Disclaimer: In compliance with Chapter 68 of the New York City Charter, I am required to disclose that the views expressed in this article are wholly my own as a private citizen. Nothing I write here is to be construed as an official position of Queens Community Board 7, the City of New York, or any of its agencies.
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How and Why I Decided to Join My Local Community Board | Committee Meetings | Land Use Committee
Introduction
In my first post, I laid out my motivations for wanting to join my community board and also the process by which I was able to realize this goal. In this post, I’m providing an account of the last meeting I attended to give a sense of what can be expected at these gatherings. This account details the Queens Community Board 7 meeting that took place in June of this year.
General Flow of Meetings
At CB 7 meetings tend to follow this general pattern, though I’m sure this is bound to vary between different community boards. The meeting opens up with a pledge of allegiance followed by taking of attendance. Then the board chair or whoever is running that night’s meeting will read of some announcements. These are usually things like events happening in the community, or job openings at city agencies. Sometimes they’ll include reminders about upcoming board events.
These general announcements are usually followed up with at least a couple of presenters from various organizations who have signed up to speak before the board. Presenters are often letting us know about services that their organization could serve our community with, i.e. free combination smoke/carbon monoxide detector installations. Sometimes they’re making an ask of the board in helping elevate an issue that’s causing problems for them, i.e. the nurses at Flushing Hospital Medical Center feeling like they’re being overextended by hospital management.
After these speakers are finished, we move on to the primary agenda items for the meeting. For some meetings, these items merely require us to take in a report from a board member about recent work done on a committee. Other times, the matter before the board requires a vote, calling upon us to exercise our capacity to make non-binding recommendations to City Council and the Borough President regarding proposals that impact our community. Some of the votes are straightforward and unanimous with little if any discussion, others can drag out into protracted and animated debates about a range of issues. This meeting was a textbook case of the latter, involving a contentious vote on a proposal related to zoning.
Topic of Discussion: a new residential development
Based on my limited observations thus far, land use and zoning proposals are more apt to spark lively debates amongst board members than almost any other issue brought before us. This makes sense as these two types of proposals have the potential to make the most direct, tangible impacts on anyone’s community. As a general concept, zoning is akin to a floor plan for a city, and is critical in shaping the look, feel, and function of neighborhoods in any city.
The proposal at hand on this night involves a development slated for a plot on 35th Avenue bounded by Farrington and Linden Streets, just north of Northern Boulevard and the core of the Flushing commercial district.
A parking lot and low-rise M1–1 (light manufacturing) zone currently occupy the space. A handful of businesses will be closed down to make way for a eight-story residential apartment building.
We were gathered to discuss and vote on whether to approve the zoning committee’s recommendation to allow a proposed residential development to be up-zoned. The upzoning would be from R6 to R7A. Areas around this proposed development have already been rezoned from M1–1 which was prevalent in this area before to prior re-zoning to R6, which allows for the construction of medium-density, multi-story residential buildings. There are subtle but important differences between R6 and R7A zones that I’ll try to outline below.
Rationale for Upzoning: Mandatory Inclusionary Housing and Floor Area Ratios
A crucial concept to understand here is that of floor area ratio or FAR. A given zone’s maximum allowable FAR determines how much total usable space a building built on a given lot in that zone can have. A higher FAR value indicates a zone that allows for higher density construction. As an example, a lot of 10,000 sq/ft with an FAR of 1.0 would allow for a building with at most 10,000 sq/ft of usable space. If the same lot had an FAR of 6.0, it would mean that the resulting building could have a maximum of 60,000 sq/ft. It’s important to note that FAR does not by itself determine the maximum height allowed in a building; that’s done with separate height restrictions. In the example provided here, you can see that a building with 4 stories each of 2,500 sq/ft on a lot the size of 10,000 sq/ft and single story building with 10,000 sq/ft are both allowable on a lot with an FAR of 1.0.
In the case of the building in question, the difference between R6 and R7A zoning rules hinged on FAR. R6 zones allow a maximum FAR of 3.0 depending on the context of the neighborhood and lot, while R7A zones allow an FAR 4.6. For the developer, this means a substantial increase in the density of the building that can be built on the same sized lot. More units equates to a higher potential profit from the sale of a building or a larger rental income stream.
The other notable factor that played a role in this zoning proposal was the recent policy changes instituted by the City Council and the mayor that call for mandatory inclusionary housing in all new construction. Mandatory inclusionary housing is the latest attempt at addressing the chronic issue of a shortage of quality affordable housing stock. The policy essentially enforces a certain percentage of units in a building to be made available at below market rates. How each unit is priced is determined by a value known as AMI (area median income). The guidelines for AMI tiers are set forth by the New York City Housing Development Corporation. The merits of the program are to be weighed against some of its shortcomings, including the fact that eligibility is only determined once. This leads to awkward situations like the one reported over the summer where people sneak through eligibility requirements for the program then get to reap the rewards of a permanent placement in an affordable unit at the expense of other, more needy New Yorkers.
Mandatory inclusionary housing requirements are what led this developer to seek the upzoning from R6 to R7A. The developer stated that based on their projections, a lower density R6-zoned building would only yield a return of 13–14% on investment, given the new mandatory inclusionary housing requirements. They sought to upzone this lot to R7A so that they could provide the required inclusionary housing units while preserving a return rate of 19% on the building. When asked, it was told to us that a return of 13–14% is considered to be unpalatable to many investors when it comes to real estate development in the city — it’s considered not enough to offset the potential risks associated with any development project.
The Debate: over-development in Flushing
The debate over the proposal at hand became one over development trends writ large in Flushing. There were numerous board members that expressed a general disapproval with the sheer quantity of new residential developments in the neighborhood in recent years. For them, deliberation on this project was an outlet to sound off on all this. People felt it was important to take a stand against perceived over-development by voting down this particular proposal. It is evident that growth in Flushing has put a strain on local infrastructure, schools, roads, and the like. However, as the vice chair of our board reminded us, it wasn’t as if the city was completely blind to all that. There were also objections over the mandatory inclusionary housing program as a whole, and as it applied to this project.
For me, what sealed the deal in my affirmative vote was the vice chair’s admonishment that even if we voted the proposal down, this was no guarantee development wouldn’t proceed. Recall in my first post that community boards only play an advisory role to the City Council and Borough Presidents. “You gotta know where the power is,” as vice chair Chuck Apelian remarked. The Council is ultimately the decision-making body that has final say over these kinds of proposals. We were also instructed to appraise the proposal on its own merits, which I felt some of my colleagues on the board had failed to do.
In the end, the proposal was approved with a vote of 33–9.
Next up: standing committees and what role they play in a community board member’s participation
