Innovation QNS officially approved by City Council
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The City Council voted to approve Innovation QNS on Tuesday, Nov. 22, 2022, following an issuance of support for the controversial project from City Councilmember Julie Won on Monday. Photo by John McCarten/NYC Council Media Unit
By Jacob Kaye
The largest rezoning in the history of Queens – dubbed Innovation QNS – was given the thumbs up on Tuesday by the City Council, clearing the final major hurdle in the half decade battle for the project’s approval.
With a vote of 46 to one, the Council sent Innovation QNS, a five-block rezoning that would essentially amount to the building of a new neighborhood in southeast Astoria, to Mayor Eric Adams, who has expressed enthusiastic support for the project and is expected to follow suit.
The fate of Tuesday’s full Council vote was largely determined the day prior, after local City Councilmember Julie Won said she supported the current configuration of the deal, which includes around 3,200 apartment units, 45 percent of which would rent at income-restricted, or “affordable,” rates. The final deal includes approximately twice as many affordable units as the original deal the trio of developers – Silverstein Properties, BedRock and Kaufman Astoria Studios – proposed building when they officially began the city’s Uniform Land Use Review Process in the spring.
The City Council’s Land Use Committee approved Innovation QNS in a unanimous vote on Monday and sent the project back to the Department of City Planning to review the modifications made to the rezoning. DCP voted unanimously to approve the changes Tuesday morning.
The city’s review of Innovation QNS was filled with tense clashes, heated debate and contentious negotiations, all of which shed light on how the mayor, the borough president and the City Council agree and disagree on how to solve New York City’s housing and affordability crisis. In the end, all seemed to come together on at least one point – building affordable housing, even if it comes with major concessions, is among their top legislative priorities.
In an interview with the Eagle on Monday, Won, who was pushing developers to commit to 55 percent affordability in the final weeks of the negotiation, called the process a “bloody battle.”
"I always knew it was going to be a compromise," Won said on Tuesday during the council’s vote.
"It is not easy when your community is disappointed and sad, but we know that we're doing the best that we can in the circumstances that we're in,” she added.
For months, support from the Council appeared tenuous, at best.
Much of the power in the Council rested with Won – the legislative body regularly defers land use decisions to the local member, a practice known as member deference. Since first taking office at the start of the year, the District 26 official has been critical of the developers. At the center of that criticism was the developers’ commitment to building affordable units within the 12-building development.
The developers originally proposed building 2,800 units, around 700 of which would be income restricted. In the final week of negotiations, they proposed eliminating all the office space originally planned for the development, replacing the space with 400 additional units, 300 of which would be income restricted, in addition to a number of other concessions.
That deal was ultimately accepted.
“Today’s vote to approve the largest private affordable housing initiative in the history of Queens is a tremendous victory for our Astoria neighbors,” said Tracy Capune, the vice president of Kaufman Astoria Studios. “[W]e look forward to working with the community to ensure Innovation QNS is worthy of the overwhelming support it has earned from neighboring residents, tenant leaders, labor leaders, faith leaders, small business owners, nonprofits and cultural institutions.”
Prior to the project’s approval, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams touted the legislative body’s work to pass housing projects and called passing Innovation QNS a “major priority” for herself personally. According to the speaker, the Council has approved 40 land use items this year, approving 12,000 new units, 8,000 of which are designated affordable.
“This was a critical project that had the opportunity to create many units of affordable housing,” the speaker said. “It was not something the City Council could fail to try negotiating.”
On Tuesday, Queens Borough President Donovan Richards said the project sets “a new standard for what community-first development can and must look like.”
Though Richards came to support Innovation QNS in September after the developers said they’d commit to making 40 percent of the project’s apartment units affordable, he voted against the project in August when it came before him as part of the ULURP process.
Richards and Won publicly clashed in October when the project came before the council’s Subcommittee on Zoning. In a hearing, both electeds referred to private conversations they previously had about the project.
“I fully believe Queens will lead our city out of this affordability crisis because, as we proved today, Queens will accept nothing less than historic investments in deeply affordable housing from any organization, private or public, that seeks to build here,” Richards said in a statement on Tuesday.
“The process of getting to a ‘yes’ on Innovation QNS was long, difficult and, at times, frustrating,” he added. “But this victorious vote belongs to each and every person who helped get this project over the finish line, especially Councilmember Julie Won, whose fierce advocacy on behalf of her constituents has helped ensure that Astoria families, first and foremost, will be the ones who benefit the most.”
Tuesday’s vote, though a predetermined affair, was not without contention.
City Councilmember Charles Barron, who represents East New York, claimed that Won had been pressured to reach a deal with the developers and that the subcommittee vote on Innovation QNS held last week was scheduled without her support.
“She needed more time to negotiate it,” Barron said, before being scolded by Majority Leader Keith Powers. “There are pro-real estate people in the city – the speaker, the mayor and the borough president of Queens.”
“I’ll be voting no on this project on principle,” he added. “But be aware, you all could be next.”
Innovation QNS is expected to take at least 10 years to be constructed. When completed, it will stretch from 37th Street to Northern Boulevard, between 35th and 36th Avenues. The area is currently occupied by a number of industrial businesses – there are six occupied apartments in the development zone and all residents have been offered relocation assistance, according to the developers. The tallest of the dozen new buildings will stand at 27 stories tall, with several others reaching at least 20 stories.
In addition to the residential units, the new neighborhood will include retail space, community facilities, a day care center, open space and a new movie theater to replace Regal UA Kaufman Astoria, which is located in the development’s path.
Of the 1,436 affordable units, around 660 will be reserved for New Yorkers who formerly experienced homelessness or for New Yorkers earning 30 percent of the area median income – or units that would be made available to a single person making $28,020 or a family of three making $36,030.
Also included in the final deal was a $2 million fund to support the legal costs generated by current tenants in the surrounding neighborhood experiencing tenant harassment and displacement.
