E-BULLETIN OF THE HISTORIC DISTRICTS COUNCIL

Here’s to the Best of 2008!

Dear Friend of HDC,

As we look toward next year, HDC would like to thank you for your continued involvement in preserving New York’s neighborhoods. We hope you will take this time to make an end-of-year donation to HDC for our continued grassroots leadership in 2009.

So much has happened over the past twelve months. Below HDC presents our choices for the “Best of 2008,” a list of notable preservation successes in New York City.  

From the successful campaigns against inappropriate development to the eleventh hour savings of notable pieces of New York history, HDC is pleased to highlight a short list of the many critical efforts to defend the unique sense of place of our neighborhoods and our city.

In no particular order, here is our “Best of 2008,”

·  Despite Owner Opposition, City Council Upholds Historic District Boundaries!
An increasingly important part of the landmark designation process is the affirmation of landmark status by the City Council. While Council action has always been the final step in the process, ever since the denial of the landmark designation of St. John the Divine in 2003, the Council has gotten more involved in deliberations over designations, inserting an overtly political perspective on preservation concerns. Combine this with the increased designation activities of the Landmarks Commission, and you can get a volatile mix, particularly when there is owner opposition to the landmarking.

This past year, there were two instances where hard-fought boundaries to new historic districts were imperiled at the Council level; in the long-sought NoHo Extension and West Chelsea. In NoHo, new owners of the White House Hotel, the oldest existing lodging house on the Bowery, fought against designation, wanting instead to build a new, taller hotel building on its site. Responding to this threat, HDC gathered a broad network of preservationists to work in tandem with local activists and local Council member Alan J. Gerson. In the end, the Council affirmed the designation and further pledged to work with the current tenants of the existing building to better their living situations. In West Chelsea, a property owner of two buildings within the district admitted that although one was worthy of preservation, its neighbor, the oldest building in the commercial historic district, shouldn’t be protected. Again, local preservationists partnered with the local representative, Council Speaker Christine Quinn, to explain the importance of this small, old building - which occupied a mid-block site - to the Council. Again, the Council weighed the arguments and decided in favor of upholding the LPC’s decisions and the community’s wishes.

·  Damaging Zoning Text Amendments Withdrawn!
Early last winter, a series of zoning text amendments were proposed by the American Institute of Architects/New York Chapter that would have reworked how new development was built in contextual zones throughout the city. The amendments were broad in scope and dealt with issues as diverse as side yard requirements, rooftop bulkheads and corner lot coverage. Individually, some of these changes were minor, but taken together as a package, they had the potential to rip open the allowable building envelope of contextual zones and maximize allowable building size. Equally disturbing was how these amendments were proposed. Since this was an application affecting citywide zoning text, all the community boards in the city had to review and vote on it, but because it was a private application, the Department of City Planning was not responsible to present the proposal. The end result was that many community boards remained unaware of how these changes might effect their neighborhoods.

As contextual zoning is one of the most useful tools in the preservation toolkit, HDC gathered a five-borough coalition to oppose these amendments. In addition to concerns about the effects of these changes, the process by which they were being adopted ran counter to community-planning practices. Working together with Council member Tony Avella, longtime chair of the City Council Subcommittee on Zoning & Franchises, HDC and its partners (which included 18 community boards and several council members) successfully fought against the amendments, resulting in their withdrawal by the applicants.

·   Packed Preservation Conference Reveals Lack of Preservation in PlaNYC 2030!
HDC’s Annual Preservation Conference this past March featured keynote speaker Rohit Aggarwala, director of the New York City Department of Long-term Planning & Sustainability and a key architect of the Bloomberg administration’s PlaNYC 2030. After a full presentation by Mr. Aggarwala on the Plan’s major tenets, HDC convened a group of professional preservation advocates to respond to its relative omission of preservation practices. With HDC Executive Director Simeon Bankoff as moderator, respondents Peg Breen, president of the New York Landmarks Conservancy; Jonathan Peters, professor at the College of Staten Island; and Anthony C. Wood, author of Preserving New York: Winning the Right to Protect a City’s Landmarks, critiqued the city’s proposal point by point, highlighting numerous ignored and misunderstood opportunities for protecting and reusing local historic resources. Subsequent panels at the conference addressed specific opportunities for preservation throughout the boroughs. Read more about the day’s events here.

Moving forward, the program for HDC’s upcoming 2009 Preservation Conference will take a more detailed look at the integral intersection between preservation advocacy and civic engagement. So many neighborhood-driven campaigns require that advocates work with elected representatives and officials from city, state and federal agencies, both in partnerships and as individual parties with separate primary interests. This year’s program will feature a number of preservationists, planners, representatives from government agencies, legal experts and elected officials who will help guide attendees on how to better engage in the political process and achieve their goals. Check your mailbox for full conference details in early 2009 and in the meantime be sure to save March 6-8, 2009 on your calendars!

·  St. Saviour’s Saved!
Not all buildings can be saved by traditional means. In a recent case, one community went above and beyond to save an historic church at the eleventh hour. The church was St. Saviour’s, a rare 1847 Carpenter Gothic style building designed by Richard Upjohn in Maspeth, Queens. The local community organization, Juniper Park Civic Association (JPCA) and many dedicated individuals, fought against all odds despite unresponsiveness and even opposition from the Landmarks Preservation Commission, Department of Parks and Recreation and the former local council member to save this structure.

Even with all of JPCA’s efforts, the case looked bad. In April 2008 the developer began demolition of the church. Still JPCA continued to rally. They managed to get the developer to agree to a demolition standstill while they raised interest and funding to dismantle and move the building. Working with the New York Landmarks Conservancy, the church was stabilized, catalogued and put into storage until an appropriate new home can be found. Read more about the case here.

In May 2008 HDC awarded the Juniper Park Civic Association a Grassroots Preservation Award for their efforts. The process to relocate and restore the church is still ongoing but now seems far more secure.

·  Seaport Plan Scrapped!
There will always be new and increased threats to New York City’s historic districts. Late this fall, one such proposal came before the Landmarks Preservation Commission. But as in the past, the preservation community came together to challenge this gargantuan proposal, which would have negatively changed the seaport district forever.

The proposal was spearheaded by General Growth Properties (GGP), the private mall developers who lease much of the properties in the South Street Seaport. General Growth proposed a massive new development in and around Pier 17 in the historic district. In order to clear enough room to build a 495-foot mixed-use tower next to the pier (and the historic district), GGP proposed to demolish the historic (but not landmarked) 1939 WPA-built New Market Building, deconstruct the landmark 1909 Tin Building (and rebuild a facsimile of it at the end of the pier), demolish the LPC-approved Pier 17 Mall building and construct a number of new tall glassy retail and hotel buildings on the waterfront.

HDC, joined by our colleagues at the Municipal Art Society, the New York Landmarks Conservancy, the Society for the Architecture of the City and Councilmember Alan J. Gerson, fiercely opposed this plan. In addition, HDC nominated the entire seaport district to the Preservation League of New York State’s Seven to Save because of these threats. (We’ll find out in January if it makes the list).

At the LPC hearing in December, the commissioners took exception to many of the elements of the project. Although the proposal was not completely turned down, the Commission sent General Growth back to the drawing board. But just recently, General Growth put all of its properties within the seaport up for sale. HDC will remain vigilant about this issue and looks forward to updating the public as this project develops.

·  Candidates for Political Office Make Preservation a Top Campaign Issue!
This spring HDC launched the League of Preservation Voters during a special election for Council District 30 in central Queens. The initiative, which aims to better educate local elected officials about the importance of historic preservation and development issues throughout the city, also helps communities and elected officials partner together to better preserve the historic resources that make each neighborhood unique.

Four candidates ran for the open seat (Anthony Como, Elizabeth Crowley, Charles Ober and Tom Ognibene), and each responded to a District-specific voter guide developed by a coalition of local neighborhood and civic associations. Click here to read their responses. HDC also hosted a candidate forum, moderated by HDC’s executive director Simeon Bankoff, which addressed questions relating to preservation and development issues in the district. Click here, here and here to read news reports about the forum and the candidates’ various responses.

The League’s effort proved to be an immediate success. The election’s winner, Anthony Como, identified preservation as one of his first main concerns and met with LPC Chairman Robert Tierney shortly after taking office.

Then, due to a technicality in the City Charter, another election was held for the seat this past November (to get the District back on the standard election schedule). This time only Mr. Como and Ms. Crowley entered the race, with Ms. Crowley being victorious this time around. Though she hasn’t yet officially taken office, Councilmember-elect Crowley already appeared before the Landmarks Preservation Commission just this week to demonstrate her strong support for the proposed Ridgewood Historic District.

HDC will be expanding its League of Preservation Voters efforts to all districts in the city, but we won’t be able to do it without ample community support. To organize a Preservation Voters coalition in your district in 2009, please contact the Historic Districts Council at 212-614-9107 or email preservationvoters@hdc.org. Please note that the League of Preservation Voters is nonpartisan and does not endorse any candidate for political office.

This coming year is going to be even busier. In 2009 we will expand our preservation efforts by implementing new educational programs, advocating for more neighborhoods, and providing community outreach with new tools and helpful publications.

Please consider making an end of year gift to HDC. You can click here to make an immediate on-line donation. Your gift is fully tax-deductible and will help us make 2009 even better for grassroots preservation in New York City.

Thank you for your support,

Everyone at the Historic Districts Council