The Benefits of Community Planning Committees

Tom Angotti discusses community planning committees in New York for Sale. He discussed the Cooper Square Alternate Plan which was the first community plan in New York City that worked to build and preserve low-income housing and after four decades became the model alternative to the private real-estate market. The Cooper Square plan influenced other community plans such as the Melrose Commons Plan that worked to preserve low-income housing in the South Bronx and hindered the top-down city-sponsored urban renewal plans.

The first Cooper Square plan was drafted in 1961 in regards to urban renewal in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. In order to prevent the displacement of low-income minorities, primarily Latinos, in the neighborhood, community organizers sparked the trend of community planning by gaining the support of elected officials, revised plans several times and withstood scrutiny from conservatives. The group was able to gain political control over land where they established affordable, low-income housing. Activists began by taking a survey of residents, as a counter to Robert Moses’ survey of developers, that demonstrated that 93% opposed the city’s development plan because it would displace blocks of residential buildings and businesses. Moses was more focused on giving land to anyone who could build luxury residences than dealing with the housing problems facing the people who lived and worked in the neighborhood. The Cooper Square community believed that the people living in the neighborhood should be the beneficiaries, not the victims of urban renewal and based their motives around human values rather than property values. According to Angotti, the Alternate Plan proposed certain blocks to be untouched, residents to be relocated nearby, and for there to be both middle and moderate-income housing units. The committee eventually became the Project Area Committee, or PAC, and consulted with the city and developers regarding urban renewal.

The video attached below is a message from Laurie Angel who is the project area committee chair of North Long Beach. She states that the community group has been working for sixteen years and has helped to implement controlled rebuilding. This allowed the neighborhood to improve much-needed infrastructure and drive up property values to the point at which residents can still afford it but the neighborhood remains competitive with surrounding areas. Angel states that the rebuilding efforts by the project area committee has improved the neighborhood drastically including lessening crime and drugs and implementing and establishing parks, community centers, libraries, fire stations and police stations to better the neighborhood. This demonstrates the effectiveness of project area committees and the lasting effects of the Cooper Square planning.

North Long Beach Video