PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Bonnie Harper, Government Attorney for a Public Authority
13:18:48
·
124 sec
Bonnie Harper, a government attorney and native New Yorker, expresses strong opposition to the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal. She argues that the plan will benefit developers at the expense of New York City's quality of life and infrastructure.
- Harper raises concerns about aging infrastructure, including water mains and the transit system, which she believes cannot support increased density.
- She criticizes the plan for potentially worsening environmental issues like the heat island effect and air quality.
- Harper questions why existing unutilized or underutilized properties are not being addressed instead of proposing new construction.
Bonnie Harper
13:18:48
Good evening, and thank you for giving me a chance to speak.
13:18:52
My name is Bonnie Harper.
13:18:53
I'm a government attorney for a public authority.
13:18:56
I'm a homeowner.
13:18:58
I am a native New Yorker.
13:18:59
I was actually born in Brooklyn.
13:19:00
I've lived in Queens.
13:19:01
I've lived in Manhattan.
13:19:03
I am alarmed at this proposal.
13:19:06
I think that the board has perhaps the best of intentions and their thoughts are laudable.
13:19:12
But to be honest with you, this plan is laughable.
13:19:15
There is nothing here except to give money away to developers, give land away to developers.
13:19:20
It's going to ruin the quality of life in New York.
13:19:25
I I I can't even begin to explain how and I know many other people have already discussed the fact that our infrastructure is aging.
13:19:35
We have water mains that are over a hundred years old.
13:19:38
They are not going to handle more water.
13:19:39
They're breaking.
13:19:40
They're being unprepared.
13:19:42
We have a transit system that is over 25 years old that's already at max capacity.
13:19:47
And inexplicably, there is cutbacks in bus service.
13:19:51
We cannot seem to export expand subway service.
13:19:55
We have cutback on so many other city services, the Department of Buildings cannot keep up with current construction.
13:20:02
The idea that we're going to have an explosion and all of this unmonitored construction seems like a disaster waiting to happen.
13:20:09
We've already had a number of basement apartments flood and people get killed.
13:20:13
Mhmm.
13:20:14
The idea that we're now going to sanction this somehow seems to fly in the face of reason.
13:20:18
Okay.
13:20:19
We have a city that is in deep trouble environmentally because we've paved over so much we have the heat island effect, which will only go up if we continue to allow this kind of infrastructure sorry, this kind of building where we continue to pave over all of our property.
13:20:36
Air quality will go down.
13:20:37
Our quality of life will go down.
13:20:40
Basically, we already have over 8 million people here.
13:20:43
We have a lot of untapped housing.
13:20:47
I don't know exactly why there is so much property that is being underutilized or unutilized.
