principles” she said she will apply to new projects in her district that require Council-approved changes to the city’s zoning code—including a controversial proposal to build a 3,000-unit complex in southern Astoria.
City Limits rounds up the latest housing and land use-related events, public hearings and upcoming affordable housing lotteries that are ending soon.
City Limits rounds up the latest housing-related events and upcoming affordable housing lotteries that are ending soon.
In 2009, the new Yankee Stadium opened, replacing what used to be a park. Since the Yankees were getting public land, the city said they needed to give back something. How did that go? Journalism students at CUNY Lehman college investigate.
The vote marks the first major milestone in the city land use process for the proposed $2 billion project, known as “Innovation QNS,” which would erect at least a dozen towers containing offices, retail space and 2,845 apartments.
One big problem with Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs), experts say, is that they’re not laws, but rather private contracts between a developer and community groups. And if those groups aren’t around to hold a developer accountable—or the developer isn’t around and there’s no successor clause—there’s little anyone else can do to enforce an agreement.
When COVID-19 hit, policymakers saw an opportunity: The city had interconnected affordable housing and homelessness crises; the city also had hundreds of empty hotels hemorrhaging cash. But a year after the state passed a law funding the conversion of hotels to affordable housing, not a single one has happened. The experience of the Paramount Hotel on West 46th Street illustrates why.
“It’s easy to cast all opposition to developments as NIMBY, but this ignores crucial racial and economic differences between neighborhoods and disparities in who has the power to decide the future of their communities.”
“The governor’s bill maintains many of the core aspects of 421-a that have been vital to our city’s economic success and is a positive first step.”
“Community Boards are currently being asked to do more with less,” wrote a task force of district managers and administrative staffers in a report released last month. “Especially in the last year-and-a-half, community boards have been on the frontlines of the COVID-19 crisis.”
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