The City Planning Commission Hearing on the issue was a reflection of “orders from the top” and the presentation was an exercise. Just pitiful when you know that City Planning was key to the decision to create the carve-out at 106th street for JHL to be able to grow on its present site. The CB7 Zoning Task Force that worked on the project did excellent work to protect the quality-of-life for our neighborhood. It included inter-departmental cooperation from Transportation, Sanitation and Buildings as well as Police and Fire departments. That we should find ourselves facing this kind of overwhelming intrusion after that effort is not a good thing.

What is proposed by JHL is a violation of the public trust in that if all went well, we’d wind up with less support than is currently available and use considerable public funding in the process. Now, that is a big “IF.” As a resident of 97th street for over a quater of century, I value the light, air and space left in the community. That said, we have to be ready for changes and have recently lived though quite a few and stayed strong and together. We vote in big numbers, many will need senior supports in the near future — what is being proposed is important to us on many levels. The current JHL plan takes care of a greedy few at an extraordinary cost to many.

JAG Dorsey