Deny the Alma Plan
Dear Editor:
The planned buildings at Surfside are not a benefit to the Rockaway peninsula and the City of New York. As a resident of Belle Harbor, my family opposes Alma Realty’s proposal to expand its footprint and construct more buildings in the existing parking lots, green spaces, sidewalks and recreational areas. Over 2,000 men, women and children live in affordable housing in these areas, and this project will affect them negatively, jeopardizing further affordable housing in NYC. Any affordable housing Alma claims will be created is a net negative if the other buildings are damaged or their rents and taxes increased when higher-end and market-priced units flood the area.
To even consider the validity of this project, a full environmental study must be conducted to address all major categories that will be impacted, including air and noise quality, emergency services (i.e., fire, police, EMT), public safety, hospital and healthcare, schools, evacuation strategy, roadways and traffic congestion, transportation and the change to the neighborhood character.
The infrastructure in the Rockaways is barely capable of supporting the existing populations: sewers, roads, transportation – we don’t have a reliable hospital since Peninsula Hospital was leveled to make room for another developer to build more condos, and that project hasn’t started either.
Alma Realty was recently cited for extensive building code violations. This proposal does not include their maintenance of the Surfside property considering the increase in damaging storms, rising water levels and the high probability of another Sandy-type storm causing extensive damage to the Rockaways. These items are major talking points by all NYC politicians, so they must be true, right? So, constructing so many buildings at the bottleneck of the peninsula, so close between the Atlantic Ocean and Jamaica Bay, is a potential catastrophe. Are insurance companies willing to cover these properties 10 or 20 years from now considering Rockaway is a Flood Zone 1 area? Look at Florida’s waterside communities to see that insurance is prohibitively expensive as more companies refuse to offer coverage.
Please deny approval and vote No to this project by Alma Realty.
Kraig DeMatteis
