Huge Pushback On Tech Hub at City Council, But Mayor Still Resistant

Residents and advocates filled the City Council hearing on Tuesday, demanding that the Mayor’s proposed 14th Street Tech Hub be voted down unless protections for the adjacent Greenwich Village and East Village neighborhoods are included, far outnumbering supporters of the plan.  City Councilmember Carlina Rivera, who will largely decide whether the Tech Hub rezoning is approved by the City Council, began the hearing with a strong statement that she was deeply disappointed in the administration’s refusal, thus far, to consider meaningful protections for the surrounding impacted neighborhoods (as well as for additional public benefits in the Tech Hub itself). This is consistent with the pledge she made during her campaign for City Council that she would condition her approval of the Tech Hub upon the provision of neighborhood protections.  Former Councilmember Rosie Mendez and representatives of Assemblymember Deborah Glick and State Senator Brad Hoylman echoed that call, while Borough President Gale Brewer and Community Boards 2 and 3 noted that their resolutions called for such protections to advance. Scores of neighborhood residents and community, preservation, and affordable housing groups joined GVSHP in testifying to urge the City Council not to approve the plan without the neighborhood protections.    Read GVSHP's testimony here; watch the video of the hearing here, and see pictures here; read coverage in Bedford+Bowery, the Lo-Down, AM New York, The Villager, Curbed, and Patch.   The City Council will vote in early August. If they vote to approve the Tech Hub without neighborhood protections, it will accelerate oversized development in the University Place, Broadway, and 3rd and 4th Avenue corridors, and help turn this part of Greenwich Village and the East Village into an extension of Midtown South and Silicon Alley.   DON’T LET THAT HAPPEN!