 |
 |
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
 |
tel/fax:
718.362.4784
Please note our new postal address when sending
contributions to the legal fund:
121 5th Avenue, PMB #150
Brooklyn, New York 11217
About DDDB
Our coalition consists of 21 community organizations and
there are 51 community organizations formally
aligned in opposition to the Ratner plan.
DDDB is a volunteer-run organization. We have over 5,000
subscribers to our email newsletter, and 7,000 petition
signers. Over 800 volunteers have registered with DDDB
to form our various teams, task-forces and committees
and we have over 150 block captains. We have a 20 person
volunteer legal team of local lawyers supplementing our
retained attorneys.
We are funded entirely by individual donations from the community at large
and through various fundraising events we and supporters have organized.
We have the financial support of well over 3,500 individual
donors.
More about
DDDB...
|
|
|
|
 |
ARCHIVES:
By Date|
By Category|
Text Search
|
MTA Cuts and Court Rules Ratner's Sweetheart Deal is Lawful
For Immediate Release: December 16, 2009
The Same Day in NYC:
MTA Approves Severe Service Cuts
Court Rules MTA-Ratner Sweetheart Deal Lawful
(Deal Left At Least $80 Million on the Table)
NEW YORK, NY — On the same day that the MTA Board approved
severe service cuts—including Access-A-Ride and discounts for school kids—a
New York State Supreme Court ruled against petitioners who challenged the MTA's
sweetheart deal for the Vanderbilt Rail Yards with developer Bruce Ratner.
This past summer the now "unexpectedly" cash-strapped MTA left $80 million on
the table when it "negotiated"
a new deal with Ratner for the 8-acre yards. Instead of paying $100 million
as he had agreed in 2005, Ratner would now, after Board approval, pay only $20
million.
The lawsuit (Montgomery
et al. v. MTA et al.) brought by State Senator Velmanette Montgomery,
Assemblyman Jim Brennan, Assemblywoman Joan Millman, Councilmember Letitia James,
the Straphanger's Campaign and Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn, charged that the
MTA violated the Public Authorities Accountability Act of 2005 when it did not
test the market for competition for the Yards or issue an independent appraisal
for the piece of valuable central Brooklyn real estate.
The MTA's deal also clearly violates the letter and the spirit of the new Public
Authorities Reform bill signed last week by Governor Paterson. As The
Times reported, "…authorities will no longer be allowed to sell real
estate for below-market value, as the Metropolitan Transportation Authority did
when it sold rights to build over railyards in Brooklyn to the developers of the
Atlantic Yards project."
Just last week New
York City announced that it has 29 developers interested in "redeveloping"
the 62-acre Willets Point, Queens district it wants to take by eminent domain.
Yet the MTA claimed that it was impossible to find any interested developers,
besides Ratner, for the 8-acre site in the heart of Brooklyn. Not one.
"The MTA has no shame—while giving a sweetheart deal to billionaire developers,
leaving at least $80 million on the table and widening its budget gap, its Board
gives a big lump of coal to school kids, disabled New Yorkers and all transit
riders. It's disgusting," said DDDB's spokesman Daniel Goldstein. "It's just one
more plaque for the Atlantic Yards hall of shame, in the no bid wing. MTA gives
it away, Ratner wins and the public loses. For what? A money-losing arena in the
middle of a fiscal crisis. We'd like to hear Governor Paterson, Mayor Bloomberg
and Speaker Quinn justify this. While the Court has ruled, these leaders can do
the right thing by New Yorkers, and collect the full $100 million Ratner reneged
on."
The petitioners will review the decision and decide whether or not to appeal the
Court's ruling.
The ruling is at: http://dddb.net/MTAsuit.
Posted: 12.16.09
|
|
|
|
