Queens City Council crony acts as proxy for Brooklyn City Council crony to approve luxury public housing tower in her district

  

Brooklyn Paper

 The City Council moved to approve the controversial 840 Atlantic Avenue rezoning this week, despite its failure to gain support from Community Board 8.

The City Council Land Use Committee voted to approve the application — which will allow for an 18-story building on the corner of Vanderbilt and Atlantic Avenues in Prospect Heights that currently hosts a McDonalds drive-through — on Sept. 13, leaving only the full City Council to vote before it’s written into law. 

An updated version of the proposal was presented to and approved by the community board’s land use committee on Sept. 2. The latest version of the proposal reduces the number of affordable units to about 54, but cements their affordability at a deeper level under the city’s Mandatory Inclusionary Housing program at option 3. It also reduces the building’s bulk by about 10 percent. 

The proposal to erect a dense mixed-use building at the corner of the two heavily trafficked thoroughfares was rejected numerous times by the boards land use committee, and by Borough President and would-be mayor Eric Adams, who requested a less dense alternative be proposed.

Committee members repeatedly raised concerns that the development was out of step with the long-planned M-Crown rezoning, which seeks to rezone the industrial corridors of Prospect and Crown Heights for development while retaining jobs in the area. The developer, Atlantic-Vanderbilt Holdings LLC, was asked by board members to resubmit their application.

Community boards play an advisory role in the Uniform Land Use Review Process, but they must officially weigh in before a project can move forward. 

The exact identity of Atlantic-Vanderbilt Holdings LLC remains murky, though Simon Duschinsky of the Rabsky Group development firm is known to be a passive investor in the project. 

According to sources familiar with the negotiations, Councilmember Laurie Cumbo, who represents the area and has the most influence over land use decisions, brokered a meeting between select committee members and the developer, which led to the most updated version of the proposal being presented to the committee and approved. 

Neither Cumbo nor any of her staffers participated in the meetings, which were attended solely by committee members and representatives for the developer, according to the source.

A statement read by City Council Land Use Chair Francisco Moya during a Sept. 10 meeting of the land use subcommittee indicated her support, though Cumbo has not attended any of the public meetings regarding the project. 

“840 Atlantic Avenue presents a rare opportunity to secure truly affordable housing and an affordable long term home for the beloved arts organizations and job-generating commercial space on a site that is currently home to only a parking lot and fast food restaurant,” the statement reads. 

A representative for Cumbo did not return a message seeking further comment. 

 

DOB transparency bill passed

Laurie Cumbo

From The Real Deal:

A new law requires the Department of Buildings to give city officials a heads up when a new building is proposed for a neighborhood.

Mayor Bill de Blasio signed a bill into law Monday ensuring that the department alert the City Council and Community Boards via email on a weekly basis after an application for a new building or for an alteration requiring a new certificate of occupancy for a building is filed. The bill also requires the department to email notices of rejected applications and also post all this information on its website every week.

Council member Laurie Cumbo, who co-sponsored the bill with Council member Fernando Cabrera, said that the law will increase transparency — a boon to neighborhoods like Downtown Brooklyn where new projects sprout up on a daily basis.

Protesters link Crown Heights to Astoria

From the NY Times:

Negotiations over the fate of Astoria Cove, the first new city development to opt into Mayor Bill de Blasio’s affordable housing program, have attracted no shortage of advocates and critics hoping to influence the process.

Housing advocates are pushing for the developer to increase the number of cheaper affordable units. Local officials are concerned about transportation and density. Real estate executives are worried that the city’s sharpened focus on affordable housing will cut into profits.

But on Sunday, the back-and-forth over the Queens project found a new set of stakeholders from another rapidly gentrifying neighborhood: Crown Heights, Brooklyn. The developer of the 1,700-unit Astoria Cove, Alma Realty, owns about 700 units around Prospect Place and is seeking to take them out of rent regulation.

“Mayor de Blasio, don’t fail this test!” pleaded one sign at a rally outside one of the buildings on Prospect Place in Brooklyn on Sunday, when elected officials and tenant organizers urged the City Council not to approve the Astoria Cove project unless Alma Realty rolls back the rent increases in Crown Heights and addresses concerns about its plans in Queens.

The City Council is holding a hearing on whether to approve the project on Monday morning. Council members can push the developer to change its proposal before accepting or rejecting the project.

Councilwoman Laurie A. Cumbo, who represents Crown Heights, said she could not support the Astoria Cove project in part because of what she said was Alma’s history of underpaying black and Hispanic construction workers.

“They’re demonstrating irresponsible development,” she said, adding that she would tell Alma that in order to win her vote, “we need you to come back and clean up your act.”

Since the administration announced in September that all new real estate projects requesting a zoning change from the city would have to build affordable units in exchange, Astoria Cove, which overlooks the East River, has become something of a litmus test for how developers and the city will negotiate future projects.

Part of me wants to say that Alma's chickens are coming home to roost. But then there's the part of me that doesn't see the City Council voting down a megadevelopment project.