New York Daily News

The problem is that zoning is used to print money for real estate developers who have bought politicians. Developers get billions while residents get a lottery for families earning $232,980 to pay $6,057 a month for “affordable housing.” Those numbers are absurd and we must do better!

As a Council Member, I refused real estate money. This freed me to use member deference to lead a rezoning to block billionaires’ row, make empty spaces in buildings for billionaires illegal, open 1,000 affordable apartments and welcome housing and shelter for the homeless. Sadly, Mayor de Blasio blocked my proposals for the Upper East Side to require affordable housing or integrated public schools in new towers. That's why I proposed removing city planning from the mayor.

Some hold up the 2021 Blood Center rezoning where member deference was ignored. That rezoning was not about blood, it was about rezoning a residential block of brownstones to build a 334-foot commercial tower. It involved Mayor de Blasio who owed lobbyists on the project $435,000, a nonprofit that provided blood as an alternative to the Red Cross, and a pandemic that had devastated our city. It promised a new headquarters and new jobs to boost our recovery.

Years later, the Blood Center headquarters moved from Long Island to Westchester. Construction never started, jobs never came, and our city never got the boost it needed. A new rezoning could allow a super-tall commercial tower without them. The City Council did not get what it voted for. This is an example for not only keeping member deference, but electing more candidates who refuse real estate money.

A real estate developer who’s pushing for a controversial rezoning in partnership with the New York Blood Center would receive $100 million in additional benefits under a plan recently outlined by Mayor de Blasio’s administration.

De Blasio has come under fire in recent days for backing the rezoning because he owes $435,000 to a lobbying firm that represents the Blood Center, a nonprofit blood bank that’s partnering with Longfellow Real Estate Partners to expand its headquarters.

In a letter to City Council Speaker Corey Johnson (D-Manhattan) dated Nov. 10, de Blasio’s director of legislative affairs, Paul Ochoa, makes clear that city’s Industrial Development Agency would provide $100 million in tax breaks to Longfellow under the development deal.

Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Manhattan), who represents the Upper East Side district where the rezoning is being proposed, said the benefit is just one more sop de Blasio is offering a well-connected developer.

Kallos said that “$100 million is a lot of money. It comes out to more than a billion in subsidies over decades, and I want to know how long it’s going to take for the city to get a return on our tax dollars because I don’t think we ever will.”

It’s far from the first time de Blasio has had to weather attacks from Kallos, who has suggested that the mayor’s debt to Blood Center lobbyist Kramer Levin Naftalis amounts to a bribe that could be having undue influence over the mayor in his support of the rezoning.

But Team de Blasio has countered that in January, the mayor made it a priority to make the Big Apple a center of life sciences, in large part as preparation to better face COVID and any future pandemics.

The Blood Center rezoning would accomplish that, according to de Blasio spokesman Mitch Schwartz.

“Months ago, the mayor invested $1 billion toward making New York City the life sciences capital of the world,” Schwartz said. “It’s the right way to rebuild our economy and prepare for public health challenges. And if major companies want to innovate and create jobs in the heart of our city, then we’ll vet their projects and work with them to identify appropriate incentives they qualify for.”

Schwartz also noted that Longfellow is entitled to the tax break and that such breaks exist to encourage agendas like the one outlined by de Blasio in January.

Rob Purvis, the Blood Center’s executive vice president and chief of staff, said the center and Longfellow are “aggressively pursuing funding opportunities to support” the project “through city programs for which it may be eligible including [city Economic Development Corp.) LifeSci funding and [Industrial Development Agency] benefits for development projects.”

“[New York Blood Center] and Longfellow are having positive conversations with the city, but no formal application or agreement has been made yet for city funding for this project,” he added.

Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Manhattan), who represents the Upper East Side district where the rezoning is being proposed, said the benefit is just one more sop de Blasio is offering a well-connected developer.

Kallos said that “$100 million is a lot of money. It comes out to more than a billion in subsidies over decades, and I want to know how long it’s going to take for the city to get a return on our tax dollars because I don’t think we ever will.”

The fight over the new Blood Center building was never about blood. It has been about two other issues: How high should the center’s for-profit partner Longfellow Development’s commercial offices tower over a residential neighborhood, and how should the City Council handle development deals in the years to come?

Mayor de Blasio and other elected officials would be required to disclose debt repayment plans under a newly drafted City Council bill that Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Manhattan) is hoping to pass before the end of the year.

Kallos, who represents the Upper East Side, has criticized de Blasio in recent days for refusing to disclose his plan to repay about $435,000 in debt he owes to Kramer, Levin & Naftalis, a law firm that represents several clients with business before the city and which defended de Blasio against federal corruption charges going back to 2015.

Legal and staffing challenges have made it nearly impossible to enforce the 2010 law, leaving commercial operators of multiple short-term units able to continue skirting it. That’s where the bill, introduced by Councilman Ben Kallos, comes in. The bill requires hosts to register with the city and obtain a registration number before they can rent out their homes, and only short-term rentals that conform to city and state law are eligible: the unit must be the host’s primary residence, and the host must be present during the rental. Registration will make it more difficult for landlords and other scofflaw operators to maintain multiple listings that are not their primary residence.

In response to The News’ story, the NYPD, the Department of Homeless Services and local pols zeroed in. Councilman Ben Kallos said Monday that DHS would be sending an outreach team to try to persuade the man to accept additional services.

Sanitation Department officials, meanwhile, declined to answer questions about how they are handling the man’s antics, and twice referred the News to city Department of Homeless Services.

Homeless Services did not respond to inquiries.

Councilman Ben Kallos (D-Upper East Side) is frustrated and noted that he successfully pushed the city to spend $250,000 for 250 heavy duty trash in the neighborhood.

“It’s a little infuriating to have someone running around knocking them over,” he said. “There is a problem with the city when someone is being allowed to go out there and destroy property worth thousands of dollars. We are failing our taxpayers.”

The ear-splitting noise from dirt bikes, ATVs and unmuffled cars with giant speakers is back with a vengeance this summer, and one city councilman has a plan to deal with it.

City Council member Ben Kallos will introduce a bill Thursday that would create a network of video cameras and high-tech microphones to catch the miscreants and then fine them up to $1,575 for a third offense.

The lead motorcycle of approximately 50 ATV's and motorcycles on 8th Ave. and W. 54th St. in Manhattan on July 15. (Sam Costanza/for New York Daily News)

Kallos, who represents parts of the Upper East Side, Midtown and East Harlem, says the bill was born out of his frustration at the inability of the police or other city agencies to deal with the problem.

“I get these complaints all the time and I have my own panic response of picking up my daughter when I hear them,” he said. “Every New Yorker knows how bad this is. So I said, f--- it, let’s put in a bill.”

While the mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement is charged with implementing the law, it has been “nearly impossible” to do so, Kallos says, due to legal challenges.

That’s where his bill comes in.

By requiring renters to register with the city before offerings are advertised online, the city would be able to reject them in advance. Failure to comply would result in steep fines.

Kallos expects thousands of units to go off the short-term-rental market as a result — paving the way for hotels to start recouping losses from the pandemic.