Agenda for Atlantic Yards Community Development Corp. meeting tomorrow vague as always, includes update on (blinkered) "Community Engagement"

The typically opaque agenda (right) for a meeting of the advisory Atlantic Yards Community Development Corporation (AY CDC) was released yesterday.

It includes the boilerplate action of approval of the previous meeting's minutes, then the broad term "Updates and Follow-Ups."

(The Agenda and Meeting Materials, which is minutes from the last meeting, are at bottom.)

That might indicate, as I wrote last week, that Empire State Development (ESD), the state authority that oversees/shepherds Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park, has determined that a joint venture including Hudson Yards developer Related Companies constitutes a "preferred developer" for six parcels over the Vanderbilt Yard expected to be transferred via foreclosure.

That foreclosure was triggered by the failure of current master developer Greenland USA to pay off some $286 million in loans from immigrant investors under the federal EB-5 investor visa program.

"Community Engagement"

The agenda also includes a report on "Community Engagement," which surely points to the Quality of Life Update meeting held online last week. (See my Weekly Digest for coverage.)

Presumably ESD staff will report on the number of notices circulated (via their mailing list) and the limited attendance, barely a dozen people. Will they explain that the choice of a meeting date one day after Election Day might have tamped down the attendance?

Will they explain, as I reported, that the online format--with attendees unable to speak, see others' questions, chat with others, or (in the main) follow up on questions--translated into mostly top-down monologues from, for example, representatives from the Barclays Center and the (previously phantom) Pacific Park Conservancy?

Will they explain, as I reported, that a representative from BSE Global did not fully answer a question raised at a previous AY CDC meeting: what percentage of children's programs in the Brooklyn Basketbal clinics planned at the closed Modell's store opposte the arena would be free and for-fee, and what would the cost be?

Will they explain, as I reported, that the Conservancy's decision to limit the closing hours of a noisy dog run outside the West Tower of 595 Dean Street managed to frustrate both dog owners, who consider the move unrealistic, and neighbors plagued by noise, who say the it can't resolve the issue?

The problem, as I reported, surely goes beyond hours to the placement and design of the dog run, and surely requires, at minimum, new measures to tamp down sound.

Meeting details

The meeting will be held tomorrow at 3 pm:

Shirley A. Chisholm State Office Building

55 Hanson Place – 3rd Floor Conference Room

Brooklyn, New York 11217

Those attending in-person should RSVP by 4:30 today. Members of the press should call (800) 260-7313; Members of the public should call (212) 803-3795. The meeting also will be webcast and taped.

Members of the public may submit comments on the Agenda items in writing to AYCDCBdMtg@esd.ny.gov by 3 pm today, though that requires a good degree of clairvoyance, since we don't know the Agenda details. Those comments will be distributed to the Directors prior to the meeting and will be posted online.

There is also a public comment section of the agenda, at least for those able to attend in person.