Community Delivers Thousands of Petitions Urging Mayor Bloomberg to Protect Flushing Meadows-Corona Park

City Hall, December 12, 2012 – Thousands of New Yorkers call on Mayor Bloomberg to protect Flushing Meadows-Corona Park from development. Petitions containing thousands of signatures were delivered to City Hall today. The Fairness Coalition of Queens received a massive outpouring of public support for its campaign to make sure that the park is protected from corporate greed. The petition urges the Mayor make sure that any proposed redesign be handled in “a fair and responsible manner to include a process for local resident and community stakeholder input”. Press Release.

The petition points out that three ‘legacy’ development proposals are being fast-tracked by the Bloomberg Administration in an attempt to circumvent community input. Utilizing both new technologies and old-fashioned people power, organizers were able to reach an incredibly large and diverse population of New Yorkers and add their voices to the efforts to save the park from corporate development.

“Parkland is very rare and precious in Queens. We need to be extremely careful about any changes to any park, but especially to Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, which is our largest park and serves as the ‘lungs’ of Queens,” said Luz Marina Bustos of Queens Community House. “We, the local community, deserve a role in shaping what is done in our community and especially in our park. Because we understand best what the park needs and because we will be the ones who have to deal with the impacts and burdens of any development there.”

“Although some are attempting to spin the media and present these are ‘done deals’, we are just beginning to consider these radical proposals to giveaway public parkland to big corporations for private gain,” said Shelma Jun of Asian Americans for Equality.  “These petitions are a clear indication that people want a transparent and open process that includes public input and prioritizes true community involvement.”

“When I was collecting signatures, people were deeply concerned about the impact these developments would have on the park, especially for families and young children,” said Dinick Martinez of Make the Road New York. “People kept asking me: Can we save the park? Is it too late? Many in our community fear that these decisions were already made without talking to the people. We need to make clear to people that this is just the beginning and we can make a difference.“

Organizers are concerned that Flushing Meadows-Corona Park (FMCP) is threatened by corporate interests who want this valuable public asset for their own private gain at the expense of the largely working class, immigrant population of Queens. Currently the US Tennis Association, the Wilpon Family (Owners of the Mets), and the undisclosed owners of a potential Major League Soccer franchise are lobbying city and state officials for rent-free public parkland.

The three proposals include:

– A 1.4 million square foot mall (would be the largest in NYC)

– 2 new stadiums and concert venues

– Several parking garages and new roads inside the park

Most alarming, these three proposals are concurrent, yet there has been no public acknowledgment by the Bloomberg Administration or any of the applicants of the potential cumulative impacts of these multi-billion dollar demolition and construction projects.

Community activists, residents, families and local businesses raised concerns about a proposal to build a private 1.4 million square foot shopping mall on public parkland–with no community involvement. The area is already well-served with shopping–including a new, half-empty mall within eyesight of the park. The Fairness Coalition of Queens (FC Queens) is calling for a new Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and a new Uniform Land Use Review Process (ULURP) application, due to the several significant changes since the 2008 including declining economic conditions, the completion of CitiField construction, the Sky View Mall has since opened and has failed to fully lease its retail spaces, and the need to consider the culmulative impacts of all these proposals on parkland.

FMCP is the largest park in Queens. Its users are overwhelmingly working class, immigrants and people of color. The park has been poorly funded for years–with budgets far below Central Park or Prospect Park. Currently neither the USTA nor the Mets  pay any money for the specific upkeep or improvement of Flushing Meadows Corona Park–despite making hundreds of millions in revenue on public land and having a tremendous impact on the park.

Major concerns voiced by the Coalition include the impact on small businesses, increased traffic and air pollution, the need for good quality jobs, loss of public space, broken promises on affordable housing and lack of community involvement.

The Fairness Coalition of Queens was formed to ensure that the people who use Flushing Meadows Corona Park and the surrounding neighborhoods are protected and any redesign is handled in a responsible manner with community input.

Petition Text:

Dear Mayor Bloomberg,

Please protect parkland at Flushing Meadows-Corona Park!

Sincerely,

New York City resident