Comments on the NY Daily News Story / Problems with ECF/DOE Projects

This comment was made in the article:

“There is so much misinformation,” said Douglas MacLaury, senior vice president of the Mattone Group, one of the developers vying for the PS 199 site. “The neighborhood gets a brand new school paid for by the residential development that rises on the site. This is a win-win for the neighborhood, children, city, and the developer.”

Not really true.  The latest ECF/DOE projects were poorly planned and are over crowded. After 4 years of displacement, the last ECF project, PS 59, opened with 1st grade and kindergarden wait-listing and a scrapped pre-K program. See the following articles:

http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120522/midtown-east/ps-59-scraps-pre-k-program-amid-overcrowding

http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120403/murray-hill-gramercy/waitlists-stretch-first-grade-at-ps-59

http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20120319/murray-hill-gramercy/kindergarten-waitlist-expected-at-new-ps-59-building-midtown 

Moreover, the developer lost financing and is only now looking to complete the project, see the Wall Street Journal article.

You can read more background information on our start here page.

Wall Street Journal Highlights Problems with Past ECB/DOE Projects

"The World-Wide project came a result of a complex public-private partnership. The site actually is owned by the city's Department of Education, which in 2006 agreed to lease it to World-Wide for 75 years. As part of the deal, World-Wide agreed to rebuild two aging schools now on the site: an elementary school and a 1,400-student high school. 

The agreement was billed by the city as an innovative way to pay for new schools, given that the proceeds from the lease—which the city in 2006 said would be worth $325 million—would more than cover the price tag for the school construction.
After the downturn hit, the tower plans were put on ice. But World-Wide went ahead with construction of the schools, which were built on the same property in a way that also left space to build the tower. The schools, which were paid for by the city, opened in the fall, and the developer also built adjacent retail space that now holds a Whole Foods."

This development raises the question of how the school was paid for when the developer postponed the building of the tower when they lost funding.  Did the city go out of pocket contrary to the so called advantage of this pubic/private development?

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