HPD Updates Plans for Housing Complex in East Harlem
The Department of Housing and Preservation Development is closer to figuring out what to do with a city-owned site in East Harlem.
The HPD last week submitted a proposal to rezone the block around 22 East 119th Street, the Commercial Observer reported. The changes will allow for a two-building housing project with 698 units and rezone the full block, bordered by East 118th and East 119th streets between Madison and Fifth avenues.
Today, the site contains a six-story, 174-unit building run by Volunteers of America-Greater New York, which runs the facility as supportive housing for single adults who are formerly homeless. The nonprofit is also sponsoring the looming project at the site.
Previous documentation around the site called for a 23-story supportive housing building and a 25-story affordable housing building. There would be community and commercial space, as well as the utilization of funding from HPD and the New York City Housing Development Corporation.
The block would be designated as a Mandatory Inclusionary Housing area, requiring an affordable housing component to any future private development within the bounded area.
The plans in the city zoning application portal referenced a three-building, 762-unit project, which HPD said is outdated. The rezoning application was first reported by PincusCo.
Volunteers of America–Greater New York did not respond to a request for comment from the publication.
Volunteers of America–Greater New York is also involved in a nearly 1,000-unit waterfront development on city-owned land in Hunters Point South, announced last month. The development, which also includes Slate Property Group and the Hudson Companies, will feature nearly 70 percent affordable units in HPD’s first deployment of the Eric Adams-era mixed-income financing push.
Elsewhere in East Harlem, a New York appellate court recently reinstated a lawsuit by CSN Realty Corp. seeking a $3 million judgment against developers Roy Moussaieff and Yousef Althkefati; CSN claims the developers used a shell entity — with no funds — to secure a contract for an East Harlem project that ultimately collapsed.
The developers denied the allegations, arguing there is no basis to pierce the corporate veil or hold them personally liable for the debt.
Moussaieff and Althkefarti planned to build a 20-story mixed-use building. An application pre-filed with the city’s Department of Buildings showed the project was slated for 2252 Third Avenue, between 122nd and 123rd streets, spanning 53,900 square feet with 61 residential units and retail space.
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