Recently the City got some good news about Rikers Island, a change from the bad news of recent years. On August 2, 2016, Mayor Bill de Blasio, together with Correction Commissioner Joseph Ponte, announced that for the first six months of 2016 the frequencies with which staff used serious force on inmates and inmates seriously assaulted staff dropped by nearly half over the past year. Overall uses of force and assault numbers were also down … <Read More>
Search Results for: Building Definition
Appellate Division Overturns BSA Denial of Sign Registration
The Board of Standards and Appeals had denied the application based on its finding that the signage was an art installation rather than an “advertising sign,” as defined in the Zoning Resolution. Local Law 31 of 2005 amends the regulations governing the usage of outdoor advertising signs by requiring companies engaged in outdoor advertising to submit to the Department of Buildings an exhaustive list of all of the companies’ “signs, sign structures and sign locations” … <Read More>
Comptroller Releases Findings of Lost City Revenue in Audit of Department of Finance
The audit report reveals that the misclassification of 140 properties has deprived the City of $1.7 million annually in lost property tax revenue. On February 18, 2016, the Office of the NYC Comptroller publicized the results from its audit of the New York City Department of Finance. The audit sought to investigate whether the Department of Finance had implemented procedures that adequately safeguard against the misclassification of Brooklyn property sites. The Comptroller’s Office and DOF … <Read More>
Bedford Historic District Unanimously Designated
Approximately 800-building district is primarily characterized by residential architecture from the late 19th century. On December 8 2015, the Landmarks Preservation Commission voted to designate the Bedford Historic District, composed of approximately 800 buildings and roughly bounded by Bedford, Nostrand, Putnam, Tompkins and Marcy Avenues, and Monroe, Fulton, and Halsey Streets in the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighborhood of Brooklyn. The area mostly consists of residential buildings constructed between 1870 and 1900, both rowhouses and small apartment buildings, … <Read More>
City Planning Holds Thirteen-Hour Hearing on Citywide Affordable Housing Proposals
CPC held the hearing at the National Museum of the American Indian in an attempt to accommodate the large number of guests, however an overflow of testifiers waited on lines outside as the hearing began. On December 16, 2015, the City Planning Commission held a public hearing on Mayor Bill de Blasio’s Mandatory Inclusionary Housing, and Zoning for Quality and Affordability proposals, which are two components of the Mayor’s Housing: New York plan. The public … <Read More>
Simeon Bankoff: Taking the Context out of Contextual Zoning
In March 2015, the City Planning Commission announced a proposal called Zoning for Affordability and Quality, which broadly calls for three principal changes in the current citywide zoning resolution. The plan proposes to change and enlarge definitions of senior housing to include more types of housing providers than currently permitted. It also proposes to increase buildable space for senior housing in some instances. The proposal also seeks to lessen or some instances no longer mandate … <Read More>