City Council Passes Two Bills Aimed to Help Cultural Sector Access Public Spaces

The program follows the concept of the Open Restaurants program. On December 10, 2020, the City Council passed two bills designed to provide arts and cultural institutions across the city with more access to public spaces in response to the damage to the City’s cultural sector because of the COVID-19 pandemic. 



East New York Affordable Housing Project Completes Phase 1

Project will result in 1,163 affordable homes. On October 20, 2020 Governor Andrew M. Cuomo announced the completion of the initial phase of the Fountains of Brooklyn project that is being constructed on the site of the State’s former Brooklyn Developmental Center in East New York, which closed in 2015. This project is a 6.7-acre mixed-use complex that will ultimately offer 1,163 affordable homes. The first two completed buildings of the project will include 332 … <Read More>



Vendors lose museum sidewalk claim

Street vendors congregated on sidewalk in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Five disabled veterans regularly operated their sidewalk vending businesses outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art. City Parks Enforcement Patrol officers, between 2011 and 2013, issued the vendors 298 summonses for “failure to comply with orders to relocate their vending carts.” The officers claimed that the vendors set up their carts approximately twenty feet from the curb when the State statute limits the … <Read More>


Appellate Division Provides Major Win for Two Bridges Developers

Two Bridges development gets Appellate Division ruling but two lawsuits remain pending. On August 27, 2020, the First Department’s Appellate Division unanimously ruled in favor of a Lower East Side development that would consist of four towers, 11,000 square feet of retail, and over 2,700 residential units. Of the 2,700 residential units, approximately 700 units will be dedicated to affordable housing and 200 units will be set aside for senior housing. The project’s development group … <Read More>