"Leaving the REBNY vs NIMBY Doom Loop"? Maybe not this time.

In a 7/31/19 op-ed headlined Leaving the REBNY vs NIMBY Doom Loop, Council Members Brad Lander and Antonio Reynoso pointed to what they call a missed opportunity in the ballot proposals approved by the 2019 Charter Revision Commission.

They write:

Currently, the process of developing a capital plan to invest in our infrastructure constitutes just making a big list – a list that is in no way informed by plans for rezoning or development. How can we plan which neighborhoods should get resilient infrastructure like levees and seawalls when land-use and growth decisions are happening elsewhere? Shouldn’t we include capital budgeting for infrastructure like transit and schools as part of the process of planning for the new residential growth that will require it?
Meanwhile, New York City’s Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) is a reactive, project-by-project process for considering changes – bereft of strategic vision, shared values, or a connection to long-term infrastructure planning.
Codified in 1975 when the city’s challenge was abandonment rather than growth, ULURP has become reduced to a shrill, tug-of-war between the pro-growth forces of the Real Estate Board of New York (who profit on each development, and therefore rarely worry about which ones make long-term sense for the public good) and neighborhood activists whose Not In My Back Yard advocacy (rooted in a variety of motivations) leaves no way to figure out where and how the growth we need to address the scale of the housing crisis should take place.

Though the Charter Revision Commission "acknowledged 'a level of public disillusionment' and that “the somewhat scattered approach the Charter currently takes to its various planning requirements exacerbates this disillusionment and confusion,'" the commission didn't take action, despite a proposal for a comprehensive planning process.

(Here's coverage of the city's resistance to comprehensive planning.)