City of Yes or Planning Mess? Zoom Conference with City Club NY

Three Presentations [Awaiting a Fourth] About the City of Yes Proposal

April 16, 2024 / City of Yes Special Report Section / NYC Real Estate & Business / News Analysis & Opinion / Gotham Buzz NYC.

Last Thursday, April 11, 2024, I attended a Zoom Conference Call hosted by the City Club of NY, wherein four zoning experts presented their assessments of the sweeping zoning changes proposed in Mayor Adams' City of Yes zoning legislation.

The City of Yes zoning proposal is being pushed hard, and it is being pushed fast, by the Adams Administration in tandem and with the strong support of the billionaire class and the real estate development industry. These two groups are supportive of Mayor Adams' proposal because it will free them from the time, expense and hassle of answering to us, the locals ... the people who actually live in the places, where the uber rich and real estate developers want to transact business.

Remember - Democracy Doesn't Work on Auto Pilot

So you'd better pay attention before the people's [aka your] input - into the sorts of structures and activities allowed in their [your] communities - is rolled back sixty years, and possibly far further back. The City of Yes legislation will provide the super wealthy and the real estate developers, from all around the world, with the power to dictate to NYC community neighborhoods what structures they're going to erect, in many cases where, and what sorts of activities will take place on the property - within the very lax parameters embedded into the City of Yes legislation.

We've been tracking this legislation for a couple of months now. First via Alicia Boyd of MTOPP [Movement to Protect the People], a community activist in Brooklyn; then via the Mayor's Office of Ethnic & Community Media [MOECM] via Zoom; then via Community Board Meetings in Sunnyside Queens where the NYC Planning Department presented the City of Yes, followed by a Community Board Six in Manhattan Zoom Conference Call; and most recently with the City Club of NY, whose presentations are being published today.

We are thankful to these people and organizations for investing the time to help do the work of a functioning democracy, which is to engage and inform the people about the decisions being made by those in power on their behalf that - may or may not - be on their interest.

• CLICK here to view the slide show presentations given at the City of Yes or Planning Mess NYC Zoom conference call on April 11, 2024.

City of Yes or Planning Mess? Zoom Conference with City Club NY

Three Presentations [Awaiting a Fourth] About the City of Yes Proposal

April 16, 2024 / City of Yes Special Report Section / NYC Neighborhoods / NYC Things To Do Events / News Analysis & Opinion / Gotham Buzz NYC. Continued.

I've taken notes the past few months of the City of Yes meetings I've attended. I hope to publish my own analysis based on all of the things I've learned at each of the sessions I've attended. But the one impression I feel duty bound to express at this juncture, is that the approximately 1,200 page piece of legislation should be taken back to the drawing board and either be completely redone or scrapped. It significantly rolls back the power of the people, and transfers that power to those who already have so much of it.

I think there are some good things in the bill, but they are by far and away overshadowed by the damage this bill will do to the city, possibly in terms of tax revenue [the shrinking of the commercial base, which is taxed at a higher rate than residential], enabling or even causing people to get in each others' hair, possibly resulting in violence or worse. Some examples are an artisan 'manufacturer' who blocks traffic in front of a building because of their frequent material deliveries. Fights over parking because developers will be able to build without making sufficient allocation to address the parking needs of the tenants in the new buildings they erect. Or neighborhoods that can't sleep because someone opened up a disco in the neighborhood. A loss of building security because a neighbor is running a lot of foot traffic through their building related to their business [really - ask yourself how is the government going to enforce laws vis a vis these residential based businesses when they do such a mediocre job - I'm being generous with this description - on enforcement now?]. Environmental problems because a home based business [like a hairdresser that uses dyes and other chemicals], is dumping the chemicals they use in their work through the residential building plumbing, because that's where they will be operating their business. And shrinking green space, because everyone who has any green space, decides to build upon it - taxing the sewer system, parking, transit and so forth. And sadly, this is just to name a few examples of all of the things that could go wrong, that the billionaires and developers who created this plan don't seem to care about, because you - not they - will be left with the 'collateral damage' of the City of Yes zoning changes proposal.

The City Club seems to have captured that sentiment in how they entitled the Zoom conference. The more I delve into this legislation, the more it looks like a failure to plan, which is, as the conference suggested, a 'planning mess'. The slide shows below were presented at the Zoom conference, and the City Club of NY has also posted a YouTube video of the conference of the City of Yes or Planning Mess? for you to view. And here is a link to a Special Reports section we just started on Gotham Buzz which contains all of our reports on the City of Yes sweeping zoning changes proposed for NYC.

The NY City Council heard the proposal on Monday, April 8, 2024. They are expected to discuss it further this month and vote on it in May 2024. So if you have an opinion about it, please make your voice heard by contacting your City Councilmember today.

But we're not done here just yet. So stay tuned.