Ratner touted the Atlantic Yards "Community Benefits Agreement" (CBA) as a gem centerpiece of his project. But the CBA establishment understands that the Atlantic Yards CBA is bogus and does not compare favorably to legitimate CBAs. In other words, the CBA was a publicity stunt, rather than the historic agreement Ratner claims. (Note: When legitimate CBAs are struck, community opposition disappears, rather than builds over 7 years as it did with Atlantic Yards.)

Last night the Bar Association of the City of New York hosted a panel discussion titled Community Benefits Agreements: Time for Reform? One thing coming out of that panel is absolutely clear: if New York is going to have CBAs, the way they are done needs to be reformed entirely.

Norman Oder reports on the panel on his Atlantic Yards Report:

Panel discusses CBA reforms; in successful West Coast CBAs, signatories don't take developer cash; developer pays upfront for affordable housing

Even if experts disagree on some aspects of reforming Community Benefits Agreements (CBAs) in New York City, they pretty much agree on several factors that, in their absence, detract from the legitimacy of the Atlantic Yards CBA:

• signatories shouldn't take money from the developer
  
• the city's Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP) shouldn't be circumvented
• the CBA should have real teeth in it

The panel discussion last night at the Bar Association of the City of New York was titled Community Benefits Agreements: Time for Reform? (Audio is here. Also see Michael D.D. White's take in his Noticing New York blog, which fills in some gaps below.)

Beyond debate about whether the city should establish rules on CBAs--a recommendation in a Bar Association report (below) issued in March--panelists also agreed that policies on issues like local hiring and living wages should be institutionalized citywide rather than subject to project-by-project negotiations.

The presence of such policies would vitiate the appeal of CBAs like the one for Atlantic Yards.

Dismay evident

The bar group's Land Use Committee, in its report, concluded that the rise of CBAs signals a deeper problem with land use process, observed Vicki Been, Director, Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy, New York University School of Law. "Participation comes too late and too little in the process."

Julian Gross, Director of the Community Benefits Law Center, a project of the Partnership for Working Families, was there to support CBAs, but acknowledged, "I share everybody's concerns about the way CBAs have played out in New York."

He pointed to a law review article he wrote raising questions about three New York CBAs, involving Bronx Terminal Market, Yankee Stadium, and Columbia University. In a handout (below), he suggested that the problem in New York was "excessive government involvement in CBA negotiations, both in designating favored community representatives and in shaping the substance of CBAs."

Neither of those apply to the Atlantic Yards CBA; however, Mayor Mike Bloomberg signed the CBA as a "witness" and publicly extolled it. His press office issued a long press release, endorsing the CBA. Bloomberg has since called CBAs "extortion.
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