[cg] RUDY GARDEN PLAN DOESN'T HOLD WATER

**L* B* <B*@ag.arizona.edu>**

>Date: Thu, 11 Mar 1999 12:28:49 -0700
>To: community_garden@ag.arizona.edu
>From: "Libby J. Goldstein" <libby@igc.apc.org> (by way of Lucy Bradley 
><bradleyl@ag.arizona.edu>)
>
>RUDY GARDEN PLAN DOESN'T HOLD WATER
>
>By LISA REIN
>NY Daily News Staff Writer
>
>Mayor Giuliani promised yesterday that affordable housing
>will be built on many of the community garden plots
>headed for the auction block this spring =97 but the city's
>housing agency nixed the idea months ago.
>
>The Department of Housing Preservation and Development,
>which builds low and middle-income housing in abandoned
>buildings and on vacant lots, declined to develop the 126
>city-owned lots that neighborhoods have converted to
>community gardens.
>
>"They've decided the properties should be passed off to us to be
>auctioned off to the public," said Patrick Muldowney,
>spokesman for the Department of Citywide Administrative
>Services, which sells off abandoned city property.
>
>A recent study of city property auctioned in Brooklyn showed
>17 of 440 lots were developed after five years.
>
>As 30 gardeners arrested Wednesday for protesting the May
>auction were arraigned yesterday in Manhattan Criminal Court,
>Giuliani said returning vacant lots to the tax rolls will promote
>economic development in poor neighborhoods.
>
>"The reality is, we need more housing in the city," he said. "If
>you keep these properties tied up, [minority neighborhoods]
>will never move to a higher level of more housing, more
>commercial development, more jobs."
>
>All but one of the protesters charged with misdemeanors for
>staging a sit-in at City Hall declined an offer to have their
>records wiped clean in six months if they don't get arrested
>again. They are due back in court April 5.
>
>Officials from the Department of Housing Preservation and
>Development declined comment.
>
>Original Publication Date: 02/26/1999
>
>
>libby@igc.apc.org       Libby J. Goldstein       phone & fax: 215-465-8878
>            Philadelphia      USDA zone 7A       Sunset zone 32
>
>        My garden must be n-dimensional if it's out here in cyberspace.

Lucy K. Bradley
Extension Agent, Urban Horticulture
Maricopa County
The University of Arizona
Cooperative Extension
4341 E Broadway Rd.
Phoenix, AZ  85040-8807

Phone:  (602) 470-8086 ext 323
Fax:  (602) 470-8092
email:  BradleyL@ag.arizona.edu
http://ag.arizona.edu/maricopa/garden/

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