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February 10th, 2004, 09:22 AM
DUMBO
There Aren't Too Many Businesses to Improve
By ERIKA KINETZ
Published: February 1, 2004
Picture of Neighborhood contained the following caption:
“Yes, there’s a chocolate shop nearby, but are there enough stores for a BID?”
Madison Avenue this is not. And don't be fooled by the $4.35 chocolate bars at the chocolatier Jacques Torres on Water Street.
The Brooklyn neighborhood called Dumbo has leapfrogged from being a gritty manufacturing district to a hot residential outpost, largely under the guidance of the developer David Walentas, the president of Two Trees Management. But it still has little in the way of stores, restaurants and other businesses.
That is why a Walentas-backed proposal for a business improvement district in Dumbo is the subject of a growing debate about whom BID's serve and who should pay for them. Property owners in a BID pay a special tax that the city collects and the district then uses to improve the area.
Two Trees owns about half the property, as determined by value, in the proposed district, a 30-square-block area, bounded by Old Fulton Street, the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, Bridge Street and the East River. The BID would use its annual budget of $400,000 to pay for, among other things, a night security patrol, trash removal, marketing and improved signs and lighting.
The proposed BID has yet to be approved by the City Planning Commission, the local community board or the City Council, and it is unclear when it would become a reality.
Dumbo would be unusual, but not unique, among BID's in that it has a high and growing proportion of residential property owners , who would be asked to help pay for the BID. Only 11 of the 46 BID's in New York depend on residential property owners for significant financing.
Residential owners in Dumbo would be charged at half the commercial rate and contribute, in total, about $52,000 a year to the BID. Most condo owners would be expected to pay $100 to $150 each annually.
The Dumbo Neighborhood Association supports the BID but some residents see the assessment as insult added to the injury of the 18.5 percent increase in city property taxes that took effect at the end of 2002. For them, it's not a matter of $150, it's a matter of principle.
Oddly, one of the largest pending commercial developments in the district, the Empire Stores, a cavernous brick warehouse that Boymelgreen Developers plans to turn into a high-end mall, would probably not have to contribute to the BID because the property is owned by a state agency.
Many opponents of the BID also believe that the plan is an attempt by developers to make residents foot the bill for maintenance and marketing. John McDermott, a board member at 1 Main Street, said he felt the BID was designed to "pay for a marketing campaign.'' And he added, "It's to make it more attractive to sell condos."
But Two Trees Management contends that the BID will not save it any money.
"We're backing this,'' said Isaac Esterman, a project manager at Two Trees, ''but we're also willing to pay for it." Two Trees, he added, would end up paying about half of the BID's annual assessment and did not plan to pass on that cost to its commercial tenants, though, legally, it could.
The New York Times
Sunday, February 1, 2004
There Aren't Too Many Businesses to Improve
By ERIKA KINETZ
Published: February 1, 2004
Picture of Neighborhood contained the following caption:
“Yes, there’s a chocolate shop nearby, but are there enough stores for a BID?”
Madison Avenue this is not. And don't be fooled by the $4.35 chocolate bars at the chocolatier Jacques Torres on Water Street.
The Brooklyn neighborhood called Dumbo has leapfrogged from being a gritty manufacturing district to a hot residential outpost, largely under the guidance of the developer David Walentas, the president of Two Trees Management. But it still has little in the way of stores, restaurants and other businesses.
That is why a Walentas-backed proposal for a business improvement district in Dumbo is the subject of a growing debate about whom BID's serve and who should pay for them. Property owners in a BID pay a special tax that the city collects and the district then uses to improve the area.
Two Trees owns about half the property, as determined by value, in the proposed district, a 30-square-block area, bounded by Old Fulton Street, the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, Bridge Street and the East River. The BID would use its annual budget of $400,000 to pay for, among other things, a night security patrol, trash removal, marketing and improved signs and lighting.
The proposed BID has yet to be approved by the City Planning Commission, the local community board or the City Council, and it is unclear when it would become a reality.
Dumbo would be unusual, but not unique, among BID's in that it has a high and growing proportion of residential property owners , who would be asked to help pay for the BID. Only 11 of the 46 BID's in New York depend on residential property owners for significant financing.
Residential owners in Dumbo would be charged at half the commercial rate and contribute, in total, about $52,000 a year to the BID. Most condo owners would be expected to pay $100 to $150 each annually.
The Dumbo Neighborhood Association supports the BID but some residents see the assessment as insult added to the injury of the 18.5 percent increase in city property taxes that took effect at the end of 2002. For them, it's not a matter of $150, it's a matter of principle.
Oddly, one of the largest pending commercial developments in the district, the Empire Stores, a cavernous brick warehouse that Boymelgreen Developers plans to turn into a high-end mall, would probably not have to contribute to the BID because the property is owned by a state agency.
Many opponents of the BID also believe that the plan is an attempt by developers to make residents foot the bill for maintenance and marketing. John McDermott, a board member at 1 Main Street, said he felt the BID was designed to "pay for a marketing campaign.'' And he added, "It's to make it more attractive to sell condos."
But Two Trees Management contends that the BID will not save it any money.
"We're backing this,'' said Isaac Esterman, a project manager at Two Trees, ''but we're also willing to pay for it." Two Trees, he added, would end up paying about half of the BID's annual assessment and did not plan to pass on that cost to its commercial tenants, though, legally, it could.
The New York Times
Sunday, February 1, 2004