{"id":1469,"date":"2022-09-23T12:17:58","date_gmt":"2022-09-23T16:17:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/?p=1469"},"modified":"2022-09-23T12:30:02","modified_gmt":"2022-09-23T16:30:02","slug":"mayor-adams-blasting-plan-part-ii-unlawful-to-file-lawsuits-against-city-and-developers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/2022\/09\/23\/mayor-adams-blasting-plan-part-ii-unlawful-to-file-lawsuits-against-city-and-developers\/","title":{"rendered":"Mayor Adams’ CBC Proposal Part II – Unlawful to File Lawsuits Against City and Developers"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Mayor Eric Adams Blasting
His Way Into Your Community!
Part II<\/span><\/h6>

This is Part II in our series on Mayor Eric Adams’ CBC’s proposals <\/span><\/a>to “improve” rezonings for developers.<\/span><\/em><\/p>

Proposal: Unlawful to File Lawsuits Against the City and Developers\u00a0<\/span><\/strong>
As we stated in the first post on this topic, Mayor Eric Adams\u2019 commission made recommendations for changes in both the law and City and State administrative policies regarding rezoning applications for development.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Their thinking is the 100,000 homeless population is a result of not enough housing, completely ignoring the fact that most new development projects have an average of 30-50 percent vacancy rate and the rise in the homeless population is correlated to the rise in development projects.\u00a0<\/p>
Sidebar:<\/strong><\/u> There is a new study out which shows that development actually exacerbates\u00a0unaffordability in urban housing markets. \u201cUpzoning is far from the progressive policy\u00a0tool it has been sold to be. It mainly leads to building high-end housing in desirable\u00a0locations.\u201d \u201c…the ultimate beneficiaries from zoning and building deregulation are\u00a0landlords and developers.\u201d \u201cA recent study by Yonah Freemark found that upzoning in\u00a0Chicago led to higher, not lower, housing prices, while having no discernible impact on\u00a0local housing\u00a0supply. \u00a0https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2019-05-09\/-build-more-housing-is-no-match-for-inequality<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/div><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
They Used Faulty Data<\/span><\/h5><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
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CPC\u00a0used time periods between 2014-2107 (five to eight years old) for data\u00a0analysis purposely ignoring the more recent projects which showed substantial growth of real\u00a0estate development. In fact, the more recent data, shows the boom in housing development has no positive correlation with how NYC is able to house its people or address the needs of the average New Yorker to obtain housing that is one third or less of their income.
\u00a0<\/span>
Other Entities Involved in these Proposals<\/strong><\/span>
Before it was finalized, a draft of this report<\/span><\/a> was reviewed by the Department of City Planning, HR&A Advisors, NYS Home and Community Renewal, The NYU Furman Center, the Deputy\u00a0Mayor for Economic and Workforce Development and the Office of the Governor. The Commission claimed that these entities made contributions to their final recommendations again showing that they are taking these proposals\u00a0seriously.
\u00a0<\/span><\/div><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
First Recommendation \u00a0<\/strong><\/u><\/span><\/div>

Doing Away with the Right to Go to Court!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>

Their Rationale<\/u><\/strong>:
Despite the fact that the City and Developers win 95% of the court\u00a0cases against development projects and rezonings, the remaining 5% they lose they\u00a0say, \u201cchills\u201d developers from applying for rezoning applications. In addition, most\u00a0challenges come from wealthy communities, so they are not equitable and fair.<\/span>
\u00a0<\/span>
Our Response<\/u><\/strong>:
It might be clear to most people how outrageous and dangerous this proposition is and its violation of our\u00a0fundamental rights to ensure our\u00a0government obeys the law, but in this climate where women are not allowed to decide what happens to their bodies, this may not seem so outrageous after all.<\/span>
\u00a0<\/span>
The Reality<\/strong><\/u>:
No one would be allowed to challenge any of the City\u2019s land use decisions. If the public\u2019s right to file lawsuits is gone, so will the incentive to obey the law. Anarchy will follow especially in poorer communities which hold less political power than more well to do neighborhoods. Remember it is both<\/u> the political and legal consequences that stop projects or makes them conform to the law.<\/span><\/p><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>
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Second Recommendation<\/strong><\/span><\/u><\/div>
If someone wishes to challenge a rezoning project, the case would be reviewed by the\u00a0City Planning Commission.<\/strong><\/span><\/div>

Their Rationale<\/strong><\/u>:\u00a0\u00a0
This would help to encourage more developers to propose development projects because\u00a0cases brought to court (which are costly and time consuming) actually \u201cchills\u201d developers from applying for rezoning applications.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

Our Response<\/u>:<\/strong>
I know this seems insane to think that the entity that helped a developer create a rezoning application, (in some cases the developer lobbied them for it), that certified it and then voted for it during the ULURP process, would null and void it, just because someone did not like how the City conducted itself.\u00a0 And you would be right!\u00a0\u00a0How can you possibly complain to the very entity that you are complaining about?<\/p>

The Threat of Lawsuits:<\/strong><\/u>
The irony of this proposal is that all through the CPC\u2019s report they stated that the \u201cthreat\u201d of lawsuits keeps the City and developers adhering to the law.\u00a0\u00a0Image if that threat is removed? There would be no incentives for the City or developers to follow the law, for what is a law without teeth to enforce it or consequences when you don\u2019t?<\/p>

Violation of Our Constitutional Rights:<\/strong><\/u>
It would also be a violation of our constitutional rights not to be able to sue the City when it engages in arbitrary and capricious conduct; which normally occurs when it comes to developers and rezoning applications.<\/p>

What is rare is wins in favor of the people and community.\u00a0\u00a0Some are due to a judge\u2019s political positions and some are due to the weakness of the existing laws.\u00a0\u00a0But whatever the reasons a five percent loss to the City and the Developers clearly does not justify the elimination of our rights for Judicial intervention.<\/span><\/p><\/div><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mayor Eric Adams Blasting His Way Into Your Community! Part II This is Part II in our series on Mayor Eric Adams’ CBC’s proposals to “improve” rezonings for developers. Proposal: Unlawful to File Lawsuits Against the City and Developers\u00a0 As we stated in the first post on this topic, Mayor […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,9,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1469","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-updates","category-fight-against-rezoning","category-knowledge-is-power"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1469","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1469"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1469\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1484,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1469\/revisions\/1484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1469"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1469"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mtopp.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1469"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}