Community Says No to SoHo, NoHo, Chinatown Upzoning Plan

By MATT HIRSCH

The New York City Department of City Planning is proposing a rezoning of SoHo, NoHo, and Chinatown, in an attempt to “strengthen SoHo and NoHo as mixed-use neighborhoods and promote equity,” according to a city briefing on the project.

However, at a public meeting held by the department on Thursday, many residents expressed their fear that the project would not strengthen the neighborhoods. Zoning Map Amendment C210422ZMM would allow developers to move in and build large-scale luxury retail and residential housing that could drive up already inflated rent prices and force middle- and lower-income Lower East Side residents to leave their homes.

Juan Rivero, a representative of Village Preservation, a non-profit that advocates for protecting historical neighborhoods in lower Manhattan, spoke about how these plans will do the opposite of the supposed goal.

“Even if this plan turns out exactly as the EIS (Environmental Impact Statement) predicts, it will produce a richer, more expensive, less diverse neighborhood,” said Rivero.  “This plan in all likelihood will create little if any of the projected affordable housing and result in the demolition of some of the existing affordable housing.”

Though the main focus of the plan, according to the official description of the project, is to promote equitable housing, 70  to 75 percent of new housing is zoned to be luxury apartments, and only 20 to 25 percent of units would be considered “affordable” housing.

The plan does not address the proposed rezoning of parts of Chinatown just above Canal Street, nor the renaming of the area to “East SoHo.”

Zishun Ning, an Asian-American member of Youth Against Displacement, an advocacy group for community-led rezoning plans, gave scathing remarks about the lack of consideration regarding residents of Chinatown.

“The city is continuing to promote racism and a displacement agenda. Chinatown and the Lower East Side have been excluded from protection against luxury highrises since the 2008 East Village rezoning,” said Ning. The rezoning project he spoke of allowed for new development in primarily Asian and Hispanic areas.

“With the SoHo, NoHo, Chinatown rezoning, the city has the audacity to incentivize developers to build luxury condos in the name of ‘racial equality and diversity,’” Ning said. “This is a displacement plan and it will destroy existing affordable housing and small businesses in Chinatown, SoHo, NoHo, and the broader Lower East Side.”

Among speakers at the meeting, there was a strong desire for more affordable housing. Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer said the current plans would only further gentrification and alienate long-time residents of the area.

“We all want to get to a situation where there is affordable housing, where there is rezoning, where the historic district is maintained, where tenants do not have to lose their apartments,” said Borough President Brewer.

The currently proposed plans place no cap on retail space, which could potentially mean even less than 20 percent of new developments would be allotted for affordable housing. Retail space is more profitable and attractive to potential landlords. Borough President Brewer said that this is one of the stark issues with the current proposal.

“We have to figure out what we’re going to do about demolition and saving tenants,” she said. “This is perhaps the largest and most challenging rezoning that we’ve all been a part of.”