News of Stuy Town sale sinks tenants’ hopes, bid

Volume Number 1 Issue Number 4 | October 20 - 26, 2006

Chelsea Now photo by Jefferson Siegel

Councilmember Dan Garodnick addressed hundreds of tenants from Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village at Stuyvesant Cove Park on Sunday.

By Gerard Flynn

Expectation at a rally Sunday that tenants of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village might yet win the bid for the 110-building housing project on the East Side turned to deep disappointment Tuesday following Metropolitan Life’s announcement that it would sell the 11,250-apartment complex to a joint investment venture of Tishman Speyer and Blackrock Realty for $5.4 billion.

Alvin Doyle, president of the Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village Tenants Association, called the news “disappointing.”

“I was optimistic because our plan included provisions where MetLife would hold onto the land and that would yield a tax advantage; but MetLife apparently found Tishman Speyer’s offer to be more attractive. I am still a little down,” he said late Tuesday afternoon.

The tenants association had joined forces with the district’s Democratic councilmember, Daniel Garodnick, to purchase the property.

Garodnick had organized a number of local union and private real estate interests and managed to submit a bid for the complex for $4.5 billion.

Garodnick could not be reached for comment by press time.

Doyle said that the tenants association would be meeting Tuesday evening to determine their “next plan of action.”

He said that despite the anxieties the sale had provoked among tenants about the future of the rent-stabilized property, the tenants association would monitor developments closely.

“We wish to notify tenants nothing will happen right now and that they are protected under the rent-stabilization laws. I just hope no one throws anything at us for not winning the bid,” he said.

Ever since MetLife announced its intention to auction off the 80-acre site built as affordable housing for returning veterans after World War II, there had been much speculation among residents and sideline observers as to how a prospective new owner might seek to recoup the enormous purchase price of the property.

Many residents said that they were expecting any new buyer to follow MetLife’s suit and escalate recent efforts to remove as many rent-stabilized apartments as possible and make them market rate, marking the end of an important era in affordable housing in the city.

Acting to allay that fear, Jerry I. Speyer, president and C.E.O. of Tishman Speyer, said that the company is “committed” to working closely with residents, elected officials and community leaders and that “no one should be concerned about a sudden or dramatic shift in this neighborhood’s makeup, character or charm.’’

The sale of the property is expected to result in a gain of about $3 billion for the country’s largest life insurer and is planned to close by the end of the year.

Doyle said that the past three months had been a “rollercoaster ride” and that Sunday’s rally seemed like a possible turning point in the strength of the tenants’ movement.

“It was a very exciting week and then we submitted our bid for the second round on Monday and in less than 24 hours it is over. That’s a bit of a comedown,” he said.

Granville Stevens, a resident of Stuyvesant Town and tenant organizer in the run-up to the sale, said that after hearing of MetLife’s purchase he went for a long walk, even though it was in the middle of a heavy October downpour.

“I went out in the rain after hearing it; I was feeling so lousy, but afterwards I felt quite optimistic since we have already amassed over 6,000 unity pledges from tenants, and as you saw the crowd Sunday, we are very unified,” he said.

At the rally Sunday, which drew hundreds of residents and prominent city politicians, including speaker of the City Council Christine Quinn, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, Congressmember Anthony Weiner and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, the absence of Mayor Bloomberg and his obstinate refusal to get involved on behalf of the tenants drew sharp criticism from many.

“Where’s Mayor Mike?” one placard demanded during the rally, which drew an audience of hundreds.

“He’s a coward,” Yasha Bundk, a Stuyvesant Town resident, said. “We are your people. We voted for you. Please support us now.”

During a his weekly radio broadcast last Friday, Bloomberg reaffirmed his intention to stay out of negotiations for the property due to the private nature of the sale.

Addressing the crowd assembled on the outskirts of Peter Cooper Village, Stringer said that Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs were becoming, respectively, a “place for the very rich and an enclave for the very poor” and encouraged the mayor to get behind the tenant-backed bid.

On Tuesday, Stevens condemned Bloomberg’s laissez-faire position and accused him of being “out of touch” and “detached” from the middle-income residents who make up roughly 70 percent of the 80-acre property.

“He should have gotten involved somehow on behalf of tenants, impressing upon MetLife that this is in the best interests of the city. He should have expressed his preference for the tenants’ bid,” he said.

“But the mayor is a billionaire and I don’t think he relates to middle-class people,” Stevens continued. “I think if you see who he has at his cocktail parties none of them are working people from Stuyvesant Town or Peter Cooper Village. The people who he considers to be in his social stratum are the people on Forbes list: the Trumps, the Silversteins, the Tishmans,” he said.