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Q&A
Comprehensive planning and aligning development with public interest
0:46:33
·
5 min
Commissioner Carl Weisbrod asks Council Member Alexa Aviles how to address the issue of developers avoiding certain districts due to anticipated council member opposition, leading to inequitable development patterns.
Aviles pushes back on framing it solely as a council member issue, emphasizing the role of the administration and city planning, and the lack of a comprehensive city plan.
She argues that development often follows profit rather than public interest (citing shelter development in her district) and council intervention is needed to align projects with community needs; responsible development requires engagement, not just avoiding perceived opposition.
Carl Weisbrod
0:46:33
Thank you.
0:46:34
Thank you, council member.
0:46:35
I was struck by what you said at the outset, which is how and I can appreciate how you and other communities and council members feel about your communities getting a lot of housing while, as you said, other communities are protected.
0:46:54
We heard a lot of testimony from developers saying that one of the first things they do is look and see which council members are at all receptive to housing and which ones aren't.
0:47:10
And those that aren't, they just won't proceed at all.
0:47:13
They won't go forward.
0:47:15
They won't propose projects because they'd have to invest a lot of money, and it would be, at the end of the day, a waste of time.
0:47:23
And, in fact, the communities that you referenced that are protected have been protected for a long time by council member after council member resisting housing in those in those districts.
0:47:37
How would you how would you address that issue, given the existing, willingness of council members to defer to each individual council member as to the desires of his or her district?
Alexa Aviles
0:47:58
Well, thank you for the question.
0:48:01
I would first I would first make an amendment here.
0:48:03
This is not a process that solely depends on a council member and a developer.
0:48:09
There is an administration.
0:48:11
There is with DCP.
0:48:13
There is the whole process.
0:48:15
There is the the borough president.
0:48:19
There are actually many political bodies that determine kind of the life cycle of these projects.
Carl Weisbrod
0:48:27
I I don't want to interrupt you, but but in fact, it does depend on, usually, on a developer who's prepared to put up some money upfront
Richard R. Buery Jr.
0:48:39
Sure.
Carl Weisbrod
0:48:40
In order to potentially see a project completed at the end of the day.
0:48:46
And, if that developer or any developer is unprepared to do that, irrespective of what the city can do, there's really not going to be development in that district.
Alexa Aviles
0:48:57
Well, I think, again, here, there there are many voices that that determine kind of whether our project comes to fruition or not.
0:49:09
If developers are not interested in engaging in the work that it will require to responsibly develop in our city, then I think that that's their choice.
0:49:21
I think lacking comprehensive plan for our city, which I think is fun a really fundamental problem for our city that we do not comprehensively plan where we can make sure that we are not only building to achieve certain level of goals to make sure that our city runs appropriately and has fair distribution of whatever, you know, public mechanisms that it requires, right, to run effectively, I think you have to it is not just the developers' whims here.
0:50:00
You have it's carrots and sticks and guardrails and responsible development.
0:50:06
So I I don't think it's just a developer.
0:50:10
If we want to incentivize the appropriate development as a city, our administration should be doing that.
0:50:18
Our council members should be doing that, and we should be doing it in a way where there's appropriate guardrails and appropriate considerations because there are different nuances.
0:50:27
In fact, our community had an enormous we haven't had a ton of development, but we have had an enormous amount of siding of shelters.
0:50:36
We've had a building of all these hotels in a community where there was no tourist attraction.
0:50:42
They were being built because the city was incentivizing shelter as a good business model.
0:50:48
And so there was no one watching for interests there.
0:50:53
Right?
0:50:53
So but the development was moving towards the money.
0:50:57
So I think, you know, there is no easy answer here, and I can't solve the problem of the developers who are chasing their profit.
0:51:04
But I can say on behalf of the public interest of this city that we not only need to comprehensively plan, but we have to place guardrails on on all facets here.
0:51:14
Right?
0:51:14
Because if you are chasing the dollar, you're certainly not trade chasing the public interest.
0:51:20
Maybe those two can converge, and many times they do, and it's a good thing.
0:51:24
Nevertheless, what we see is development that is not quite hitting the interest and the need within our city.
0:51:31
And this is where the council's intervention is able to help move that in the place closer to to the needs of the residents.
0:51:43
I'm not sure I fully answered your question.
Carl Weisbrod
0:51:46
It may not be a fully answerable answer.