Last week, Mayor “Red” Bill de Blasio sent the city into a tizzy by declaring that he’d like to see some more room devoted to affordable housing at the Domino Sugar factory development. His request was going to “doom” the project according to the Daily News. Last night, according to a press release put out by the mayor’s office, it turned out the crazy idea of “negotiating” with developers actually worked, as Two Trees’ Jed Walentas agreed to add more apartments in exchange for the ability to build taller buildings. Hey, let’s send Mayor Tall to fix this thing in Crimea!
The agreement between the city and Two Trees brings the total amount of affordable apartments in the development to 700, up from 660 originally. More importantly, it also increases the square footage of the space reserved for affordable housing to 537,000 square feet, which should free up space for more two- and three-bedroom apartments. The affordable units will also be permanently affordable according to the Times. In exchange for that, Two Trees gets to build their gigantic towers even higher, and can charge higher rents on some of the affordable units.
All in all, de Blasio comes out looking better than our prediction on Friday of two sides reaching “an agreement that makes them both equally miserable.” It’s almost as if he realized that he was the mayor of New York City, not just a conduit for making developers’ dreams come true. Not that everyone is on board with this crazy new negotiating thing, but as per usual, if you’ve got the Post editorial board sputtering with incoherent rage, you’re probably doing something right.