NOLITA — The Lower Manhattan Development Corporation will take feedback from the public on a variety of potential projects to fund — including city-planned affordable housing at the site of the Elizabeth Street Garden — at a forum on Sept. 17.
The city wants to build up to 75 units of affordable housing where the Elizabeth Street Garden currently stands, and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development applied for $6 million in funds from the LMDC for the project. The plan has existed since 2012 and was secured by Councilwoman Margaret Chin as part of the City Council's approval of the massive Seward Park development project known as SPURA.
LMDC is considering several projects at the forum, and how to spend $50 million from a recently settled construction-related lawsuit.
Locals say that since volunteers got involved with the garden about two years ago, it has become an important neighborhood fixture, offering events and activities and a rare green space in the densely-populated Nolita-SoHo area.
According to Community Board 2, nearly a quarter of their district's population lives in Little Italy & SoHo, but the neighborhoods hold only 3 percent of the district's parkland.
But HPD maintains the garden only recently became available to the public, and a local group called Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden never had or sought permission from the city to use the site as a community garden.
The de Blasio administration is taking back several community gardens around the city to develop affordable housing on those sites.
In a resolution passed in August, CB 2 asked the LMDC not to fund the project, and asked HPD to consider building affordable housing at an array of other city-owned sites, which the board said would allow the city to create more units while also leaving some green space in the neighborhood.
The LMDC public forum be held in Fiterman Hall on the 13th floor of the Borough of Manhattan Community College building at 245 Greenwich St. (the side entrance to the building is on Barclay Street).
It will run from 4:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. and comments can be made orally or in writing. They are also welcoming suggestions for downtown Manhattan projects that are not yet being considered.
