Friday, May 18, 2012

A gem of an editorial, part 1


From the Queens Chronicle:

If preservation through LPC action isn’t feasible, the city should simply buy the site at the fair market rate, whether the owner is willing to sell or not. The last time it was sold, in 2010, the price was $105,000.

Compare that to the $3 million going toward saving a schoolyard in Jackson Heights. Or the $14 million being spent on an unnecessary expansion of Borough Hall. Or the $180,000 per station the MTA shells out for its Arts for Transit and Urban Design Program.

Our office receives announcements of much larger spending initiatives from the proud politicians who secured the funding just about every day. Just this week the mayor announced that the city will be spending $9 million to encourage parents to make sure their kids attend school, largely through advertising and education about the importance of avoiding truancy.

Let’s say for the moment that parents really do need to see ads on buses to know their children should go to class. Could the city maybe get away with spending $8.9 million and put the remaining $100,000 into preserving Brinckerhoff?

Whatever the source of the money, it can and should be found. Let’s see our elected officials who are voicing support for preservation put their money where their mouth is. Yes, you’re right, our money, not theirs — but we all know they often treat it like their own. If the 14-member Queens City Council delegation split the cost evenly, using their so-called member item funding, it would be a little more than $7,000 apiece. There’s no reason whatsoever that could not be done.

Will the City of New York make a one-time payout of a measly hundred grand to let dozens of the people who first settled the place we call home rest in peace? You’d think so. We hope so. We’ll see.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

i agree with Q.C. completely.
Remember $2.7 MILLION was spent on refurbishing the Martins Field space into the Old Towne Flushing Burial Ground ,a few years ago .

local public school play ground spaces have recently been converted to tree covered (most are dead or dieing),bench parks, at a cost of $2-3 MILLION each. the phony running tracks with sewer drains are unused?

$105,000 should be an easy get for tricky dick queens politicians.

Anonymous said...

Nah...
the city is spending too much money on that diving board, etc. for the Astoria Pool.

Anonymous said...

The city could have bought
the RKO Keith's theater for
a measly 3.4 million dollars in 1986,
when it was still in near perfect condition.

They didn't!

Somehow NYC seems to prefer giving Chinese developers the upper hand when it comes to destroying historic
sites.

Anonymous said...

Is the LPC making lists for City Planning to give developers outlining problematic development areas that have things like cemeteries, etc?

If so, a nice use of their mandate, eh?

Maybe they can make it public so we all can enjoy our tax dollars at work.

Anonymous said...

Nah...
the city is spending too much money on that diving board, etc. for the Astoria Pool.
----
hey don't go there - you can thank jack for that bolt of genius.