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NEWS & EVENTS

Thank You! for Attending HPD's Presentation to Build on the Garden

Thank you to everyone who attended the Jan. 20 Community Board 2 (CB 2) Working Group on Affordable Housing Development meeting and everyone who handed out fliers, emailed friends and brought neighbors. Also, special thanks to the neighborhood children and P.S. 1 students for making posters. Nearly 300 people filled the auditorium — 95 percent of whom were there to support preserving Elizabeth Street Garden.

What's Next?

Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden is pursuing all possibilities to Stop the RFP! To do this, we need your help. Please join us at our next Garden meeting.

Monthly Garden Meeting — Sunday, Jan. 31, Noon – 1 p.m.
Location: Lovely Day Restaurant, 196 Elizabeth St. (across from the Garden)
[map]

Elected Officials' Support

Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden formally urged our elected officials and the de Blasio administration, including HPD, to take a CB 2-wide approach to meet both the affordable housing and open space needs of our community.

We heard words of support from the following elected officials:

Garden Supporters Question HPD's RFP Process

Thanks to tough, thoughtful questions by the CB 2 working group and savvy, well-researched Garden supporters, the public learned more about HPD’s RFP process, and we are now better armed to fight it!

Because of ambiguous responses from HPD, there remain a number of unanswered questions:
  • Has HPD taken into account a 1981 commitment for the Garden site to be maintained "exclusively for recreational purposes"?
  • Would development of 15,000 sq. ft. of housing on the site leave any meaningful park space in the remaining 5,000 sq. ft.?
  • Why is HPD reluctant to pursue more actively development of the Hudson Street site, an alternative location within CB 2 where affordable housing can be built without destroying Elizabeth Street Garden?
  • How many of the proposed 60 units of housing would actually be available to residents in CB 2, let alone the surrounding neighborhood?
  • Why isn’t HPD mandating that senior housing be guaranteed?
  • How is the lucrative ground-floor retail component of development driving this process, and how would it impact local small businesses?
  • Would Special Little Italy District zoning requirements be upheld?

Garden Press
Winter Garden Hours

Winter Garden Hours (weather permitting)
Weekends, Noon – 3 p.m.

Volunteers keep the Garden open during the sunniest and warmest hours of the day, year-round. Email volunteer@elizabethstreetgarden.org to help.
January 2016 Blizzard
See you in the Garden.
Volunteer, attend events and join the conversation:
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Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization incorporated in 2014 in New York with the mission to preserve Elizabeth Street Garden as a unique public green, open space and NYC Park. Contributions made for the charitable purposes of Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.

A copy of the latest annual report may be obtained, upon request, from Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden, 235 Elizabeth St., Ste. 23, New York, NY 10012 or the New York State Attorney General’s Charities Bureau, 120 Broadway, Third Floor, New York, NY 10271.
Copyright © 2016 Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden, All rights reserved.


Our mailing address is:
Friends of Elizabeth Street Garden
235 Elizabeth St., Ste. 23
New York, NY 10012

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