By the way—have you been listening to the Hell Gate Podcast? New episodes drop on Friday. For the latest on the mayor's race, you won't want to miss it. You can listen here, or wherever you get your podcasts.
In April, when it seemed like the Elizabeth Street Garden might finally be evicted so that the plot it rents from the City could be developed into the much-delayed Haven Green affordable housing complex for seniors, its supporters scrambled the jets.
By that, I mean they put on a performance that included some of their most high-profile supporters. It was a show of force, a demonstration that with just an afternoon's notice, they could assemble a coalition of some of the most annoying people in New York City: Patti Smith, TV news anchors, a former "Glee" actor, Councilmember Chris Marte, independent musicians, me, and the white guy standing next to me who told me he's lived in Mexico City for the past five years but always comes to ESG when he visits. They had to fight, one young woman said on mic before singing a Joni Mitchell song, to preserve this Eden.
Elizabeth Street Garden has thoroughly convinced many of these typically progressive types, if you'll pardon my stereotyping, of a simple idea: that the City's plan creates a "false choice" between affordable housing and green space (Haven Green would in fact have green space built into it). They've been so successful that the future of the garden has become one of the questions the New York Times asks each of the mayoral candidates running in the Democratic primary. And First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro, in one of his first acts on the job, reportedly put the planned eviction of the garden on hold at the request of some of his famous, powerful pals, and pitched the idea of looking into starting a new project at a different City-owned lot.
But advocates for affordable housing, like the Community Services Society of New York's Iziah Thompson, a senior policy analyst, and Oksana Mironova, a housing policy analyst, say the choice between Elizabeth Street Garden and affordable housing for downtown seniors is real.