5:30 PM UPDATE from Voice of Gowanus:
Today we won a temporary restraining order on the Gowanus Rezoning!There’s a lot more to accomplish but we are excited for this first step. Thank you to all who have advocated for a better plan for Gowanus. Thank you to everyone who has contributed to the Gowanus Legal Defense Fund! And special thanks to our allies all across New York City who have been fighting unjust rezonings — this is a moment of celebration for us
And don't forget to donate to our Gowanus Legal Defense Fund to be part of the crew that made it happen.
LAWSUIT COMING TODAY AGAINST GOWANUS REZONING
Voice of Gowanus Challenges “Virtual” Review Process
GOWANUS, BROOKLYN - Attorneys for community coalition Voice of Gowanus (VOG) will file suit against New York City’s Department of City Planning today. The legal suit, to be filed in State Supreme Court in Kings County, challenges the de Blasio Administration’s illegal plan to use a so-called “virtual” land use review procedure for the proposed Gowanus rezoning.
The suit challenges multiple aspects of the largest proposed city-led rezoning in recent times—at 80 square blocks, more than twice the size of Hudson Yards—and seeks to stop the de Blasio Administration's attempt to ram it through in the midst of a global pandemic and economic crisis, when the public is unable to participate fully.
“When you’re dealing with a massive project of this scale that is going to impact so many people’s lives, the community must have its voice heard; that is simply not possible with virtual public hearings,” said VOG’s attorney Jason Zakai of Hiller, P.C. “There are detailed, step-by-step rules laid out in City law on how to conduct the public review process. They are there for a reason, and the City must follow them, even if that means waiting until the pandemic is over.”
The suit calls for the start of the Uniform Land-Use Review Process (ULURP) to be temporarily delayed until the pandemic has been brought under control, and aims to stop the Department of City Planning from certifying the proposal on January 19th, 2021.
“Virtual ULURP is illegal pure and simple,” said Penn Rhodeen, an attorney and member of the VOG legal committee. “ULURP was already tilted against the community prior to the pandemic. Now the city tries to create a false sense of urgency for this rezoning in a shameful attempt to justify an even more watered-down approach to the public review that is guaranteed by the city’s charter. Our suit is on the right side of the facts and the right side of the law. Suits like that win.”
VOG also continues to consult with environmental expert Maureen Koetz regarding significant health and safety issues related to the toxic pollution and raw sewage overflows in the Gowanus Canal, an EPA Superfund site that lies at the center of the proposed rezoning area. The Gowanus Legal Defense Fund continues to generate support for suits that challenge this deeply flawed rezoning proposal.
“We have been watching with horror for years as the ill-advised Gowanus rezoning crept forward. We tried to improve the plan through our civic engagement, but the city thinks it knows best and has left us with no choice but to file an action to stop this de Blasio madness,” said local resident Debbie Stoller of VOG. “Gowanus deserves better - that’s what we’re fighting for.”
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7 comments:
As a new resident to the Gowanus, I am totally for this considering the environmental mess around me. I live in a garden apartment and sewage is constantly backing up into kitchen and the stench is horrible. How can you expect to develop this area without fixing the sewer problems?
That is the question we have been asking for the past ten plus years. Hard to imagine why Councilmember Lander is pushing so hard for this rezone.
He has been calling Gowanus a rich white neighborhood. More like an abused, giant toxic dump that he has been advertising to developers as the next hot Brooklyn neighborhood.
he is shameless
Let this be Brad Lander's legacy- how he tried to manipulate and dump on his Brooklyn constituents to further the agenda of developers - as he tries to claw his way to trying to become NYC Comptroller. I will be sure to tell everyone I know. His one line to defend the horrible rezoning plan is that it will create affordable housing. Yeah, on the most polluted toxic site in the State! And so called "Affordable Housing" needs a good look at, too while we're at it.
Anon 9:43am - contact your landlord immediately to install a backflow preventer for their property. If he/she refuses, stop paying rent and call the Fifth Avenue Committee for support and call the Brooklyn Paper the next time this occurs.
Ano 9:43am, these devices can block sewage from flowing back into a building from the street, but when the street can't take sewage from the building they don't do much to help apartments on the lower level with sewage from upper floors backing up in the building as the building in times the building can't send sewage into the street.
As Katia said, this is long time problem that is more intense from properties that are closer to the canal and buildings with back-flow devices may avert some sewage backup so long as they can restrict water use in the building during those instances.
Doesn't the lawsuit just need to argue to a judge that this excludes a segment of our community? To participate in ULURP meetings, one needs to first purchase Internet service, Internet equipment (phone or computer) and be taught how to use the equipment? What % of the 2,500 residents of NYCHA just north of the rezoning area are without such resources? The City's digital exclusion in ULURP is mostly of lower income seniors of our community and the NYCHA population is mostly older Black and Latino residents.
anon 10:45AM, there are 2,500 NYCHA apartments with 2.4 occupants average per apartment so the total population is +/-6,000 low income residents. Assuming about 1/3 fall into the non-internet / elderly demographic, that's 2,000 disenfranchised CB6 community members (not 2,500).
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