Park Advocates Threaten Suit Over Plant

By JORDAN MOSS

Unless city officials quickly reverse course and subject their plan to build a water filtration plant in the Norwood section of Van Cortlandt Park to the same type of public review process followed when the site was originally chosen three years ago, park advocates say they will pursue legal action. 

"We will use every legal means at our disposal to make the city follow state and city laws related to protecting parks," said Elizabeth Cooke, president of the Friends of Van Cortlandt Park, an advocacy group that successfully sued the city the first time it tired to build in the park. "We are consulting with our attorney now on what are the strongest grounds upon which we can challenge this rushed decision."

The city is under federal order to choose a site by April 30. In addition to Mosholu Golf Course in Van Cortlandt Park, a site along the Harlem River near Fordham Road and another one in Westchester are under consideration, but the city's Department of  Environmental Protection (DEP) indicated two weeks ago in a meeting with the Bronx' state Assembly delegation that it wants to build at the golf course. In that meeting, and in another one with park and community activists, DEPT Commissioner Chris Ward said that the original $43 million slated for park improvement projects and another unspecified amount for Bronx renovations would be made available if the project was approved.

Cooke and other opponents of the plan insist, however, that the city has not followed city and state land use review procedures that must precede legislation. 

"This mayor prides himself on pubic open government and yet here we are on April 8 and as of last night no bill had been introduced in the Assembly or the Senate," Cooke said. "[There is no] time for hearings or public debate. If this passes, it will be done lickety-split by special rushed processes that prevent public disclosure."

A memo circulated to state legislators by New Yorkers 4 Parks, a citywide advocacy group, and the Municipal Art Society fleshes out the case presented by Cooke and other park advocates. 

The memo argues that the city cannot rely on the previous environmental impact statement (EIS) drafted for the golf course site because several things have changed. 

There is a new plant design and the DEP has not released detailed plans for the facility, the document states. The advocates also argue that security issues stemming from Sept. 11 now need to be examined. Cooke says, "the security arrangements around public water supplies have changed dramatically." And the EIS, the advocates maintain, is supposed to evaluate alternative sites and must explain the relative advantages and disadvantages of Eastview and the Harlem River sites and why they were ultimately passed over in favor of Mosholu.

The park supporters also say the plant is subject to the city's Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) for many of the same reasons, but also because a zoning amendment must occur since the park land is being removed from the jurisdiction of the city parks commissioner. Cooke pointed out that the previous ULURP "didn't request alienation of parkland." In fact, the city was foiled in its attempt to build at Mosholu two years ago when the state's highest court ruled that the city could do so only if the legislature passed an "alienation" bill to authorize the city to remove parkland from recreational use.

Charles Sturcken, director of public and intergovernmental affairs at the DEP, said that, although the golf course will be the agency's preferred site by April 30 if it can secure legislation, the two other sites are still in play. He added that his agency, in following the stipulations of a federal consent decree, had applied for pre-certification to the Department of City Planning for the Harlem River site in order to initiate ULURP and were in the process of completing an EIS for the Westchester site. He would not say which of the two sites the DEP prefers if it can't build in Van Cortlandt Park. But he did say that the Harlem River site "is extremely difficult to construct in," but that the problems are "not insurmountable." The city does not want to build in Westchester because it will have to pay taxes there. Sturcken said the site "is not in the best interest of the city [but] if we have to go there we will go there." 

As of Tuesday evening, legislation had not surfaced in either the City Council, where a home rule message must be pass - essentially a request for state legislation - or in the state legislature. 

Councilman Joel Rivera, a Fordham Democrat, who also holds the influential position of majority leader, said, "We still haven't received a home rule to my knowledge. We're looking to see what happens in Albany in reference to their side of the legislation before we act on it ourselves." As for his position on the site, Rivera said he "would have to see all the details [and] take into consideration that it's mandated by federal law and if we do not get a water filtration plant somewhere we will be heavily penalized." 

A spokeswoman for Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said that no bill had yet been introduced. Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, the chief opponent of the plan and the local lawmaker Silver said he would defer to when the state court ruled two years ago, said he's spoken to Silver but that the speaker hadn't yet made up his mind. "I've had a couple of conversations with the speaker," Dinowitz said. "I don't know that he's made a decision on what he's going to do on this. I hope that he will support the local member, as well as the community in this matter, as I've told everybody." 

Dinowitz warned, "there are very powerful forces working to make this happen."

The city's labor unions, which want the plant built in the Bronx, have made their views known in letters to lawmakers. 

"We should not, particularly at this time of fiscal difficulty, be exporting opportunity and increasing capital costs when more responsible alternatives exist," wrote Edward Molloy, president of the Building and Construction Trades Council of Greater New York.

In the state senate, Efrain Gonzalez, who represents the area that surrounds the site, said he was reserving judgment. "To speculate when the facts are not in, it's ludicrous," Gonzalez said. "I will make a determination when and if I have all the facts before me. Right now, it's all a political football." A spokesman for State Senator Guy Velella, whose district includes the park itself, did not return a call seeking comment. 

Asked if he was concerned about the upcoming April 15 deadline, Gonzalez, referring to Albany's notorious foot-dragging said, "We had to pass a budget by April 1."

Sturcken said that even if the city can't secure the state legislation by April 15, the federal government would probably be satisfied if it were in the pipeline. "If we have tacit approval in the houses but it's not yet passed, we'll take it to the US attorney and we think they'll be reasonable in granting us some time," he said. 

In addition to possible legal action, community residents continue to organize in hopes of stopping the plant, the construction of which they believe will wreak havoc on the area's quality of life. The COVE, a Norwood teen center, is organizing a rally in the park near the intersection of Gun Hill Road and Jerome Avenue on Saturday, April 12, from noon to 3 p.m. For more information, call (718) 405-1312.

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