Christopher Leon Johnson testifies in support of Intro 833, raises transit and shelter concerns

And it should be that each elected official have some kind of say

on what's going on or what's rezoning.

And this tax amendment, anyone in their right mind, if you give someone 30 feet, extra feet on your property, if you think your taxes will not go up later on when it's reassessed, something is wrong with you.

But I'm just, I would like to get an opportunity to speak to my constituents first, to let them know what is coming down the pike, just because it worked for us.

One elected official district, it may not work for another elected official district.

I just ask my colleagues to keep that in mind.

I would do the same for anyone else in their district.

And I would love for this partial of my district to be pulled out of this.

rezoning.

Thank you.

Thank you, Council Member Mealy.

And before I open up to the public, just want to clarify, this is not a text amendment.

This is just an amendment to the administrative code.

Okay.

All right.

So before we begin hearing testimony, I will remind everyone that this meeting is being held in hybrid format and members of the public may view this live stream broadcast of this meeting at the council's website.

Members of the public who wish to testify may do so either in person or through Zoom.

Those wishing to testify by Zoom must register online at the New York City Council's website at www.council.nyc.gov slash land use to sign up.

For those of you here with us in person, please be sure to see one of the sergeant at arms to prepare and submit a speaker's card.

We will limit public testimony to two minutes per witness.

If you have additional testimony or if you have written testimony you would like to submit, we ask that you please email it to landusetestimony at council.nyc.gov.

And please include the phrase Intro 833 in the subject line of your email.

Lastly, I would like to remind everyone that this is a government proceeding and the quorum must be observed at all times.

Members of the public are asked not to speak during the meeting unless you are testifying.

The witness table is reserved for people who are called to testify and no video recording.

Recording or photography is allowed from the witness table.

Members of the public may not present audio or video recordings as testimony, but you may submit transcripts of such recordings to the sergeant at arms for inclusion in the public hearing.

We have one person that came and signed up to testify, Christopher Leon Johnson.

Ready?

Ready?

Yeah, hello.

My name is Christopher Leon Johnson.

I support this provision 100%.

Let me be on the record that I live at 273 Buffalo Avenue in the 41st Councilman District, which covers Ralph Avenue all the way to Rockway Parkway.

I think that's the end of my district for Eastern Parkway.

But I'm going to say this right now that, look,

I think that we need more housing around there.

But the thing that the councilman doesn't want to address is that the transportation over there is abysmal.

Where is her saying about that we need a bus line on Eastern Parkway?

I told my Sandy nurse if she really cared about this so much.

Look, I'll say this right now that if the councilman, my councilman, want to carve it out, I'm not going to be opposed to it.

I think one of the big issues with that area alone on Ralph Easton Parkway is that shelter, which is called the Renaissance Shelter, which is like a full-blown.

Men's shelter.

Look, if this bill goes through, if they want to do a rezoning on Ralph Avenue and Easton Parkway, I think they need to start doing a final way to get rid of that shelter on Ralph and Easton Parkway, which is called a rent-a-shout shelter.

Going forward,

I hope that Sandy Nurse and my council member, Darlene Mealy, gets to a resolution with this bill at hand.

Like I said before, if Mealy wanted carved out, I have no problem getting it carved out.

But Sandy has to find a way to really put upgrades in her district.

Going to her area, it's like a disaster.

It's a disaster walking down over there.

It's really dangerous over there to really walk over there.

My area is way more safer than her area on Easton Parkway.

But if she want to push this forward, she need to push more traffic calming on Easton Parkway on her side of the district.

That's what we have.

We are having no traffic coming in my district.

So my area, including Mealy's Park.

So that's all I got to say.

Thank you so much for your testimony.

Thank you.