Sanders the next one in trouble?

From the NY Post:

Southeast Queens residents traded one politician who’s under indictment for allegedly covering up the theft of state funds for another who is in hot water with the state Board of Elections.

State elections officials said last week that they were preparing to sue James Sanders for failing to file proper expenses in his campaign report due 10 days after his Sept. 13 state Senate primary. After The Post’s inquiry, the Democrat updated his filing over the weekend.

Sanders, a councilman who’s had similar issues in a prior race, last month defeated Sen. Shirley Huntley, who is under indictment for allegedly covering up the theft of $30,000 in state funds from a charity she funded.

The board has also sued Sanders four times over the past three years for ignoring required disclosure reports from 2009 Council race, which he won easily.

“(Campaign) people have called over the years to find out what’s missing and then promised to make the filings and then they haven’t made the filings,” Board spokesman John Conklin said.

Sanders' campaign directed questions to his Council office; a spokesman there acknowledged the error with the recent forms but said he could not speak to the 2009 campaign filings.

Queens native back home

From NBC:

A 26-year-old Queens man who was banned from flying without explanation while trying to return home after visiting family in Montenegro is finally back in New York.

Samir Suljovic arrived at Penn Station Monday night after spending three weeks fighting to get back to the U.S. He went to Montenegro in July, and when he tried to fly back home out of Vienna, Austria on Oct. 1, airline officials told him he couldn't board the flight, citing orders from the Department of Homeland Security.

Suljovic, who was raised in Queens and lives in Oakland Gardens, believes he was banned from flying because he's Muslim.

What it all boils down to

From an Op-Ed in the Daily News:

Bloomberg-preferred developer the Related Companies in partnership with Sterling Equities, the real estate firm controlled by the owner of the Mets, have plans to build a 1.4 million-square-foot mall and parking garage. The majority of the land for the $3 billion Willets Point project would be taken from parkland adjacent to Citi Field currently used for parking. The administration is attempting to get away with not alienating the land as is required under state law in order to use parkland for non-park purposes.

The city is desperately trying to rely on a 1961 bill that never replaced parkland used for Shea Stadium.

If the 40-plus acres being proposed for mall use are no longer needed for parking then it should revert back to its original recreational use. Our elected officials should be pushing for that instead of giving away our public spaces to the highest bidder.

Major League Soccer is pushing to build a 35,000-seat professional soccer stadium on up to 13 acres. The $300 million plan calls for filling in the former Pool of Industry from the 1964 World’s Fair.

Proponents of the project have sought to characterize the site as decrepit and “under-utilized.” One of the more absurd MLS claims is that it’s a water body and that only 1 acre of grass would be used.

According to that philosophy, our water features, which make up fully one-third of all city parkland, are okay to develop. Besides providing pleasant views, the fountain area is used for jogging, as well as for wildlife.

Unlike the Willets Point deal the city is requiring MLS to replace park land. But these replacement park facilities would not provide the same usefulness, location or value.

As part of a $500 million expansion, the U.S. Tennis Association plans to build a 15,000-seat stadium and an 8,000-seat stadium, as well as two parking garages adding 500 spaces.

The city Economic Development Corp. is also irresponsibly attempting to push this massive project through without conducting a full environmental review of all three projects, needed to assess the cumulative impact.

If our officials were truly interested in creating jobs, start by taking care of the park. For decades people have fought for the city to care for this vital resource.
Elected officials should be supporting the hiring of desperately needed permanent workers to maintain, program and secure the park. They have continuously allocated a fraction of the park funds needed and instead have been increasing making deals that commercially exploit them.

Because what Queens needs is a 3rd proposed convention center

From The Politicker:

...even though Mr. Doctoroff is no longer in command, might it still be possible to see a gondola stretch across the East River between Lower Manhattan, Governors Island and Brooklyn? Or a light rail line running the entire length of the waterfront from Astoria in Queens to Brooklyn’s Red Hook? Or, most audacious of all, tearing down the Javits convention center and moving it to yet another decked-over rail yard, this time in Sunnyside, where it would be surrounded by apartment and hotel towers and a sizable retail complex?

These were among the proposals Mr. Doctoroff put forward on Friday during a speech at the Municipal Art Society’s MAS Summit 2012. They were meant as examples for the next mayor to latch onto in order to “extend the achievements of the Bloomberg Administration by knitting new connections among emerging communities, amenities and institutions.”

Will this guy just go away already?

Consumers may get whacked by regulatory decision

From the Times Ledger:

The state is demanding the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission turn back a recent decision regarding how market rates for one of Astoria’s power plants are calculated on the grounds that the ruling could increase electricity bills across the state by up to $500 million.

“FERC is modifying the rule in a way that will artificially force [Astoria Energy II] to increase its offer price for capacity to a point where it will not be accepted,” the state Public Service Commission said in a press release.

The PSC’s request for a hearing was in response to FERC overturning last month a 2010 decision by the New York Independent System Operator. The latter agency determined that the costs of operating Astoria Energy II, a 550-megawatt plant, at 17-10 Steinway St. in Astoria’s Con Edison complex, were smaller than the predicted revenues the plant was projected to earn from the electrical market.

Astoria Energy II’s local competitors — US Power Generating’s Astoria Generating and TransCanada’s TC Ravenswood — had issued complaints against the ISO’s decision and FERC decided to have the ISO redetermine Astoria Energy II’s operating costs with changes to the test the PSC said would set up Astoria Energy II’s cost to be higher than the market rates.

The PSC estimated this could increase electricity bills for consumers both in New York City and upstate by $500 million in 2013.

Those in historic districts think restrictions are worth it

From the Times Ledger:

Manhattan and Brooklyn, with their dense housing stock, have about 30 and 50 historic districts, respectively. But Queens was a harder sell, according to Wolfe, and has 10 historic districts, the second-fewest of the five boroughs.

In the late 1980s, Douglaston Manor residents began arguing their case before the city Landmarks Preservation Committee, a body in charge of conferring historical status.

A decade later, the historical society finally won them over. Regulations ensured that new development conformed with the historical aesthetics of the landmarked buildings. Meanwhile, in other century-old neighborhoods, urban development continued unfettered.

“If we didn’t have designation 15 years ago, this neighborhood would look like Malba,” [Architect Kevin] Wolfe said, referring to an area near College Point that is home to expensive waterfront property and historic homes of its own, but is also known for its “McMansions,” a derogatory term for palatial houses built as cheaply as possible to the limit of zoning regulations, often in a Mediterranean style replete with turrets and open-air balconies.

“It’s not about taste. It’s about greed,” he said.

Wolfe prefers to see architecture as a physical reminder of history.

“It’s what makes life rich. It’s a connection to your past that continues to change and grow,” Wolfe contended. “Historic districts are not places that are frozen in amber.”

The homes can be modernized in an organic way that allows them to age into the 21st century.

“You can do that in a graceful way or you can do it like a barbarian,” he said.

CUNY Law School opens in LIC

From the Daily News:

The state’s top judge has delivered his ruling: CUNY School of Law’s new location in Queens is a boon for the judicial system.

New York State Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman christened the public service law school’s move on Monday from Flushing to Long Island City.

The school completed the move from Main St., Flushing, to the up-and-coming area of Long Island City in the shadow of the Citigroup Center. Large-scale tenants such as JetBlue and the city Department of Health have re-shaped the western Queens landscape, transforming the neighborhood from its gritty, industrial days.

The building was formerly a training center for Citigroup, but the Great Recession created an opportunity for CUNY honchos to pounce on the prime location, said Iris Weinshall, CUNY’s vice chancellor for facilities planning.

Michelle Anderson, dean of CUNY School of Law, said the new location will help its local students cut their commutes significantly.

Isn't it funny how the Machine's buzz words were used in this article?  "Up-and-coming"  "gritty" "landscape."

It was better before it was forcibly gentrified, when people could afford to live there and businesses could afford to operate there.

They tweed in their own homes as well

From the NY Post:

When politicians snooze, taxpayers don’t just lose — their cash goes to support legislators’ real-estate investments.

New York lawmakers who sleep over in their own Albany-area second homes rake in $165 a night if they claim they must stay over for official business.

Under the Legislature’s loose “per diem” reimbursement system — for which no receipts or other proof are required — Assembly members and state senators who own houses or condos near the Capitol collect the same payments as those who stay in hotels.

Those who have bought their own pads say it’s only fair.

Taxpayer support for their real-estate investments is just one more item in legislators’ goodie bag — and has helped boost Assembly and Senate travel and per-diem expenses to more than $32 million over the last decade.

Gov. Cuomo may push to end the per diems in return for a legislative pay raise, aides say.

“I’m not in the business of collecting per diems to supplement my income,” said Assemblyman Michael DenDekker (D-Queens), who claimed a total $32,434 in stipends in 2010 and 2011.

Since 2003, he has owned a two-family house near the Capitol worth about $195,000. He rented out each unit for $800 a month and stayed in hotels while in Albany on legislative duties.

But last year a deal to sell the house collapsed, and DenDekker couldn’t find a second tenant. So he moved in Jan. 1 for the Legislative session.

“I’d rather get year-round income off the apartment,” he said.

State Sen. Malcolm Smith (D-Queens), elected in 2000, said he recently sold a house valued at $190,000 in adjacent Rensselaer County, He bought it 25 years ago for vacations, then rentals.

When in Albany, he always stays in hotels or with family, said Smith, who collected $38,139 in per diems in 2010 and 2011.

Broad Channel residents fined due to DEP incompetence

From the Queens Chronicle:

It’s a classic case of the right hand not knowing what the left hand was doing.

Residents living on Larnark Road, an isolated dead-end street that sticks out into Jamaica Bay on the east side of Broad Channel, have no sewer connection. When their homes were built more than half a century ago, their sewage just drained into the bay.

But 30 years ago, the city Department of Environmental Protection promised to connect their sewers to the city’s system to prevent sewage from seeping into the bay, which had been classified a federally protected habitat. They’re still waiting.

Patience wore thin and was completely sapped when $30,000 fines were issued to the residents of Larnark Road and nearby Church Road by the state Department of Environmental Conservation. They had ruled it was the residents’ fault their sewer system was not legal.

Angry and despondent residents went to Assemblyman Phil Goldfeder (D-Far Rockaway), who called in city and state officials to his office for a meeting on Oct. 10.

Residents and other local officials wanted the city to take responsibility for the fines because it had reneged on its agreement to build new sewers. The DEP said it never went through with the sewer project because the Department of Transportation ruled Larnark Road was a private road since it was not on a map, which would mean the city was not responsible for the sewers on the street, the residents would be. The state, believing the DOT’s assertion that Larnark Road was a private road, fined the residents.

“The city does not do sewer projects on private roads,” Goldfeder said.

But Larnark Road residents argued they do not live on a private road. The street, which extends from Noel Road near the neighborhood’s subway station to about 300 feet into Jamaica Bay, is clearly a city road, they say. Local officials agree.

“It’s clear that this is the city’s responsibility, and they need to acknowledge it and move on to design and construction,” said Jonathan Gaska, district manager of Community Board 14, which includes Broad Channel.

There are some who think Bloomberg is a master urban planner

From WNYC:

Justin Davidson, New York magazine’s architecture critic, looks at the ways development has changed the city’s character during the Bloomberg years. We’ll take calls on how neighborhoods have changed through new zoning, historic districts, and new construction in the last decade.

Weigh in: Has New York become a city of generic glass towers? Does protecting historic buildings and neighborhoods preserve the city’s character or hamper development?

Listen to just a snippet of the interview and you'll quickly realize that Davidson is pretty clueless. Here's urban planner Michael D.D. White's analysis and response to his remarks:

Before the “Barclays” Center there was “no character” at that site?

The plan for Atlantic Yards mega-project “flows from” a “Gehry design” that developer/subsidy collector Forest City Ratner is “legally” obligated to follow?

Davidson is carelessly promulgating misinformation that’s in service to the Ratner narrative. He does so notwithstanding a level of scrutiny he gave to Manhattan’s comparable, but overall smaller, Hudson Yards only a week ago which level of scrutiny is entirely inconsistent with such ignorant assessments.

In describing the “Barclays” site as previously having “no character” Davidson describes it as a single block that was at the triangular intersection of two large trafficked avenues. That’s what it is now: It's not just a “block” but a newly created superblock created out of what were previously three blocks. Previously, it wasn’t just between two avenues: Previously, Fifth Avenue and Pacific Street flowed through that now superblock block to define those three individual, separate blocks.

And if Davidson is to consider his own point that preserving a neighborhood means paying attention to “the economics of it” and “the character” of a neighborhood (presumably with respect to its interwoveness with the rest of the city), then he should note that what was cleared away at the “Barclays” site just to make way for arena included, but was not limited to, Freddy’s, a neighborhood bar and music venue, and two large newly renovated condominium buildings. Freddy’s was an anchor and a gathering place generating neighborhood connection. The two condominium were also more important than just what they were themselves: They set the tone and example for development that was taking off in the neighborhood, something the Ratner organization elected to wipe out because it was competing with its own properties which Ratner wasn’t developing at the time.

Getting back to Queens, at about 14:40, Paul Graziano, the planner who designed most of the downzonings in Queens, weighs in on Davidson's assertion that Queens downzonings are a bad thing. He mentions the 1961 zoning maps that have been in place until recent years when the rezonings were completed. They based zoning pon the prediction of a buildout of 12-16M people. That type of density transposed on neighborhoods of 1 and 2 family homes were a recipe for disaster.

Continued hysteria over Greek Nazis

From the NY Times:

The evidence was elusive: late last month, a professional Web site suddenly appeared, showing the party’s swastikalike logo set against a dark Manhattan skyline and calling on the city’s Greek diaspora to donate food and clothing to a charity drive to benefit struggling poor people in Greece. There were pictures on the site: one was of a group of men with their backs turned to the camera, wearing black T-shirts reading, in Greek, “Golden Dawn New York.”

Although the site went down within days of its emergence — targeted, it was reported, by Anonymous, the hackers’ group — it provoked sufficient outrage that local politicians, doing what they do, rallied at a news conference to condemn the right-wing party, and a grass-roots protest movement sprang up in an effort to oppose it.

The problem was — and, indeed, still is — that almost nothing is known about the party’s actual presence in the neighborhood. Does Golden Dawn really have an office in Astoria, the center of the city’s Greek community? That is not clear. What are its goals? Also unclear. Is its membership significant or minimal? No one knows for sure.

...a phone call in search of some specifics to Peter F. Vallone Jr., the local city councilman, produced an e-mail from a spokesman saying that Assemblywoman Aravella Simotas, who represents Astoria, knew more about the group. While trying to be helpful, Ms. Simotas said, “I only know a little — and it’s all secondhand.”

What if they do? You can't legislate against free speech. The pols in this town, and everywhere, for that matter, LOVE to play on people's fears. We have Latin gangs, neo-Nazi skinheads, Black Panthers, Al Qaeda, the City Council, etc. in this town. So what is the big deal about adding fascist Greeks to the mix?

A bit of a conflict, don't you think?

From the Times Ledger:

A Manhattan consulting company often tapped for city development projects plays dual roles in Queens, having supported a nonprofit that advocates for the redevelopment of Willets Point, but also preparing the study that helps determine whether or not that development will go forward.

AKRF is a Manhattan-based environmental consulting firm that operates in several states around the Eastern Seaboard and specializes in environmental impact statements — studies on how development projects will affect the surrounding area by taking into account factors like changes to traffic, pollution and noise and the character of existing neighborhoods.

In New York City, these studies are used to inform legislative decisions on whether to grant approvals for projects like the $3 billion redevelopment in Willets Point, where private developers hope to replace the collection of junk yards and auto body shops with a large, mixed-use development.

AKRF is preparing the environmental impact statement for Willets Point. At a Sept. 27 public hearing in Corona, Linh Do, senior vice president at AKRF, walked a crowd through how the statement would proceed and solicited input on what the company should consider when preparing it.

But AKRF was also hired by the Flushing Willets Point Corona LDC, a nonprofit headed by former Borough President Claire Shulman.

The LDC has received state grant money to try and revitalize development along the Flushing waterfront west of downtown and across the Flushing River from Willets Point. After a bidding process, it selected AKRF to lead a team to perform environmental consulting and analyze ways the redevelopment of the area could move forward.

But according to 2011 filings with the Internal Revenue Service, the Flushing Willets Point Corona LDC’s stated mission is to “conduct outreach and obtain support for economic initiatives in the redevelopment of Willets Point, Flushing and Corona.”

And on the nonprofit’s website, AKRF is listed as one of its community supporters under a heading that reads: “Thanks to their generous support, the LDC is able to vigorously pursue exciting development initiatives for the greater Flushing Willets Point Corona area.”

In 2009, AKRF was a sponsor of a gala put on by the LDC, according to Nicholas Roberts, a project manager at the nonprofit, and Do said she volunteers time to brief the nonprofit on the progress of the Flushing waterfront project.

Yeah, it's gonna be Shangri-La... Look, we already know what "revitalized" means to these folks. See Downtown Flushing. See Jamaica. What's with the obsession of this city to kick out manufacturers and commercial activity and replace it with lameness?

Photo from Yelp.

Farm Museum to tend to cemetery - if city buys it back

From the Times Ledger:

The Queens County Farm Museum board recently voted unanimously to maintain Brinckerhoff Cemetery, the centuries-old burial ground where several of Queens’ first settlers are interred, but would not be able to carry out the plan unless the property changes owners, Museum President James Trent said.

Trent said upkeep for the small lot on 182nd Street near the intersection of 73rd Avenue would be minimal, including keeping litter out, removing trees, shoveling snow on the sidewalk and cutting the grass between the curb and the fence – activities that would come at just a small cost to the museum.

He said otherwise the shared vision for the cemetery among a community of preservationists is for Brinckerhoff to remain largely as it is today, including missing headstones, except for perhaps the addition of a plaque or sign detailing the burial ground’s history.

But despite the vote to maintain the site, Trent said the future upkeep of the cemetery by the Queens County Farm Museum is not a done deal.

Although the city Landmarks Preservation Commission recently voted unanimously to designate Brinckerhoff Cemetery as a landmark, protecting the burial ground from development, the land is still owned by Linda’s Cai Trading Inc., which before the LPC vote had been arguing it should be free to develop the land.

Trent said that means presently the museum is not allowed on the land.

He said he would like to see the city step up and offer to acquire the property so it could be turned into a public space.

“The city did own it, the city was not supposed to have sold it,” Trent said. “And so really the city needs to take it back.”

The city sold Brinckerhoff at public auction to pay off tax debts in the mid-20th century.

Trent said it was unclear whether the cemetery would change hands in the near future.

“The people who own it, we don’t even know if they want to sell it,” he said.

Well, that is an important caveat.  But I'm sure after 12 years of doing nothing, Jim Gennaro and Toby Stavisky will see to it that funding is applied toward this venture.

What a soccer stadium will actually cost us

From a letter to the editor of the Queens Chronicle by MLS president Mark Abbott:

Your story, “Less recreational space — Teams worry about proposed MLS Stadium in Flushing Meadows Park” (Oct. 11, multiple editions), is a drastic distortion of the reality of our stadium proposal. Most notably, our stadium would not result in a loss of community soccer fields.

In fact, MLS plans to renovate the community soccer fields surrounding the stadium, transforming them into world-class, all-weather turf fields for the community to use year round.We will renovate these fields before the stadium is built and that renovation will be phased so players are impacted as little as possible.

Is that so?

Here's an aerial of Flushing Meadows:



Here's a rendering of MLS' proposal:



Now, I'm not much of a cartographer, but it sure looks to me like 4, maybe 5, soccer fields - two of which are artificial turf that we taxpaying schmucks spent a lot of money on - are going to be swallowed up by this stadium.

Not only that, but it looks like they've proposed to chop down a shitload of trees in the park to install volleyball courts that no one asked for, as well as "relocate" the soccer fields they're stealing to practice areas that currently are situated between the trees. So, they'll be Replacing porous ground and trees with environmentally unfriendly artificial turf, which certainly will not be used inside the stadium, but apparently is good enough for the rest of us. If it burns players in the summer, when the fields will be most heavily used, well tough shit.

In talking with friends and neighbors about what Queens needs most, not one of them mentioned a soccer stadium. Or a mall at CitiField. Or an expansion of the tennis stadium. More parkland, more police, road and sewer repairs, better schools and preventing overdevelopment are the top priorities.

Large SI site next to be crappified

From SI Live:

It has provided spiritual comfort for more than a century, but the future of the Mount Manresa Jesuit Retreat House in Fort Wadsworth may now be left to fate — its 10 acres of chapels, gardens and grottos have gone on the market for $15.9 million.

The news has sparked concern that the property, which has the most wide-open zoning, could become the latest in townhouse developments.

The New York Province of the Society for Jesus announced in June that Manresa — along with the St. Ignatius Retreat House in Manhasset, L.I — would close by next summer so the Jesuits could revamp their mission to focus on ministries for young adults and Spanish speakers.

St. Ignatius is also on the market, listed at $49 million, according to the Rev. Vincent Cooke, a Society spokesman.

He said suggestions for the site have ranged from college dorms to healthcare facilities to residential development. 

In 2010, Councilman James Oddo (R-Mid-Island/Brooklyn) wrote to the City Planning Commission asking if there was a way to pre-emptively rezone the site, looking for ways to protect it in the event of a future sale.

“The answer then, and the answer now, appears to be that you couldn’t selectively rezone and cut out this one area,” said Oddo, noting that much of the area surrounding Manresa is zoned the same way.

A 10-acre property most certainly can be rezoned. In fact, you can have different zoning for one end of a block than you have for the other. If Jimmy had been paying attention all these years, he'd know that. Or maybe he does know that, and he also knows whichever developer has their eye on purchasing this property, and so he wants development at the site.  In any event, these council members give up too easily.  It's a shame, because it would make a nice park.

Koo notices that Downtown Flushing has an issue

From the Daily News:

Navigating the sidewalks of downtown Flushing is a bit of an art form as pedestrians weave and dodge around merchandise that spills out of storefronts, vending tables and lines of commuters waiting for the bus.

City Councilman Peter Koo thinks that needs to change.

Koo (D-Flushing) is asking the city to crack down on the vendors — legal and illegal — who have turned Main St. into an obstacle course.

“I walk this street every day,” said Koo, who said he has received complaints about the vendors since he was first elected to office in 2009. “The sidewalks are very narrow. You can’t walk.”

Koo said he is even mulling legislative action that would ban vendors along Main St., similar to the restrictions that exist along Austin St. in Forest Hills.

The downtown Flushing area is both a transit hub and a shopping center, home to several bus lines as well as the Long Island Rail Road and the No. 7 subway.

That makes it a prime location for vendors and merchants.

Koo said some shop owners are frustrated by vendors who take away business while others add to the problem by renting out space in front of their stores.

Bayside has a vendor problem as well.

Cost of living rises faster than income

From Crains:

In the decade that ended in 2010, housing and transportation costs rose nearly twice as fast as income for median-income households in the New York metro area, according to a new report tracking the nation's 25 largest metro areas. The report, which was released Thursday morning, also had some good news, however: Despite the jump in costs, the New York area fell into the middle range in the group in terms of affordability, ranking 10th.

Housing and transportation costs in the New York area rose 55% during the 10-year period, while income grew 31%, according to the report by the Center for Housing Policy, an affiliate of the National Housing Conference. More than half of households' income, 56%, goes toward housing and transportation, with housing carrying most of the burden, at 34%. The report, dubbed "Losing Ground: The Struggling of Moderate-Income Households to Afford the Rising Costs of Housing and Transportation," covered New York-area households with annual incomes of $34,389 to $68,778.

The rise of housing and transportation costs in New York outpaced the average for the 25 metro areas, which rose 44% in the decade, driven mainly because of housing expenses.

In New York, the report found that homeowners carry a bigger burden than renters. Renters spend roughly 52% of their income on their home and transportation, versus a homeowner, who spends 61% on those items. Homeowners also lay out slightly more of their income on transportation, 24% versus 21% for renters.

Hot sheets hotel killed

From the Queens Chronicle:

A controversial plan to open what many feared would be a “hot sheet motel," a charge-by-the-hour facility probably to be used for prostitution, along North Conduit Avenue across the street from Springfield Gardens High School, has been killed. City Councilman James Sanders Jr. (D-Laurelton) announced today that the property has been sold to new developers who intend to build a small strip mall at the site.

The community was so concerned about the project that residents filed a lawsuit to block the property owner, Sailesh Ghandi, from moving ahead, stating that the establishment would not only attract an unsavory element to the neighborhood, but that Ghandi had failed to meet the city's deadline to finish the foundation of the building in accordance with a zoning variance he was granted.

Some believed Ghandi would try to demonstrate that he had a common-law right to build, meaning that he had made a significant financial investment in the construction of the motel and therefore should be allowed to continue the work. But now those fears have been allayed with the sale of the property and residents can finally breath a sigh of relief.

Photo from the Daily News.

Profiles in gerrymandering: Woodhaven, Kew Gardens and Richmond Hill

Redistricting Maps 3
From Queens Civic Congress:

Woodhaven / Richmond Hill / Kew Gardens

The Commission has proposed a wholesale shift in Council District representation for
Woodhaven, Richmond Hill and parts of Kew Gardens, moving well over 200 blocks
between the 28th, 29th 30th and 32nd Council Districts. The area is divided into five
neighborhoods (Figure 17): Woodhaven, Woodhaven North, Richmond Hill, Richmond
Hill North and Kew Gardens. All of Woodhaven and 1/3 of Woodhaven North is
presently located in the 32nd Council District, while the rest of Woodhaven North,
Richmond Hill North portions of Richmond Hill and Kew Gardens are located in the
30th. The rest of Kew Gardens and a portion of Richmond Hill are in the 29th, and the
remainder of Richmond Hill is located in the 28th (Figure 14).

The Council District boundaries proposed by the Commission (Figure 15) represents a
significant change in representation in what QCC believes to be not in the best interests of these important areas of Queens. The character of these neighborhoods is rather specific: Woodhaven North is comprised mostly of two-family detached houses, while the remainder of Woodhaven is more typically a mix of detached houses, rowhouses and small apartment buildings; Richmond Hill North is comprised mostly of one-family detached houses, while the remainder of the area is also similar mix to Woodhaven. Kew Gardens is largely split between areas containing large single-family houses, two-family rowhouses and six-story apartment buildings.

Richmond Hill North and Kew Gardens also have the distinction of being the first
suburban planned communities in Queens County, developed by the Man family between
1870 and 1930. These neighborhoods, which have tenacious civic organizations including the Kew Gardens Civic Association and the Richmond Hill Historical Society, are adamant about not being split between several Council Districts, and the Queens Civic Congress agrees with them.

The main natural and manmade boundaries in these neighborhoods are quite prominent
and obvious: The Brooklyn-Queens County line on the west; the Long Island Railroad
trestle between Woodhaven and Richmond Hill in the center; and the Van Wyck
Expressway on the east.

From north to south, the boundaries are Forest Park and the Jackie Robinson Parkway;
Jamaica Avenue, which acts as both a commercial center and a visual dividing line
(including in housing type) due to the elevated subway; and Atlantic Avenue on the
south. Additionally, Richmond Hill North and Kew Gardens have a specific boundary
line delineated when the areas were developed over a century ago.

QCC has proposed certain common sense boundary adjustments based upon the
geography and natural boundaries of these neighborhoods (Figure 16) which will cause
decreased disruption to the shape and content of the current Council Districts. We believe that, for the most part, Jamaica Avenue should act as the boundary between the 30th and 32nd Council Districts as it is being proposed between the 28th and 29th Council Districts; the only exception to this is a section between the Long Island Railroad trestle and 111th Street that would continue south to Atlantic Avenue, which would remain in the 30th Council District (which represents most of that area presently).

Additionally, the QCC proposes that a section of Woodhaven between Woodhaven
Boulevard and the Long Island Railroad from Jamaica to Atlantic avenues would be
moved to the 32nd Council District, as would an area of South Richmond Hill south of
Atlantic Avenue and east of the Long Island Railroad trestle (Figure 16).
The 29th and 30th Council District lines between Richmond Hill North and Kew Gardens
would also be shifted to reflect the actual boundary between these two discrete
neighborhoods.

Meanwhile, the Woodhaven Residents Block Association has its own proposal.

Hoped-for greenstreets put on hold

From the Queens Courier:

A state senator scolded the city for making changes to a green program that has left some turf in his district deserted.

Unused road areas have been turned into leafy green spaces since 1996, under the city Department of Parks and Recreation’s Greenstreets program, but now only pieces of land in flood-prone areas are being considered by the agency.

State Senator Tony Avella said the “abrupt” modifications to the program’s initiative has led the Parks Department to reject many requests made from northeast Queens residents who had hoped to have blights near their homes beautified.

“Unfortunately, with this new, restrictive criteria that [the Parks Department] has instituted, additional locations will be rejected,” Avella said, adding that he had secured several Greenstreets throughout his district, including ones along Francis Lewis Boulevard. “As a result, these locations continue to deteriorate and become blights in the neighborhood.”

But the program’s priorities now lie beyond surface-level aesthetics, according to the Parks Department, which in 2010 changed Greenstreets’ focus to capturing storm water, reducing the burden on the city’s sewer system. They are only now constructed where they are “absolutely necessary,” a spokesperson said.