The "affordable housing" development of death

Documented 

On April 6, Holger Molina, a 46-year-old immigrant from Ecuador, was removing plywood as part of his job in the construction of a 17 story tower. It is slated to become the tallest building in the area bordering Ridgewood, Queens and Bushwick, Brooklyn. It was raining when, at 3 p.m., Molina slipped and fell from the first-floor stairwell approximately 20 feet through a hole into the basement. He was rushed to Wyckoff Hospital and the next day was declared dead from the injuries sustained in his fall, according to the safety incident report filed by his employer.

After the accident, a Department of Buildings inspector visited the construction site and “observed no safety measures to safeguard workers,” according to the violation report, which considered the incident an aggravated offense level two, the most serious violation from the agency. The judge of the Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings in New York upheld the violation and slapped the contractor, AB Capstone Builders Corp, with the maximum penalty — a $25,000 fine. For that single incident, the Department of Buildings would issue additional violations for penalties worth $55,000 in total. 

The penalties were imposed after the project, slated to be called Myrtle Point — a mixed-use complex with four floors of commercial space and 133 residential units, of which 30 percent would be an “affordable component” — had been fully suspended on three instances since 2021. As of today, the Department of Buildings has issued five full-stop work orders after considering that the work on any of the 90,000-square-foot property was unsafe for workers. 

That’s an inordinate number of stop-work orders for a construction project. For example, the 47-story office tower at 425 Park Avenue scheduled to be completed next year — a complex renovation project that added 75% new construction to the old building’s structure, costing more than $900 million — has over 90 safety violations, according to Department of Buildings records. However, this agency has never issued a stop-work order for that renovation project, which started in 2016.

Construction worker falls to his death at luxury public housing tower development site

QNS 

The Myrtle Point development, also known as Ridgewood Towers, located at 3-50 St. Nicholas Ave., will be 17 stories — making it the tallest building in the area once completed. The mixed-use building will be used for retail and residential spaces.

According to the DOB, the first four floors will be dedicated to commercial use.

In the months leading up to this fatal incident, DOB issued a total of eight violations regarding safety conditions at the construction site. These violations could total thousands of dollars in fines pending an Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings investigation.

One violation issued in March cited a “failure to institute/maintain safety measures resulting in worker injury due to inadequate housekeeping at time of inspection…”

Ted Renz, the executive director of the Myrtle Avenue Business Improvement District, said that this accident was a tragedy. 

“We are deeply saddened by this tragic accident and loss of life at this construction site,” Renz said. “This is a major development in the Myrtle Avenue Business Improvement District that will bring major retail and new housing opportunities to the community.”

On March 23, just a couple of weeks before the fatal fall, DOB issued safety violations after another worker was injured due to “poor safety conditions.”

The Ridgewood Towers project was originally met with much opposition from the local community and its leaders when it was proposed over five years ago.

D.O.B. puts a stop to overdevelopment after three construction workers got killed last month

 

NY Daily News

More than 300 city construction sites have been shut down this month because building inspectors found glaring safety violations, the Daily News has learned.

The 322 sites, more than a third of which were in Brooklyn, were shuttered during a massive zero-tolerance safety sweep conducted by the Department of Buildings designed to tamp down on construction deaths in the city.

Seven hardhats have died in construction-related accidents so far this year, including three in May alone, Buildings officials said.

Those killed include 32-year-old Queens resident Diego Lliguicota, who was working on the sixth floor of a Long Island City building when he fell down an elevator shaft on May 22.

Just five days later, on May 27, a 49-year-old Brooklyn construction worker died after he fell four stories off the roof of a Flatbush bank he was helping demolish. He was not tethered to anything, he lost his balance and fell, authorities said.

“The recent spate of construction worker deaths in our city is tragic, senseless — and even worse, entirely avoidable,” DOB Commissioner Melanie La Rocca said.

Developers reliance on "body shop" non-union construction workers focus of new City Council bills

 

The Real Deal

 Construction unions may be nearing a victory in their war on “body shops.”

A new City Council bill would impose licensing and disclosure mandates on companies competing with union labor at construction sites.

The bill, expected to be introduced by Council member Diana Ayala on Thursday, would require labor brokers to obtain a license from the city and report their workers’ demographics, wages and benefits twice a year.

The measure has been sought by the construction laborers union, Local 79, which wants the city to crack down on nonunion companies that supply low-wage laborers to general contractors. The union accuses them of exploiting women and the formerly incarcerated in particular.

“Construction body shops provide developers with a cheap labor pool, made up of black and brown justice-affected nonunion workers,” Ayala said in a statement. “Body shops take advantage of the scarcity of employment opportunities for re-entry workers, and effectively force these workers into dangerous jobs, with no training, for low pay. They prey on the fears of resentencing.”

But the nonunion firms say their jobs are a lifeline to people leaving prison, providing them with pay and skills that help them get back on their feet. Union construction jobs are much harder to get, they say, and involve navigating a system that is confusing and arcane for many New Yorkers.

Under the proposed legislation, companies applying for a license must provide proof of insurance, disclose their ownership structure and certify that they comply with the law. The city can deny a license if the company — or an affiliated predecessor — has outstanding legal penalties or if the Department of Consumer Affairs and Worker Protection deems that it “lacks good moral character.”

Companies that operate without the license would face $200-a-day fines. General contractors, subcontractors and licensed employment agencies/organizations would be exempt. A separate City Council bill is seeking to require general contractors to obtain a license.

Over the past decade, unions have lost ground to nonunion general labor firms, especially in the affordable housing market. Local 79, however, has negotiated with developers, agreeing to wage concessions to win work.

Last month the City Council’s Committee on Consumer Affairs, which is chaired by Ayala, held a hearing on employment agencies and other labor-placing businesses. The meeting largely focused on body shops, as the union calls them.

At the time, the Real Estate Board of New York proposed alternatives to address allegations of exploitation, including increasing funding to the Department of Consumer Affairs “to better protect justice-involved and other vulnerable workers from wage theft and other unsafe or illegal practices.” The organization also pitched requiring that workers on publicly funded construction jobs be paid more than minimum wage, plus benefits.

Not so essential construction continues during state shutdown, including the Target in Elmhurst

THE CITY

The list of “essential” construction projects and permitted work has ballooned sixfold since Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced a virtual construction shutdown last month, Department of Buildings data shows.

Some 4,936 job sites are now allowed to be worked on, up from about 800 on April 3, according to the Buildings Department.

Among them: hotels in Manhattan and Brooklyn, a new Queens Target, and, as the Columbia Spectator first reported, the future home of Columbia University’s business school.

The greenlighted projects also include renovation work on rental buildings under an exception for a “sole worker,” raising concerns for tenants.

Under a revision of its original shutdown guidance, the state has expanded “essential” building work beyond primarily infrastructure projects, hospitals and affordable housing.

As long as ground already has been broken, construction now can also proceed on any type of business that’s allowed to continue in-person operations during the state’s coronavirus-driven “pause.”

That broader list includes hotels, restaurants, convenience stores, banks, appliance stores and storage facilities, among other businesses. Public and private school construction is also permitted.

One worker on a Manhattan hotel project fumed, saying his bosses were treating the pandemic like “a joke.”

“To make the hotel essential, they might as well open every job, because that hotel is far from essential,” he said. “That hotel is deemed essential while we are deemed expendable.”

The city’s rules for “essential business” construction appear somewhat narrower than the state’s.

Work on “essential businesses” can proceed only “if it pertains to alterations of existing buildings and has been permitted by the department prior to April 15, 2020, the city guidance says.

DOB notes that the vast majority of the 35,000 sites that were ordered shuttered in March are still closed. But some local residents say they’ve been shocked to see work going forward on a wide-ranging set of long-term projects while the pandemic still claims hundreds of lives per day.

The far-from-complete Target site in Elmhurst, also slated to contain a Starbucks and a Chipotle, will eventually house some type of “ambulatory diagnostic treatment or healthcare facilities” above the 23,000-square-foot big box store, city filings show. So the Department of Buildings is allowing construction to continue.

Patricia Chou, a member of the grassroots community group Queens Neighborhoods United, which has long opposed the development, said that while a medical office may be in the offing, the core of the planned facility is still a shopping center.

“Our primary concerns are that they are endangering workers at the site and exploiting loopholes to complete this project,” she said.