Yesterday, the City Council Subcommittee on Zoning and Franchises held a three-hour hearing on the One45 residential development that would be sited at 145th St. and Lenox Ave. on what has been a truck depot. After close to a decade, it’s time that the Council finally vote yes to almost 1,000 new apartments.
But there’s not a vote scheduled by the Council and so the new homes — desperately needed in Harlem, as elsewhere — that the development would create will hang in limbo for a while longer.
What additional information needs to be gleaned here? This is not brain surgery; every bit of data that the Council needs to make a decision is already on offer. What is lacking is the political will, for the same exasperating reasons as always: members are held captive by the fear of annoying politically-plugged-in and perennially vocal NIMBYs in their districts and the city overall.
We’ll remind legislators that what they should perhaps worry about more is the perception that they’re sitting on their hands when it comes to necessary housing. This very project was arguably the genesis of former Harlem Councilmember Kristin Richardson Jordan‘s downfall. Her zealous advocacy in favor of deeper affordability for her constituents was appreciated up until a point, but beyond that point it was pure obstructionism that left a smelly lot where there could have by this point been around 500 designated affordable units, along with community space and programming.
The choice here isn’t between a 50% affordable and a 70% or 75% affordable development. It’s between that 50% affordable development and nothing, or even worse than nothing, a truck way-station that brings noise and smog and congestion to the area.
A failure to vote is not the absence of a decision, but avoiding taking a stand, however the rules do require a vote by June 30, which happens to be shortly after the primary election. Will the Council let the political calendar take precedence? How about having a Council vote on the project before the primary voters cast their ballots? The housing crisis isn’t going to be solved by one apartment complex, but it has to start somewhere. Let it start in Harlem.
We do not need more hearings or additional proposals or further years of negotiation. What we need is a yes vote that will clear the way for this development to be erected where it should have gone a long time ago already. For all of the reforms included in the City of Yes package that Mayor Adams introduced and the Council eventually mostly approved, that’s all lines on paper until actual physical housing is built.
The many residents who are eyeing an exit from the city based largely on housing costs alone cannot live inside of a legislative framework.
This all operates on a delayed schedule, so even if the Council were to approve this project tomorrow, it would take years for the units to materialize. Do members have that kind of time? Don’t most already consider this to be a five-alarm fire that threatens the city’s very viability? Approve the development. The NIMBYs will scream and cry about it for a little while, but ultimately what the community will remember is how hundreds of new affordable units became available where once there were a bunch of trucks.
