Bronx Living Wage Battle
Moves To City Council

One of the city's longest-running real estate sagas finally heads to the City Council this week, putting lawmakers at the center of a battle over living wages and local control of development.

At a hearing on Tuesday, the Council's zoning subcommittee will take up consideration of The Related Companies proposal to purchase the massive Kingsbridge Armory, a 575,000-square-foot, red-brick castle in the West Bronx that has been empty—and the subject of a wrestling match between community groups and the city—since 1994.

Related has proposed a $310 million mall, complete with cinema, health club, restaurants and shops, to be built within the existing walls of the landmarked Armory. The company estimates the three-year construction project will employ 1,000 union workers and that the resulting retail center will provide 1,200 jobs, space for use by community groups and a publicly accessible outdoor plaza.

The project will give Bronx shoppers better choices, Related says: "For too long, residents of the northwest Bronx have had to travel outside of the area to meet their shopping needs, often having to leave The Bronx completely to go to Westchester and other surrounding communities."

Under a plan tentatively approved by the city's Industrial Development Agency (IDA) earlier this year, Related would pay $5 million to purchase the Armory; seven years ago, the city spent at least $25 million to repair the building. Related would also receive $17 million in city, state and federal tax incentives for the project. An analysis by the IDA says the project will generate a net benefit of $85 million in tax revenue to the city over the next 30 years.

But the subsidies—direct and indirect—to Related are fueling efforts by local community groups to secure guarantees that the jobs at the Armory mall pay "living wages," defined in city law as $10 an hour with benefits or $11.50 an hour if no benefits are provided. The state minimum wage is a significantly lower $7.25 an hour.

"We're not asking for pie in the sky," says Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter, a board member of the Northwest Bronx Community Clergy Coalition. "Our asks are very normal and reasonable. This is public land, and taxpayer dollars. What we don't want is a developer to come in and dictate to us what those changes are and not take into consideration what the damage to this community will be."

Related has refused to make a commitment to living wages, arguing that it would derail the project. Joanna Rose, Related's vice president for corporate communications and public affairs, told City Limits: "Demands on the retail community to pay a wage not required anywhere else in New York City or New York State would render the project unleaseable, unbuildable and unfinanceable—not only for Related but for any developer."

A long road

In 2000, community opposition helped torpedo a Giuliani administration proposal for a retail and sports complex at the Armory. When the Bloomberg administration turned its attention to the site, a coalition of community groups called KARA (Kingsbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance) won a seat at the table for the drafting of the request for proposals, or RFP, for the Armory project.

That RFP said that the New York City Economic Development Agency would "view favorably development plans that maximize the number of jobs that meet the city's living wage and health benefits standards." KARA also secured a commitment from the city's Department of Education to build schools in buildings next to the Armory that were not part of the commercial redevelopment.