A plan by the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) to generate much-needed revenue through land leasing has been met with uproar from public housing tenants and elected officials.

NYCHA’s land leasing plan involves eight different sites and 325,000 square feet of land, including public open space and at least one community center. The ground lease, which lasts for 99 years, would allow developers to build on the land while it remains under NYCHA ownership. NYCHA says this plan would generate 30 to 50 million dollars annually, or two percent of the organization’s unmet capital.

The land leasing program involves primarily development of housing, including 4,000 private housing units with 80 percent at market rate and 20 percent permanently affordable units. NYCHA residents will receive priority for the new housing. Some of the development will also involve commercial space.

According to public housing residents and elected officials who showed up to a City Council hearing last week, NYCHA is moving forward too quickly with the ground leasing plan and refusing to address tenants’ numerous concerns.
City Council member Rosie Mendez is one elected official outspoken in opposing the plan as it currently stands.

“NYCHA should wait longer so residents can review [the plan], adequately respond and have the opportunity to stop it if they so decide,” she said. “There is a difference between getting feedback and doing something with that feedback.”

She added that residents of public housing have concerns about every single aspect of the plan and should have been consulted from the very beginning of its formulation.

NYCHA Chairman John Rhea said the organization is facing aging housing stock and the rent they collect only provides half of their operating costs.

“We’ve seen a dramatic change in assistance received from government officials,” he explained. “There has been a precipitous decline in federal government funding.”

He explained while other cities would resort to reducing public housing stock, “preserving public housing is the only proven option in New York City.”

“There are not enough options for low income families, this mission is more relevant than ever before,” explained Rhea. “Given the pressures faced by the government on all levels, we must find ways to chart our own path and do more with less.”

“Preservation comes with tradeoffs and hard decisions,” he added.

Nonetheless, City Council officials and tenants have made their views clear.

Assemblymember Brian Kavanagh said: “While we’re fighting at the state level, we need to make sure NYCHA cannot unilaterally sell off NYCHA housing.”

“Decisions of this significance need a full hearing,” said Kavanagh. “A real process means at the end of the day there’s a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’”

Councilmember Melissa Mark-Viverito noted 2,000 children attend a community center which would be eliminated by the plan, and questioned where they would go instead. She said a full review would be done for luxury condos, and the same courtesy must be given for public housing.

Jane Wisdom, President of the Frederick Douglass Houses, said she is overwhelmed by NYCHA’s actions.

“They’re pushing us and the tenants are very upset,” said Wisdom. “We worry about the quality of life, we want time.”

Lela Santiago, a senior tenant at the Meltzer Houses said NYCHA has been tricking tenants by using sign-in forms at their meetings as a display of consent, while many tenants show up just to be informed or voice their disapproval of the plan.

“There is no tenant involvement,” she said. “They manipulate us.”

Despite concerns by tenants, Rhea assured community members every cent generated by the plan will be used for capital improvement. NYCHA says it will create permanent jobs for its residents, not demolish a single building and avoid increasing rent or hurting anyone’s current work situation. Rhea added tenants’ relationships with their landlords will not be affected by the plan and the plan will not go forward without full engagement with all residents, council members and stakeholders.

“This is our single largest opportunity to make money to reinvest in public housing and the time to act is now,” said Rhea. “The challenges aren’t going anywhere and become more urgent with every year that passes.”

Gun detractors and defenders are up in arms after spates of recent violence. What will new laws mean for our safety?

By Emily Johnson

The first person to be killed with a gun this year in Manhattan was a 16-year-old kid.
Raphael Ward loved baseball and was devoted to his 7-year-old brother. On the night of Jan. 4, he took a bullet to the chest after he refused to hand over his warm winter jacket to a group of thugs.
At the time, state Sen. Dan Squadron said of the crime, “We must continue to work together as a community to fight the scourge of gun violence and make our homes and our streets safer for our families. From stronger gun laws to improved safety at NYCHA developments, we are reminded far too often that the time to act is now.”

Vows of action after tragedy are common and seldom become reality, particularly where guns are concerned. But in this post-Sandy Hook era, suddenly everything that once seemed politically fraught is on the table. And New York is at the forefront of a long-dormant issue that has exploded into the national awareness since 26 people, including 20 young children, were gunned down in the Connecticut elementary school on Dec. 14.

On Tuesday, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed a bill that expanded a ban on assault weapons, limited the number of bullets allowed in magazines and bolstered mental health regulations surrounding gun ownership.

The response to the law, predictably, was immediate and furious. Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott invited disgruntled New York gun owners to move to the Lone Star State. The National Rifle Association cried foul on the haste with which the bill was pushed through, and together with the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association, immediately organized a legal team to review the bill.
The governor defended speed as necessary to prevent a rush to snatch up more guns before the laws went into effect. Considering that in first weeks after the Sandy Hook shooting, the mere suggestion of gun control being reopened for discussion sent people around the country into a gun-buying frenzy, he may have had a point.

Sen. Squadron, a longtime advocate of increased gun control, welcomed the new regulations and called for President Barack Obama to follow suit.

“Our work isn’t done,” he said. “Where Albany has acted, Washington must now act as well.”
Washington didn’t take long to follow suit. Last week, invoking Sandy Hook’s child victims, Obama announced a comprehensive initiative aimed at rolling back gun violence and called on Congress to reinstate the national assault weapons ban and to establish universal background checks for anyone buying a firearm. He also signed 23 executive actions, which did not require congressional approval, that implemented steps like incentives for states to share background check information and hire school resource officers. These were moderate actions, for the most part, aimed at cracking down on school shootings from every angle.

Has there ever been a sleeper issue that, when roused, was more of a lightning rod than gun control? In a polarized country where the Second Amendment is defended with well-funded and fervent zeal, the president himself didn’t go near the issue during his first term, and treated it as taboo in a reelection campaign wary of scaring off swing-state voters.

But now that the NRA has lost its chokehold on the issue, the can of worms it has opened nationwide is astonishing. As liberal activists and politicians leap at this window of opportunity, the panicked gun lobby is doubling down, arguing that more guns make us safer. Conspiracy theories have sprung up claiming that the killings at Sandy Hook were fabricated, or part of an elaborate government plot. The First Amendment was thrown under the bus in favor of the Second when a White House petition to deport CNN’s Piers Morgan for publicly urging stronger gun control received over 100,000 signatures. It has set off heated debates about race in the context of mass shootings, which are predominantly carried out by white men. It has launched a series of provocative, viral articles on mental health by people identifying with shooter Adam Lanza, or with his mother. It has prompted blistering criticism of the media’s role in creating future mass shooters by sensationalizing their actions.

Amid all of this noise, is there no factual common ground? Will this bill actually be effective in curbing gun violence like the incident that claimed Raphael Ward’s life?

New York Assembly members and state senators, a largely blue assortment of people, overwhelmingly hailed the new bill as a positive step.

“While it should not have taken the tragedy of Sandy Hook to begin the long-overdue conversation on guns that we are currently having, I am glad that New York state, which already has some of the toughest gun laws in the country, will act to make them tougher,” Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal said, while Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said he was “very pleased that the governor said he would join the Assembly in enacting serious and meaningful gun safety legislation.”

Some mental health experts, however, had concerns about one provision of the law: namely, requiring therapists, doctors and social workers to report patients they see as dangerous—which would automatically disqualify them for gun ownership.

Dr. Paul Appelbaum, a professor of psychiatry at Columbia University, told the New York Times that the requirement “represents a major change in the presumption of confidentiality that has been inherent in mental health treatment” and warned that it could discourage people with potentially homicidal tendencies from seeking help in the first place.

Other mental health elements of the plan have been better received, such as an amendment to Kendra’s Law. The 1999 law, which requires people who have been deemed a sufficient risk to society to undergo psychiatric treatment, has been extended through 2017 and outpatient treatment will now be required for a year, up from six months.

Laila Dewan, 37, who has two young sons and lives in the same Lower East Side housing complex where Ward lived with his mother, was cautiously optimistic about the New York law.

“It’s great,” she said. “It’s important to protect kids, you know?”

“It’ll be better for everybody, if it actually does make a difference.”

The city’s eviction moratorium was extended post-Sandy, but tenants are left hoping they’ll have enough time

Last Thursday, Council Member Dan Garodnick, various legal groups and at least one New Yorker facing eviction convened on the steps of City Hall to push for an extension to the eviction moratorium that had been lifted the Monday before.

The New York Civil Court had initially issued a moratorium on evictions following Hurricane Sandy, but legal advocacy groups were calling for an extension, indicating that thousands of New Yorkers were still without a home after the storm.

“To resume evictions when we know many families will have nowhere to go is callous and irresponsible,” Garodnick said in a statement.

In spite of the rally’s minimal turnout among those directly impacted, the New York Housing Authority (NYCHA) has since announced it will extend the moratorium, giving tenants facing eviction until the beginning of February to catch up on past-due rent before initiating eviction procedures.

While the extension may alleviate pressure for some, one such tenant, Maria Perez, who believes she was the only person in her position at Thursday’s rally, just hopes that will be enough time for her.

“I’m meeting with a lawyer … I have my fingers crossed,” Perez said.

Perez is one New Yorker and Lower East Side resident strongly affected by the moratorium, particularly as her situation has been exacerbated following Hurricane Sandy.

She said while there are many like her, there was little to no information disseminated about the City Hall rally beforehand, making it difficult for other displaced New Yorkers to trek out and show their support and meet with the legal groups present, like MFY Legal Services.

“I know I’m not the only one going through this,” Perez said.

Nonetheless, the rally was successful for Perez, who was approached by a lawyer willing to look into her situation.

Perez has been on the brink of eviction since her daughter moved out two years ago and NYCHA’s Section 8 branch never lowered her rent. The organization has also been completely uncommunicative, she said. She said her building suffered severe damage in the storm, damage that has become yet another obstacle.

“Section 8 has been asking for things like my Con Edison breakdown,” an exasperated Perez said.

“My landlord doesn’t care if I stay,” she said. “Section 8 is the problem.”

She doesn’t blame the program entirely for their oversights, however, pointing out they are clearly overburdened. Perez said while they used to assign one worker to a set number of tenants, their offices are now an endless array of windows and chairs for waiting, and “you never see the same person twice.”

“[Hurricane Sandy] slowed down the process,” she said, as she has been trying to fight the pending eviction.

Perez said she has been unable to get in contact with the necessary people at Section 8 to resolve her situation—one she claims is an illegitimate eviction. If this was difficult prior to the storm, it’s all but impossible now.

Wasim Lone of the Good Old Lower East Side (GOLES) tenants organization has been helping Perez with her case.

“She has serious medical problems,” explained Lone, who was rushing off to help Perez with her situation at the time, particularly ensuring she receives her Supplemental Security Income (SSI).
“I’m sending her information to the Marshall,” he said.

“GOLES is a rat hole with five or six people working,” explained Perez. “But they are some of the few people who care.”

GOLES, which aims to give power to low-income tenants on the Lower East Side and keep them in their homes, is funded by corporations, like some banks, and various government agencies.

The process Perez describes has reportedly been laborious from the start, but the extension gives her more time to resolve the situation.

“I’m going to a Section 8 office now,” she said, after speaking with Our Town Downtown. “I hope it’s not like the zoo up on Fordham Road.”

Photo Courtesy of Raymond Normandeau/Normandeau Newswire

Raymond Normandeau, press secretary of the Queensbridge Houses Tenants Council in Queens, was tired of the conditions in the Queensbridge housing project where he has lived since 1973, and decided it was time to engage in a little community activism.

While he may no longer be a member of the Astoria ambulance corps (or small time film actor) as he was in the eighties, Normandeau, who is legally blind, always has several projects on his plate—primarily non-threatening but direct ways of getting the authorities to pay attention to tenants’ plights.

And it’s not the violence at Queensbridge with which Normandeau is most concerned, violence which rappers like Jay-Z—who grew up in Queensbridge—have memorialized in their music.

“I lived here through the crack epidemic,” said Normandeau, “when we heard gunshots once a week.” He added he’s grown accustomed to life in the Queens borough project, as, surely, “even people in Afghanistan grow accustomed.” And, Normandeau points out, security has been better since so many chain hotels have cropped up in the area, some “just a gunshot away.”

“Maybe a tourist got robbed or something,” said Normandeau, of the increased security. “I go online to see their [hotel] room prices.” Many prices are in the $129-$200 range.

No, it’s the day-to-day quality of life with which Normandeau takes issue. One major problem confronting Queensbridge tenants, according to him, is the amount of dog feces which accumulates around the housing project (inside and out). It may sound like a joke—even I had a good laugh when the ever-eloquent Normandeau described the situation—but then I saw the pictures. Frankly, they were beyond disturbing.

Unfortunately it seems the only way to get anything done, is to “raise a stink” (my words). It has to be the right kind of stink though, explains Normandeau, it must come about through the graceful “pressuring and embarrassment” of local officials. He’s already tried, with little success, to get the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA)’s attention on Twitter, where he actively follows their feed and peppers them with questions about when various repairs will come through.

Photo Courtesy of Raymond Normandeau/Normandeau Newswire

That’s why Normandeau started the “Queensbridge Landscaping Magazine” (more of a magazine cover, but that’s just a technicality), and in conjunction with the endeavor, Normandeau also organized a contest.

“I asked people to send in photos,” said Normandeau. “The freshest pile, the strangest-looking pile, a pile that had been stepped in a lot.” And piles, he accrued. Thirty-nine of them to be exact, which is how many photos are featured on Normandeau’s website, devoted to the contest (click strictly at your own risk).

Normandeau then took his “Landscaping Magazine” covers, complete with graphic visuals, and began distributing them at community meetings, where local politicians and government officials would convene. This seemed to be exactly the sort of whimsical embarrassment Normandeau describes, the very kick-in-the-pants humiliated officials needed to clean up Queensbridge a bit.

It doesn’t stop at the fecal matter though. Normandeau knows better than anyone it’s not easy navigating a rundown project when you’re technically blind. Obstacles on sidewalks, lights that stay burned out for years…it’s a blind man’s Ironman. That’s why Normandeau released the “Blind Navigating” cover for his “Queensbridge Landscaping Magazine.”

“Blind Tenants Navigate Booby Traps,” the cover headline reads. He handed this one out at meetings too.

Photo Courtesy of Raymond Normandeau/Normandeau Newswire

Normandeau describes the positive aftermath: “‘Blind Navigating’ got [the] sidewalk fixed within days after I handed it out. [The] sidewalk had been like that for over one year.”

Tenants may “feel that NYCHA treats [them] as unwanted,” as Normandeau points out, but as one man, he has finally found a way to be heard through his acts of vigilanteism.

Normandeau also operates the Queensbridge website, which takes, among other things, event submissions: “Having an Event? Community meeting? Open house for Apartment sublet? Art show? Performance? Gun fight?”

The website leaves no wrong untouched, also decrying NYPD and NYCHA’s laissez-faire policies: “Smoking knapsack at a sensitive location? Take photos, run to safety. The NYPD may not be interested, but we are!”

Queensbridge Houses website (courtesy of Normandeau)

Photo Courtesy of Wiki Commons

by Alissa Fleck

Violence is on the rise in the City this summer and cops blame everything from heat waves to the recession to tensions caused by—the ultimate hot-button issue—stop-and-frisk (or would that be the impending soda ban?). Unfortunately, either way, the City’s housing projects seem to suffer most in times like these. While it’s nearly impossible to point to the City’s most dangerous projects, here we report on conditions in four of the most problematic and dilapidated repeat-offenders.

 4. Sheepshead-Nostrand

“Cops Resond to Call for Jumper at Nostrand Houses, Turns Out to be Elevator Repairman” reads a recent headline from Sheepshead Bites, Sheepshead Bay’s self-proclaimed “only independent news blog.” The story continues: “If you saw heavy police activity turn up near [Sheepshead-Nostrand Housing Projects] at around 2:30 p.m. today, the answer is no, it wasn’t another violent incident in the [projects]. It was just an elevator repairman.”

Nonetheless, this mishap speaks volumes about what you can expect at Sheepshead-Nostrand on any given day. The blog also reported the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) recently recommended the NYPD implement terrorism task force technology in this Bed-Stuy housing project. A commenter on the blog speaks to the level of disrepair in the project: “What this goes to show is that seeing a repairman on a roof actually fixing something gave the residents such shock, that they could not comprehend as to why anyone would be up there.”

3. Brownsville Houses 

Brownsville is the highest housing project concentration area in Brooklyn, and generally considered one of the City’s most dangerous neighborhoods. There are 18 projects in the mile and a half stretch of Brownsville, including the Brownsville development, which contains 27 buildings.

James Brodick, project director of Brownsville Community Justice Center, described Brownsville as 100,000 people “living on top of each other,” which certainly sounds like a recipe for disaster. Brodick also offered up generations of poverty issues and territorial disputes as deeply rooted causes the Brownsville projects have so much consistent trouble avoiding infamy’s spotlight.

2. Marcy Projects

News One For Black America released a list of “The 7 Most Infamous U.S. Public Housing Projects.” Brooklyn’s Marcy Projects ranked #2. While news reports point to the human danger in Bed-Stuy’s Marcy Projects, a perhaps greater concern is three-foot rats might get to you before anyone else does.

1. Pelham Parkway 

It might be enough to say residents of the Pelham Parkway Complex in the Bronx, which recently witnessed the murder of an 88-year-old grandmother, refer to a section of the project as “Siberia” and refuse to set foot there. City Councilman James Vacca, who oversees the Bronx district that includes Pelham, knows exactly where Siberia is located. Violence spills over into the community, he reports, which manifests in the numerous shootings at stores just across the street. Again, violence and disrepair—a general overarching sense of apathy and hopelessness—seem to go hand-in-hand.

Vacca pointed to things which discourage Pelham residents most: “urine in the hallways…buzzer systems that do not work…inadequate lighting…the quality of life…the crime.” It’s essentially the lawlessness that pervades when people sense they’ve been forgotten.

When India Bidaisee recently visited the Upper East Side’s Holmes Towers, she didn’t expect that she would have to look out for falling air conditioners.

“No, stand on this side,” Bidaisee’s friend and Holmes resident, Maria Laurano, cautioned as she passed by the tower where an air conditioner had fallen out of a 20th-floor window and plummeted into the Eisman Day Nursery playground at the end of May, narrowly missing a group of children.

More recently, another air conditioner fell from the building into a grassy area away from the pedestrian path on June 23.

In the wake of these incidents, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) is heavily enforcing its already established regulations for air conditioner installation.

“NYCHA has increased its focus on proper air conditioning (AC) installation and has sent additional letters on this matter to residents…We have increased our regular AC unit audits,” a NYCHA spokeswoman said in a statement.

Among the enforced guidelines is the need for supportive metal brackets to hold air conditioners in residents’ windows. Air conditioners in immediate danger of falling must be immediately removed and replaced with a window guard. Only air conditioner installation specialists can remove the units from apartments, the spokeswoman said, but NYCHA maintenance workers can do so in emergency cases.

Other air conditioner deficiencies, according to a June 22 letter issued to residents, must be repaired within three days. Those who don’t comply can face eviction, the letter outlines, but the NYCHA spokeswoman said that no one has ever been evicted for an improperly installed air conditioner.

Council Member Dan Garodnick, who represents the Upper East Side, said he is helping residents of the Holmes Towers and the neighboring Isaacs Houses understand the NYCHA guidelines “in plain language.”

“Installation and removal of air conditioning units is an extremely dangerous process, and people need to be aware of that,” Garodnick said.

Some local residents think that the enforcement is necessary.

“I think it’s a good idea, because the air conditioner is in for a long time and it can loosen,” said a resident who wished to be called L.M. “It gives an extra lift and security to the AC.” But she thinks eviction as a consequence for noncompliance is “a little bit extreme.”

Laurano said that the required brackets cost $30 each and are hard to afford.

“You live in public housing,” Laurano said. “Not everyone has the money.”

“It’s expensive to do that, but I think it’s safe so [another incident] won’t happen again,” one resident said.

Garodnick said he could not recall another incident when an air conditioner had fallen in his district. The closest recent incident, according to an article in the New York Post, was in 2006, when a woman was injured by an AC unit that fell out of a window on East 104th Street, north of Garodnick’s district.

Outside of the NYCHA system, the Department of Buildings is also stepping up its enforcement of proper air conditioner installation. Window air conditioners are now designated as “safe or “unsafe,” according to a department document, instead of “safe with a repair and maintenance program,” because of a rise in unstable ACs in the city. For those marked as unsafe, a department representative must sign off, confirming that repairs were completed.

Sally Maldonado, the director of the Eisman Day Nursery, believes NYCHA residents may have the hardest time meeting AC installation guidelines.

“You have more accidents happening in NYCHA developments because you have more people who can’t go out there and buy the bracket to install air conditioners properly,” Maldonado said.

Over a month later, Maldonado is still frightened and won’t allow children on the playground.

Home Invasion
Last Thursday night, a masked man pushed his way into an apartment on West 81st Street, brandishing what appeared to be a silver weapon to the startled male victim who answered the door. The suspect, who police said is known only as “Anthony,” told his male victim to shut up and get on the ground, then went into the living room where a woman was sleeping and told her to get on the ground as well. When she got onto her knees, he hit her in the back of the head and tied her hands. The invader then forced both victims into the bedroom, where he demanded the code to their safe and withdrew $4,700 in cash, then fled the apartment. The suspect is still at large.

Not-So-Friendly Friend
A woman called police last week to report a theft by her one-time Facebook friend. She said that she met the man on the social networking site and had been having a consensual sexual relationship with him. At their most recent tryst at the Comfort Inn Motel on West 71st Street, she asked her companion to fetch a few items from her car. When he did not
return, she checked the vehicle and discovered that her pal had grabbed $3,000 in cash and left her. Sounds like a solid case for de-friending.

Prank Callers
A worker at the Martin Luther King School reported that while she was a work, an unknown person snatched her $600 iPhone out of her bag and made 39 unauthorized calls on the cell phone before she could freeze her account.

Grabby Hands
On Saturday, a 61-year-old woman waited patiently in line at a TD Bank location to make a deposit. The customer in line behind her, a 60-year-old woman, was not so patient, and reached into the victim’s purse to lift $400 in cash. The thief was promptly arrested.

No Saving Seats
A patron of the arts attended an event at Lincoln Center’s Avery Fisher Hall last week and placed her bag on the empty seat next to her. She was so riveted by the evening’s entertainment that she didn’t notice until later that her black Chanel purse, worth $3,000 on its own, was gone. The purse also contained a $1,000 Gucci wallet, a $499 iPhone, a $200 Blackberry and $400 in cash, as well as credit cards.

Angel Assault
Last Wednesday, scared residents of the Amsterdam Houses NYCHA development called police as a man high on the drug known as angel dust terrorized everyone who walked through the lobby. The crazed man threatened anyone who passed, including kids, and refused to leave. When police arrived, they tried to subdue the man, but he was able to
punch one of the officers square in the face, breaking his glasses and giving him
a nasty laceration. The man continued flailing his arms and contorting his body
to avoid the handcuffs that police eventually slapped on him, and they discovered two bags of the illegal drug in his pockets. The man was arrested and brought to Roosevelt Hospital for treatment.

Baby as Decoy
A couple walked into a Duane Reade last Thursday pushing a baby stroller, a normal sight until an employee noticed that they were stashing several varieties of Crest White Strips under the carriage. They were able to fit 21 boxes, worth a total of $1,025, into the stroller, then fled the store. Now police are on the lookout for a couple with extremely bright smiles.