Atlantic Yards not employing number of construction workers originally expected

By Erin Durkin. Daily News

The Atlantic Yards project is lagging on its promise to create much-needed construction jobs.

Only 100 people have been put to work at the Prospect Heights site so far, a Forest City Ratner executive conceded last week - compared to 1,476 predicted in state documents by late 2010.

"Right now, job numbers obviously are less than what they will be as construction gets full throttle at the arena," said Forest City Ratner Vice President MaryAnne Gilmartin.

The Empire State Development Corporation's job projections were made in 2009, and lawsuits and money trouble delayed groundbreaking on the new Nets arena a few months longer than officials expected at the time.

But even accounting for delays, the current number of jobs is much lower than expected. There were supposed to be 563 construction workers on site in the first quarter of 2010, 742 in the second, and 1,055 in the third.

James Caldwell, president of the nonprofit Brooklyn United for Innovative Local Development, said he's disappointed so few jobs have been created so far, though he still supports the project.

"I'm not satisfied because the community's not satisfied. They're coming in asking us for jobs daily," he said.

The promise of 17,000 year-long construction jobs was a key selling point for the controversial arena and 16-tower project. Ratner and ESDC both insisted that goal can still be met.

"The number of job-years hasn't been altered; they will merely be created at a different pace in light of the changes in the construction schedule," said ESDC spokeswoman Elizabeth Mitchell.

Ratner spokesman Joe DePlasco said the number of construction jobs will grow to 450 by late next spring. (Emphasis added.)

...by late spring 2010, one year before DePlasco's projections, there were supposed to be 742 jobs, and 1055 by the third quarter.

So [450 jobs by late spring 2011 is] way behind projections.

Same number of job-years?

The ESDC stands its ground regarding promised jobs, the Daily News reports:

The promise of 17,000 year-long construction jobs was a key selling point for the controversial arena and 16-tower project. Ratner and ESDC both insisted that goal can still be met.

"The number of job-years hasn't been altered; they will merely be created at a different pace in light of the changes in the construction schedule," said ESDC spokeswoman Elizabeth Mitchell.

Not necessarily. That's only if the project is built at the full 8 million square feet.

There are no requirements for Forest City Ratner to build a project of that size. It can build a project about one-third smaller without penalty.

As I wrote 9/17/09, board materials (press release, memo) require the developer to build a 675,000 square foot arena and "improvements containing at least Four Million Four Hundred Seventy Thousand (4,470,000) gross square feet (exclusive of the square footage of the Arena)."

That's a total of 5,145,000 square feet, or a little less than 65% of 7,961,000 square feet...