Q&A
Plans for community center and public open space
2:25:21
·
147 sec
Council Member Farías and Ken Fisher discuss the development team's commitment to providing space for a community center and creating public open space within the development.
- The team is committed to working with the council member and community to find a proper tenant for the community center space
- Renderings of potential public open space have been created and submitted
- The open space aims to welcome train station users and provide additional shopping opportunities
- The development team is open to collaborating with the community on the design of the public open space
Amanda Farías
2:25:21
Your team has publicly discussed providing space for a potential community center.
2:25:25
I know we spoke about this several times kind of going back and forth on what was square footage space necessarily need, or is that a leasing space?
2:25:34
Is your team committed to that use into working with my team and the greater purchaser community to find a proper tenant for the space?
Ken Fisher
2:25:41
Yes.
Amanda Farías
2:25:43
You have discussed providing public open space within the development.
2:25:47
Can you briefly describe what such open space could look like and you and your client, are you folks able to collaborate with the purchaser community to design any public open space that may be created under the proposal?
Ken Fisher
2:26:02
The testimony I submitted, and we'll submit it again electronically for the record, include some renderings of what the space could be like.
2:26:10
As we envision it, it it serves 2 purposes.
2:26:13
1 is to welcome people who'll be using the train station into the into the community.
2:26:19
And activate that that block.
2:26:21
The other is that we heard at your community forum for many of the residents that they like some variety in retail and more shopping opportunities to be determined.
2:26:32
So as we see at the Plaza provides an area for for circulation.
2:26:37
It breaks up the bulk of the the ensemble of buildings, provide some additional shopping and again contributes to the sense of place.
2:26:48
I just want to note though This is uncharted territory for all of us.
2:26:54
You all are making a bold commitment to the future of of the parkchester neighborhood.
2:27:00
The market is untested.
2:27:02
And so our ability to actually be able to finance and build something is going to take some amount of effort.
2:27:13
We're open to the possibility of home ownership for as part of the restricted income component.
2:27:21
Senior housing is more complicated because of the way the buildings would be established, the funding streams, and other things.
2:27:31
But we're absolutely open to meeting with HPD to discuss these things, and we're also absolutely committed to providing a community space as you discussed in you know, in collaboration with your office and the community.