A letter to Christine Quinn

Ms. Quinn:

I would personally like to thank you on behalf of the all the employee's of the Hotel Pennsylvania. Because of your vote, and the votes of other members of the NYC Council you have effectively put them out of work, and increased the unemployment of NYC. All for a few campaign contributions from Vornado. Fantastic job Ms. Quinn, we will be sure to remember this next time we go to the polls on election day to vote for you.



Gregory Jones
Save The Hotel Pennsylvania Foundation

DCP decisions.

The following are a list of the decisions handed down by the DCP for the various ULURP filed for 15 Penn Plaza.  A copy of each has been sent to MBPO and Christine Quinn.

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/cpc/100237.pdf

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/cpc/100050.pdf

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/cpc/100048.pdf

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/cpc/100047.pdf

http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/cpc/100049.pdf

Protest!!

We are planning to protest the city council 6/30/2010 @ 1:30 PM in front of city hall!

We hope to get as much media as possible, spread the word.   Lets show the city council we mean business and refuse to let them tear down this Hotel!

15 Penn Plaza

The City council are a bunch of narrow minded money hungry SOB's.  They only give a shit about what they think is best for them and not what the community thinks.  I brought up the finical instability of Vornado, and the "Hole in the Ground" that is Filenes basement in Boston, and the almost $500 million in loans that Vornado has defaulted on in the past few months.  Doesn't matter to them, they are only interested in rolling the HP into the Moynihan station and west side development projects with MSG and getting paid off on it.  Never mind that it will take 4 1/2 years to build (if they build at all) and all the environmental hazards that a project of this size comes with (noise and air pollution and ground transportation) nope, none of that matters to them, if they feel the FAR is worth the opening of the Gimbels passageway then so be it they will get the approval to build.

Bottom line this project is going to get approved one way or another.  So with that I say thanks to all who DIDN'T SHOW UP to help.

Meeting with Christine Quinn's Staff

The meeting has been set for 5/19  1:00 PM

A letter to Brian Footer requesting a meeting with Ms. Quinn

I sent a letter to Mr Footer requesting a meeting with Ms. Quinn, lets see what happens now.  In the mean time I suggest that anyone wanting to go, contact me and let me know what their schedule is going to be like before we book it so we can organize as many people as possible.


Mr. Footer,

I was directed to you to request a face to face meeting with Council Woman Quinn and my colleges, in regards to the 15 Penn Plaza Project.  If possible please contact me at either this email or the phone number below to discuss a time.  Thank you.


Gregory Jones
Save The Hotel Pennsylvania Foundation

New York, NY 10001

gregory.jones@savehotelpenn.org
http://www.savehotelpenn.org

Christine Quinn

We received a phone call from the Office of the City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's Liaison, Jose Conde.  Apparently to my surprise, there are several steps in getting the Hotel Pennsylvania re-zoned.  A process known as ULURP, (The Uniform Land Use Review Procedure).  There are many steps in this process the first of which is preparing an EIP (Environmental Impact Study).  Then it has to go to the Borough President, then to the City Planner, and then on to City Council.  Each of these steps has a certain time limit imposed on them before they must be completed.  Right now as stated, it is only in the EIP stage, and has a long way before it gets to the City Council.

The actual steps involved can be found here:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/luproc/ulpro.shtml

All in all I would say this is good news!  Mr. Conde will keep us posted of any changes.

No word yet

Still no word other then the canned response from Duane and Quinn's email.  Looks like I'll have to stop down there.

A letter to Christine Quinn

Councilmember Quinn:




Forgive my intrusion into your schedule, but if I may take a few minutes of your time today, I wish to ask you if you would assist us in a matter that is currently before the NYC Zoning Council.



As you may be aware, the owners of the historical Hotel Pennsylvania have filed with the city paperwork to have the current site of the hotel rezoned. The Hotel is located within a C6-6 zoning a C6-4.5 and within the Penn Center Sub district of the Special Midtown District. Vornado wants to rezone the spot to allow the construction of Single Tenant Office Scenario and/or a Multi-Tenant Office Scenario. (A copy can be found here http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/pdf/env_review/15_penn/draft_scope.pdf) Either of these scenarios would require the demolition of the Hotel Pennsylvania.



Numerous RFE have been submitted to the LPC, with the majority backing of CB5, the HDC, and Assemblyman Gottfried. So far all have been denied for consideration. To sum it up Ms. Quinn, this hotel should have been preserved years ago after the original Pennsylvania Station was demolished back in the mid 1960's. I ask that you please lend your support to aid us and help by letting your fellow city council members know, that we the citizens care about our neighborhood, and the Hotel. We do not want to see the Hotel Pennsylvania destroyed, in fact we would be overjoyed if was refurbished back to its original glory. There has been talk about how this construction would create new jobs for the city, but Ms. Quinn we know that in the current economic situation, the jobs that would be create would only be temporary. The "office tower" would sit mostly empty of tenants, and would put all the current employees of the Hotel Penn out of work. Any business that would move into this office tower would only be relocating from other areas of NYC and thus would not be creating any positive work flow for NYC.



Ms. Quinn we don't need another office building in NYC, we have plenty. Help us by preserving the things in Manhattan that matter.











I thank you for your time, and hope to hear from you soon.



Sincerely,







Gregory Jones
Save The Hotel Pennsylvania Foundation
gregory.jones@savehotelpenn.org
http://www.savehotelpenn.org/

Election Year

Well the primaries are over, and we now know who will be running for office against the incumbent politicians. Running against Christine Quinn will be Yetta Kurland and Maria Passannante Derr. We will be closely watching both of these candidates. As you know Ms Quinn represents the districts that the Hotel Pennsylvania resides in. This is a crucial position to hold, and a key to the Hotel Pennsylvania getting the recognition that it deserves. If you want to assist us in contacting these candidates, Maria Passannante can be reached via her website http://www.voteformaria.com/contact and Yetta Kurland at http://yettakurland.com/contact.

If you contact these candidates please send us a copy so we can publish it.