The Price of Bertha Lewis' Silence
How much does it cost to buy Bertha Lewis’ support? According to this week’s Brooklyn Papers, half a million bucks. At the end of an article detailing the racial rifts in the debate (which we think are actually more class differences that happen to fall along racial lines), we learn that for all Ratner’s lip…
How much does it cost to buy Bertha Lewis’ support? According to this week’s Brooklyn Papers, half a million bucks. At the end of an article detailing the racial rifts in the debate (which we think are actually more class differences that happen to fall along racial lines), we learn that for all Ratner’s lip service to affordable housing, if he ends up not keeping up his end of the bargain to make half the units “affordable”, all he has to do is pay Lewis’ organization, Acorn, $500,000. A drop in the bucket to buy the silence of a woman who could have been a real thorn in his side.
Race War on Yards [Brooklyn Papers]
Berta Lewis = Moron [No Land Grabd]
Sadly, Metrotech was conceived before the World Wide Web and so ’tis not just a simple matter of providing links to publications of that period showing how things were done.
This link implies some of what went on: http://www.citylimits.org/content/articles/articleView.cfm?articlenumber=1221.
Though I would love nothing better than going through microfiched copies of differnt city publications and personally delivering copies to each and every one of you, the necessisty of making a living seems to prevent me from doing so. It’s probably a fools errand anyway, since the skeptics here won’t even acknowledge the bait-and-switch that’s going on with the current boondogle.
What about all of the promises of minority jobs for Fort Greene when Metrotech was going up? Those never happened, since most of the people who work there are commuters from other neighborhoods.
Bx2Bklyn – your point about the affordable housing component not being viable in a luxury development is not borne out by the multitudes of similar developments in Manhattan below 96th Street, where the addition of affordable housing results in large tax deductions.
As for broken promises – considering the design is in flux and a shovel hasnt hit the ground – calling him a liar for not living up to promises on this project is not fair… if your calling him a liar then you better have actual promises broken.
DDDB itself stated that only 15% of the property in the footprint is comprised of city streets. IMO, that does not qualify as “a lot of land”.
Do these really qualify as broken promises? An emerging project inevitably undergoes changes as the process unfolds, so it’s only fair to allow for that. Also, Woodside Al’s comment was that Ratner had reneged on “many many promises in the past”, which seems to refer to projects like Metrotech and the Atlantic Center. Any proof of broken promises concerning those?
So anonymous 3:21, you do see Ratner’s broken promises. Originally, by the way that rooftop park was supposed to be a street level public park. Don’t forget that a lot of the land going into his project (Pacific St. specifically for one) is public property, and a major street.
Fuuny but the Brooklyn Papers has been against the project from the beginning. Same for Norman Oder. As for the roof-top park, insiders say it’s not happening period whether for renters/owners or the public. It would just cost too much and it would be difficult to draw the public 620 feet in the air just for some open space.
http://timesratnerreport.blogspot.com/2005/10/how-many-construction-jobs-at-atlantic.html
http://www.brooklynpapers.com/html/issues/_vol28/28_39/28_39nets1.html