REMARKS
Council Member Lee expresses concerns about transportation and parking in her district
3:19:28
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127 sec
Council Member Linda Lee addresses the panel, acknowledging the need for housing while expressing concerns specific to her district. She highlights the lack of railway access, reliance on buses and cars, and the diverse needs of her constituents, including seniors and flood-prone areas.
- Questions how to propose more housing given MTA budget constraints and reduced bus services
- Suggests considering a sliding scale for parking mandates rather than complete removal
- Inquires about improving the waiver process for developers while maintaining some mandates
Linda Lee
3:19:28
Hi.
3:19:28
How are you?
3:19:30
Thanks for being here today.
3:19:31
And I just wanna say that yesterday when I asked questions to chaireconomic, I understand obviously that we need housing and as chair of mental health disabilities and addictions committee.
3:19:41
I fully understand that housing is one of the most important social determinants of health.
3:19:46
So I believe all these things.
3:19:48
However, the question I wanted to post to you all is that I live in 1 of 2 city council districts that literally has no railway, subways.
3:19:57
We rely very heavily on buses and cars, and we have a lot of older adults seniors were a very diverse community in terms of background, ethnic background.
3:20:06
I represent parts of Northeast And Southeast Queens, tons of flooding because of hurricane Ida, because of the Southeast Queens water table rising as well as rainfall falling.
3:20:16
So I I asked 2 I have two questions, which is and this is for open for any one of you guys, is how would you propose more housing with the fact that the MTA budget is not improving and that we don't have more bus.
3:20:30
In fact, our bus lines or in bus services are getting cut.
3:20:33
So we need to make sure that we can all live in this city, and this is the conundrum I think that all of us are facing as council members is that each district is very different.
3:20:43
The characteristics are very different, and my issue with this plan is that it sort of has a one size fits all.
3:20:48
Right?
3:20:49
So my question is, how would you propose a district like mine getting around transportation wise given the limits?
3:20:57
And the second question is more, I guess, the developer, which is one of the questions I had yesterday for chair grodnick is if we were to perhaps do a sliding scale for the parking mandates but keep them because as we know, we need to keep city agencies accountable as council members because we can't even get them to do simple reporting bills on how they're spending funds.
3:21:18
Right?
3:21:18
So can we keep the mandates?
3:21:21
And what I understood is that the waiver process, which developers can apply for, is cumbersome.
3:21:27
So my question is, would it be beneficial to have a relook at the waiver process, but keep the mandates?
3:21:34
So those two questions.
