City Planning Chair Asks About Affordable Housing, Height at Arrow Linen Hearing

After a series of contentious public hearings on the controversial Arrow Linen rezoning, more than two dozen Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, and surrounding locals waited for hours on Wednesday at a City Planning Commission meeting to have their voices heard. The proposal calls for two mixed-income buildings at a minimum of 13 stories to be built in a low-rise residential area on the site of a longtime commercial laundry in Park Slope.

Of the 26 people who spoke on the plans, 18 called on the agency to reduce the heights of the buildings and make them more affordable, and eight gave the proposal full support as is.

Those against stressed they want to see housing on the site, but want something more affordable than what is proposed and more in tune with the local context. Meanwhile, those backing the proposal said the city needs more housing in all forms and every neighborhood has to do its bit.

The proposal put forward by Arrow Linen has two at least 13-story buildings that include at least 244 apartments. Of those apartments, a rep from developer Apex Development has told the community, at least 61 (25 percent) would be affordable to households earning an average of 60 percent of Area Median Income. The developer said the buildings will include a mix of studio, one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments.

Since the application was filed, many in the community have vocally opposed it, largely through the group Housing Not Highrises, saying it is out of context with the residential stretch of three-story row houses and will not meet the affordability needs of those most in need of housing.

Commissioner Juan Camilo Osorio grilled Arrow Linen’s lawyer on the affordability options for the development, and questioned whether the different proposals made by Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso had been explored.

The lawyer said while the team hadn’t specifically asked Housing Preservation and Development about the funding options, the agency’s funding timeline won’t work for the developer. Osorio asked the rep to find out the details and report back to the commission.

At the hearing, locals against the proposal said the number of luxury apartments included in the development and their likely high-income residents could push up prices in the area and that the rezoning of nearby houses created a displacement risk. They also said local infrastructure and resources can’t handle the development and that shade from the high-rises will shadow nearby senior housing and other properties, among other concerns.

They also accused Arrow Linen of lobbying local politicians with donations, of having undertaken no real community engagement, and said they didn’t trust the development team’s claims that they wouldn’t take advantage of City of Yes and build up to 19 stories.

CPC Chair Dan Garodnick questioned Arrow Linen on whether it would build bigger than the 13 stories proposed, and Arrow Linen’s lawyer said there was no incentive or plan to do so. The chair also asked about the displacement risk of people in the townhouses included in the rezoning, and why Arrow Linen isn’t pursing a 100 percent affordable development. The lawyer said the displacement risk is low in the neighborhood, and that Arrow Linen wants to keep the site and not sell it to an affordable housing developer.

“Please do not believe any developer saying they won’t go above 13 stories when the district would allow 19 stories,” local Julia Meltzer-Harris told the commissioners. She said Arrow Linen’s claims the towers “would, quote, match the residential context and character of the neighborhood is an objectively negligent and reckless assessment.”

“This application has been a dishonest behind closed doors push to line the pockets of one landowner at the expense of any community input.”

She called on DCP to listen to locals pleading for what she said was a more appropriate zoning district at this site, saying locals agree with the goal of adding new housing across neighborhoods and said residents want “to do their share by way of building moderately sized apartment buildings near public transportation.”

Matthew Imberman said commissioners just need to look down nearby 4th Avenue to see “the long stretch of poorly built, overpriced, underfilled, deteriorating towers…to see how these giant developments benefit their developers and not their communities.”

He added that residents had wanted to work with Arrow Linen on a compromise that would provide “meaningful affordable housing while still providing the ability to develop these sites” but that requests for engagement had been ignored.

“What we are saying is that private developers should not be allowed to profit at the expense of our neighborhood’s residents who have invested time and money to create this close-knit community, a community the developers wish to cash in on.”

Former school nurse Amy Wenger said she lived with her husband, a teacher, near the Arrow Linen site and said the company had “never been involved in our community except to be an employer” and she questioned their consideration with employees given her experience with employees’ sick children at the local school.

“They’ve never been involved in our community…they never supported a soccer or baseball team. They never put any program on in the school. They never did anything in our community,” she said.

“I totally reject them building luxury housing in my backyard. I do support affordable housing. My whole life has been about supporting affordable housing, affordable medical care, all sorts of affordable things to make this community more livable.”

On the other side of the coin, community members said there isn’t enough housing for New Yorkers and there is no more-affordable alternative proposal on the table, urging the commission to back the proposal as is to support the new apartments.

Local resident Courtney Adrian accused those opposing the rezoning of making “thinly veiled attempts to stop this because they don’t like shadows and they don’t want more people in their neighborhood.”

She said she is fully behind the new development, and would be fully behind a neighborhood-wide upzoning. “I don’t even care that it’s only market rate, I have to hope that supply will eventually lower rent, and even if it doesn’t, can it really possibly get any worse than it is right now?”

She said that while she hates that “housing is a commodity and not a regular consumer good” and said that she doesn’t want to be “up here making real estate people richer, but like this is the point that we’re at.”

“I hope we can stop gatekeeping this Garden of Eden that I love so much and that you approve this project.”

Veronica Yurovsky said she lives in a building in Park Slope that is 18 stories tall that was built in 1968, and said if it were built today, “people would claim that it’s out of character for the neighborhood and would mount campaigns against it being built.”

“It also happens to be a building where the majority of people who live there are working class and people of color, many of whom have been part of the fabric of this neighborhood since the ’60s and ’70s, and most of them would not be able to call Park Slope home without the ability to live in this building,” she said.

“These are the people that we exclude by not building enough housing. The rich, or those lucky enough to have stabilized leases, or those who have bought at the right time get to stay, everyone else is told to stay out.”

The commission is still accepting written testimony on the proposal ahead of a vote that is yet to be scheduled. The proposal will then go to the City Council for a vote before ending up on the mayor’s desk.

Related Stories

• BP Backs Controversial Arrow Linen Project, But With More Affordable Units
• Community Board Votes No on Contentious Arrow Linen Rezoning in Park Slope
• Locals Clash Over Arrow Linen Site’s Future at Raucous Community Hearing

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