The new Second Avenue Subway (photo: Patrick Cashin/MTA)
Two years ago, Mayor Bill de Blasio released a comprehensive plan for the city that included funding to study the expansion of a subway line on Utica Avenue, Brooklyn, one of the most crowded transit corridors in the city. The plan roused speculation among transit advocates and elected officials that funding for the much-needed subway line might eventually be in the pipeline, but with little movement on the study, some are beginning to doubt whether officials are truly committed to the project.
The Utica Avenue subway line would extend the 3 and 4 train from Eastern Parkway southward down Utica Avenue, a stretch of Brooklyn that includes East Flatbush, Flatlands, and Marine Park, and is home to about 168,000 residents. The extension has been a topic of discussion for more than a century, first proposed in 1910 when residents of Brooklyn cited “business and residential needs” as a key factor motivating their desire for a dedicated subway line. In 2015, Mayor de Blasio’s One NYC plan designated $5 million towards studying the feasibility of the subway line, a result of the capital funding agreement between the city and state.
But elected officials and residents have heard little about the planned study -- which was scheduled to be conducted in the current fiscal year ending June 30 -- and are beginning to voice their complaints about a lack of communication from the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the New York City Department of Transportation.
“I definitely wasn't consulted, I do know about the study, but I wasn't told about it.” said Council Member Jumaane Williams, who represents the East Flatbush district where the line would be built. Williams said he had to contact the DOT directly after he learned about the study in 2015, and ask for an update himself. “My hope is that maybe with this new study, they're trying to get us more involved...but the reality is I don't think many of us are aware,” he said.
A spokesperson for the DOT said in an email, “The DOT and MTA launched the study process last year.” The spokesperson did not respond to multiple emails requesting details on the timeline, but stressed, “An extension along Utica would bring great opportunities to more communities and was a priority of the City during MTA capital plan negotiations.”
MTA spokesperson Kevin Ortiz said that the agency was coordinating with the DOT, but that much of the onus fell on the city. As Ortiz explained it, the study had yet to begin. In an email, he said, “This is a city allocated project, so we need a better idea of what the city wants out of the study. So we are working with them to refine the scope to meet their needs and envision hiring a consultant to conduct the study later this year.” In a followup email, he referred questions to the DOT.
State Assemblymember N. Nick Perry, whose district includes Williams’ constituency, said he has been given scant information on the proposed study. “I know there’s been a little noise about this, but I haven't heard anything more,” Perry said. “So far it's still something in the pipeline and it may be quite a long pipeline.”
The Crown Heights-Utica Avenue subway station, from which the potential Utica line would extend, has almost 9 million riders a year, making it the 37th most popular station out of 472. The extension would run down Utica Avenue to Kings Plaza, cutting across a district that has few trains in the area. “People complained about having to walk a couple of blocks on Second Avenue,” Council Member Williams said. “There are no trains in many parts of my district within many blocks.”
Recognizing the dire transit needs on Utica Avenue, the DOT last year launched the B46 Select Bus Service, which runs along the Utica corridor and carries 44,000 people every day. The route was identified as a priority in 2009, and realized in 2016 after several meetings with Brooklyn community boards. The route extends six miles from DeKalb Avenue to Kings Plaza, covering a similar region to the prospective Utica Avenue subway.
But the buses, according to Council Member Williams and Assemblymember Perry, present their own problems. People in vehicles get penalized for violating the restricted bus lanes, which are closed to cars and trucks from 7am to 4pm. “It's obviously not good for working people's pockets to get $115 tickets, so I'm trying to figure out how they're measuring the success of the bus lanes,” Williams said.
Perry believes the ticketing may be taking a toll on commerce in the district as well; truck drivers attempting to make deliveries along the street get fined too. “Right now they get tickets...and some of them can't afford the cost of doing business,” Perry said. “Folks are looking to move off Utica Avenue, and that's an economic hub of this community.”
Even with the implementation of the B46, Perry pointed out a similar issue with the DOT, a lack of communication with the affected commuters and residents. “It seems to me that they snuck it through really, because they spoke to a select group of people and by the time the information got down to the folks who were really going to be impacted they were already in their implementation mode,” Perry said.
De Blasio’s decision to devote $5 million to the plan in 2015 may have mollified politicians and residents at the time, but some transportation insiders have a different take on the matter. Jon Orcutt, the director of communications and advocacy at TransitCenter, and the director of policy for the DOT from 2007 to 2014, said that the Utica Extension study was one of a number of studies that get funding, but rarely make it beyond the desk of the MTA.
“If you go back through MTA capital programs, there are lots and lots of studies like this...in some ways the MTA sort of buys peace with elected officials by studying things that they say they want to look at,” Orcutt said. “They may be studying them for even longer than they need to be studied.”
To go from talk to action, said Mitchell Moss, director of the NYU Rudin Center for Transportation Policy and Management, there needs to be a concerted effort by the community, the city and the state. “The important thing is to have advocacy from all levels,” he said.
Moss pointed out that the state’s priorities have been elsewhere on larger projects. For the last few years, the MTA had been scrambling to complete construction on the Second Avenue subway line, which was a priority for Governor Andrew Cuomo. After perennial delays, which drew constant complaints from residents of the East Side who bemoaned the lack of mass transit facilities, the line finally opened on deadline to the public on January 1.
Political will for the Utica line, in comparison, has been relatively muted. Council Member Williams said he was “not sure why this has stalled.” He continued, “I think many times there are parts of this city that are not paid attention to as much as others, and I think we've fallen into that bucket for quite some time. Obviously it's time to change that.”
TransitCenter’s Orcutt thinks the mayor hasn’t prioritized or advocated for the Utica Extension, which he believes is necessary to push it forward. “Bloomberg got the 7 Extension... but they went and made a case with the Governor and went all in for it and it happened,” he said. “I don't think there's anywhere near that kind of push or pressure to get the Utica project going.”
***
by Elena Burger, Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito (photo: @BenKallos)
City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito vowed defiance against President Donald Trump’s immigration policies and promised to uplift and empower New York City’s immigrant population in her final State of the City speech at the Kings Theater in Brooklyn on Thursday.
Mark-Viverito, the first Latina speaker of the body, has 10 months left on the job before she is term-limited out of the Council. On Thursday, she sought to cement her legacy and inspire with her speech, titled “Who We Are,” that recognized the city’s cultural and ethnic plurality. As in years past, the heart of her speech was a commitment to justice -- for immigrants, for students, for women, and for those caught up in the penal system, to name a few.
The speaker took a staunch stand against recent actions by the federal government, in particular raids that were carried out across the country last week by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents, during which 41 undocumented immigrants from New York City were arrested. She said the city would not comply with federal immigration agents in targeting city residents who do not pose a public safety threat. “New York has always persevered, no matter the obstacle,” Mark-Viverito said, stopping short of mentioning Trump by name. “Whether defying a king in England or a president in Washington, we stand up for what is right.”
Mark-Viverito also proposed a slew of new legislations to protect undocumented immigrants, including one barring ICE agents from entering private areas on city property and offices that provide social services without a judicial warrant or court order; a bill to restrict ICE officials from entering public schools and accessing student records; and a system to limit the city’s collection of personal data and guidelines for disclosure of personal data to the federal government.
The Council will also attempt to baseline legal defense funding for immigrants facing deportation, she said, and establish immigrant family resource centers in each borough.
She also said officers of the NYPD, Department of Probation and Department of Correction would not be allowed to enforce federal immigration laws. “Three million immigrants live in New York City, they fuel our economy, they propel our city forward,” she said. “They are an indispensable part of our city’s landscape and they are absolutely, unquestionably New Yorkers.”
The city will also create it’s own “wall of resistance,” Mark-Viverito pledged, by coordinating policies and advocacy with other sanctuary cities and jurisdictions across the country. Additionally, she announced a first-of-its-kind conference of legislative leaders through the National League of Cities, scheduled for April at the City Council. “Just imagine dozens of Criminal Justice Reform Acts and municipal identification card programs instituted in every big city across the United States,” she said, touting two of the council’s key accomplishments in the last three years. “The possibilities for national solidarity on almost any issue are endless.”
Along with her focus on immigrant protections, Mark-Viverito also proposed a number of progressive measures, the likes of which have defined her tenure at the Council. She called for “culturally responsive” education that encourages conversations on race in city schools, measures to address cyberbullying, steps to reduce overcrowded classrooms and a comprehensive plan to teach sexual health education in public schools. Mark-Viverito vowed that the Council would aggressively and proactively protect women’s reproductive rights, ensuring access to free birth control in New York City and pushing state legislators to pass the Reproductive Health Act. And she said the Council will pass legislation requiring the city meet racial and gender equity goals in its policies and programs.
“We must make sure all New Yorkers are on equal footing - and that we’re providing a pathway for all New Yorkers to be heard and to succeed,” she said. “This is who we are.”
Mark-Viverito also committed to expanding criminal justice reform by reducing pre-trial incarceration, making bail procedures easier and reducing the population of the Riker’s Island prison complex. She expressed her support for raising the age of criminal responsibility from 16 to 18, an issue that is currently being debated at the state level, and said the Council will work with the district attorneys to clear low-level summons warrants that are more than 10 years old.
“This year, we will continue to stand for justice, access and fairness,” she said. “This year, we will once again show the world just who we are.”
***
by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette
Marvin Holland (Photo via Holland's campaign)
Union organizer Marvin Holland, the runner up in Tuesday’s special election for the District 9 City Council seat, has confirmed to Gotham Gazette that he will mount a challenge against the winner Bill Perkins when the seat is up for grabs again later this year.
The District 9 seat in Harlem was recently vacated by Inez Dickens, who was elected to the state Assembly, leaving just one year left in the term. A nonpartisan special election for the seat was held on Feb. 14 with nine candidates on the ballot. State Senator Bill Perkins, who held the District 9 seat between 1998 and 2005, won with 3750 votes, about 34 percent of the 11,149 votes cast, according to the New York City Board of Elections’ unofficial results (Final results are certified two weeks after the election). Perkins will serve the rest of Dickens’ term and will have to run for reelection, which will involve a Democratic primary in September.
Holland, who came second in the race with 2073 votes, believes that he can build more support and name recognition to pose a stronger challenge in the September primary. “In a few short months, we built a strong, diverse coalition amongst the people most under attack from Trump’s policies, and beat all expectations while highlighting some very important issues facing our community,” Holland said, in a statement to Gotham Gazette. “With this race, the foundation has been laid for a new political future for Harlem.”
As political director of Transit Workers Union Local 100, Holland built a coalition of labor and community support and his vote totals even surpassed Larry Scott Blackmon, the favored candidate of the Harlem old guard. Blackmon, a FreshDirect executive, came in fourth in the race with 1,324 votes, despite being endorsed by Dickens and former Assemblymember Keith Wright, who chairs the Manhattan Democratic Party.
Holland’s campaign pointed out that 66 percent of the voters didn’t choose Perkins, despite his long history representing the neighborhood and his familiarity in the community. “So, their vote could have been an anti-Perkins choice,” said Jon Greenfield, a spokesperson for Holland, in an email.
Greenfield said the race ultimately hinged on name recognition and that Holland can spend the next six months building his own. “Marvin can hold his showing in the East Harlem portion of the district (Assembly District 68), build name recognition in central Harlem over the next months, and gather anti-Perkins, anti-establishment votes,” he said.
Holland will also continue to consolidate labor support and reach out to Dickens and Wright for their support. “Harlem deserves elected officials accountable to them,” Holland said. “I intend to keep the promises made to the people during this campaign, and will continue the work we have begun to be their candidate in the September primary for City Council.”
The race will still be an uphill challenge for Holland. Perkins received endorsements from Mayor Bill de Blasio and the City Council’s progressive caucus in the special election. He’s confident that he will be reelected and hopes to do as well in September as he did in the Tuesday special. “I have every reason to believe I’ll do even better,” he said, in a phone interview.
He wasn’t surprised to hear Holland will run against him, and even welcomed the challenge. “I wouldn’t be surprised if any of the other candidates that participated in the election are considering the same thing,” he said, insisting that he doesn’t take his frontrunner status for granted. Only one other candidate, Shannette Gray, has officially declared a run for the District 9 seat with the Campaign Finance Board. She did not participate in the special election.
“It’s a marathon, not a sprint,” Perkins said of the election. “We just ran the first mile.”
***
by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette
Note: this article has been updated.