The finished canvas from The City Love Project in New York City

UPDATED SEPTEMBER 27 at 1 PM: The event has been moved to Friday due to Thursday’s chances of rain.

Jersey City this week will become the fifth American city to host the interactive public art show known as the City Love Project (CLP), as the city gears up for this weekend’s annual Artists Studio Tour.

“CLP invites anyone and everyone to paint what you think your city loves. With no right or wrong answer, locals and visitors have a chance to EXPRESS their personal interpretations,” the CLP site reads. “Using only black and red paint, the canvas transforms into a living portrait of the city through the eyes of the people.”

The interactive art project, which is run by Trey Phillips and David Dorfmon, provides a giant 6 by 12 foot canvas with the phrase “Jersey City Loves ___________” on it. This is to visually propose CLP’s question — “What does your city love?” Using black and red paint, participants paint their answer to the question, and the project is videotaped, photographed and shared on social media, creating multichannel connections.

CLP is being brought to Jersey City by a handful of real estate firms — MEPT, Harwood Properties, Corvus, the Schenkman Group — and the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency (JCRA). The project will be at three sites in the city this Friday, September 30 — 9 am at McGinley Square, 1 pm at Journal Square, and 5 pm at Grove Street. The results from the project will then be on display this Saturday and Sunday at City Hall as part of the Artists Studio Tour.

“In order for the city to reach its full potential it needs to recognize the arts community and promote it,” JCRA executive director Robert Antonicello says in a statement. “I believe most residents would be surprised at how widespread the arts community is in the city and how deep its roots are within various neighborhoods. The artists can provide a level of vitality, color and excitement that bricks and mortar cannot.”

City Love from POPMEDIA on Vimeo.

Taking on an urban farming project was a great fit for the Jersey City-based organization, which reintegrates former prisoners into society. The farm program helps individuals gain marketable employment skills while at the same time bringing fresh and healthy food to a Greenville community that desperately needs it (not to mention turning what was once a blighted empty lot into a working farm).

The Friends broke ground on the farm, which is on Kearney Avenue between Ocean Avenue and Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, in May, and it recently began harvesting the bounty and selling it to local residents via an on-site farmers market. But now it says it is being “evicted” from the site by the JCRA. While the agency disagrees with this characterization, it seems clear that farm will have to find a new site.

Healy administration officials and the JCRA have pledged to help the group find a new home, but that did not prevent many of its members and leaders from speaking out at this week’s City Council meeting about what they say is an injustice committed against them by the JCRA.

“We’re being asked to remove our workers from the lot so the JCRA can initiate the same program with an outside organization not connected with the community,” Friends research analyst and program administrator Brooke Hansson said at Wednesday’s meeting. “There are many lots in the area — why are they taking this one?”

The disagreement boils down to exactly what Friends executive director Annette Joyner and JCRA executive director Robert Antonicello may have agreed to when the project was first conceived.

Joyner says the JCRA leader is reneging on his initial promises to give the Friends the previously vacant and blighted lot. She also says Antonicello is bringing new organizations — including the Jersey City Food Co-op and One City, a non-profit run by the JCRA — into the mix.

Perhaps not surprisingly, Antonicello remembers things differently. He says the JCRA never promised the land to the Friends, but rather allowed the group to operate there with the understanding that eventually other organizations would be involved. He says he initiated the project when he learned about a similar program in Newark called the Prodigal Sons and Daughters, and he wanted the JCRA to get involved with growing local organic produce that could be donated to the needy.

“100 percent of what One City raises goes to charity,” he says, adding that all operational costs are absorbed by the JCRA. “We always intended One City to be in charge of the program.”

He thought the Friends would be a great addition to the program, but says there was never any plan to donate the farm plot to the group.

“Why would we give away land when we wanted a farm there to be run by One City? The JCRA already owned the land; it wouldn’t make sense to give up the property only to look for some more elsewhere,” he says. “We wanted to get the Friends of the Lifers involved, but had no intention of giving them that lot.”

Everyone seems to agree that in February of this year, Antonicello brought Joyner — and city officials like planning director Bob Cotter and Ward F councilwoman Viola Richardson — to an urban greenhouse hydroponics farm in Orange, where Prodigal Sons and Daughters was growing organic produce to be both sold and donated.

Antonicello says that he expressed his interest in bringing a similar program to Jersey City, and that although he did not have a firm vision in mind at the start of the project, he’d hoped to bring in a number of different groups to work together on this project – a fact he says he made clear from the get-go.

“We had Jersey City Food Co-op on board to buy one-third of the produce, we wanted to have one-third of the produce donated, and one-third to be sold to whoever wanted to buy it,” he said of a plan he had suggested to Joyner.

But Joyner says she was not interested in working with either the Food Co-op or One City, since the Friends had already developed a working model and preferred to stick to that.

“They want to do what we’re doing already. We give crops to a food pantry, we’re selling produce to raise funds for our business so we can pay the food handlers that are working on our farm,” she says.

The JCRA, Joyner says, is trying to control how her company operated and failed to account for the Friends’ primary goal: to reintegrate ex-offenders into a community.

“Why would the Jersey City Food Co-op be a part of this when you have to buy a membership?” she asks. “Where does that fall into job creation? We’re employing a population of men and women who are hard to employ. Nobody wants to hire them. This was our model.”

In addition to the job training, workers at the Friends’ garden receive $240 each week as a stipend, which Joyner says is often used by ex-offenders to pay fines and to help put their lives back together.

One worker, 46-year old Mark Graham, spoke at this week’s council meeting, describing himself as “one of the faces of the program.” Saying that “job system failed me,” Graham pointed out that the organization was there when he had nowhere else to turn.

“I’ve served 16 years in prison. I came home three years ago and tried everything possible you can do. I got my high school diploma and a driver’s license,” he said, but he still was not able to find work. “The only thing there for me was this program. There are not too many things like this.”

Officials from the city, the JCRA and the Friends of the Lifers are set to meet soon to discuss where the group can move its farm.

Photo courtesy of the Friends of the Lifers Youth Corp

The land deal fell apart late yesterday, just hours before the City Council was hoping to pass the city’s 2011 budget, immediately throwing the spending plan — which had included the $15 million in projected revenue from this sale — into question. But the administration quickly followed the news of the deal’s demise with a promise that the city would move a budget forward “with no tax increase.”

“We have been working on a Plan B for some time in the event that this deal was not finalized for this year’s budget, and have identified additional revenue sources and areas where cuts can be made,” Kelly said in a statement released yesterday afternoon. “We have been able to realize additional revenues that were not readily apparent earlier in the year and conservative revenue estimates have proved just that, conservative. Items such as PILOT [Payments in Lieu of Taxes, from abatements] revenues, receipts from delinquent taxes and hotel tax revenues have been realized above initial projections.”

But residents at Wednesday night’s council meeting seemed unconvinced, with a handful of public speakers at the meeting hammering Kelly about the budget question.

The often-unperturbed Kelly, who said he receives daily emails from “20 or 30 people” about the budget, showed more irritation than usual at the constant questioning.

“It’s disingenuous to say we don’t have a budget or a spending plan. We have a spending plan that we haven’t veered from,” the business administrator said. He called the budget “a living document,” noting how things can change through the course of a year.

“Yes, this one item of $15 million did not come to fruition, but it’s not like we were resting on our laurels. We were looking at additional spending cuts and revenue,” he continued. “The budget process is 12-month-a-year process.”

He said that the council will meet with the administration on Tuesday to address in detail how the city will make up for this shortfall.

At least one council member — Ward E councilman Steven Fulop — remained as skeptical as the residents, dismissing the notion of a “spending plan.”

“I spoke with the state today,” said Fulop. “They’re concerned about the budget.”

The state, which has to sign off on Jersey City’s spending plan, warned the administration back in July that the city could face state penalties, a bond downgrade, or even the loss of control over the setting the property tax rate if it failed to adopt its budget by August 26. Kelly responded with a letter promising that the city would adopt a budget by September 14; that promise is now broken as the budget must once again change before being approved.

Fulop hammered home a point he’s made for several years about faults in the city’s budgeting process, which usually involves the spending plan being passed well into the year it covers, with the majority of its funds already spent through emergency appropriations. As of the last council meeting, 86.2 percent of the then-$496.6 million 2011 budget — $428 million — had already been allocated.

The councilman and mayoral hopeful also pressed Kelly on where the $15 million was coming from.

“Now miraculously we find $15 million, when we were fighting about the [free health] clinic and about our library cuts and layoffs?” Fulop wondered, saying he was surprised how “easy” it was to find the money all of a sudden.

“It hasn’t been easy; just ask the [hundreds of] people laid off,” Kelly replied. “We did not miraculously find money; we were conservative with our revenue projections.”

What exactly the administration’s “Plan B” is remains unclear, since all of the increased revenue items touted in yesterday’s announcement were also touted when the previous budget amendment was unveiled — and that plan still included the $15 million land sale deal.

It also remains unclear how the administration will keep its promise to not raise property taxes. The most recent budget amendment, which included the land sale, called for $215,107,176 to be raised by taxation; that was already $30 million higher than the amount raised by taxation in 2010′s budget, $185,058,594. However, city spokesperson Jennifer Morrill told JCI earlier this month that property taxes “will be slightly lower in calendar year 2011 versus 2010″ despite that change, a message reiterated yesterday by the administration’s promise of “no tax increase.”

A special meeting of the City Council has been scheduled for Tuesday, September 20 to introduce the revised budget amendments, and a public hearing will be held on Tuesday, September 27, prior to the regularly scheduled City Council meeting. The council will then be able to vote on adoption of the budget at that same meeting.

As we reported earlier today, the land sale was apparently contingent on the developer being granted a long-term tax abatement for the market-rate housing units on the site. But the JCRA says that wasn’t what derailed the deal. Instead, Tessler’s concerns for “market conditions” and the “uncertainty for construction financing” were the primary cause for tabling the project, according to a release sent out by the JCRA.

“The agency worked diligently to bring this matter to a swift conclusion so as not to delay the city from making decisions regarding its budget,” JCRA executive director Robert Antonicello says in a statement. “The agency has been directed by the mayor’s office to revisit the site for alternative solutions.”

City officials have put the $15 million projected land sale into the proposed 2011 budget; no word as of yet how this will change that document. We’ll keep you posted.

Rendering of the once-proposed development courtesy of the JCRA

New questions are being raised this week about a $15 million deal for land behind the Jersey City Medical Center after it was revealed that the deal may be contingent on the developer being granted a generous tax abatement.

As the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency (JCRA) and the potential purchaser of the land, Tessler Developments, talked to council members at Monday night’s caucus about the developer’s plans to build a massive proton therapy center on the site, Tessler’s representative acknowledged that it will seek a tax abatement for part of the deal, and may walk away if it doesn’t get one.

“We are going to apply for an abatement,” Tessler representative Charles Harrington said. “My client does have the option to waive the deal.”

The abatement will be sought for the approximately 1,000 market-rate housing units the developer plans on building as part of the $291 million complex, which will also feature commercial development and the area’s first proton therapy cancer treatment center.

“This is a very substantial investment and not just for my client,” Harrington continued, calling the deal a “job generator” that will bring nearly 500 jobs to Jersey City. “When you invest so much money, you look for as many constants as you can.”

Harrington, however, said there was no specific language in the agreement addressing tax abatements, and JCRA director Robert Antonicello said such language could not be put into a land deal agreement, a point echoed by city spokeswoman Jennifer Morrill, who stresses there’s no guarantee Tessler will receive an abatement.

“There are several steps prior to the granting of a tax abatement, including site plan approvals,” she says. “As with all tax abatement applications, [this] will be reviewed on its merits.” 

The $15 million land deal, which city officials hope will plug a large hole in Jersey City’s 2011 budget, has drawn criticism from Ward E councilman Steven Fulop, who first raised the issue of the abatement on Monday. He says that the problems with this deal are a result of the city not having a firm grasp on the overall budget process.

“By relying on this $15 million to plug a budget hole as opposed to making cuts earlier in the year, the mayor is ensuring that the administration, council and taxpayers have no leverage when negotiating the tax abatement with the developer,” he tells JCI. “The developer knows the mayor put all the chips in this basket, so there is no way the city will have leverage to negotiate what is best for the taxpayers.”

In his comments to JCI, Fulop echoes broader criticisms of Jersey City’s tax abatement process, pointing out that a number of officials and advocates, including the state comptroller, have said the process is unfair in its current form.

The state comptroller’s 2010 report, for instance, suggested that “tax abatements should be used carefully and sparingly given the multitude of pitfalls, their far-reaching impact, and the reality that exemption from taxation is a departure from the normal allocation of tax obligations.” A report released in 2009 by statewide policy think tank New Jersey Policy Perspective said abatements should be used sparingly, and only in areas of Jersey City that wouldn’t receive developer interest to begin with.

“The land sale should move on its merits and the taxpayers should not have a gun to their head to give developers a tax abatement on 1,000 market-rate Downtown condos,” Fulop says. “It is not fair to force additional tax abatements on the residents that may not be the best deal for residents.”

The City Council will vote tonight on the introduction of an ordinance that would transfer the final 25 or 30 percent of the land in question to the JCRA, which is required to happen before the deal with Tessler can go through.

Rendering of the proposed development courtesy of the JCRA

The property in question has been the subject of debate and controversy since April, when Ward E councilman Steven Fulop began to question whether the city could actually receive $15 million for it, as it had estimated in its 2011 budget. A few months later, a state official said the city was “highly unlikely” to fetch the full price.

But now it appears that it may, with the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency (JCRA) having lined up Tessler Developments as the designated developer for a massive complex that would include not only the region’s first proton therapy center, but also commercial space and about 1,000 market-rate apartments, some earmarked for those undergoing treatment.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the procedure is somewhat controversial in medical circles:

The treatment involves using a proton beam to precisely deposit a cancer-treatment dose near a tumor or affected area with less scattered radiation to the rest of the body, said Dr. Glen Gejerman, co-division chief of urologic oncology at Hackensack University Medical Center. It has so far been studied on brain tumors and on lung, pediatric and prostate cancers.

The controversial therapy is supported by some doctors who say it targets tumors more effectively than conventional radiation and is safer on surrounding tissue and organs.

Others have been critical, saying the relatively new therapy hasn’t been subjected to enough peer-reviewed research.

The City Council will vote next week on a resolution transferring the land to the JCRA, after which plans and engineering drawings would be submitted to the city’s Planning Division for approval, a process city spokeswoman Jennifer Morrill says will take between 9 and 12 months. She said the city expects construction to start by the end of 2012, or early 2013 at the latest.

The administration is still hoping to include the $15 million in this year’s not-yet-passed budget, but Morrill says they are still “working with the state” on that.

Fulop, who has criticized the land-sale process, says that he and his colleagues haven’t yet seen any plans for the site.

In addition to City Council and Planning approval, the project still also must be licensed by the New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services as an ambulatory care center. No application has been submitted, the agency tells the Wall Street Journal.

But Yitzchak Tessler, Tessler’s owner, tells the paper he’s requesting licensing. To help fund construction, he says he has lined up $250 million in private investments, as well as signed contracts for $90 million worth of equipment and software.

Rendering of the proposed development courtesy of the JCRA

Jersey City Redevelopment Agency executive director Robert Antonicello tells JCI that the agency’s LEAF rebate program can give residents rebates as high as $750 if they purchase certain types of Energy Star water heaters.

“The program offers an opportunity for people to actually upgrade their present systems that were damaged by Hurricane Irene and save money going forward because of the high energy efficiency offered by energy star rated products,” Antonicello says.

Details on the rebate program can be found via the links on this website or by calling 201-547-5810.

The Berry Lane Park project, which the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency (JCRA) calls “one of the most ambitious open space projects in the city’s history,” is slated to be 13.5 acre park with both passive and active elements built on land formerly occupied by rail yards, auto repair shops and warehouses just south of Communipaw Avenue and east of Garfield Avenue. (The photo at right shows one part of the area as it is now.) This year’s federal grant of $200,000 adds to $600,000 in federal grants the project has received in the previous two years.

The second $200,000 award will be used to clean up a site on Dwight and Ocean, which will eventually house 64 affordable-housing units. The site contains contamination from both a former gas station and a former dry cleaning business, and the JCRA estimates the total cleanup cost at $1 million. The agency hope to break ground on the project next fall, according to the JCRA’s Franklyn Ore.

“By then we hope to have the land cleaned and we hope to have all of the funding finalized,” he tells JCI. The JCRA project will join two existing affordable-housing buildings for seniors recently built by the Jersey City Housing Authority at the intersection.

“This project is very important for that neighborhood,” Ore says, pointing out that it will go a long way towards cleaning up the rest of the intersection.

Jersey City’s grants are part of $3.4 million in funding allocated to a number of projects in New Jersey, which itself is part of a larger $76 million being doled out nationwide.

“The grants we’re awarding to communities across America will support projects that will help create thousands of jobs and make our communities cleaner, healthier and more prosperous places to raise a family and start a business,” EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson says in a statement. “They’re part of our overall effort to clean up communities and put our nation on the path to a sustainable future.”

Local officials welcomed the awards as well, with Mayor Jerramiah Healy saying the grants will keep Jersey City “moving forward towards a more sustainable future,” and Sen. Frank Lautenberg praising the success of the federal program.

“The Brownfields program has a history of success throughout the state where new businesses have sprung up in place of abandoned properties,” he says in a statement.

A strong showing by members of the Harsimus Cove Association, who voiced frustration at the lack of dialogue with their organization and argued that the redevelopment plan was an abuse of the city’s power, “opening the door” to future abuses, was not enough to convince the council that the redevelopment plan would be detrimental to the neighborhood.

Dan Levin, a former president of the Harsimus Cove Association and good-government activist, said he was not convinced the city should pursue redevelopment.

“The area the redevelopment is targeting is exciting, it’s a vibrant community, [and] it remains a great neighborhood because it’s not blighted and not in need of redevelopment,” he said Wednesday night.

“This eliminates [the city’s] ability to sell to the highest bidder. Our concern is about value,” he said. “This is not what the law was created to do. This is not blighted land. Put it out in open market, let zoning conform.”

As we reported earlier this month, under New Jersey law, the redevelopment process can be taken on properties that are severely blighted and/or dangerous. But it can also be taken to spur certain preferred types of development in an area if the plans are “consistent with smart growth planning principles.”

In its report on the Erie Street property, Jersey City’s Planning Division, while noting that the actual JCPD headquarters building’s structure is “in fair condition,” says the interior of the building has fallen prey to “substandard maintenance” and “deteriorating conditions,” and it dubs the surface parking lot “obsolete” and “substandard.” City planning and redevelopment officials maintain that this, combined with making sure the right kind of development goes into the area, is more than enough reasoning to designate it in need of redevelopment.

And as for the neighborhood group’s concerns, the council overwhelmingly thought their concerns were met in substance, if not in principle. Before voting for the ordinance, At-Large Councilwoman Kalimah Ahmad, told the neighborhood activists that she was convinced that it “complies with your concerns” in terms of keeping with the neighborhood’s historic integrity. She pointed instead to the lack of dialogue between the city and the neighborhood association as the problem, and something that needs to change.

“You just were not brought to the table, which we should make sure we do going forward,” she said. “You have a right to be heard [before] we draw up plans.”

At-Large Councilman Ray Velazquez, who voice similar concerns about the lack of dialogue, ultimately said that “it’s important the project moves forward” because the expected revenue is part of the budget plan. He also pointed out that just because the council is adopting the redevelopment plan doesn’t mean they will automatically accept any bid, nor issue a tax abatement.

“Clearly there’s some misinformation out there … there’s no tax abatement. We have the final say, if we don’t like the bids, [we can reject them],” he said. “But we can’t afford to waste time. We made a commitment to keep taxes stable.”

Council President Brennan was less sympathetic, pointing out that the redevelopment plan was heard and approved by the Planning Board in April.

“I don’t know how people are coming here and saying this is the first they’re hearing about it,” he said.

“We’re bad landlords, we don’t keep on top of buildings,” Brennan added, referring to the headquarters’ condition. “This redevelopment plan will enhance the neighborhood. It will improve your property.”

To allay some of the fears voiced by residents, Jersey City planning director Bob Cotter spoke at the meeting to explain the redevelopment process. He argued that because of the size of the lots in the project, the zoning restrictions in the neighborhood make it difficult to undertake worthwhile projects.

“There is very little floor play for residential units to be built” within the zoning requirements, he said. “It’s a practical thing. An apartment building that looks like five townhouses” would be more “efficient” for the space, and would look appropriate, Cotter argued. But it would technically violate the zoning.

“We’ll get the most value out of the property,” he said, pointing out that selling to the highest bidder does not always equal the best sale.

Cotter, like Jersey City Redevelopment Agency executive director Robert Antonicello, pointed to the “mistake” made at 121-125 Newark Avenue as a cautionary tale of highest-bidder selling. The city rejected a $2.3 million bid from a developer who had a plan that fit the neighborhood, they said, instead opting to sell the building at auction; it was ultimately sold to Brooklyn’s Lazer Mechlovitz for $2.61 million 15 months ago.

“The city sold the property to the highest bidder, and we got a pizza parlor that looks like something from 1962,” Cotter said, referring to Nick’s Village Pizzeria, “not something [belonging to] the 21st century [as] it should be.”

Cotter argued that more ambitious and fitting developments often cost more, and that often “takes away how much [a developer] can pay for property.” But he said the planning process must be viewed more holistically.

“[Mechlovitz] isn’t investing in Jersey City the way we need,” he said. “We should sell to the best proposal, not the proposal with the most money. Long-term investing is what’s important.”

Charles Kessler, a co-founder of the Harsimus Cove Association, said Cotter presented “interesting information,” but added that it would have been “nice if he’d come to our neighborhood association to get our feedback and tell us these things before it’s imposed on us. We want to have some feedback in the redevelopment plan.”

Meanwhile, another resident took to the podium to advocate for a different neighborhood she said is “in actual need of redevelopment.”

“What I can’t understand is how redevelopment and progress in Jersey City is happening [Downtown] and meanwhile in the Marion section we’re sitting and waiting for something to happen. There hasn’t been any progress; we’re standing still,” Jeanette Rotondo said. “I don’t understand why nothing has been done to encourage this redevelopment.”

Now that the Redevelopment Plan has been approved, the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency will begin the Request for Proposals process.

Photo: Ian MacAllen/New York’s Sixth

“It strikes us as odd that the city would be satisfied with selling 8 Erie and an adjacent parking lot — prime real estate in historic Downtown Jersey City — for a pauper’s sum of $4 million,” HCA president Mike Francisco says in a statement issued Friday (the $4 million figure comes from earlier reports published in the Jersey Journal; city officials hoping to oversee the sale contend there is no target purchase price). “Anybody who has recently looked at the price of a single-family row house knows that the stated sale price of 8 Erie and the adjoining parking lot is alarmingly low.”

Francisco’s statement also notes a lack of community planning and consultation with those who live and work in the neighborhood.

“Most troubling about this situation is that the proposed sale of this landmark building in the heart of the Harsimus Cove Historic District has not been opened up to the public,” he says. “The residents and business owners in Harsimus Cove and Downtown Jersey City should have a say in what ultimately comes of this property.”

The city’s Planning Division has recommended that the properties in question be declared “in need of redevelopment,” and has created a Redevelopment Plan to guide the future use of the site. Both of these measures were held up at the last City Council meeting, as Ward E councilman Steven Fulop questioned whether the city should keep some of the land for a municipal parking deck. But if the redevelopment measures go through, the bidding process would be altered, and the developer would also be eligible for potential tax abatements, in addition to other incentives.

Once designated “in need of redevelopment,” the bidding process would fall under the authority of the Jersey City Redevelopment Agency (JCRA), the autonomous agency that fosters redevelopment of areas in the city that are blighted, and has helped bring many large-scale real estate projects here.

“The JCRA, pending council approval, is about to begin the RFP [Request for Proposals] process for the sale and redevelopment of 8 Erie Street, which by nature is open, public and transparent,” Mayor Jerramiah Healy says. “Any person or member of the development community who would like to partake in this process is entitled to do so. The city is seeking the highest and best use of the property for not only the residents of Downtown, but also for all of our taxpayers.”

But one prominent good-government activist contends that using redevelopment is not the ideal process for this situation, and thinks that step should only be taken as a last-resort measure.

“By putting forward a resolution to initiate the redevelopment plan, the city started a process that will allow them to avoid zoning requirements,” says Dan Levin, who also lives in the Harsimus Cove neighborhood and is a former president of the HCA. “By putting it under redevelopment, they can limit potential purchasers to whoever they want.”

In other words, the JCRA does not have to award the project to the highest bidder. Instead, it reserves the right to reject “any and all” proposals if they are found unacceptable, as the agency phrased it in a recent RFP.

But JCRA executive director Robert Antonicello says this fact is actually a positive for local development, not a negative. He says that when the city sells a property directly, the developer who bids the highest has to be awarded the property, no matter what they intend to do with it.

“’What did they sell it for?’ is not the only question when selling a property,” he says. “When land is sold through auction, you might get a speculator who wants to flip the land later and sits on it, so the area [continues to be] unused.”

He points to 121-125 Newark Avenue as an example of the negative consequences of a direct city auction. A developer had expressed interest in the hulking property at the triangular corner of Newark, Grove and Columbus, and it planned bring businesses that fit in with the burgeoning “restaurant row” on Newark, according to Antonicello. However, the developer was firm on paying only $2.3 million.

The administration wasn’t thrilled with that purchase price, so it sold the building directly at auction instead, ultimately receiving about $300,000 more for the property, when Brooklyn’s Lazer Mechlovitz bought it for $2.61 million 15 months ago. Since then, one storefront pizza shop did open and several commercial tenants have begun to slowly fill in the upstairs offices. Antonicello contends that if the city had chosen to designate the building “in need of redevelopment,” the JCRA would have had more leverage to force the developer to work within a certain acceptable framework, and on a tighter timeline.

And while Antonicello readily admits that the agency often has ideas about what kind of development it wants at a site, he insists that doesn’t translate to pre-determining who will get to develop that site. The agency, he says, is completely objective when vetting RFPs; if not, developers wouldn’t want to invest the time and money it takes to even submit a RFP.

“If developers thought the process was crooked, they just wouldn’t bid,” he says, pointing out that a fully realized RFP could cost a developer as much as $30,000. “The process costs so much money.”

Redevelopment has historically been an action taken to properties in areas of serious urban decay and blight, as a means to entice developers to work in conditions that would otherwise be difficult or impossible. But that began to change in 1992, when New Jersey consolidated and revised its redevelopment law, creating more municipal flexibility for redevelopment plans.

There are eight criteria used to measure the appropriateness of a redevelopment designation under the state law, including if buildings are unsafe, dilapidated, “untenantable,” damaged by natural disaster, or “detrimental to the safety, health, morals or welfare of the community,” but also if the plans to redevelop are “consistent with smart growth planning principles.”

As the JCRA notes in its glossary of redevelopment terms, by using the criteria, the state has expanded the types of properties that can be determined in need of redevelopment, including “some not typically thought of as ‘blighted.’”

In its report on the Erie Street property, Jersey City’s Planning Division, while noting that the actual JCPD headquarters building’s structure is “in fair condition,” argues that the “substandard maintenance” and “deteriorating conditions” inside the building, as well as the “obsolete” and “substandard” surface parking lot are enough to qualify the property as “in need of redevelopment.”

Antonicello has also inspected the headquarters building, and he contends that the interior would almost definitely have to be gutted for either office or residential use; although he says it is “functionally operational,” he says it is too “dark and depressing” to be attractive to potential residents or business owners.

That, he says, combined with making sure the right kind of development goes into the area, is more than enough reasoning to designate it in need of redevelopment.

“Our mission at the end of the day is, how do you redevelop a city, how do you provide housing, how do you provide economic growth?” Antonicello says. “Price is only part of an analysis in a deal, we also consider, what do we want to happen here? What fits in a neighborhood? And does the developer ultimately have the capacity to fulfill his plan?”

The resolution declaring the area in need of redevelopment and a first-read ordinance approving a Redevelopment Plan for the area will both be voted on at Wednesday’s City Council meeting. If successfully introduced, the ordinance will be up for a public hearing and final vote on May 25.

Photo: Ian MacAllen/New York’s Sixth