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Pols And Starrett Tenants Urge Owners To Keep Rents Affordable Calling on the owners of Starrett City to do right by the taxpayers that subsidized the complex for the past 30 years, New York City Comptroller Will-iam J. Thompson, Jr., City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and City Council Member Charles Barron joined dozens of Starrett City tenants, members of the Starrett City Tenants Association, other elected officials and leaders of NY ACORN today to call on the owners of Starrett City to commit to principles and a process to preserve affordability in the impending sale of the complex. The group called on the principles of Starrett Associates and all potential bidders to submit all bids for Starrett City to a panel comprised of NY ACORN, Starrett City Tenants Asso-ciation, clergy, labor leaders and local elected officials. The panel will interview each bidder and then analyze and rate each buyer's commitment to afford-ability. At the end of the process the panel will certify and approve bidders who agree to a set of principles to keep Starrett City affordable. Elected officials also called on Star-rett Associates to agree in advance to only move forward with bids that the tenant panel finds will preserve affordability for Starrett's 11,000-plus tenants. Council Member Charles Barron said, "We must be vigilant in our efforts to assure that any new owner of Starrett respects affordability, and provides qual-ity maintenance and security. A victory for affordability at Starrett City represents a victory for affordability na-tionwide." Comptroller Thompson said. "We need to do everything we can to protect the wonderful and diverse community that is the heart of Starrett City." "Time and time again, the tenants of Starrett City have stood together and demonstrated their resolve to protect their neighborhood," said Council Speak-er Quinn. "I'm proud to stand beside them once again to send a message loud and clear: every single unit in this community - all 6,000 of them - must remain affordable." "Starrett City is a thriving community and a beacon of affordability- and it's only fair that the Brooklynites who call Starrett home should have a strong decision-making role in its future," Markowitz said. "The last time someone tried to buy Starrett City, they talked a good game about affordability. But when you look-ed at the numbers it was clear they were attempting to pull a bait and switch on Starrett tenants and New York taxpayers," said Bertha Lewis, Executive Director of NY ACORN. "We are not going to go through that again this year." The tenant panel is demanding that any developer considering buying Star-rett and any government agency or lender involved in the purchase or sale of Starrett City submit their bid to the panel and agree to be interviewed by members of the panel. One year ago. the owners of Starrett City put the Starrett City complex of 5,881 apartments spread out over 46 buildings along the Jamaica Bay on the auction block. On February 9, 2007, Clipper Equi-ties entered into a contract with Starrett Associates to purchase the complex for $1.3 billion. One month later, on March 1, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development re-jected Clipper's bid because the new owner's plan would not preserve Starrett City as affordable housing for its largely working class population of over 11,000 tenants. On July 9, HUD and state officials rejected a revised version of Clipper Equities' bid, and in August, Clipper's contract to purchase the complex expired- killing the deal once and for all On August 29, Starrett Associates wrote to New York state officials and signaled their intention to withdraw from New York's Mitchell-Lama hous-ing affordability program. Tenants and government officials believe the letter is a negotiating tactic to give them leverage in winning approval of an eventual sale and are calling on the owner's of Starrett City to work with tenants to keep the complex in the Mitchell-Lama program and affordable to current and future tenants.
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