 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
‘Nightmare’ housing crisis looms My One Bank neighbors and acquaintances in other affected buildings have been asking why our city leaders have not called upon experts in the areas of housing policy, social policy and law enforcement to begin an emergency study to forecast what the fallout would be if over a million renters should find themselves in situations similar to ours.If over a million people suddenly find that they have no housing security, wouldn’t this place an impossibly large burden on the city’s already strained assistance programs? What would happen if even a modest percentage of these renters were forced to find replacement housing during a time of record-low vacancies? Our city leaders frequently speak, mostly in theoretical terms, about the city’s “housing crisis.” Due to their inaction, city leaders are complicit in creating what could be a housing and social crisis beyond anyone’s worst nightmares. Of course, State Sen. Thomas Duane’s office and several other city officials are attempting to raise the alarm and assist in this situation, but they are the exception, not the rule. Andrew Berman did not present the Community Alternative Plan to St. Vincent’s officials at the Jan. 28 meeting referred to, nor were any representatives of Community Board 2 present at the meeting. In fact, the Community Alternative Plan, the work of more than a dozen different neighborhood groups, block associations and neighboring buildings, was shared with St. Vincent’s weeks earlier, and the Jan. 28 meeting was one in which St. Vincent’s invited those groups to meet with them to discuss the issues raised in the plan. At that meeting, neither Rudin nor St. Vincent’s gave any responses to any of the particulars of the plan, but promised attendees such responses would come soon. A month later, in spite of repeated requests, we have still heard nothing from either Rudin or the hospital. We were, therefore, surprised to read in Chelsea Now St. Vincent’s statement that one of about a dozen issues community groups have raised regarding the Rudin/St. Vincent’s plan — splitting the 330-foot-tall hospital into two more moderately sized buildings on either side of Seventh Ave. — is, in their minds, impossible. We have still heard no response to any of the other very serious issues we have raised, such as the size of the enormous planned Rudin apartment block, the inappropriateness of wholesale demolition of historic buildings in a landmark district and the impact of the proposed plan upon traffic, schools and other local infrastructure. And the response regarding the impossibility of splitting the hospital into two buildings that could be connected by enclosed tunnels below street level — when hospitals all over New York connect separate buildings by belowground and aboveground passages — actually raises more questions than it provides answers. The article also incorrectly implies that St. Vincent’s is being asked to transport patients through the same tunnel that medical waste and garbage would be transported through; nothing could be further from the truth, and such mischaracterizations have been brought to St. Vincent’s attention before. We continue to extend ourselves to St. Vincent’s to try to work with them to find a way of meeting the hospital’s needs while respecting our neighborhood’s hard-fought landmark and zoning protections. However, the lack of responsiveness to the issues many in the community are raising, and the lack of direct communication by the hospital and its development partner Rudin, is preventing true progress from taking place.
|
|
|
Chelsea Now is published by |
Written permission of the publisher |