Caption Indicted Mayor Adams and the People Of Yes

 

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. We're fucked.

GSD MIA

 

THE CITY

The city Department of Health and Mental Hygiene had nearly 1,200 unfilled positions in June — making the agency on the pandemic’s frontline one of 46 in city government missing more than 10% of their budgeted employees, according to preliminary figures obtained by THE CITY.

The numbers reflect an ongoing challenge in hiring and retaining government workers, an issue that’s getting scrutiny at a hearing on Friday under City Councilmember Gale Brewer’s Oversight and Investigations Committee, which produced the preliminary numbers.

They show the citywide government jobs vacancy rate at 7.9% as of June. The agency with the most extreme shortfall was the Commission on Human Rights, which had 37 of its 136 budgeted positions unfilled — a rate of 27.2%.

Among larger agencies, vacancy rates were highest at the Department of Buildings, at 24.2% (489 vacancies), the Department of Health at 19.1% (1,189 vacancies) and the Department of Social Services at 17.3% (2,256 openings).

The numbers were slightly better at the city’s uniformed agencies.

The Department of Correction had a shortage of 862 workers in June, or 9.1%, although an extended trend of employees calling out sick has been compounding problems there.

And while the NYPD had a comparatively low vacancy rate of 2.9% in June, that equates to 1,448 unfilled positions, the preliminary numbers show.

“I don’t know where all these vacancies are, but I can tell you from personal experience, everything is slow in terms of getting sign-off,” said Brewer. “I’m just worried the expertise we’ve had over the years is going to disappear from the city.” 

Telling it like it is

Ray Rogers condemns NYC's rezoning policies as REBNY policies that benefit fat cat developers like Rob and Jerry Speyer (Tishman Speyer), Jed Walentas (Two Trees Management), Gary Barnett (Extell Development Company) and Daniel Brodsky (The Brodsky Organization). Rogers says REBNY is run by "bullies and racketeers" while speaking at Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer's rezoning hearing in East Harlem (7-13-17).

Manhattan...it's not Queens

From DNA Info:

Elected officials said they will bring a lawsuit against the city if it doesn't halt a trio of skyscrapers slated to rise on the Two Bridges waterfront.

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and Councilwoman Margaret Chin on Friday said they will urge the Department of City Planning to reject an application submitted by developers to build the residential towers within a three-block radius, urging the agency to instead put the developments through a more rigorous review process.

But if the city elects to approve the application, which is now making its way through a comparatively lax review, they will resort to legal action, said the politicians.

"To the members of the City Planning Commission, we have a simple message: if you rule against this community, we will use every tool at our disposal to make sure the voices of the people are heard," Chin said at a rally near the development sites.

JDS Development Group plans to build a 77-story tower at 247 Cherry St., while Two Bridges Associates plans two towers on a shared base at 260 South St. Starrett Development is planning a 62-story residence at 259 Clinton St.

Neighbors fear the collective developments will negatively impact their quality of life by blocking views and natural light, overcrowding an area with sparse transportation and open space options, and driving up property values by bringing hundreds of market-rate units to the largely low-income neighborhood.

Brewer and Chin last year urged DCP to put the towers through its rigorous, seven-month Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP), which would require a review from the local community board, borough board, city council and the mayor himself before going to a vote.

The agency shot down the request, stating the towers are considered "minor modifications" because they do not require new waivers or zoning actions.

Instead, the developments are subjected only to a city-mandated environmental review process aimed at identifying and mitigating potential impacts they may have on the surrounding area.

Could you imagine a Queens elected official even threatening something like this? Usually they just say, "Oh well, I tried" while they pocket scads of dough from the developer.

Fixing the ULURP process

From an Op-Ed by Council Member Geenfield and Borough President Gale Brewer published in Crains:

The current Uniform Land Use Review Procedure requires the Department of City Planning to make development applications public when the Planning Commission certifies them, roughly seven months before the City Council would vote to approve them. But applicants often submit paperwork describing their projects much earlier. Their plans can go through months or even years of pre-certification work. These pre-application forms matter because once an application is certified, it is difficult or impossible to make major changes.

One of us, Borough President Brewer, has made a practice of submitting Freedom of Information Law requests for those forms so her office can get a head start. The other, Land Use Chairman Greenfield, formally requested that they be turned over voluntarily. We both think it’s time to take that approach citywide.

If community boards, borough presidents and council members can review these forms at roughly the same time the Department of City Planning can, then they’ll know what’s coming. They’ll be better equipped to think through projects’ merits and demerits, seek out input from affected stakeholders earlier, and flag community concerns before it’s too late to address them.

So today, as the Committee on Land Use holds an oversight hearing on the mayor’s preliminary budget for the Department of City Planning, the council is requesting—as a “term and condition” of adopting the department’s budget—that pre-application forms be shared automatically with the relevant community board, borough president and council member. A range of data on the pre-application forms will also have to be included in the annual Mayor’s Management Report.

Bringing more transparency to the zoning process will make it less of a high-stakes, zero-sum game. When that happens, we’ll be better able to use zoning to deliver the results—whether it is affordable housing, commercial and manufacturing space, infrastructure, or open space—that our neighborhoods need.

A new approach to big development?

From Crains:

Neighborhood groups would get an earlier jump on city development plans under a proposal being advanced by Councilman Antonio Reynoso, who organized a Friday convening of about 100 planners, housing group leaders, community board members and others.

The Bushwick councilman and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer want to build in a community engagement process before the city's formal land-use review process to give the public a stronger hand in determining the details of local real estate projects. Such a change would require a modification of the City Charter, Reynoso said.

This would give neighborhoods a chance to account for new infrastructure needs, according to the borough president.

"The old model, wherein there's no pre-discussion, ends with community stakeholders just chipping away at the impacts of a project or worse, accepting concessions that have little to do with the project's impact. That's why we need to be smart and start early," she said.

Meeting attendees decried what they consider superficial community engagement processes and the city's project-by-project approach to development.

Do council members have too much land use power?

From the Observer:

It’s no secret that local Council members typically have veto power over what developments go up in their districts. But after the City Council rejected a rezoning proposal for affordable housing in Inwood when the local member dropped his support, the practice is getting more scrutiny—particularly from a mayor who once held the same sway when he sat in the Council himself.

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, who served three terms in the council and continues to deal with land use questions as borough president, called the question “a hard one.”

“In twelve years on the Council, the tradition of deference on local land use matters gave me the leverage I needed to negotiate better land use deals for my constituents,” Brewer said in an e-mailed statement. “It’s a tradition that usually produces better outcomes—but like all traditions, it can’t be absolute, and it shouldn’t be abused.”

This kind of local control is not unique to New York City government, says Paul Graziano, an urban planning consultant and Queens preservationist, who said the practice occurs “pretty much everywhere around the country” in state legislatures and in the federal government.

There are examples of local control on larger stages, too—the New York State Legislature itself must receive a “home rule” message to pass a bill if it affects a particular city, locale or municipality.

Graziano said the practice works in constituents’ favor most of the time—often, the city wants to pursue development to which locals are opposed, and they can often influence their local elected official more effectively or directly. Amid that kind of local outreach, Rodriguez, who supported the MIH zoning amendment that paved the way for such deals, seemed to struggle to decide how to vote on Sherman Plaza. A committee vote on the project was scuttled at the last minute, he waffled about whether he’d actually announce a position at a press conference and was even heckled by opponents to the development while he spoke at length before announcing his final decision.

Why Maspeth is getting a shelter, part 1

From the NY Post in 2014:

Mayor de Blasio has put the kibosh on a homeless shelter proposed for the Upper West Side, the man pushing the project claims.

Ron Edelstein, whose family owns the Imperial Court Hotel on West 79th Street, said a high-ranking city Department of Homeless Services official told him the mayor ordered the agency to reject his proposal to convert the 227-room building into apartments for 340 homeless people.

Anti-shelter pressure came from local elected officials, including Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, a former councilwoman.

Unfortunately, the people of Maspeth don't have this kind of representation, so they're going to get a shelter no matter how hard the local pols huff and puff in fake indignation for the cameras. Especially when the council member actually makes a deal to place a shelter.

Four Freedoms Park President defends Katz gift

From Roosevelt Islander:

I asked FDR Four Freedoms Park Conservancy President Sally Minard:

Do you think it appropriate for a NY State park located in the Manhattan jurisdiction on Roosevelt Island to receive funds from the Queens Borough President discretionary capital budget earmarked for Queens parks?

Will FDR Park return the money to the Queens Borough President's Office for use in Queens parks?...

Ms. Minard replied:

Less than 1% of the Borough President’s appropriation is designated for FDR Four Freedoms Park. The funds, combined with funding from Manhattan, New York State and private sources will support installation of new lighting to illuminate the exterior of the memorial park. This lighting installation will make the remarkable Louis Kahn design, a sculpture in the New York landscape, visible from the Queens and Manhattan shorelines after dark. The beauty of the illuminated Kahn design will be a new experience that will be shared equally by residents of Queens and Manhattan.

Every month, thousands of Queens residents already share the free educational and public programming, commemorative events, musical performances, and health and fitness sessions offered to visitors at FDR Four Freedoms Park. They come to enjoy the Park’s lush lawn, tree shaded allees and peaceful waterfront promenades with spectacular Queens and Manhattan skyline views.

Well I didn't expect this lady to look a gift horse in the mouth, but by her logic, Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer should be allocating funding toward Gantry Park in LIC because Manhattanites can see it and on occasion take the ferry over to use it. (Somehow I don't see that happening.)

How about we just keep it simple and require that the BPs spend their pots of money in the boroughs they represent? Is that really too much to ask? Or is helping developers sell real estate now the primary function of elected officials?

Pols call for heightened safety at construction sites

From CBS New York:

City officials are calling for improved safety measures at construction sites after a worker fell to his death in Manhattan this week.

As WCBS 880’s Jim Smith reported, standing at the construction site at 46th Street and Eighth Avenue where the worker fell to his death down an elevator shaft, Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer said, “Here was a grim responsibility to demand safety in and around New York City’s construction sites.”

Brewer said the city already this year has surpassed the eight construction deaths in all of the previous year.

The Department of Buildings says it takes aggressive enforcement action against unsafe construction professionals. It says development is at an all-time high, and with that comes more accidents.

Sure, they'll call for action at the hearing, then forget about it until the next death. After all, there's money to be made by the people who line their pockets.

Manhattan BP & Brooklyn Council Members introducing landmarks legislation

From The Real Deal:

Manhattan borough president Gale Brewer unveiled a plan Wednesday to speed up and simplify the landmark review process.

The legislation, to be co-introduced with council members Dan Garodnick, Brad Lander and Stephen Levin, calls for a public web database of all actions by the Landmarks Preservation Commission and would allow online applications for landmark status.

The proposed laws would also put a lid on the length of the application process. It calls for a 90-day limit for responses to applications for landmark status and a 180-day limit for historic districts applications. Moreover, unresolved landmark cases could no longer be shelved for more than five years.

This is the same package of REBNY sponsored crap bills that Leroy Comrie tried to foist upon us when he was chair of the Council's land use committee some time ago. I'm sure there'll be more where this came from.

Lie-lies on lulus?

From the NY Post:

Fifteen current and former City Council members promised to donate their annual taxpayer-funded bonuses to charity in recent years — but only three could offer any proof they had, a Post review found.

Despite being given at least three weeks to show that they put their money where their mouths were, only Councilmen Eric Ulrich (D-Queens) and Steve Levin (D-Brooklyn) and former Councilwoman Gale Brewer, now Manhattan borough president, could do so. They provided a mix of donation lists and thank-you notes as proof.

The remaining dozen officials — who have been public credited with not pocketing the annual political handouts from the council speaker of $4,000 to $28,000 — declined to offer documentation, provided scant detail of recipients or ignored The Post’s requests entirely.

The bonuses, known as “lulus,” are doled out to members who take leadership roles or otherwise curry favor with the speaker.

This included Majority Leader Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Queens), who for eight weeks was unable to provide a single receipt documenting what he has done with the $60,000 in lulus he has been allocated since 2010.

It was only after a Post reporter confronted him in person that Van Bramer’s office provided a short list of recipients, including the NAACP of Astoria and the 108th Precinct Community Council, but no amounts, dates or documentation.

Those two groups confirmed they had received donations of $100 each from Van Bramer.

But his minimal list was more than what was offered by the bulk of council members, who provided no detail of charitable giving from their bonuses.
Those include current Public Advocate Letitia James, Mathieu Eugene and Darlene Mealy of Brooklyn; Fernando Cabrera of The Bronx; Julissa Ferreras, Karen Koslowitz, Ruben Wills, and Peter Koo of Queens; and Rosie Mendez of Manhattan.

Why can't they just check their tax returns?

An end to poor doors?

From the NY Observer:

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer wants to put an end to “poor doors” and she wants to do it now.

“We are here to discuss a very troubling trend in the construction of new condominium buildings,” Ms. Brewer said this morning in City Hall. “It has come to my attention that developers are abusing an option left over in the inclusionary housing zoning text to create segregated buildings, often known as two-door buildings.”

Ms. Brewer, a former Upper West Side lawmaker, is frustrated about what is occurring at a development on the Upper West Side, where affordable units will be segregated into one section of a new building, 40 Riverside Boulevard, and market-rate condos in the other. Construction on the building began during the Bloomberg administration.

“In 2007 the state of New York modified the 4218 program so developers could only access the program’s tax benefits if they provided the affordable housing on site. But the city didn’t amend the local inclusionary housing program to fully effectuate that change” Ms. Brewer explained. “It was a mistake, but as a city we can rectify it. Changes can and must me made to the city’s inclusionary housing program to stop developers for segregating and segmenting buildings.”

Ms. Brewer said the “poor door system” was an affront to Manhattan’s values. She said she was working with City Council on legislation that would eliminate the loopholes in the inclusionary housing regulation and put an end to the “poor door” system.

“The two-door system, or creating a poor-door system as some media have coined it, is an affront to New Yorker’s belief in fairness and diversity” she said. “Creating a two-tier system in a development that is receiving tax benefits is offensive.”

Lawmakers want more transparency from film industry

From Capital NY:

A bill before the New York City Council this afternoon would require the timely posting of film and television production locations and times, in a searchable format, to the city's website.

The Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment currently requires productions to distribute letters notifying local residents and merchants at least 48 hours in advance of a shoot, an agency spokesperson said in an email. Productions are also obliged to post "No Parking" signs with a contact number 48 hours before a shoot begins, and residents are encouraged to contact the Mayor's Office with their concerns immediately via 311.

But bill sponsors Manhattan borough president Gale Brewer and Council member Ben Kallos think these measures aren't giving residents enough warning. The proposed legislation is one part of Kallos and Brewer's larger effort to make more public data freely available online and the city government more transparent.

“I think most often people know there’s a production because they see a sign saying 'No Parking,’ or when they go to find their car, it’s no longer there because it’s been moved for a film production," Kallos said. (According to the city's website, production companies pay to tow cars the night before or morning of a shoot, and they are expected to keep a list of the spots where relocated vehicles are parked.)

Brewer told Capital she has fielded hundreds of complaints and inquiries by telephone, citing the after-hours posting of signs as a particular concern.

"It’s 6 o’clock in the evening, and there’s nobody to call in the city of New York, so if it was up on the web, that would be a perfect example of how to use the information," she said.

Salvation Army running illegal hotel in Manhattan

From the Daily News:

The Salvation Army has been illegally renting rooms, hotel-style, at its Williams Memorial Residence on the Upper West Side, city officials said.

The scrutiny marks the latest skirmish in the battle that has unfolded since the faith-based organization unveiled its plan to sell the residence to a private developer.

The Department of Buildings issued the violation Wednesday, after Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer called on City Hall to investigate.

Brewer and Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal (D-Upper West Side), among others, took an interest in the senior residence last month, after the Salvation Army announced it would sell the West End Ave. building for more than $100 million, and use the money to open a new residence above a community center in East Harlem.

The organization said it could not afford to maintain the 89-year-old building and promised residents a spot in the new place, at the same rent they currently pay.

The residents, however, quickly griped about making the move, and officials rallied behind them.

The Salvation Army faces a small fine for the violation.

Midtown east rezone is back on the table

From Crains:

Mayor Bill de Blasio announced a new timeline for the rezoning of a large swath of east midtown in Manhattan Friday, one that could stretch into 2016 but will allow for one major skyscraper project to get started in the meantime.

Under a special permit to be issued by the city and subject to public review, SL Green will build a 1.6 million-square-foot office building adjacent to Grand Central Terminal on Vanderbilt Avenue between East 42nd and East 43rd streets. The 65-story tower will be 150 feet taller than the Chrysler Building on the other side of the train station.

The project, called 1 Vanderbilt, will include indoor and outdoor public space, as well as underground connections to the subway to help relieve above-ground congestion. The public review process for the surrounding five blocks along Vanderbilt Avenue will begin this fall.

SL Green will invest more than $100 million to improve the flow of commuter traffic through Grand Central Terminal, said Marc Holliday, CEO of the development firm. But City Planning Commission Chairman Carl Weisbrod said the developer's investment in transit infrastructure will be "a lot more than $100 million," and other private firms looking to reap benefits from the rezoning will need to pony up as well.

Mr. Weisbrod confirmed two other development sites as part of the initial Vanderbilt corridor rezoning: a property on Madison Avenue owned by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, and the Roosevelt Hotel on East 45th Street.

The rest of the midtown east rezoning, which was shelved last year when the Bloomberg administration officials could not get midtown Councilman Daniel Garodnick to sign on, won’t kick off until at least the spring of 2015, and will likely extend into the following year. Mr. de Blasio tapped Mr. Garodnick and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer to oversee a lengthy community review process before the mayor unveils a plan for the 70-block rezoning.

Brewer introducing landmarking lifeline

From Crains:

Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer plans to introduce legislation that would require the city Landmarks Preservation Commission to consider any building older than 50 years for review, whenever a developer files permits to demolish it, she announced Friday.

The proposed legislation would require the commission to take 30 days for public review before deciding whether or not to consider a building for landmark status. Separately, it would also codify a provision that prohibits owners of buildings under consideration for such protected status from gaining demolition permits.

Ms. Brewer announced the legislation at a news conference along West 57 Street, where developers are currently building some of the city’s tallest towers, including Extell Development’s One57 and JDS Development’s super-thin tower nearby.

On a related note, I found this flyer in Midtown this past week:

Council suddenly standing up to developer

From Crains:

In a possible harbinger of a new political climate facing residential developers in the city under an increasingly activist city government, the new Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, several City Council members and the powerful building workers union 32BJ SEIU will rally outside of the Manhattan offices of residential developer TF Cornerstone Wednesday afternoon demanding changes in the way it treats workers at its buildings.

32BJ SEIU has long been at odds with TF Cornerstone, the developer that had built up much of the Long Island City waterfront in recent years, and which was recently selected by the city to develop the second phase of Hunters Point South just to the south of its earlier towers. The union has alleged the developer's treatment of some of its building service workers is not up to the union's standards, and has demanded that the developer adopt industry-wide benchmarks for pay and benefits, something the developer said it has already done.

"TF Cornerstone pays its building workers equal or better-than union wages at all of its residential properties around New York City," a spokesman for the developer said.

Although this is not the first clash between the union and the developer, Wednesday's rally, which called for "a new day for development," is now taking place in a more liberal administration, which some in the Progressive Caucus, including City Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Queens), said bodes well for labor's cause.

"I think there is progressive moment in the city of New York that is reflected in Mayor [Bill] de Blasio, Speaker [Melissa] Mark-Viverito and folks like myself," said Mr. Van Bramer, the Council's majority leader who was set to attend the rally. "I definitely feel like there is a lot of momentum when it comes to us making sure that government projects come with an affordable housing component, and also that labor is at the table."

Peace and quiet coming soon?

From the NY Post:

Catching Zzzz’s could get a lot easier if the City Council passes a bill limiting the hours construction workers can operate.

The proposal, now being pushed by council members Dan Garodnick, Rosie Mendez and Gale Brewer, would make it harder for construction companies to get permission to work late nights and early mornings.

“After-hours construction work, while sometimes necessary for emergency work, is the bane of many New Yorkers’ existence,” Brewer said. “We need to ensure that after-hours work only takes place when absolutely necessary.”

The bill’s authors are unsure of how many after- hours variances are granted annually, but Mendez’s office said it received 686 complaints about them in the past six years alone.

As it is now, crews can work around the clock if they secure a variance from the Department of Buildings. It isn’t hard to get one because companies abuse an “undue hardship” dispensation, Garodnick said.

“The rules need to be clearly laid out and they need to be followed,” he added.

Under the proposed law, the hardship category would be eliminated altogether, and contractors would be forbidden from working before 7 a.m. and after 8 p.m. on weekdays, or before 11 a.m. and after 4 p.m. on Saturdays — except in emergencies and when public safety is at risk.

Building more towers on top of schools

From CBS New York:

The city reportedly has plans to knock down two Upper West Side elementary schools to allow high-rise apartment buildings to go up in their place.

The Department of Education’s Educational Construction Fund listed the sites, on 61st Street and 70th Street, in Crain’s New York last fall, calling for interested developers to come forward.

City Councilwoman Gale Brewer is up in arms over selling P.S. 191 and 199 to developers, WCBS 880′s Rich Lamb reported. Brewer said millions of dollars that have been plowed into improvements into those schools will go down the drain.

“Do we want more tall towers in our neighborhood? We have Riverside South, we have three tall towers, some of which are 60 stories going up on Amsterdam Ave. and 69th Street and I could go on and on about the development on the West Side,” Brewer told Lamb.

But Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott noted that any new construction would require the developers to build cutting-edge schools for free on the lower floors of whatever structure they put up.

“We have several projects out there like that. There’s a project up in the 90s East Side where there’s a building with condominiums and below that is a great school at no cost to the taxpayers,” Walcott told reporters including Lamb on Monday.

Walcott added he would never sacrifice a school.

Brewer said taller towers mean more families with kids and bigger schools. Though there will be hearings, Brewer added that knocking down schools “to build more towers is being foisted upon us.”