The Brooklyn Marine Terminal has a consensus problem.
The task force charged with deciding the terminal’s fate can agree on at least one thing: They are not ready to vote on the project.
The group’s 28 members unanimously decided Thursday not to vote on the Economic Development Corporation’s $3.7 billion vision for the site.
This is the fifth time the force has postponed its fateful vote on the project, which in its latest form included 6,000 housing units (with 40 percent affordable) and a 60-acre, modernized port.
The vote would have decided whether the project could advance to environmental review and the state’s general project plan review process. To pass, two-thirds of the task force and two-thirds of the task force’s leadership need to approve it.
We don’t know exactly how the vote would have looked if it had taken place Thursday, but it can be assumed that the project didn’t have enough votes to move forward. Or, at least, there was enough opposition to make the vote very interesting.
“It has always been our goal to achieve broad consensus on a BMT redevelopment plan, and after extensive discussions with members of the Task Force who remain opposed to the current plan, they have indicated that they believe that further refinement and community engagement could achieve that broader consensus,” Rep. Dan Goldman, state Sen. Andrew Gounardes and Council member Alexa Avilés, said in a joint statement. Goldman chairs the task force and Gounardes and Avilés serve as vice chairs.
The trio noted that the task force will consult with neighboring communities to develop a “set of bottom line items that must be adequately addressed in order to reach a viable path forward.”
The city’s Economic Development Corporation said in its own statement that the delay will “allow for additional time for meaningful community engagement and conversations to happen with those members and the public who had previously voiced their opposition.”
Opponents have accused the city and state of trying to rush the plan forward. Avilés and Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso have voiced concerns that the plan would further diminish the city’s industrial and manufacturing capabilities.
In a Brooklyn Eagle editorial she co-wrote with Eddie Bautista, executive director of the NYC Environmental Justice Alliance and a member of the task force, Avilés called the plan “half-baked,” and raised doubts that the commitments made as part of the plan would be honored.
The vote hasn’t been rescheduled.
The city took control of the terminal last year through a land swap with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which received Staten Island’s Howland Hook Marine Terminal in the exchange.
The port handles roughly 60,000 containers every year, or about 1.5 percent of the containers brought into New York Harbor. The administration saw the deal with the Port Authority as an opportunity to double down on moving goods by water — to reduce trucks transporting perishable food items throughout the city, for instance — while also using a portion of the site for housing.
Giving a task force the preliminary ability to bless or kill a massive development before it begins a state review process is unusual and was settled upon around the time of the land swap deal. The state’s general project plan process sidesteps the city’s usual land use review process, and was the mechanism used to approve the nearby long-delayed and long-criticized Pacific Park project. It also would have been used for Amazon’s headquarters in Queens, had that moved forward. So, adding upfront community input and preliminary authority over the project could, hypothetically, counter the bad taste that general project plans leave in some people’s mouths.
This process is playing out as the Adams administration is trying to eliminate the choke points in the city’s land use review process. The next few weeks (and months?) will likely determine if city officials begin to regret the setup.
What we’re thinking about: What kind of changes will be needed to the Brooklyn Marine Terminal plans to secure approval from the task force? Send a note to kathryn@therealdeal.com.
A thing we’ve learned: In the 17th and 18th centuries, Mapleton, Borough Park and Bensonhurst in Brooklyn were part of a village known as New Utrecht, per the New York Times.
Elsewhere in New York…
— The Justice Department sued Mayor Eric Adams for NYC’s sanctuary city policies, claiming that they are obstructing the Trump administration’s attempts to enforce its immigration agenda, the New York Times reports. As the country’s largest sanctuary city, New York has laws that all but prohibit cooperation between police and prison officials and ICE, which the Trump administration says are a constitutional violation.
— Gov. Kathy Hochul said she is considering redrawing New York’s congressional districts to gain more blue seats if Texas follows through on Trump’s demand to do the same for Republican districts, Gothamist reports. A mid-decade redistricting process would be legally complex and would be made more difficult by New York’s ban on gerrymandering.
— Mayor Eric Adams once again accepted donations from straw donors and submitted them to the city’s matching funds program, according to The City. Two donors who are listed as having made donations eligible for matching funds said they did not donate to Adams or other candidates, and three donors listed what appear to be incorrect addresses. Of 17 such donors, 16 have not donated to any NYC politician in the last 20 years. — Quinn Waller
Closing Time
Residential: The top residential deal recorded Thursday was $25.2 million for a 7,112-square-foot, sponsored-sale condominium unit at 50 West 66th Street in Lincoln Square. Janice Chang and Ann Cutbill Lenane at Douglas Elliman had the listing.
Commercial: The top commercial deal recorded was $43.5 million for a 56,384-square-foot property at 139-141 Franklin Street in Tribeca. Sofia Brothers sold the building to TPG Angelo Gordon.
New to the Market: The highest price for a residential property hitting the market was $7 million for a 10,105-square-foot townhouse at 471 West End Avenue on the Upper West Side. Jade Shenker and Nicole Palermo of Serhant have the listing. Breaking Ground: The largest new building application filed was for a proposed 64,282-square-foot, 99-unit residential project at 940 Woodycrest Avenue in Highbridge. Nikolai Katz filed the permit on behalf of ZLB Investments.
— Matthew Elo