Prepping for COY Housing Opportunity Scoping Meeting

Mayor Eric Adams is proposing drastic changes in the zoning resolution city wide.  As a result, the Department of City Planning has identified 18 out of 20 negative environmental effects that will come with these changes (see list). This list runs from shadow and sewage impacts, to congestion, public health etc.

In preparation for the “Scoping meeting” to address these negative impacts, the media has been doing its best to send out opinion pages, exhibits and “research” all supporting these changes.  If one were to only review what the media has written, one would get the impression that no one objects to these changes, despite the fact that these are city wide changes that will have a tremendous negative impact upon how our city will look and function in the future and jeopardize the safety of its residents.

We will attempt to bring a more balanced perspective to these changes so that on Thursday if you choose to attend the “Scoping Meeting”, you may be able armed with some information and facts.

Please Educate Yourself First.

What is really unfair of the Department of City Planning is the many changes that are happening under these proposals and the little bit of time the public has to educate itself.  See the end of this article for some things you can do to better understand what effects these changes will have on you and your community.

Text Amendment Changes

We suggest that you read this document in phases, as there are a lot of changes being proposed.

The list is alphabetical, so you can just skip to the section you are interested in.  There are also other changes that we did not disclose in this email.  For a complete list of the changes please click on this link.

Below is the list some of the proposed changes.
(Click here for our summary explanation of these changes.)

1. Apartments Will Now Be on Commercial Strips/Districts
2. Apartments On Top of Manufacturing Businesses.
   Current Rationale of Keeping Manufacturing Businesses Separate from Residential
3. Apartments Buildings in Backyard
4. Building Sizes Increase – Increase in Floor Area Ratio “FAR”
5. Building Size Increase for Irregular Lot Sizes
6. Building Tall, Narrow Buildings – Removing Sliver Law
7. Bulk Sizes Increase without Public Review (Weakening the Uniform Land Use Procedure “ULURP”)
8. Bulk Definition
9. Conversion to Residential Housing – Removal of Restrictions
10. Dwelling Unit Factor- Total Removal
11. Height Limits – Increasing all Height Limits
12. Lot Sizes Reduction in Low Density Area – Splitting Lots in Half
13. Parking Requirements – Total Removal
14. Property Line – Building Right Up to Property Line.
15. Property Line – Existing Buildings Can Build on Space Between and Around Buildings – Infill
16. Single Room Occupancies “SROs” Are Back
17. Universal Affordability Preference “UAP”– New Word for “Affordable” Housing? – Increase in FAR

Final Thoughts

Putting It All Together

So, let’s say you have one-story single-family home fully detached in a low density block, (i.e. Queens, Staten Island), a developer can now buy that house, split the lot in two, build 4 four story buildings (two on each lot), build to the lot lines, eliminating any exterior space around the apartment buildings, build to the street curb, with no space between the two buildings, provide no parking for these new apartments and turn it into an SRO!  It is hard to say how many apartments but we would guess, around 10 to 40 new apartments.  Just image what they will look like right in the heart of an all single-family one-story block!

And it will be “as of right”, which means the developer will not have to ask anyone’s permission, buy, destroy and build!

Environmental Categories the City Will Examine

The City must examine these proposals against a list of possible environmental consequences (see list) such as shadow impacts.  They are however, not limited to this list and can examine other areas of environmental impact if the rezoning warrants it. Such as increase in crime and violence as a result of creating SRO back into the community.  In the case of the SRO, one would require an examination of the facts surrounding SROs existence in the past and the rationale and reason these were outlawed decades ago.

The City Will Not Examine all Communities for Their Negative Environmental Impacts

Despite these text amendments being done for all of New York City, DCP has decided to only study what they call “Representative Neighborhoods” to determine the possible negative environmental effects, instead of taking the time to really determine how these vast and drastic changes will affect each community board (59 in total).  One can surmise that the “representative neighborhoods” will produce results that will cause the least amount of harm to the community.

For example, you can bet your bottom dollar they will not be using Gowanus, despite the fact that Gowanus can now see an even greater number of apartments and heights in their community which would adversely impact upon their sewage system that constantly overflows and is out of compliance with so many City, State and Federal Laws.

Is this Lawful?

That is question a lot of people are wondering because the State Environment Review Act, “SEQRA” which demands that this Environmental Impact Statement be done due to possible negative environmental effects, does not allow a municipality to select an environmental review on partial land being rezoned.  The entire land must be assessed, for it is the entire land that is being rezoned.

Secondly, this is the first time that that a Mayor of NYC has attempted to perform a city-wide rezoning process, where an EIS must be performed.  So, we are treading on new ground, putting more and more power in the hands of one person.  If he is able to do this image all of the other Mayors moving forward, what they will do.

Don’t Look Towards the Court

One thing that we have learned in 20 years of litigation in the Courts regarding challenges to rezoning applications is that only the City and Developers win.  What is the probability that every single challenge in NYC, that supported the people and communities has been overturned by the Appellate Divisions? With a 100% record, for wins for the City and Developers shows the Courts would be powerless to do anything about this City-wide rezoning application, regardless of how outrageous and stupid the City arguments will be.

We suspect that is why Frank Carone, the developers’ lawyer became Eric Adams’ Chief of Staff and sat down and helped to create these text amendments. He probably did it with the certainty that they will prevail despite legal challenges and violations of the law.

There is only one force that can stop this rezoning application that is the City Council, because they must vote yes on them.

Things you Can Do

Know Where You Live and the Type of Zoning Your Community Has

To better understand the changes and how they will be affecting your communities (every community in NYC will be affected) it is important for you to know your existing Zoning both where you live and your surrounding community.  The best way to find out is to contact your local community board and ask for a zoning map of your entire Community District, or go to the New York Department of City Planning’s website and enter your address, under finding your zoning.

However, if you don’t want to do that, then this is a rule of thumb that you can consider.  If you reside in a low-density area, where there are a lot of small one to two family detached or semi-detached homes. These are R-1 to R5 zones.  For medium districts which may have one to two family homes but may also have apartment buildings of up to six to eight stories, the zonings can be from R-5 to R7.  For high density zones where the buildings may be 10 stories or higher it would be from R6-R10.  Please note that normally the higher zoning may prevail if you have a combination of residential development including single and multi-family apartments.

Share This Email!

Pass this Email to everyone you know and let them know that major changes are trying to be done by one person, Mayor Adams, basically giving this city to the developers and the real estate industry. Changes that can have negative effects which are permanent and irreversible.

Put Pressure on your City Council Person

Get in Contact with your City Council person and demand that they vote no to these changes, with the awareness that Real Estate Developers is already lobbying and making promises to all the City Council members in an attempt to buy them.