To Inwood’s surprise, CU signs community agreement

A long-awaited agreement between Columbia and residents around Baker Field has been signed—an announcement that came as a surprise to many Inwood residents at a Tuesday night meeting.

“An agreement has been signed by Columbia,” said Sandra Harris, Columbia’s appointed community affairs liaison for the University’s Baker Field project. “The community is working on identifying a group to sign it.”

Susan Ryan, a member of Advocates for Inwood Manhattan, said that’s news to her and other residents, who have been asking for a community benefits agreement since the project earned City Council approval on April 6.

“For three weeks the community has been patiently waiting for Columbia to send us their new draft of the Community Partnership Agreement and we still haven’t seen it, so it seems the real question is, what exactly did Mr. Bollinger sign?” Ryan said in an email. “We will say that it’s not something that the community has vetted and this seems very strange considering that this is supposed to be a ‘Community Partnership Agreement.’”

Local residents did meet with representatives from City Councilmember Robert Jackson’s office to craft a list of recommendations for the agreement, which were submitted to the University a few weeks ago. But Ryan said that residents have yet to see Columbia’s revised version of the agreement—which Susan Russell, chief of operations for Jackson, said she had received Tuesday evening.

“Columbia has sent us what we understand to be their final draft of the agreement and we are scheduling a meeting to review it with elected officials and community members,” Russell said, adding that the meeting will happen sometime in the next few days.

Harris said she thinks residents will be pleased with the final agreement, which includes extended tennis court hours and an increased number of sports camp scholarships from 19 to 32.

“We believe it is truly a collaborative partnership agreement so I think overall the community will be pleased,” Harris said, noting that the agreement will be posted on the project website.

But the confusion over the timeline of the agreement’s approval caused tensions at the open-house style meeting.

“These types of actions do not support Columbia’s claim that they want to be a ‘good neighbor.’ In fact, they are antithetical to it,” Ryan said.

Officials from Columbia’s Facilities and Community Affairs departments, as well as construction company representatives, were present to answer questions about the University’s $50 million Baker Field development project, which includes plans for a 47,700-square-foot Campbell Sports Center and a public waterfront park known as Boathouse Marsh at 218th Street. The five-story sports center, which is expected to be completed by fall 2012, will house coaches’ offices, training facilities, and meeting and study spaces for student athletes.

Inwood resident Edie Ricks said that a larger event at which residents could address questions to a panel would have been more effective.

“I feel like I’m taking a crash course in this in the last month,” she said. “I don’t know the questions to ask, but when other people ask the questions, I’m interested in hearing them.”

Associate Vice President of Construction Business Services and Communications La-Verna Fountain said that Columbia is open to conducting future meetings in a variety of formats.

“We hear very mixed reviews,” Fountain said. “Some people want this, other people want the meeting. We set this up so people could come to the meeting and walk around and ask questions. ... You may not get all your questions answered tonight but your questions are being heard. You have ways to contact us.”

Beginning this week, residents should expect temporary fencing to rise along 218th Street and Broadway, soil testing, and demolition of a maintenance shed from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m.

But many residents Tuesday evening said this is all information that Columbia should have made available to the community sooner. Resident Obie Bing, who has worked with asbestos for 28 years as an engineer, said he still has concerns about Baker Field construction but that he’s hopeful they will be resolved.

“We have nothing,” he said, referring to records of asbestos removal for the maintenance building that Columbia plans to demolish and possibly dangerous effects from non-asbestos materials on residents and students attending two schools across the street from Baker Field. “They said they’d get pertinent information to me, so if they do, then this will have been helpful.”

chelsea.lo@columbiaspectator.com