The Importance of ULURP (Excuse me)

ULURP is the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure.  Here is a short blurb about it:

"Prior to 1976, the City Planning Commission reviewed only applications related to zoning, the city map and urban renewal and housing. In 1976, the list of applications subject to Commission review was enlarged and now includes, pursuant to the City Charter enacted in 1989, those itemsdescribed below. The Charter's intent in requiring ULURP was to establish a standardized procedure whereby applications affecting the land use of the city would be publicly reviewed. The Charter also established mandated time frames within which application review must take place. Key participants in the ULURP process are now the Department of City Planning (DCP) and the City Planning Commission (CPC), Community Boards, the Borough Presidents, the Borough Boards, the City Council and the Mayor."  For more detail see: http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/luproc/ulpro.shtml#ccr

Right now, the proposed development does not require ULURP. It is important to get the DOE to agree to ULURP because it puts the decision making process in to the hands of other players including the Community Board, the Manhattan Borough Present and the City Council.

Helen Rosenthal, City Council Candidate in the NY Press

How The Department of Education Made New Schools A Cause of Community Anger

Written by NYPress on March 22, 2013. Posted in Opinion West Side Spirit, West Side Spirit.

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By now, most Upper West Siders are familiar with the City Department of Education’s decision to demolish one of our local schools, P.S. 191 or P.S. 199, to make way for luxury housing towers in already crowded neighborhoods. There are so many fundamental questions about how this proposal came to be, a lack of discussion about whether or not it’s ever acceptable to sell public assets to a private developer, and why this proposal was dropped on the Upper West Side with virtually no notice that it has put an indelible taint over the entire project.

Go to the Article

Meeting Tonight for City Council Candidates

Meet the Candidates for City Council, District 6, the seat being vacated by Hon. Gale Brewer.

Come and let your voices be heard about the PS 199 Development proposal.

The event will be on Thursday, March 28th, 2013, 7PM at

Council House
241 West 72nd Street
Between Broadway and West End Avenue

To date the following candidates have declare:

Mel Wymore
Helen Rosenthal
Marc Landis
Noah Gotbaum
Debra Cooper
Ken Biberiaj

How Tall will the Tower Be?

The sample drawings in the RFEI show a tower of 402 feet for a 38 floor building.  To put this in context, this is taller than 8 of the 11 towers in the Trump Complex along Riverside Boulevard.  A 50 story building example was also given that would be over 500 ft. high.

The RFEI states that the height can even be larger than the 50 story sample, "The developers should note that taller towers could be built than shown if smaller floor plates are utilized." (p. 62 of the RFEI)

For example, according to the Wall Street Journal, the tower to be built above P.S. 59/H.S. for Art and Design (the ECF's last project) is slated to be 715 ft. high

To see the drawing click here.

To see the height of neighborhood buildings click here.

Community Board 7 Resolution

On March 5th, 20113, Community Board 7 passed a resolution 34 to 0 concerning the proposed development of school properties including PS199.  This is the conclusion of the resolution:

"THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT Community Board 7/Manhattan calls on the Department of Education, the School Construction Authority and the Educational Construction Fund to:

1. Prior to the formulation and release of any RFP relating to these sites, conduct immediate, consistent and meaningful public outreach to all constituencies in the affected community and solicit public comment and concerns relating to all phases and aspects of the proposed redevelopment;
   
2. Provide a written commitment that the key aspects of any redevelopment proposal for these sites be subject to ULURP. "
   
   
   The full resolution can be found here.
   

Candidates Roundtable for Seniors

Meet City Council Candidates

Sunday April 7th at 11:30am, Lunch and Live Music

Club 76 - Senior Center

120 W. 76th St, 3rd Floor Ballroom

Neighborhood Facts - Density and Growth

Here are a few highlights from our research, see the full report here:

1.The overall population increased (Census Track 155) was 49.5% while NYC as a whole increased 2.1% and Manhattan increased 3.2%.

2. For the entire Lincoln Square area, the population change from the year 2000 to 2010 was 11.3% while NYC as a whole increased 2.1% and Manhattan increased 3.2%.

3. The 72nd Street Subway is the 14th busiest in Manhattan and of the busiest subways in Manhattan, the 72nd Street Subway had the largest percent usage increase from 2007 to 2011 at 11% increased utilization and the largest single year percent usage increase from 2010 to 2011 at 5.3% increased utilization. 

Check out our Document Library

We have created a library of important documents relating to the PS 199 project located at:

https://sites.google.com/site/199proposal/

Included are:

- REFI (Request for Expressions of Interest) for the Project from the Education Construction Fund: this gives the most details about what is being proposed including site development, school size and funding.

- ECF 2008 Environmental Report from East 57th Project:  This is a report about the last school construction project the ECF did.  It provides insight into the criteria for moving ahead.

- Sample Drawings of what the project will look like inrelation to surrounding buildings.

- Letters from Elected Officials

- PS199 Neighborhood Fact Sheet: This highlights some of the density and resource utilizations issues in the neighborhood.

Please take a look and if you have other documents that would be of interest to our community and this project please email us at 199demolition@gmail.com.

Meet the Candidates for City Council District 6

Meet the Candidates for City Council, District 6, the seat being vacated by Hon. Gale Brewer.

Come and let your voices be heard about the PS 199 Development proposal.

The event will be on Thursday, March 28th, 2013, 7PM at

Council House
241 West 72nd Street
Between Broadway and West End Avenue

To date the following candidates have declare:

Mel Wymore
Helen Rosenthal
Marc Landis
Noah Gotbaum
Debra Cooper
Ken Biberiaj

News from WestSideRag.com

EXCLUSIVE: THE CITY IS CONSIDERING PLANS TO DEMOLISH PS 199 AND PS 191 (UPDATED WITH CITY RESPONSE)

Posted on February 17, 2013 at 1:39 pm by West Sider

In somewhat shocking news, we have learned that the city has solicited and received proposals from developers to demolish PS 199 on West 70th Street and PS 191 on West 61st Street and build luxury towers on their sites. PS 199, an elementary school, is one of the most highly regarded and popular elementary schools in the entire city, and the building was designed by renowned architect Edward Durell Stone. Both schools have also had millions of dollars worth of renovations in recent years, which would be reduced to rubble.

The city would demolish the schools in order to allow developers to build large luxury apartment towers with new schools in them. The schools could be demolished as soon as 2015, according to a mother of students at PS 199 who attended a PTA meeting about the plans last week. Parents and school officials apparently were not briefed on the plans, which are already quite far along, until recently. The city clearly expects opposition to the plans (more on that below), and parents look like they might fight.

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News from WestSideRag.com

PTA TRIES TO REASSURE PARENTS ABOUT POSSIBLE PUBLIC SCHOOL DEMOLITIONS

Posted on February 20, 2013 at 9:45 pm by West Sider

The news we broke about the city’s effort to find developers willing to redevelop the sites of two Upper West Side public schools has shocked local parents. PS 191 on 61st street and PS 199 on 70th street could be demolished and redeveloped as high-rises with new schools inside them. Now the PTA at PS 199 is trying to quell parent anxiety.

“First and most importantly, no decisions have been made regarding anything and the demolition of PS199 is not imminent!” the PTA letter says (full letter reprinted below).

Since soliciting ideas from the real estate community months ago to develop high-rise apartment buildings with new schools on the sites of three current schools (two on UWS, one on UES), the city’s Educational Construction Fund (ECF) has received dozens of proposals from developers. The initial brochure sent to developers said that they could build on the sites with virtually no public review: the traditional development review process known as ULURP would be suspended because the sites of the current schools are owned by the city and the zoning in the area allows for large buildings. But since the plans leaked, city officials have said that they will involve parents throughout the process, and any development will have to go through ULURP (this may come as a surprise to developers who read in the city’s “request for expressions of interest” that they would not have to go through this process).

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News from the NY Times

Saving Schools and Libraries by Giving Up the Land They Sit On

Quote from the article:

“What makes a place interesting is different kinds of architecture and a school looking like a school,” said Laurie Frey, a member of the Community Education Council in District 3, a board that represents public school parents on the Upper West Side of Manhattan. “There’s a feeling of, ‘Oh please, not another high rise,’ and a feeling that, since we’re already getting used to an increased density in our few blocks, do we really need more?”

The city’s Educational Construction Fund is reviewing proposals for construction of high-rise apartment towers on the sites of two public schools near Lincoln Center — P.S. 191 on West 61st Street and P.S. 199 on West 70th Street, which was designed by the modernist architect Edward Durell Stone — and another school on East 96th Street, the School of Cooperative Technical Education. In each case, new schools would occupy the lower floors of the new buildings.

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DOE Seeking Proposals to Demolish Two UWS Schools

By Ivan Pentchoukov
Epoch Times StaffCreated: February 19, 2013Last Updated: February 19, 2013

NEW YORK—The New York City Department of Education (DOE) is seeking proposals from real estate developers to demolish two schools on the Upper West Side to make way for residential towers. 

The schools would then be reincorporated into the residential projects, with the developers footing the bill.

The two schools in question, P.S. 199 and P.S. 191, are nine blocks apart and are both in the midst of renovations worth more than $12 million. Notably, P.S. 199 is one of the most coveted public schools in the city and was designed by Edward Durell Stone, the architect who also worked on the Museum of Modern Art and the Radio City Music Hall.

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News from thebrokerbuddy.com

Development Battles: City Wants to Demolish UWS Schools to Build Luxury Towers

Over the long weekend, the West Side Rag broke some surprising news: the city is considering plans to tear down three schools on the Upper East and Upper West Sides and replace them with luxury apartment towers. What’s even more shocking is that the city has been seeking plans since November, and parents with children in the schools were just recently notified. The schools in question are PS 199 at 270 West 70th Street, PS 191 at 210 West 61st Street, and the School of Cooperative Technical Education at 321 East 96th Street. PS 199 has 850 students, PS 191 has 550, and unsurprisingly, parents are pretty pissed about the plans. A rep from the DOE said that the city will only move forward with plans if they find something worthwhile. DNAinfo reports that a dozen developers have expressed interest.

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News from nypress.com

Dept. of Ed Plays Russian Roulette with School Buildings

Written by Joanna Fantozzi on March 15, 2013. Posted in Breaking News, News & Features West Side Spirit, West Side Spirit.

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Parents are outraged that the DOE can’t tell them which of two possible Upper West Side schools will be demolished and rebuilt

The Upper West Side community has come down hard on the Department of Education for not communicating to the public about possibly demolishing and rebuilding P.S. 191 on West 61st Street, and P.S. 199 on West 70th Street. At a meeting last week with Community Board 7 and the Community Education Council for District 3, the DOE revealed that it only plans to rebuild one of three schools: P.S. 191, P.S. 199 or The School of Cooperative Technical Education on the Upper East Side, and that the plans are only in the preliminary stages.

“Why are we concerned? The incredible lack of notice,” said Mark Diller, the chair of Community Board 7. “We only found out about the project because a P.S. 199 parent who reads Crain’s noticed an ad announcing expressions of interest for three city owned sites. They gave addresses but never said that they are public schools. But the parent was savvy and recognized the school’s address.”

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News from gothamist.com

FREAK OUT: City Wants To Turn UWS Schools Into High Rises

P.S. 199 is ONLY three stories? TEAR IT DOWN (Jen Chung / Gothamist).

Super easy way to freak out New York City parents? Threaten to tear down (or rezone) their schools! And, because the Department of Education loves to freak out parents, the former is exactly what is appears it is doing on the Upper West and East Sides. Nice to know ya, P.S. 191 and 199 (also the School of Cooperative Technical Education)!

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News from TheRealDeal.com

City reaches out to developers to build high rises at sites of three schools

February 18, 2013 03:00PM

The city has reached out to developers for proposals to build high-rise towers at the site of two schools on the Upper West Side and one in Harlem, including the renowned Edward Durell Stone-designed P.S. 199, West Side Rag reported.

The schools—P.S. 199 Jessie Isador Straus located at 270 West 70th Street, P.S. 191 Amsterdam located at 210 West 61st Street and the School of Cooperative Technical Education located at 321 East 96th Street—could be demolished as early as 2015, a parent at P.S. 199 who attended a PTA meeting on the matter, told West Side Rag. In total, the three schools enroll just under 1,900 students.

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News from DNAinfo.com

City Plans to Tear Down Two Upper West Side Schools for High-Rises 

February 18, 2013 6:52am | By Emily Frost, DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

UPPER WEST SIDE — The city wants to knock down two Upper West Side elementary schools to clear the way for privately developed high-rise apartment towers — a plan that is infuriating local parents and education advocates.

The Department of Education's Educational Construction Fund posted a request for interested developers in Crain's New York in November, offering up two "prime development sites" at 210 W. 61st St. and 270 W. 70th St., without mentioning the fact that they are home to P.S. 191 and P.S. 199.

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News from curbed.com

City Wants to Demolish UWS Schools to Build Luxury Towers

Tuesday, February 19, 2013, by Jessica Dailey

Over the long weekend, the West Side Rag broke some surprising news: the city is considering plans to tear down three schools on the Upper East and Upper West Sides and replace them with luxury apartment towers. What's even more shocking is that the city has been seeking plans since November, and parents with children in the schools were just recently notified. The schools in question are PS 199 at 270 West 70th Street, PS 191 at 210 West 61st Street, and the School of Cooperative Technical Education at 321 East 96th Street. PS 199 has 850 students, PS 191 has 550, and unsurprisingly, parents are pretty pissed about the plans. A rep from the DOE said that the city will only move forward with plans if they find something worthwhile. DNAinfo reports that a dozen developers have expressed interest.

Go to Article

Elected and Appointed Officials List

Michael Bloomberg Mayor	Office:  Attn: Mayor Bloomberg City Hall New York, NY 10007 Email form: http://www.nyc.gov/html/mail/html/mayor.html Website: www.nyc.gov/portal/site/nycgov/
Dennis Walcott Chancellor DOE	Office: Tweed Courthouse 52 Chambers Street New York, NY 10007 Email form: http://schools.nyc.gov/ContactDOE/ChancellorMessage.htm  Website: http://schools.nyc.gov/ContactDOE/
School Construction Authority Fred Maley Director of External Affairs	Phone: (718) 472-8207 Office: 30-30 Thomson Avenue Long Island City New York, 11101 Email: fmaley@nycsca.org Website: www.nycsca.org Full Directory: http://www.nycsca.org/AboutUs/Pages/ContactUs.aspx
Educational Construction Fund	Vacant Position Director Phone: (718) 472-8281 and (212) 374-5026 Main information Number: (718) 472-8287 Office: 30-30 Thomson Avenue, 4th Floor Long Island City, New York 11101 Web: http://schools.nyc.gov/community/facilities/ecf/default.htm
Jerrold Nadler US Congressman, 10thdistrict	Phone: 212-367-7350 Office: 201 Varick Street, Suite 669, NY, NY 10014 Emailform: https://jerroldnadler.house.gov/forms/writeyourrep/default.aspx    Website: http://nadler.house.gov/
Linda Rosenthal State Assemblywoman	Phone: 212-873-6368 Office: 230 West 72nd Street, 2F, NY NY Suite 2F10023 Web Address: http://assembly.state.ny.us/mem/Linda-B-Rosenthal
Christine Quinn Speaker of the City Council, running for Mayor	District Info District Office Phone: (212) 564-7757 District Office Address: 224 West 30th St (Suite 1206) NY, NY 10001                                                 Legislative Info Legislative Office Phone: (212) 788-7210 Legislative Office Address: 250 Broadway Suite 1856 NY, NY 10007 Web Address: http://council.nyc.gov/html/home/home.shtml Email Form: http://council.nyc.gov/d3/html/members/contact.shtml
Scott Stringer Borough President	Phone: 212-669-8300 Office: 1 Centre Street, 19th Floor, New York, NY 10007 Website: http://mbpo.org/
Gale A Brewer City Council Member District 6	Legislative Office Phone (212) 788-6975 District Office Phone (212) 873-0282 Email: mailto:gbrewer@council.nyc.gov Legislative Office Address:  Office 250 Broadway Suite 1744, NY 10007 Website: http://council.nyc.gov/html/home/home.shtml
Marc Diller, Chair Community Board 7 Roberta Semer, Second Vice-Chair	Phone main office: 212-362-4008 Mark Diller: 917 691 0865 Office: 250 West 87th Street, New York, NY 10024 Email main  mailto: office@cb7.org Email Mark Diller: mailto:mdiller@nyc.rr.com Website: www.nyc.gov/mcb7
Community Education Council in District 3, a board that represents public school parents on the Upper West Side of Manhattan	Website: http://www.cec3.org/ President Christine Annechino, mailto:cannechino@cec3.org Laurie Frey mailto:lfrey@cec3.org PS 199 Liason Miriam Rengier mailto:mrengier@cec3.org Overcrowding and Space Utilization Committee Noah Gotbaum, mailto:ngotbaum@cec3.org