Life in the fast bike lane

  

NY Post

 More than one-third of people riding motorized two-wheeleers on the Big Apple’s protected bike lanes and greenways speed dangerously, an analysis by The Post found.

Although the city last week revved up its crackdown on dangerous driving by operating speed cameras round the clock, bike lanes remain severe safety hazards flooded with scofflaws on e-bikes, mopeds and motorcycles that constantly disobey the 25-mph speed limit.

Over the past week, a team of Post journalists used a radar gun to track speeders on paths crossing the Williamsburg, Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queensboro bridges, as well as bike lanes in Midtown and at Hudson River Park.

Of the 486 two-wheelers clocked, 167 – or 34% — sped above the 25 mph max, including some as high as 35 mph. They include dirt bikes, all-terrain vehicles and others outlawed on city streets and bike lanes.

 he need for speed was especially noticeable on the Williamsburg Bridge where 44 – or 59% — of 74 motor bikes using its pathway over an hour-long period Friday went over 25 mph.

The Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan Bridge’s lanes were also filled with speeders. Over an hour, 37% and 30% of its bikers were also caught, respectively, speeding by the reporter and photographer.

On the Queensboro Bridge, 18% of the 87 motorized bikers clocked went over 25 mph – but, unlike the other East River crossings, its bike lane is shared with pedestrians who were forced to dodge dirt bikes and other rogue rides.

On Thursday afternoon, The Post set up near Stuyvesant High School on Chambers Street for an hour and clocked 33 – or 43% — of 77 motorized bikes zipping along the Hudson River Park bike path over the speed limit.

New Yorkers said they’re fed up with bike-lane lawbreakers.

“It’s a huge problem!” barked Peter Epstein, an avid 60-year-old bicyclist after pedaling along the scenic bike lane on Manhattan’s West Side. “People are walking by” because they have “the green light to cross the path, and these [motor] bikes are zooming right up to them; there’s not even time for anyone to react. It’s just crazy.”

NYPD expected trouble at house party, then it came

 

 

AMNY

A gang of men unleashed a hail of bullets, shooting into a residential Queens party late Friday night, which prompted detectives to return fire and injure three men, police said.

Members of the NYPD Violent Crime Squad were parked outside 219th Street and 130th Avenue in Laurelton observing a party which they believed had gang connections. The detectives sat in an unmarked car wearing plain clothes, according to Chief of Patrol Jeffery Maddrey when, at 11:35 p.m. on Aug. 5, a group of men arrived and began firing into the event.

“Now, understand there was about 75 to 100 people at this party and now you have a group of males firing into this group,” Chief Maddrey said during an early morning press conference on Aug. 6. “The detectives saw this, they realized danger was imminent.”

It was reported that the Violent Crime Squad rushed from their vehicle and attempted to stop the mayhem by immediately shooting at the men. After a brief firefight, police brought down three of the men with an array of bullet wounds. All three men were hurried to a local hospital, two of whom are expected to survive. A third man, however, is currently in critical condition.

The detectives were also removed to a medical facility for treatment of severe tinnitus, police said.

Early in the investigation, it wasn’t yet known if any of the revelers were also struck. Well after sunrise Saturday, Crime Scene Unit detectives were still canvassing the area for evidence, marking as many as 39 shell casings left in the exchange of bullets.

 

Duck sauce killer possessed gun while under house arrest, used it to commit suicide

QNS 

Glenn Hirsch, the man charged in the April 30 murder of a Chinese food delivery man in Forest Hills, committed suicide on Friday morning, Aug. 5, just before he was set to appear in court, his attorney confirmed with QNS. He was 51 years old.

Hirsch’s body was discovered in his apartment by police at approximately 10:06 a.m. Hirsch’s attorney confirmed with QNS that Hirsch had shot himself.

Hirsch had allegedly been upset with the restaurant that the delivery worker, Zhiwen Yan, worked for, The Great Wall Restaurant in Forest Hills. There was a feud over duck sauce that led to the murder, earning Hirsch the moniker “Duck Sauce Killer.”

He allegedly stalked and harassed workers from the restaurant. Hirsch was seen on surveillance video during the night of April 30 allegedly driving by the restaurant after dropping his wife off at work. He had passed by the restaurant seven times before Yan left the restaurant to make a delivery at around 9:30 p.m. Hirsch followed him as he made the delivery. When Yan stopped at a red light at 67th Drive and 108th Street after completing the delivery, Hirsch approached Yan and shot him in the chest, according to authorities. Yan had died as a result of a single gunshot wound. He was 45.

Swimming banned at Riis Park after bacteria found in water

  

 

NBC News

A popular beach escape for sweltering New Yorkers took a hit this week, the same day heat indices climbed back near the triple digits.

Park officials announced the closure of all swimming at Jacob Riis Park until further notice citing unsafe water conditions.

Samples taken from water along the Queens beachline produced high bacteria levels that exceed the National Park Service safety standards.

Regular swimmers to NYC beaches know well the challenges of getting in the water this summer. In addition to a handful of shark sightings that have suspended swimming for brief periods, large stretches of the Rockaways have been closed through much of the summer for construction and restoration of the beach. 

 

 

Caption Mayor Adams and his happy team

Alleged affordable housing building completed in Far Rockaway

 

QNS

The 100 percent affordable housing project — called Beach 21st — transformed the vacant lot on city-owned land near the Far Rockaway-Mott Avenue subway station, delivering on key commitments from the “Downtown Far Rockaway Roadmap for Action,” a comprehensive plan released in 2016 to revitalize the neighborhood and improve the quality of life for local residents.

“Seven years ago, I convened the Downtown Far Rockaway Working Group to develop a $288 million roadmap for this community’s revitalization and reverse decades of deliberate disinvestment,” Queens Borough President Donovan Richards said. “I could not be more proud of the life-changing progress we are delivering for the families of this neighborhood in the form of housing, open space, education, and beyond — it truly is a new day for Far Rockaway, where its residents are finally being heard loud and clear.”

The multi-agency effort, led by the New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC), delivered street safety upgrades, new pedestrian space, climate resilience, and flood protection measures to an area that was pummeled nearly a decade ago by Superstorm Sandy.

Councilwoman Selvena Brooks-Powers applauded the Department of Transportation for completing a $114 million infrastructure project that was completed three months early and $25 million under budget, the NYCEDC and community partners for their commitment to “synergetic community spaces to strengthen the neighborhood, provide vital housing to residents, and construct a stronger, better downtown Far Rockaway.

“Thriving communities need vital open spaces, community spaces, community engagement, affordable housing, and a formidable connection to critical services,” Brooks-Powers said. “The Beach 21st Street mixed-use development has the necessary synergy to assure that our community stays on the trajectory of vibrancy.”

Julie Won's constitution for affordable housing development

 

Queens Post

Councilmember Julie Won has put together an extensive list of guidelines—with input from non-profit leaders and community organizations– that developers must adhere to when seeking a rezoning in order to get her support in the city council.

Won, who was a Community Board 2 member prior to being elected, says the document aims to democratize the rezoning process, providing the community with greater input as to what is deemed appropriate for development. She said past rezoning decisions were left almost exclusively in the hands of councilmembers and were less “community driven.”

The guidelines she has created is what she refers to as a “living document” that she says will change with the needs of the district and city.

“As an office, we partnered with nonprofit partners to craft our land use principals document and have socialized it with the City Council Land Use division as well as other community partners,” Won told the Queens Post. “This is a living document that will continue to evolve as our community also continues to evolve.”

The guidelines essentially call on developers to do more than what is standard today in order to get their rezoning applications approved. She is calling for greater community outreach (in multiple languages), offer affordable units at deeply affordable levels and to invest in public services.

Won’s guidelines are important since she will ultimately determine the fate of rezoning applications in the 26th Council district, which covers Sunnyside, Woodside, Long Island City and parts of Astoria. The council, which must approve all rezonings, typically votes in lockstep with the representative where a development is proposed in what’s known as member deference.

“We released our land use principles to promote our community’s role in building new developments in our district and bring transparency to the land use process. We want to make sure that developers meet the minimum requirements to do business with our district: community engagement, affordability, and community investment.”

 

Open restaurant shanties law will be heard by State Supreme Court

If there is debate about keeping outdoor dining restaurant shanties on the streets of #NYC, this one should end it. As rats scurried away from piles of wood that were dismantled from the structure where they once called home

This is under every one of these, even the fancy ones pic.twitter.com/XeeOStZeVx

— JQ LLC (@ImpunityCity) July 19, 2022

 

 NY Daily News

A Manhattan lawsuit calls for the city and state to scrap the outdoor dining option launched when the pandemic hit in 2020, arguing the al fresco operations now leave a bad taste in their mouths.

The eight-page Supreme Court filing cited “increased and excessive noise, traffic congestion, garbage and uncontrolled rodent populations (and) the blocking of sidewalks and roadways” since the Temporary Outdoor Restaurant program began in June 2020.

“Now some restaurant owners are using the sheds for storage, not for outdoor dining ... some are filled with garbage,” said Brooklyn Community Board 4 Chair Robert Camacho in an affidavit with Friday’s suit. “Some are filled with garbage. Some have kids in there getting high.”

 In addition, the lawsuit alleged, the outdoor dining option created problems for traffic on city streets and sidewalks, along with a dearth of parking spaces for customers that leads to a reduction in business.

“TOR also continues to appropriate substantial share of public sidewalks and streets for private use and profit,” the suit alleges.

Lower East Side restaurant owner Vincent Sgarlato supports the continuation of outdoor dining in the city — to a point. Some of the outdoor operations near his eatery turned into “putrid structures” over time, and cleanliness in general has become a pandemic problem in the area, he said.

The Department of Transportation Alternatives are making up neighborhoods now

 

As everybody knows on this blog and anyone else that lives in Queens that counts, the only Fresh Pond that exists in Queens is a street that it's named after. Fresh Pond Road goes from Glendale to Ridgewood ending at Flushing Avenue near Maspeth (thanks to the commentor and Crappy for correcting me). Gotta wonder if the DOT or more likely Lyft/Citibike are getting into the branding of neighborhoods, since they are privatizing public streets with these crappy bikes (that are apparently very easy to steal).

Governor Kathy Clown's pay to Medicaid play scheme to remain in power

NY Post 

A couple with ties to a firm that’s been awarded hundreds of millions in Medicaid transportation contracts over the years has driven more than $300,000 combined into the campaign coffers of former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and current Gov. Kathy Hochul, records reviewed by The Post reveal.

Critics say the donations are a textbook case of Albany’s pay-to-play culture that allows bidders and contractors to give massive campaign contributions to the governor whose agencies oversee them. By comparison, New York City law limits donations from bidders and contractors to the mayor and have business Big Apple agencies to $400.

The firm, Medical Answering Services, founded by president Russ Maxwell in 2004, was awarded eight contracts totaling $403.7 million by the state Health Department from 2011 through 2018. Four of the contracts don’t expire until next year.

Maxwell and his spouse, Morgan McDole, dropped $236,000 into Cuomo’s campaign coffers over those years.

The couple has also dumped more than $100,000 combined into the campaign coffers of Hochul, as governor and lieutenant governor under Cuomo — and the Hochul-controlled state Democratic Committee.

McDole, for instance, gave three contributions totaling $52,600 to Hochul over the past year — $22,600 on Jan. 8, 2021, $10,000 on Sept. 9, 2021 shortly after she became governor and $20,000 on April 24 of this year.

McDole donated another $20,000 to the Hochul-influenced state Democratic Party on April 27 of this year.

Meanwhile, Maxwell has donated $32,100 to Hochul since 2018 and $176,000 to Cuomo during his tenure. McDole donated another $60,000 to Cuomo.

“It’s a perfect example that shows how lax state campaign finance laws are,” said John Kaehny, director of the government watchdog group Reinvent Albany.

Oakland Trailer Park

 

 

 

 

There is now a RV Camp in Bayside right next to Oakland Lake on the Cloverdale Blvd bike path !

Thanks JQ for all the work you do running Queens Crap.

 

Skull found by abandoned Van Sicklen house last year identified as middle aged woman reported missing from Brooklyn

 

NY Post

Human remains that were discovered in a Queens back yard have been identified as a 53-year-old Brooklyn woman — and authorities say she was murdered.

The NYPD said Thursday that the skeletal remains belonged to Gloria Lee, who was last seen alive at her home in Flatbush in May 2021.

The medical examiner has ruled Lee’s death a homicide, although the cause has not been released yet.

Around 6:40 a.m. July 26, 2021, a person walking by an abandoned home on Pine Grove Street in the Jamaica neighborhood of Queens spotted a human skull in the yard and called 911.

Investigators do not know how Lee’s remains ended up at that location, nor how long they had been there before being found.

The woman had no known ties to the home on Pine Grove Street. 

 

City resorts to hotels and the Podolskys again to shelter the homeless

 City Limits

With the number of families in homeless shelters on the rise, New York City officials have once again turned to a pair of notorious landlords closely aligned with Mayor Eric Adams’ top aide to secure extra bed space.

Brothers Stuart and Jay Podolsky—known for profiting off of poorly-maintained housing, and recent clients of Adams’ Chief of Staff Frank Carone—are leasing at least three of their hotels to the city for use as shelters for homeless families. The sites include the Marcel in Gramercy, which reopened to homeless families earlier this month; the Apollo in Harlem, where staff said families began staying July 2; and the Ellington in Morningside Heights, where work crews began prepping for the return of homeless residents in June after the city moved families out a year earlier.

Despite the Podolskys’ sordid pasts, city officials have long leased hotels and tenement buildings from the brothers for use as temporary homeless shelters. In 2017, the property owners retained Carone, then a partner in the law firm Abrams Fensterman, to represent them in negotiations with the de Blasio administration that led to the sale two years later of 17 buildings housing homeless families in the city’s scandal-scarred “cluster site” program. Under that scheme, the Department of Homeless Services (DHS) placed families on a temporary basis in privately-owned apartments they leased at exorbitant prices. The Podolskys managed to extract $173 million from the city in the portfolio sale—$30 million more than the value assessed by an independent appraiser—after raking in millions from the cluster rentals.

Among advocates for the rights of homeless New Yorkers, the deal was seen as a key step toward finally eliminating the cluster site program that stuck families in miserable—at times fatal—conditions overseen by notoriously neglectful landlords. In the case of the Podolskys, the problems extended beyond neglect: the brothers have been convicted of harassing low-income renters in a campaign of “terror,” prosecutors said, and accused in 2019 of cheating on their taxes while renting apartments to the city.

Still, they managed to cash out with Carone—at the time, attorney for the Brooklyn Democratic Party and a key bundler for then-Mayor Bill de Blasio—at the center of the agreement.

In his first six months as Adams’ gatekeeper, Carone has faced several accusations of influence-peddling and scrutiny of his business ties. But City Hall spokesperson Fabien Levy said Carone had no hand in the latest Podolsky deals and that he sought to avoid conflicts of interest with the Department of Social Services (DSS) when he was appointed to the government post.

“He was not a part of the decision-making process of choosing this site as a shelter,” Levy said. “In fact, months ago, he proactively asked DSS’s general counsel to create a list of matters that he may have worked on or touched on in his capacity as an attorney prior to his joining this administration so that we could properly note and recuse himself from participation in any decision-making or discussion. As such, this matter was never even brought to Frank.”

City Limits submitted a Freedom of Information Law request for the shelter contracts to see how much the Podolskys are getting paid and how many Podolsky hotels are used to house homeless New Yorkers. City-contracted nonprofits rent rooms in at least two others, the Longacre and the ParkView, for homeless adults.

City Hall’s assurances have yet to assuage good government experts, who raised concerns about the latest deal with the Podolskys when contacted by City Limits. Reinvent Albany Executive Director John Kaehny said the agreements illustrate deeper problems with the way social service business gets done in New York City.

“It’s such a rich broth of conflicts of interest with all these powerful people in the city,” Kaehny said. He also criticized the Podolskys’ history of past criminal activity and allegations of tenant harassment.

“The Podolskys are a concern because of more than just their connection with Frank Carone. They seem to be not very good landlords or to be not very good vendors,” Kaehny said. “This far into being a social welfare state, we don’t have better options?”

Mayor Adams approves stadium in Flushing for soccer team

 

 NY Post

Mayor Eric Adams is expected to announce that he is onboard with plans for a 25,000-seat soccer stadium to be built near Citi Field that will be home to the New York City Football Club, sources close to the situation said.

“A deal is close, but negotiations are ongoing,” a source said.

Even with the mayor’s blessing the stadium would still need to be approved through the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) which is not a given, sources said.

Still, a new stadium for the reigning MLS Cup Champions could be built by 2025, a source said.

The NYCFC has been nomadic playing home games this season at Yankee Stadium, Citi Field and Red Bull Arena in Harrison, New Jersey. So the prospect of a permanent home would be welcome news to their loyal fan base.

It likely also would be built in time for the 2026 World Cup which is being held in New York City and New Jersey.

Media reports a few months ago said a new stadium would most likely be built in the Bronx, but that is no longer the case, sources said.

 

Party transfer crashers might effect August primary elections

 

 NY Post

The Democratic Party’s gerrymander debacle has created an extraordinary situation: New Yorkers are allowed to switch their party affiliation at the ballot booth on Aug. 23 to vote in another party’s primary elections. 

Under normal circumstances, a voter had a Feb. 14 deadline to change party affiliation for primary elections scheduled in June.

But since judges nullified the Democrats’ partisan gerrymandered district maps — which GOP critics labeled a Hochulander since Gov. Kathy Hochul signed off on them — for Congress and state Senate and ordered primary elections on Aug. 23 based on districts redrawn by a court special master, that deadline no longer applies.

Registered independent or unaffiliated voters can join a party to vote in a contested primary race and registered Republicans or Democrats could temporarily change their party affiliation and crash another party’s primary races for Congress or state Senate. 

For example, Republicans or independents could decide to re-enroll in the Democratic Party to vote in the contested primary between Reps. Jerry Nadler and Carolyn Maloney and Suraj Patel in the 12th Congressional District covering the East and West sides of  Manhattan.

Or Republicans or unaffiliated voters could switch registration to Democrat to vote in the crowded 10th Congressional District primary covering lower Manhattan and brownstone Brooklyn. Candidates include Councilwoman Carlina Rivera, Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou, House impeachment lawyer Dan Goldman, Rep. Mondaire Jones, former Congresswoman and Brooklyn DA Elizabeth Holtzman and Brooklyn Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon, among others.

 

MTA coming up short on funding the subway from low ridership, but will devote 10 years to make cellphone service accessible in the tunnels.

 

 NY Daily News

 The MTA needs billions in new funding by 2025 to avoid dire cuts to mass transit service in and around New York City, agency officials said Monday.

Before the pandemic, rider fares and driver tolls covered about 40% of the agency’s roughly $18 billion in annual operating expenses. But new ridership projections show that model is no longer sustainable.

New projections now show that the MTA faces a $2.5 billion funding shortfall come 2025, giving lawmakers precious little time to find new funding sources to prevent service cuts and layoffs that would hamper New Yorkers’ ability to move in and around the city.

“The new dedicated funding is necessary to avoid what we’re all trying to avoid,” said Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chief Financial Officer Kevin Willens. “Large fare increases, service cuts and layoffs.”

The MTA previously estimated ridership on the the agency’s subways, buses and railroads would reach 77% of prepandemic levels in 2022, bumping up to 86% in 2023. But the spread of the omicron variant over the winter halted many companies’ plans to return to in-person work, tanking those estimates.

The MTA now projects just 61% of those riders will be back on trains and buses this year — with just 69% of them returning in 2023.

 Transit officials on Monday did not lay out what new funding sources they seek, but said planned fare hikes for 2023 and 2025 wouldn’t be enough to cover the shortfall.

CBS New York 

Cell service is coming to New York City's subway tunnels. 

On Monday, MTA CEO Janno Lieber told CBS2 the agency is rolling out a 10-year plan to install equipment that will let riders use cellphones in all underground tunnels. 

Lieber said the $1 billion investment also includes installing Wi-Fi service at all above-ground stations. 

Transit Wireless CEO Melinda White said in a statement, "Expansion of the riders' connectivity through the tunnels and across the above ground stations shows the MTA's ongoing commitment to the rider experience."

The upgrade comes as the MTA is strapped for cash. The agency is moving what it calls its "fiscal cliff" up one year sooner, since outside projections of ridership returns fell short. 

The MTA is turning to the federal government for more money, saying the pandemic relief funding will now run out in 2024. 

The agency says a full return to ridership may not come until 2035 or later. No doubt, officials hope advancements, like adding Wi-Fi, get more people underground sooner.

AOC AWOL

Respectfully, she ran on breathing our air. I do see the other neighboring congressional representatives quite often. I’ve met w Meng and others. Seems there’s different standards for folks. We’ve been through some bad crises and never a phone call. I’ve tried many times.

— Jessica Ramos (@jessicaramos) July 25, 2022

 

 NY Post

A progressive state lawmaker from Queens took a shot at Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for being “absent” and out of touch — accusing the left-wing icon of blowing off a meeting.

Sen. Jessica Ramos, whose western and central Queens district overlaps with AOC’s congressional district and who has been an ally, unloaded on the congresswoman after a med student complained about her canceling a health care forum.

“A couple of the most highly respected health policy academics recently set up a meeting with AOC’s office to discuss NHS-style healthcare reform,” said the medical student, who uses the Twitter handle @jai_lies.

“They were told bluntly by AOC’s staff, ‘we’re not doing healthcare right now.'”

The health activist added: “So while she’s doing performative resistance art for the cameras she’s ‘not doing healthcare right now. We are in the middle of two pandemics & people are still dying because they lack healthcare. this is not fighting.”

He was referring to AOC getting arrested during an abortion protest and faking that her hands were handcuffed behind her back. 

Ramos then began a series of attack tweets on the congresswoman.

“Maybe if you spent more time in your office and with your team you’d know what goes on. Just saying it would be nice if you breathed our air,” Ramos, who chairs the Senate Labor Committee and is backed by the left-leaning Working Families Party, said in a tweet.

“So, as an employer, what happens with the staffer who said this?”

Lizzie gets the money

THE CITY

 Four years ago, a socialist bartender named Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez shocked the political world by unseating Congressman Joe Crowley, Queens’ longtime Democratic party boss. 

Now, the Crowley clan has a chance to get revenge. 

Former City Councilmember Elizabeth Crowley, Joe’s cousin, is running for State Senate, and one of her primary opponents is Kristin Gonzalez, a Democratic Socialist backed by Ocasio-Cortez.

Campaign finance records show an ideologically heterodox coalition lining up to support Crowley, who has a big fundraising lead in the race, including at least $80,000 from registered Republicans, lobbyists, and people in the real estate industry.

Bradley Tusk, a former campaign manager for Republican Mayor Mike Bloomberg turned venture capitalist and political “fixer,” gave Crowley $7,500 (Tusk is a donor to THE CITY). Alfonse D’Amato, a pro-Trump Republican and the founder of Park Strategies LLC, a lobbying firm gave $2,500 to Crowley. 

“I’ve known her personally and professionally for a long time,” D’Amato said in a statement. “We worked together on a television program. She is a good person.”

Crowley, a self-described “tenant advocate” who has pledged not to take money from “big real estate developers,” has, in fact, received a handful of contributions from big developers in addition to tens of thousands in donations from landlords and other real estate industry professionals.

James Pi, founder of Pi Capital Partners, one of New York City’s largest private real estate companies with over two billion dollars in assets it manages, controls or owns, contributed $5,000 to Crowley. H. Dale Hemmerdinger, chairman of Atco Properties & Management, which owns and manages more than 20 buildings and has previously been accused of “slumlord” tactics, gave $1,000 to Crowley.

Crowley did not respond to questions about whether she would return the money she received from the big real estate developers.

One Brooklyn landlord, who gave $2,000 to Crowley, said he hopes she “takes into account everybody, and not just [the] populist movement.”

“I think [there’s] an unfair picture being painted of bleeding, blood-sucking capitalists when 99 percent are just trying to do the right thing and give back to their communities,” he said, referring to real estate owners.

In a statement, Crowley, who has raised more than $500,000, said she is proud to have built a “strong coalition” of donors, volunteers, and labor unions, many of which have both contributed to and endorsed her campaign.

“As a single mom who has battled the hardships so many of our families are currently facing, I have the experience and will fight for a more affordable New York with better access to housing, transit and childcare,” said Crowley, a former union painter and the daughter of a big Irish family. 

Asked for her response to other campaigns accusing her of breaking her pledge not to take big real estate money, Crowley continued: “It is clear that my opponent wants to only focus on the inside political track. Despite that—I’m not playing that game. The stakes are too high and voters at every door I visit are deeply concerned how we will improve their quality of life. That’s why I am running.”

NYC Housing lottery is open for unaffordable apartments at an ugly ass luxury public housing tower

  

Jackson Heights Post

The NYC Housing Preservation & Development launched a lottery Tuesday for 14 income-restricted units in a 12-story luxury building on Jackson Avenue in Long Island City.

The development, called The Green House, is located at 10-25 Jackson Ave. —between 50^th and 51^st Avenues—and consists of 46 units. The building is striking since it is covered by three large murals that each measure about nine stories tall.

The 14 income-restricted units are for prospective tenants who earn up to 130 percent of the area median income. The units are far from inexpensive and are by no means for low-income workers. The most low-cost studio—at $2,431 per month—is for an individual who earns between $83,349 and $121,420.

Two-bedroom units will rent for $3,090, with applicants required to earn a household income of between $105,943 and $187,330 in order to apply.

There are 3 studios, 4 one-bedrooms and 7 two-bedrooms up for grabs.

The building includes an expansive amenity package, ground-floor retail space, and 40 parking spots.

The murals have been painted by Faile. The developer, Charney Companies, commissioned Faile to paint the murals as a means of enhancing the building and the neighborhood. Faile is known for blending fine art, street art, and popular culture together.

Charney is a Long Island City-based firm — headquartered on 46th Avenue—that also built The Jackson, a 53-unit condo building at 13-33 Jackson Ave.

 

Queens and the City

 

 Queens Chronicle

The New York City Districting Commission voted last Friday to make public its preliminary proposal for the city’s reapportioned City Council districts, which poses potential changes for parts of Astoria, South Ozone Park, South Richmond Hill and more.

The proposal comes after weeks of public hearings throughout the city, and accounts for a 7.7 population percent increase citywide and a 7.8 percent increase in Queens since 2010.

Perhaps the most significant change in the borough isn’t even in the borough at all: Should the finished maps resemble the preliminary ones, District 26, which is represented by Councilmember Julie Won (D-Sunnyside) and includes Long Island City, Sunnyside and parts of Woodside, would shift westward to include Roosevelt Island and parts of the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

Won was particularly concerned about the map’s implications for Woodside.

“Looking at the preliminary Council maps, it is painfully clear that no one on the NYC Districting Commission has read the City Charter. The commission chose to separate our communities of color in Long Island City, while also disenfranchising our immigrant communities by splitting Woodside into four council districts,” Won said in a statement.

“While it would be an honor to represent New Yorkers wherever they live, I cannot stay silent while the Districting Commission erases the progress made by immigrants and people of color in my own neighborhood.”

She added that the commission “must be held accountable for violating every single requirement mandated by the City Charter,” and that she would fight it on the proposal.

The councilmember’s office did not comment on her district’s potential inclusion of the Upper East Side, nor did it elaborate on which measures of the City Charter she believes the commission violated. When asked about both, Won’s office said it could not comment further, citing a staff vacancy.

Chapter 2-A, Section 52 of the City Charter says, “District lines shall keep intact neighborhoods and communities with established ties of common interest and association, whether historical, racial, economic, ethnic, religious or other.”