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New Lawsuit Tries To Halt Plan For Residential Towers At Brooklyn Bridge Park
By
Miranda Katz
Published Jul 8, 2016
Modified Jul 8, 2016
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By
Miranda Katz
Published Jul 8, 2016
Modified Jul 8, 2016
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It's been a decade now since plans emerged for condo towers to go up just west of Brooklyn Bridge Park's Pier 6, and still the proposed housing is embroiled in controversy. The Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation has already settled one lawsuit from a community group that objected to the development, and now BBPC is being sued again, as some Brooklyn Heights residents refuse to accept the plan to bring a mixture of condos and affordable housing to the site.
Originally, the two towers slated for Pier 6 were planned as luxury developments, but ater Mayor de Blasio took office and intervened, the plans for Pier 6 were amended to reserve 30% for affordable housing for some 100 middle-income families making between $67,100 to $138,440 each year. In the previous lawsuit, the community group People for Green Space demanded that the project submit a new application and undergo another environmental review, and last summer, a judge denied that request for a new review, but ruled that Brooklyn Bridge Park would have to request an official modification to its project plan.
The ESD had previously supported the plan, but backed out in May, citing concerns over conflicts of interest—namely, that the developer, RAL Development Services, donated $10,000 to Mayor de Blasio's barely-legal Campaign for One New York a month before it was selected for the Pier 6 project, and that one of the project's investors, China Vanke, was involved in the shady Rivington House deal that's currently under investigation. After the state backed out, the city said it would proceed anyway, leading to speculation that BBPC would be sued again, and even after the state reversed course and backed the plan in June, another lawsuit was already in the works.
The Brooklyn Heights Association is now seeking a court order to annul the June decision to go ahead with the development and to require another environmental review before anything further proceeds. The petition argues that the development as planned would "take much-needed land that should be an important part of the Park (its entrance), exacerbate the dramatic overcrowding in the community's schools, which are already in crisis, and loom incongruously over the adjacent low-rise neighborhood of Brooklyn Heights."
As far as the petition's legal claims go, they're pretty knotty, but essentially the BHA is arguing that the plan as stated doesn't comply with the legal restrictions that govern any development at the park and points out that the environmental review conducted for the project took place in 2005, so may now be out of date. It also alleges that BBPC broke its own rule not to consider or award a contract to developers not registered with a database of companies doing business with the city (RAL Development apparently wasn't registered until earlier this year, though it was selected for the project in 2015).
"We would prefer to admire the park than sue it," said BHA President Patrick Killackey. "But the BBPC has consistently violated the fundamental commitment on which the BHA and the community supported the Park's creation: that real estate development at the Park would be limited to only the amount necessary to fund the Park's financial needs. We need open space at the park, not needless new condo towers."
The petition also takes issue with the suggestion that community opposition to development on Pier 6 is synonymous with an opposition to affordable housing: it argues that "this is a shameful argument...BBPC knows full well that the community opposed housing at Pier 6 for more than a decade, long before mid-2014 when BBPC first suggested the inclusion of moderate and middle income housing, and that it opposed all housing at Pier 6 when the only development at issue was luxury housing."
The developer for the Pier 6 towers has dismissed this latest suit as a "frivolous attempt to block essential park funding and affordable housing."
In a statement, Brooklyn Bridge Park spokesperson Belinda Cape said that "we're proud of our Pier 6 project and the meticulous, merit-based process that brought it to fruition. We've exhaustively demonstrated that the Pier 6 development is essential to the long-term funding of the Park—in addition to providing sorely needed affordable housing and union jobs in the process. We're confident that we've satisfied all legal requirements, and look forward to ensuring that the Park will have the funding it needs to serve millions of New Yorkers long into the future."
Tagged
affordable housing
brooklyn bridge park
campaign for one new york
pier 6
Miranda Katz
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