OPINION

Is It a Crime to Destroy Recreation Space?

By Brian J Pape, AIA

If I were to knowingly violate a deed restriction, zoning law, or building code, I know I would be committing a punishable offense. So, what happens when certain previous council members do a secret, back-room deal to violate the deed restriction for the Elizabeth Street Garden (ESG), which limited the city-owned site for recreation uses only?

The ESG site was part of the Free School Society’s P.S. 5, built in 1822, and donated to the city in 1853 for city educational use with outdoor play areas, according to the deed restriction records. It continued as a school until 1981. The city sold the southern part of the school site to LIRA, a non-profit Section 8 housing organization, for a 151-unit affordable housing building fronting on 21 Spring Street (also a violation of the restrictions), reserving the northern ESG site “exclusively for recreational use.”

The city chose to violate their obligation for recreational use by neglecting to maintain the schoolyard. It was never supposed to be “an empty lot.” That violation was then sanctioned by the city council with that back-room deal in 2019, and we are now facing the destruction of a beautiful recreation space. Some would say the garden must go to provide affordable housing for the city, but the site has already had affordable housing built on part of it.

The New York Times (Sunday, Aug. 11, 2024’s Real Estate Section article “Save the Trees, Please, Kids Plead” by Anna Kodé), reported that schoolchildren were writing to Mayor Eric Adams to spare Elizabeth Street Garden. The garden is essentially the only green space for P.S. 130.

In another Times article (Aug. 22, “Pleading for ESG” by James Barron), Robert DeNiro, Martin Scorsese and Patti Smith write eloquently to save the Garden. How does the city reply?

“It really doesn’t matter who sends a letter,” Housing Commissioner Adolfo Carrión Jr. said. “I’m sure that the letter writers they’ve recruited in some cases don’t have the whole context of the history of the site, let alone the understanding of the crisis that we’re facing.”

Telling falsehoods about the ‘whole context of the history’ is their coverup of the deed restriction violations. If the Garden is destroyed, the only recourse is for concerned citizens to vote the bums out, replace the rapacious bureaucrats, and make their actions illegal.

Why are citizens and lovers of NYC, schoolchildren and the Community Board 2 of Manhattan (CB2) continuing to work to save the garden from destruction in the face of an obstinate city council and mayor?

We need to understand what a community really needs for quality of life for all. If you are not aware of what makes a community whole, let’s look at some significant events in our community’s history. (The following text is part of Parks’ Historical Signs Project and can be found posted within its park.) 

“Since its opening in 1966, Bleecker Playground has been a social and recreational meeting place for neighborhood families and children.

“This land was acquired by the city Department of Parks in 1963 as part of a new traffic pattern widening Bleecker Street and eliminating part of Bank Street. A number of warehouses, and a circular Department of Public Works comfort station were demolished to make room for the new playground. It was created as the result of cooperation between Parks and neighborhood civic groups who recognized the need for safe play spaces for local children.”

Obviously, the need for open recreation space was so essential that demolishing buildings was accepted.

“During the early 1950s, Anthony Dapolito, lifetime park advocate and then chairman of CB2, had successfully worked for the creation of Thompson Playground in SoHo. Residents of the West Village were inspired to approach CB2 and Parks Commissioner Robert Moses for a playground in their neighborhood, so by decision of the City Planning Commission, Parks, and Borough President Hulan E. Jack, an open space was carved out of Manhattan’s crowded West Village. The location chosen, on Hudson Street, between Horatio and Gansevoort, would displace only twelve families in three residential brownstones, and it required the demolition of a Department of Sanitation garage, a wastepaper loft building, a furniture warehouse, and a parking lot.”

Once again, the need for open recreation space was so essential that demolishing buildings, even a few dwellings, was accepted.

This is the kind of thinking that should be applied to ESG, and in fact that is what CB2 has consistently advocated for years.

Make it a crime to destroy neighborhood recreation spaces, already.