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Councilmember Erik Bottcher took a crosstown walk with mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani. Their closeness includes complicity in the sell-out of NYCHA.

Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani with Councilmember Erik Bottcher promoting more gentrification on 34th Street by closing traffic to small businesses.

Democrats will do the bidding of MAGA billionaires before they will answer to NYCHA public housing residents.

To celebrate the REBNY’s successful rezoning of the Midtown South section of Manhattan, Councilmember Erik Bottcher (D-District 3) took a walk alongst 34th Street with Assemblymember Zohran Mamdani (DSA-A.D. 36). Their walk was timed to gamely show for the cameras who would make the trip fastest : The pair of Democrats or the crosstown M34 bus.

The competition between the political pedestrians and the surface mass transit was meant to promote the idea of transforming 34th Street into a busway that would eliminate vehicular traffic in favour of improving the performance of the crosstown bus route. It was a noble gesture of a manufactured, public benefit from the controversial Midtown South rezoning, even though it would likely lead to the death of small businesses in a major retail corridor, much like how 14th Street was transformed into a ghost town after its own busway conversion.

The amount of community-crushing development about to befall Chelsea, Midtown South, and Times Square is unimaginable. Non-stop gentrification was always the goal of REBNY-adjacent Democrats.

We have the Midtown South rezoning, the new Port Authority bus terminal, the Hudson Yards expansion, a possible casino (Larry Silverstein or Jay-Z), a new Trump-controlled Penn Station, a high-rise in the Meatpacking District, and now the RAD/PACT privatisation and demolition of NYCHA. How much construction can we take in our community ? Democrats will roll over, spread their cheeks, and let REBNY jam its throbbing, blood funnel into anything that smells like money.

These big budget projects are why Democrats have lost their base, because there’s always money for upward transfers of wealth, like from a cash-strapped NYCHA to certain REBNY members in the real estate development industry, but there’s no there there to address the extremes of exploitation in late-stage Capitalism. There’s no help for the Democratic Party’s base, especially not amidst a housing crisis. 

And for Councilmember Bottcher and Assemblymember Mamdani to gaslight voters into believing that a busway on 34th Street was the perfect solution to a housing crisis, the inflation in consumer prices, and the MAGA assault on the republic was exemplary of how the Democratic Party has lost touch with reality. The Democrats are united in ending public housing, and their inferior consolation prize is a busway. Only those disassociated from reality would believe this gaslighting.

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NYCHA tenants in the Chelsea Houses senior building have received notices of 90-day forced relocation over looming RAD/PACT privatisation and demolition scheme

Seniors waited in a line to speak with a reporter about the forced relocation by NYCHA over the looming RAD/PACT demolition of public housing.

Over a dozen seniors lined up last week outside to speak with a reporter. One senior citizen had to go rest upstairs after becoming overcome by stress.

Last week, the New York City Housing Authority began delivering notices to residents of the senior building at the Chelsea Houses public housing development known as the the Chelsea Addition. The notices informed tenants that they had 90 days to agree to forced relocations do to the looming demolition of the Chelsea Addition. Residents of a public housing building on 19th Street in nearby Fulton Houses received similar notices on or about the same day.

A narrated video of part of the gathering was shared on Facebook Live and was reshared on the X social media microblogging site.

Seniors waited in a line to speak with a reporter about the forced relocation by NYCHA over the looming RAD/PACT demolition of public housing.
Seniors waited in a line to speak with a reporter about the forced relocation by NYCHA over the looming RAD/PACT demolition of public housing.

The reporter moved a report, published by Gothamist, in which it was confirmed that, “Residents of a senior housing complex in Chelsea are receiving vacate orders as the New York City Housing Authority moves forward with its plan to replace and modernize a sprawling public apartment complex with both new public housing and market-rate units.”

The Democrats in the District are supporting the upward transfer of wealth from a cash-strapped NYCHA to a MAGA billionaire.

Everyone from U.S. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y. 12, State Sen. Brad Hoylman (D-N.Y. 47), Assemblymember Tony Simone (D-A.D. 75), Councilmember Erik Bottcher (D-Manhattan 3), and LGBTQ progressive activist Allen Roskoff are complicit in the RAD/PACT demolition of public housing.

We call the American style of Government a Duopoly, because both corporate political parties agree on major issues. For example, Democrats support the wholesale end of Section 9 public housing by transferring all public housing residents to Section 8 rental assistance vouchers at the same time when President Donald J. Trump, Sr. (R) has advocated for ending Section 8 rental assistance vouchers as part of his administration’s implementation of Project 2025, the MAGA blueprint for shredding the social compact.

Although New York Democrats claim to oppose Trump’s MAGA White Nationalist agenda, in actuality, Manhattan Democrats actually support Project 2025 given the RAD/PACT demolition facing NYCHA in Chelsea. Democrats, protected by LGBTQ progressive acctivist Allen Roskoff, for example, take it a step further by supporting the upward transfer of wealth to MAGA billionaire Stephen Ross, the owner of The Related Companies, which stands to profit from the demolition and displacement of public housing residents in Chelsea.

Thus far, the only NYCHA preservation group, which has filed a lawsuit to review the RAD/PACT privatisation and demolition of Fulton Houses and Elliott-Chelsea, has been Fight For NYCHA.

Fight For NYCHA have helped organise several news reports about the looming evictions. Our Article 78 Petition is now fully-briefed and is pending before Manhattan State Supreme Court. We’ve also been asking other groups to help residents in the Chelsea Addition and the 19th Street building to begin proceedings in Housing Court. Please donate what you can to our Go Fund Me to cover our expenses.

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Pack the Court on Monday morning as Fight For NYCHA makes one last effort to stop RAD/PACT !

It appears that Mayor Bill de Blasio should have put RAD/PACT conversions through the ULURP Process. But he didn’t !

Because protests have not worked, the last few members of Fight For NYCHA have sued Mayor Bill de Blasio (WFP-New York City), the City of New York, NYCHA CEO Greg Russ, and NYCHA to stop the RAD/PACT privatisation of public housing !

It’s been almost three years since Fight For NYCHA was formed. In that time, the activism to save public housing in New York City has been beset by division, sectarian politics, ego, obfuscation, and subversion. We had AOC refuse to stand-up to Mayor de Blasio’s use of RAD/PACT and the Blueprint to sell-out NYCHA. We had other Electeds approve of the sell-out of public housing, and they never faced any consequence for having participated in the sell-out of public housing. We had socialists and other sectarian groups promote the use of Section 8 vouchers to the disadvantage of public housing residents, which was shameful and a form of betrayal, because that was certainly no way to show class solidarity. Rather than confront Mayor de Blasio, some activists formed YouTube talk shows to promote themselves. Other groups, like Movement School, sought to use NYCHA activism as a cover for membership drives that was entirely divorced from a commitment to an outcome to saving Section 9 public housing. We also endured selfish political candidates, seeking to use NYCHA issues for their political campaigns, only to turn their backs once their campaigns floundered. Other political candidates, like Marni Halasa, used NYCHA activism for press clips ; it didn’t matter that she was leading/misleading residents in the wrong direction. All that mattered were her media mentions.

The lawsuit we filed was largely based on the lawsuit filed by Beep Gale Bewer (D-Manhattan) to stop the infill development at Holmes Tower, which she won after Mayor de Blasio backtracked from the unlawful plans for the real estate development in the Upper East Side.

We had no choice but to file this lawsuit after activism to mobilise public housing residents failed in New York City due to many “community groups” and nonprofit orgs running interference for Mayor de Blasio and other corrupt Electeds. Remember how one nonprofit hosted Council Speaker Corey Johnson (D-Manhattan) at a Black church in Brooklyn after it came to be known he supported the sell-out of public housing in Chelsea. Even after we exposed the truth of how some Socialist Democrats were collaborating with Mayor de Blasio in his scheme to end all Section 9 public housing, it came to a shock to many that it took direct action in the face of the DSA to put a halt to the Blueprint.

The lawsuit, filed as an Article 78 Petition, revealed that Mayor de Blasio’s implementation of RAD/PACT was illegal, since the way that Mayor de Blasio is rolling-out RAD/PACT conversions violate the City Charter and the New York State Public Housing Law. The City Charter and the Public Housing Law require large-scale projects, like RAD/PACT conversions, to be put through the ULURP Process. But Mayor de Blasio, NYCHA, CEO Russ, and the City of New York did not follow the laws. In respect of the RAD/PACT conversion of Fulton Houses and Elliott-Chelsea, the lawsuit made a showing that the de Blasio administration admitted that they decided to act outside of the ULURP Process.

As time passed, we knew that litigation, like this, would be our last resort, if social movement building failed in the face of sectarian opposition. We ask for support, as we make it clear that all other groups must set aside self-interest and self-promotion for the common good of all. And that means seeing to it that Section 9 public housing is saved from privatisation. This must be made a priority, at long last.

Pack the Court !

Date : Monday, Nov. 15

Time : 9:30 am

Place : Supreme Court, New York County, 60 Centre St., Room 130

Update

Updated 12 Nov 2021 13:55 The Defendants have filed motions to dismiss our Article 78 petition. We need to work together to put a stop to RAD/PACT once and for all !

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