Photo: DNAinfo/Rachel Holliday Smith.

Police Remove Protester from Rezoning Meeting Again

Police once again removed a local activist from a Crown Heights community board meeting after she repeatedly interrupted the gathering organized to discuss rezoning in the neighborhood.

At the start of Monday night’s Community Board 9 land use committee meeting, Alicia Boyd of Movement to Protect the People shouted down its members, claiming they no longer had standing given last week’s abrupt resignation of CB9’s chairman, Dwayne Nicholson, last week.

“Excuse me, but according to your bylaws, everybody begins again [is reappointed] when a new executive board comes into play,” Boyd interrupted the meeting to tell Ben Edwards, CB9’s land use committee chair, who was leading the meeting.

Edwards and the board mostly ignored Boyd’s repeated interruptions and attempted to proceed with the meeting. But by 7:15 p.m., soon after the meeting started, they asked police officers stationed at the back of the room to remove her.

“This is an illegal committee!” Boyd shouted as two officers led her out, saying to attendees, “You black people better start standing up and protecting this community, ‘cause otherwise they’re going to throw us out!”

Boyd received a summons for disorderly conduct, police said. It was the second time Boyd was forcibly removed from a CB9 meeting and hit with a summons. Her first summons came during a Feb. 11 CB9 meeting on the same issue.

The chaos continued after Boyd was removed Monday, with frequent interruptions and shouting from remaining MTOPP and board members alike over how to revise a controversial letter created last year to request the Department of City Planning start a study of changing land use rules in southern Crown Heights and Prospect-Lefferts Gardens. Concerns over how to define “affordable housing,” “modest” expansion of homes and “contextual” zoning dominated the conversation.

Shortly before 10 p.m., the committee voted — nine in favor, two opposed — to send a redrafted letter to CB9’s full board for a vote next week as MTOPP chanted “No vote! No vote!” over the roll call.

It’s unclear what specific language will be added or removed from the rezoning document. The board did not formalize any key points to be scrapped or revised before they voted.

The next full CB9 board meeting is set for Tuesday, March 24.

The discussion of the rezoning document has been pushed back repeatedly in past months as controversy surrounding the issue heats up. The neighborhood rezoning process started in earnest a year ago when CB9 first requested that city planning begin studying land use changes in response to an uptick in development in the area.

3 Comments

  • zoned out

    Zoning laws are a restriction on the production of housing…. a form of poverty. Not being able to have somthing you want is sleight degree if poverty, but being barely able to afford what you need IS a greater degree of poverty.

    Murray Rothbard said, There is no such thing as a shortage in the free market, have you ever heard of a shortage of van goghe paintings…. a scarcity yes but no shortage….. shortages are created by government Via price ceilings…and out right restrictions. In nyc we have both. ..

    Immagine if the mad mayor del blapsycho decided that wonder bread is sooo wonderful, i should not be sold for more than $0.50 a loaf so every child can enjoy its nutritious delights….. given that this is far below the current market price….. wonder bread will cease to be sold in stors as its profitability declines below cost. Eventually wonder bread will only be sold by shady character s in trench coats in dark back allys…

    rent, is a type of price….

    prices are fixed by supply and demand…

    if housing supply doubles next year, prices will drop by half. …….all things remaning the same.

    production of new housing requires labor,

    demand for Labor, depending on scale equils new jobs that pay well, until price equilibrium is met…. after labor costs drop as the market for construction labor become saturated with supply.

    As jobs increase, crime tends to decrease. Gentrification also has shown to reduce crimeas well but with out the added benefits of a robust economy.

    Also an economic study has shown that in gentrufied areas poor pople tend to leave their neighborhood less frequently then in non gentrified neighborhoods. …..
    which seems to sysay poor people pay more to live in their neighborhood vut the increasd orice is worth the cost as the choose not to leave compared to poor in non gentrified neighborhoods who leave at a much higher rate. I believe i seen that on mises.org or tomwoods.org.

    That being said if zoning limits allowed for more building, the neighborhood would benifit from lower housing costs, and lower crime with out the negitive effects that come from gentrification such as increased desposable income inequality which is a move toward poverty for thos finding themselvesxable to buy/save less.