East New York Brooklyn Rezoning Plan Update: Protesters Face Off with De Blasio Commissioners

The city's plan of rezoning the neighborhood of East New York for new development has met stiff resistance from protesters.

East New York recently become a refuge for minorities fleeing high rents in other parts of the city - and activists fear the De Blasio administration's proposals, which would allocate bulk housing to people making $31,000 to $50,000 a year, and in turn affect the current residents getting priced out.

The De Blasio administration argued that the growing population in the neighborhood of East New York and the creeping gentrification will lead to displacement if the plan will not push through. The administration promised that the rezoning will reserve half of all current residents and that the 1,200 apartments built in the first years would be subsidized by the local government and would be below-market rent, as reported by the Observer news.

"We do not want to displace anybody. We want to provide affordable housing that can keep people in their neighborhoods," said Vicki Been, the commissioner of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development. "The zoning proposal before you today is not a trigger for displacement. It is a preventative measure."

The protesters seemed unimpressed and called it a plan that "is not for us," as the commissioner concluded her testimony.

The director of the Department of City Planning, Carl Weisbord, argued that the plan will provide the lowest-cost affordable housing the city could support without assistance from the federal government.

Most of the area that is covered by the proposed rezoning belongs to the district of Councilman Rafael Espinal, a supporter of the plan, though some areas are under the ardent opponent of the plan, Councilwoman Inez Baron.

City Limits news reported that East New York is the targeted neighborhood out of 15 for rezoning, as part of the De Blasio administration's effort to build 80,000 and preserve 120,000 units of affordable housing. By rezoning corridors, it will help promote residential and commercial development, as well as seek to encourage the growth of affordable housing, while urging the revitalization of the neighborhood areas regarded as underdeveloped.