Eight rezonings rolled through Chair Farrell Lewis's first meeting running the zoning subcommittee, and the sharpest moment came in Ravenswood, where Councilmember Tiffany Caban put the area's track record on the record: since 2018, six private rezonings have won approval allowing up to 1,192 new units, roughly 300 of them affordable, and not one project has broken ground. She asked the applicant's attorney, Richard Bass of Akerman, why. His answer named COVID, two rounds of the Trump administration, rising interest rates, and the death of both 421-a and 485x, then conceded his crystal ball was cloudy. The 33-01 11th Street site he was pitching, owned by Catholic Medical Mission and zoned R5 since 1961, would add 251 units with 63 permanently affordable, plus a 3,300 square foot office so the nonprofit can move its back-office staff off Wall Street. Caban won a switch to MIH Option 1 for deeper affordability and a commitment to prioritize childcare, health clinics, and groceries on the ground floor. The item was laid over.
In Far Rockaway, Councilmember Selvena Brooks-Powers pressed Richard Lobel of Sheldon Lobel on the thing she cares about most: homeownership. The 14-10 Beach Channel Drive plan, a seven-story building cut from 118 units to 98 after community board feedback, maps MIH Option 1 for about 25 affordable units and preserves an existing church on site, with a fresh-food supermarket planned at the corner. Brooks-Powers pointed to Ocean Crest and the Arverne East project as local proof that rental-and-ownership mixes can work, and Lobel said the developer was still studying whether financing allows it. The unit mix landed at 57 one-bedrooms, three two-bedrooms, and ten three-bedrooms with a single studio reserved for a super.
The day's cleanest deal came out of Sheepshead Bay, where Councilmember Inna Vernikov said the 1417 Avenue U project normally would not have her vote. Community Board 15 voted it down over parking. But the team committed in writing to 27 parking spaces for 76 units, close to one-to-one, half a block from the Avenue U Q station, and Vernikov flipped to support. Every hearing was held and laid over, leaving the votes for a later session and the real test, whether any of these buildings actually rise, for the years after that.