Friends of Fort Greene Park (FFGP) has filed two lawsuits that challenge the $10.5M Parks Department design that would erase the character and use of the northwest area of our historic Park. FFGP believes that the real agenda is social engineering to disrupt current use by public housing residents, church groups and other local residents.
Replacing what is now a shady green space with a 43’ wide plaza running from a new corner entrance to the monument steps, as well as adding a fifth entrance to this one area, requires the removal of 58 mature shade trees. Excavation to flatten the grassy mounds for the plaza will certainly kill another 13 trees.
The plaza will pave over an estimated 13,314 sq. ft. of open greenery and move the popular barbecue area away from nearby luxury high rises, including one developed where a Brooklyn Hospital building now stands, which backs on to the Park.
We had no recourse but to sue to seek transparency and accountability.
From the beginning of the approval process, Parks repeatedly made misleading public statements about the number and condition of trees to be cut down. Public meetings presented an illusion of soliciting community input, but none of the suggestions and feedback from residents was ever taken into consideration. The community was very clear about wanting needed repairs and retaining current amenities, but the Parks Department gave the message: Accept the design changes or get no funding at all. We had to file repeated Freedom of Information requests in order to get answers. One of our lawsuits was for a highly redacted report on the park, and attorney Michael Gruen, President of the City Club, a civic organization, won the case on behalf of FFGP in State Supreme Court, but Parks decided to appeal the judge’s ruling, the hearing held on April 4th, 2019
The second lawsuit was filed by renowned environmental attorney, Richard Lippes, who changed US environmental law through his representation of plaintiffs at Love Canal and Three Mile Island. This suit, on behalf of the Sierra Club, the City Club and Friends of Fort Greene Park, is demanding an environmental review, which Parks claims isn’t necessary. Besides obvious impacts from such vast tree removals, Mr. Lippes cites the historical nature of the park and how this would affect current uses.
Though Parks touts mandated “Tree Restitution”, they never disclose where new trees will be planted or what that will cost. The law says these new trees can go anywhere in the neighborhood. This was the basis for another of our FOIA requests. The official NYC Parks forestry report released by a FOIA request indicates that required restitution alone costs $858,732, not including the colossal cost of removal. Replacement trees would be 3” caliper saplings.
It is well-known among arborists that nine out of ten new trees in New York City die within the first two years. It takes 20 years for a tree to grow large enough to process air pollution–a major benefit in a high-asthma area like ours.
The Parks Department has characterized opponents to the plan as “the ladies”—a deprecating dismissal of our initial group. But Friends of Fort Greene Park is a diverse community of neighbors that is growing daily as people are still learning about the plan.
We three co-authors are neighbors who didn’t know one another until coming together in this fight. One of us is a third-generation resident of Kingsview Homes, a 290-unit, 66-year old, middle-income co-op across the street from the park. No one from the Parks Department or the Park Conservancy reached out to Kingsview.
One of us, a Taiwanese-born designer, was disturbed by the dismissal of negative responses to the plan by NYCHA residents at a community input meeting held by the Parks Department in February 2017.
The third is a white senior who is a painter, long time park activist and a homeowner who was shocked by the clear purpose of discouraging use by those who live on this side of the park.
All three of us live within two blocks of the park, but we are just a few of the hundreds of neighbors who signed our petitions and have spoken out to elected officials and Parks Commissioner Mitchell Silver to voice our dismay.
We all want repairs and upgrades to this long-neglected part of the Park. What we don’t want is for our refuge to be replaced by a concrete grandiose entryway suitable only for commercial purposes and skateboarding. Please visit our website for archived videos, documents and press coverage of our battle to save Fort Greene Park, and add your name to our petition!
http://FortGreeneParkFriends.org/
Monique Cumberbatch is the chair of the Chair, Community Affairs Committee of Kingsview Homes, Inc.
Enid Braun is a founding member of the Friends of Fort Greene Park.
Ling Hsu is the president of the Friends of Fort Greene Park.
