Newsday managed to publish an entire article about the conversion of the JFK Hilton into affordable housing without naming the developers, Slate Property Group and RiseBoro Community Partnership.
You might ask, What’s the big deal? But think about it. Would a daily newspaper run a story about a New York basketball team winning a playoff series without mentioning the Knicks?
For better or worse, it’s pretty common for mainstream publications to cover development without paying much or any attention to the developers. If they are included at all, it’s usually near the end of the piece.
In this case, Newsday gave full credit to the Hochul administration for the conversion of the hotel into apartments. Gov. Kathy Hochul’s own press release at least cited the developers, but not until the sixth paragraph.
From reading it, you’d think she converted the hotel herself.
“Governor Kathy Hochul today announced completion of Baisley Pond Park Residences, a 318-unit, $167 million affordable housing development in South Jamaica, Queens,” it began.
“By transforming a long-vacant hotel into hundreds of affordable homes,” Hochul said in the second paragraph, “we’re delivering real results for low-income and formerly homeless New Yorkers while making smarter use of existing buildings.”
The project did get 29 percent of its funding — $48 million — from the state’s HONDA fund, which Hochul helped to create. But, reality check: This is a private project by for-profit and nonprofit developers. It is not a state project.
Before we even give Hochul 29 percent of the credit, consider that HONDA, which stands for the Housing Our Neighbors with Dignity Act, has proven very difficult for projects to use, as The Real Deal explained in a much more informative story about the Slate/RiseBoro project.
To be clear, I am not criticizing the governor. Her press office got her good publicity, which is what a press office is supposed to do. It also brought attention to a worthy project that might not have happened without the HONDA legislation.
Nor have I ever heard a developer complain about not being mentioned prominently in coverage by a general interest publication. Usually they are happy to stay under the media’s radar because they are accustomed to being hammered.
Whatever project they propose is criticized as:
- for people who are too rich (billionaires! gentrifiers!) or too poor (homeless people! crime!)
- having too many bedrooms (children will flood local schools!) or not enough bedrooms (families need housing!)
- too far from the subway (traffic! parking!) or too close to the subway (crowded platforms and trains!)
- Too profitable (pure greed!) or too risky (that will never work — you should abandon it!)
Slate and RiseBoro probably chuckled at being omitted from Newsday’s piece but were surely glad to yield the spotlight to the governor. They know politicians’ currency is praise and publicity. Developers’ currency is permits and profits.
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