Printed in the Queens Courier, 4/13/2013

BY GEOFFREY CROFT

In a recent op-ed (“A new alliance for Flushing Meadows-Corona Park,” March 10) Councilmember Julissa Ferreras argues for the need to create a new nonprofit alliance dedicated for Flushing Meadows-Corona Park (FMCP).

The alliance would collect money from the USTA and other businesses using the park and spend it exclusively on the park. Agreeing to a deal that puts money into a park fund in exchange for a yes vote, along with a few other “concessions”  is a misguided policy that would allow the USTA to expand and set the stage for more businesses to try and take more public parkland.

That is exactly what is not needed for the park.

It is the city’s legal responsibility to properly fund our public parks, not that of private businesses.

Make no mistake this is NOT like the Central Park Conservancy or the Prospect Park Alliance model as she has attempted to claim.  There is a huge difference between receiving philanthropic contributions from civic-minded people seeking nothing in return and establishing a fund explicitly created for extracting money from businesses exploiting the park.

She said she is doing this to ”to help protect this irreplaceable park.”  The park does not need this type of “protection.”

A detailed plan on how this alliance model could work has already been drawn up.  It was devised with the help of a Parks Department partner group New Yorkers for Parks, in concert with the councilmember, working behind closed doors.

Despite repeated requests Ferreras has refused to voluntarily provide a copy of this plan.  For the first time in 15 years I’ve had to resort to FOILing a councilmember. This is not a good sign.

These deals only weaken communities and make it easier for the next encroachment. They also allow the very people whose job it is to properly fund and protect our public spaces off the hook.

The councilmember was correct, though, when she said the park has not received the attention and resources it deserves.

Whose fault is that? Does anyone think our elected officials are doing their jobs when FMCP has only 14 employees for a 1,200-acre park?  That’s disgraceful.

Each year our elected officials allocate a fraction of the funds desperately needed to properly maintain, operate, secure, and program our 29,000 acres of public parks.

This year is no different.  Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s current $70.1 billion proposed budget allocates just $ 283.2 million or o.4 % in tax levy funds for parks.

Over the last 40 years no other city agency has lost a greater percentage of its workforce than the Parks Department.  This happens year after because the public does NOT demand accountability.

The city continues to try and abdicate its responsibilities by entering in these public/private agreements that officials are not only allowing but actively encouraging.  They are increasingly resorting to these pay-to-play funding schemes.  This welfare mentality has to stop.

These deals hand over enormous power and decision making authority to these groups with little transparency and accountability on what is supposed to be public land.

We need our elected officials instead to allocate proper resources for our parks; it’s what the public pays taxes for.

Until communities begin to stand together and demand accountability from officials and “so called” park advocacy groups, the public can expect more of the same – our parks being sold out.

Geoffrey Croft is the founder and president of NYC Park Advocates, a non-profit watchdog group dedicated to improving public parks. He is also a founding member of Save Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, a coalition of community-based civic and environmental groups opposed to the commercial encroachment of FMCP.   

Why is New Yorkers for Parks organization irresponsibly taking the position that it would be perfectly acceptable for the USTA to steal more parkland so long as it sets up a “park maintenance fund” for Flushing Meadows?

Instead, they should be advocating for adequate resources to be allocated to the park in the City budget. The current fraction of 1 percent allocated toward parks citywide is woefully inadequate, and the City is required by the City Charter to maintain its property.

Genuine park activists would not be advocating for the USTA to take and replace parkland since the obvious thing to be demanding here is that the City not allow this private business to expand within the park.

So as not to mislead the public, they may want to rename their group “New Yorkers for the Privatization of Parks.” Positions such as that of this organization are the reason why we have such a disparity in park conditions in the first place.

Christina Wilkinson
Queens, NY
Co-founder, Coalition to Save Flushing Meadows-Corona Park

And it is both huge and hideous!

FIRST LOOK: MLS’s Queens Stadium Renderings [Empire Soccer] 2/25/2013

Visions of that Major League Soccer stadium in Queens [Capital New York] 2/25/2013

First Images Of Massive Soccer Stadium Revealed For Flushing Meadows Park [A Walk in the Park] 2/25/2013

State Senator Tony Avella has petitioned the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission for landmark status for Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, citing its history and remaining historical structures.

In a previous entry, we highlighted the text from the Fairness Coalition' handout "10 reasons to vote NO on the USTA expansion."  Number 2 was the following: 

• Power Plant in the Park?
  
• The plan calls for building a dirty diesel fuel power plant to be built inside the park. Hidden inside the most recent DEIS report, the USTA seeks to build a 8 Megawatt, 20 foot high diesel-fueled power plant. Surrounding communities already suffer from air quality and asthma rates at epidemic levels. This power plant will emit a massive amount of air pollution into the park and surrounding communities. (page 11-17 DEIS Jan 2013)
  

Let's take a closer look at what the DEIS says about this:

• CENTRAL CHILLER PLANT 
  
• To meet electrical power needs during peak demand conditions, the proposed project may include additional reciprocating engines that would serve a central chiller plant. Due to insufficient natural gas availability, it is assumed that the engines would use diesel fuel. The plant would have a maximum capacity of up to 8 megawatts and would be operated only during the US Open.
  
• The plant would be located to north of the project site—north of Meridian Road, east of Arthur Ashe Stadium (Stadium 1), and west of Louis Armstrong Stadium (Stadium 2). This would be approximately 350 feet from areas that would be accessible to the public.

One megawatt can power 1,000 homes for a year.  So about 8,000 homes could be powered by this chiller plant.  Why would a stadium need this kind of power?  And they will house it in a 2-3 story building.  Does Flushing Meadows need more non-park-related buildings?

This was from a 1994 article in the Queens Tribune.

• A 63-year-old Blue Atlas Cedar tree died in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park. It was killed, City parks officials said, by poor handling when tree movers hired by the U.S. Tennis Association uprooted the tree to make room for expansion of the U.S. Tennis Center. At a funeral for the tree, City Parks Commissioner Henry Stern pointed a finger at USTA officials, and promised an “inquest” to verify the cause of the tree’s death. The tree was a gift from the Emperor of Japan, planted in 1964….

The USTA has a history of arboricide.  Yet they have proposed transplanting dozens of mature trees to make way for their parkland theft.  Transplants generally don't go well, as the USTA are Parks Dept are well aware.

Great open letter to the City Council over on the blog, Queens Crap.  Here's an excerpt regarding FMCP:

We, the people, need leaders who are willing to stand up for the citizens they represent and lie down in front of an earth-moving machine when the government, local, state, or federal, seeks to take a portion of Flushing-Meadow Park or Willets Point under some misguided notion of “eminent domain.” We do not need leaders who pander to developers to have their picture taken when the ground is broken. That is not leadership; it is sellout. Individual rights must be restored and both the private and public property of the citizens of New York must never be allowed to be taken for any private purpose, period. As I said in my first letter, I will do all to awaken the Patrick Henry in each of my fellow citizens so that they will remember how you violated the will of the people four years ago and send you packing in November. And if you happen to win, you shall remain imposters. 

Sincerely,

William J. Cariello III

The following are a list of comments submitted to our website:

- I cannot believe that my state assemblyman (Moya) and state senator (Peralta) are both in support of this land-grab. I will vote for neither if this deal goes through, and will contribute time and money to ANYONE who runs against them in a primary or general election. I urge ALL my neighbors to do the same. Shame on you, Moya and Peralta!

- The USTA has been siphoning off land for almost 30 years. I remember the park when... Now this? Sure, I will sign. This is the only place where people can play ball and just enjoy themselves. Who's getting paid off?

- If private businesses can take my parkland away so they can make millions of dollars, then I'm just going to have to start recreating inside the office buildings of New York. The CitiBank building in LIC has a nice big lobby, I'm sure they won't mind if we organize a pick-up soccer game there...

- I agree with the comments and have wondered why the city hasn't done more to restore the buildings still standing. It would serve the city to provide more places for the communities to have places for children and families to come and enjoy. Fresh air and cultural activities.

- Save our parks!

- The current policy of this NYC administration that allows the private use and take-over of public parks, including Damrosch Park in Lincoln Center in Manhattan, and now Fresh Meadows Corona Park in Queens must be opposed vigorously by the citizens.- We need more green spaces not less.

- Keep FMCP earth and family friendly!

- The loss of parkland can never be regained. This is so short-sighted. Poor Queens.

- How to protect this park forever from being sold off a little at a time.

- We of the 99% need space to play, relax and control the stress of a society that truly cares more about the one percent.

- I am very much against all of this happening to Flushing Meadow Park. Please keep me informed. Thank you.

- I am very opposed to the proposed soccer stadium in FMCP. I believe the Park should be preserved and enhanced, particularly the beautiful remnants of the historic 1964 World's Fair.

- Thanks so much for your work. We absolutely must save this park.

- Fix the park, don't destroy it.

- I am a resident of Corona, as well as a student at Forest Hills High School. Ever since I have caught wind of this project, I have been opposed to it, not only because it would take it parkland that NYC so desperately needs, but because it would take away in essence, a huge part of my childhood, as well as steal it from other people that currently use it. I grew up in that park. I grew up running there, playing soccer with family members and friends, biking there and exploring the numerous niches of the parks, exploring the wonderful historical treasures it provides, as the site of two World Fairs. I grew up seeing people play not just soccer, but almost every other sport imaginable - cricket, baseball, softball, football - in that vast green expense of Flushing Meadows. Now, that prospect of seeing families truly enjoy the park as it should be enjoyed is under threat, solely because out elected officials have long neglected to take care of it. That itself is a shame, as it's one of the crown jewels of the NYC Parks System, due to rich history - but it's not treated as such. Flushing Meadows is not like Central Park, or even Prospect Park. We do not have a well funded, multi-million dollar "conservancy" to take care of it - in fact, we don't even get the same amount resources those parks get from the city - we don't even know how much FMCP gets from the Parks Department! But what FMCP really is, is that it's a park for the working class - a park where people, most of them low-income to working class people - many of them immigrants - can go and get a dose of fresh air, of enjoyment through relaxation and sport, something that FMCP provides. It might not be in the condition it deserves to be, but it serves it's purpose well enough. But it can be much better, yet these proposed "plans" do nothing to improve the FMCP's current state. Instead, it worsens it to a point of near destruction. Barry Lewis, an architectural historian, once said aloud, "Who lives in Queens?" He answered it himself when he said: "The people who live in Queens are really the people who make the city run in a basic, gritty way..." And that is true. The people of Queens are the ones that make this city run. We are the ones that make NYC great - through our diversity, hard work, and determination. As such, we deserve a park that serves in the best interests of the community, not for the best interests of private developers. To do the opposite, to give this treasured parkland away, at a time when NYC needs parkland more then ever, would be anathema to the purpose of parkland - to provide a place where people, the common man, can enjoy themselves freely, and relax - with ample green space. If there is anything I could do to help, please let me know. Now, more then ever, the people of Queens need to stand united and face this threat to our flagship park that would permanently damage our way of life. To let this happen would set a dangerous precedent that our parkland is up for grabs by developers - something that we need to stop in it's tracks now!

- Willing to stand before bulldozers to save OUR FMCP.

- The mindset should not be what will the community get in return for alienating additional public parkland. Instead, we should join together and "not give up another inch" of public parkland.

- Save the NYS Pavilion

- The Queens Coalition for Parks and Green Spaces supports all efforts to save FMCP. Pay attention as this attempt is aimed at FMCP today-Maybe your local park NEXT! PARKS are for people, not developers!

- This park, the site of two remarkable world's fairs, was a gift to the people of New York. To give one single inch of it to private concerns is unfair and a violation of that gift. The park needs improvement but it does not need to be dismembered and taken from the taxpayers.

- I have lived in the Flushing area and now College Point for nearly 20 years and would hate to see this come to fruition.

- Please save this historical park!

- I hope this petition goes through and our land is saved from ruin.

- I am in total agreement with preserving Flushing Meadows-Corona Park as it is. This is outrageous that there seems to be so little regard for the quality of life in our communities. Not every peace of land has to turn into a shopping mall! We have plenty of them as it is. We need to be heard about this vital part of our city we live in.

- The proposed retail mall is, in particular, a total outrage and should not be allowed.

- A disgusting land grab with no respect of the history of the World's Fair. Spend the money on the park and the remnants of the fair.  The park needs a lot of work other than a soccer stadium.

- They can play soccer games in Citi Field when the Mets aren't there. And why place a retail center right on top of Citi Field? We need some space to BREATHE.

- Stop the rape of public park land in Queens! Flushing Meadows-Corona Park is a people's park. Over the decades it has been slowly taken away from the people! Enough is enough, Bloomburg! You stole the will of the people of this city when you anointed yourself mayor for a third term -- do NOT steal our park land as well! SAVE FLUSHING MEADOWS-CORONA PARK!

- I love Flushing Meadows Park and would hate to see parts if it lost to these new development projects.

- Please do not build on this park. Please build elsewhere. Thank you

- Keep the park a park!

- I was able to go to the 64-65 fair a few dozen times as a teenager.In the years since I often ride my bike through the grounds.I also use the pitch and putt course so the park holds a special meaning for me.

- I grew up going to this park, What this city needs is to keep the park.....

- The obvious choice, is to preserve, restore, celebrate, and honor the historic elements present in Flushing Meadows Corona Park. Even the most basic research into the World's Fairs reveals the immense size and scope of these events, the impact they had is undeniable. NYC should be honored that these events occurred in Queens, but instead they propose stamping out a significant part of the remnants with this soccer stadium. The Pool must be kept. If it is an “eyesore,” the city must fix it up, not destroy it. Clean it, install a smaller fountain in the center, pay homage to what it once was. The stadium does not belong in this park, it should have never been considered, NYC Parks and everyone responsible for even suggesting this should be ashamed.

- Please do not continue to build on this land while ignoring the historical and environmental treasure this park has been. Enough is enough!

- FMCP is a heavily used park. It is hard to understand why the City of New York and the Parks Department do not protect it the same way that they would Central Park, except as an abandonment of duty to benefit the citizens, in favor of big money.

- We don't need private development in our park - we need to restore our landmarks (i.e., The New York Pavilion) and turn into a public space for our community as it was intended. The park belongs to the people, not the privileged rich who only frequent the park during the US Open or a ball game! Let's beautify the park and make improvements and preserve our history and landmarks, not destroy it with eyesore garages and strip malls!

- The park is a very welcome oasis in a very developed world. Once any portion of it is paved over it is gone forever. There is no way the city would put any of these projects in Central Park. Why is Queens treated less than an equal borough?

- When Robert Moses handed the Park over to the City after the 1964-65 World's Fair, I highly doubt his intentions were to have it built over by structures that would financially benefit private corporate sponsors. Save the Park as intended by Mr. Moses.

- We have more than 5,000 children playing soccer on Saturdays from 8:00 AM till 2:00 PM. The same number is divided to play each day of the week from 6:00 till 9:00 PM. Adults also use the soccer field the rest of the weekend. Our community is made of middle and lower class with income from $18,000 to $35,000 This is the most affordable healthy sport that our children can afford. We already have a proposed stadium with lots of promises?

- Parkland is for the people, not for others to make a profit! These three projects must be stopped!

- Flushing Meadows-Corona Park should only be developed as open space parkland and NOT a shopping mall. The park has been neglected over the years and needs revitalization. Why has the park been allowed to deteriorate? The answer is certainly NOT commercial development! We need more recreational activities in the park. We need concerned elected officials and citizens to maintain, upgrade and enhance the park facilities.

- Let's keep the park a park for the people--people who have no back yards---people who take their children there to play and romp around---people who like to see the grass and the trees and enjoy a day out in the fresh air.

- Yes, I want to join you and save our park. I was active against the USTA when they proposed it's stadium, but we lost. I was very disappointed with Mayor Dinkins and our borough president when they wholeheartedly supported the tennis stadium.

- As a 64 Worlds Fair attendee, I very much want to see the park saved as a reminder as to what was and what the park will be for all those that enjoy a relaxing day either alone or with family in our own park. 

- We need the park, it's our families' park. You can't just pay to destroy our memories and the ones that are about to be made by our kids!  We can't let this happen.

- We can't let even an inch of public parkland be taken away from the current Flushing Meadows Corona Park and I will do whatever I can to make sure that doesn't happen.

- What is a park, should stay a park! Parks are for everyone and it's wrong to develop Flushing Meadows Park in this way. I have many wonderful memories of enjoying Flushing Meadows park and it would be a shame to deny future citizens the same good times and open spaces that my generation was able to enjoy...Besides, the park is WETLANDS, have you not learned from the disaster of SuperStorm Sandy? From an environmental standpoint it would be disastrous to build up FMCP. We need those wetlands and flood plains to mitigate future superstorms.

- This land is my land not Emperor Bloomberg's!

- The proposed Tennis expansion and MLS stadium must be stopped. FMCP is choking from over development of commercialism. These proposed projects will destroy the historic core of the park. I would be happy to help in any way to save the park.

- Queens park land should be as sacred as Central Park, Bryant Park or Madison Square Park. Why not a stadium in Central Park, a parking lot in Bryant Park and an Indy 500 style oval around Madison Square Park?

- It's part of Queens,  we don't want it to be damaged in any way.

- This is disgraceful. Like we really need another mall in Queens. The tennis center is fine the way it is. Soccer stadium - don't think so. Use Citi Field. And the traffic, the traffic and did I mention the traffic.

- Leave the park alone. No more private take overs.

- We need to fight to save this park.

(An Open Letter to City Councilwoman Julissa Ferreras)

Over 100 years ago Frederick Law Olmstead, the genius who created Central and Prospect parks in this city and many other parks elsewhere, said, “The first duty of our park trustees is to hand down from one generation to the next the treasure of scenery which the city has placed in their care.” That requirement rests squarely upon the shoulders of all elected officials in this state and city, and, with due respect, it includes you.

While Flushing Meadows Corona Park in Queens is the second most-used park in our city, primarily by the poor and middle class, it is also the most abused, littered with all sorts of illegitimate nonpark structures that would not and should not be allowed in Central, Bronx, Prospect or Clove Lake parks. This has occurred over decades through the malfeasance of many elected officials, primarily in Queens, who viewed their constituency as real estate moguls and businesses and not the little people who are the users of the park.

The claim that FMCP is different from other parks is nonsense and a ploy to justify the constant attempts to trespass on it. There is nothing in the City Charter that designates FMCP as being different than any other park. And the abuse is not justified for economic reasons. Apart from how the claimed economic benefits are, in terms of the city’s gross economy, paltry and of little or no significance, a civilized society does not sell or barter public parkland.

In the depths of the Great Depression of the 1930s, this city did not sell or barter parkland. Indeed, if you believe parks should be for sale, you should state publicly you would support what has occurred in FMCP happening in Central Park. Of course you would not, and the time has come for you to insist on similar treatment for FMCP.

Your attention is directed to the Queens Chronicle Jan. 31 edition and its comprehensive, well-thought out editorial opposing Major League Soccer’s attempt to construct a stadium in FMCP (“Flushing Meadows soccer stadium must be stopped”). It is clear there is no justification for yet another assault on the integrity on FMCP, and the proposed stadium must be rejected. Like most private for-profit businesses, MLS is free to purchase property on the open market. Enough is enough, and the desecration of FMCP must stop.

In using your good offices to reject the stadium you will be making it clear you understand the importance of parkland not just for current residents, but for generations as yet unborn. Let right be done, oppose the MLS stadium in our park and earn an important legacy as a public official.

Benjamin M. Haber
Flushing

Headline from today's New York Post, below.  Amazingly, Sterling Equities and The Related Group proposed a Shinnecock Nation-run casino on city parkland as part of their Willets Point West proposal, and the City hasn't completely ruled out the plan!

Please see stories in today's NY Post, A Walk in the Park and Willets Point United blogs, and see map below: