Who Needs Luxury Condos? / Main Street WIRE

	June 12, 1999
Who Needs Minischools Converted to Condos? by Opponents of Minischool Conversion

We Need Schools The Masterplan and General Development Plan designated the minischools as school classrooms. There is at present a serious shortage of classrooms in New York City for as many as 120,000 students. Roosevelt Island's minischools could ease that shortage and should be offered, since that is their purpose. And when Southtown is built, our island will have need of even more classrooms. Will another school have to be built later on? Or will our students have to leave the island to attend school? Since RIOC maintains that Roosevelt Island is now self-sufficient, do we really need to sacrifice our children's schoolrooms to provide RIOC with the modest amount of $250,000 in annual income that it hopes to earn from the condominiums? We Need Southtown Development on Roosevelt Island should be concentrated on Southtown, not on random and unnecessary changes that defile the original plan.
Roosevelt Island has been acclaimed by urban planners worldwide for its concept that fluidly incorporates buildings and open spaces. The design of our present development will be violated by adding stories to the minischools. Not only will the views from a great many apartments in the surrounding buildings be destroyed, but property values of these same apartments will be adversely affected without due process, in order to benefit a very few. The proposed condominiums will also suffer from difficult access. The temptation to use the riverside promenade for vehicular access will become irresistible, and the pedestrian bias that was the foundation of our community will be lost, possibly forever. Furthermore, once the Masterplan and General Development Plan are altered without seeking an Amendment and without the involvement of the residents and the local Community Board, a precedent will be established for further violations.	Members of the RIOC Board's Capital Planning and Development Committee toured the minischools in June.
We Need Justification Roosevelt Island was built with tax-free or low-interest bonds issued by New York State to provide badly-needed affordable housing. It is unconscionable to use such money to subsidize luxury condominiums. What justification can there be for the minischool conversion to luxury housing, which negates the fundamental objective of providing affordable middle-income housing close to Manhattan Island?
Furthermore, there is an explosin of luxury housing in the East 59th Street area of Manhattan. How do we know that there will even be a demand for such housing on our Island, when there are more viable alternatives in Manhattan? We Need Planned Communities Residents on this Island chose to live here, in part, because this was a planned community. Ad hoc changes to the plan, such as the minischool conversions, will totally subvert this original intention. Purposeful involvement for the good of the entire community has been a hallmark of Roosevelt Islanders. Luxury housing has little to offer towards that spirit in this close-knit Island community. We Need to Be Consulted Virtually every community group on the Island has voiced opposition to this project.	Developer Diane Wilson wants to convert three of the minischools to luxury condominiums and add a second floor to portions of each.
The Roosevelt Island Residents Association declared the conversion plan to be "an attempt to change the very nature of the community." The Rivercross Board of Directors unanimously adopted a resolution opposing the additional story on the minischool conversion plan as being "contrary to the General Development Plan for Roosevelt Island." The Westview/Island House Taskforce presented petitions with 500 signatures to RIOC opposing the minischool conversion plan. Patrick Stewart, President of the Roosevelt Island Residents Association, declared that "RIOC management's determination to act arbitrarily instead of seeking acceptable compromises with the residents... has cost the State of New York three years of extensive effort with nothing to show in return." Shirley Margolin, a former Assistant to the Commissioner of DHCR, feels "there has not been sufficient exploration of alternative proposals that are more in keeping with the residential, middle-income nature of the present community and its Master Plan." Richard Wade, former Commissioner of Housing in Chicago, Illinois, says: "... The well-to-do never have trouble finding shelter... our mission is to relieve a critical shortage of low- and moderate-income housing that is worse now than it was 20 years ago." We don't need luxury condominiums! Need More Information? Call 752-7607.

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