City Council to Take On Underage Drinking

The city council recently wrapped up its first year-a year that many say helped city government inch toward transparency-under Speaker Christine Quinn, D-Chelsea.

"The old saying is that a little sunshine is a good disinfectant, and I think that's proved to be the case in the city council," said George Arzt, a political consultant, noting reforms in city lobbying policy.

Arzt also predicted that campaign finance and health care reform will be major priorities in 2007.

The year 2006 ended with a controversial battle over real estate tax breaks, and 2007 will usher in hearings on nightlife legislation.

Nightlife Legislation

The city council promised to crack down on underage drinking at city bars, lounges, and nightclubs in 2007. The council speaker, other council members, and representatives from law enforcement and the nightclub industry gathered at a Nightlife Summit on Dec. 28 to react to spikes in violent activity around clubs and bars, keeping in mind recent "high-profile tragedies," such as the July murder of an 18-year-old woman who had been bar-hopping on the West Side before she was killed.

Some of the summit's recommendations have already been introduced on the council floor, according to John Collins, a spokesperson for the city council. In the next few months, the council will discuss a bill mandating the use of ID scanners at bars and nightclubs and one requiring the installation of security cameras at all bar and nightclub entrances and exits. Another measure it is currently debating would let city police shut down bars and nightclubs that have repeatedly broken the law.

"We just want to make sure people go out, have a good time, and get home safely," Collins said.

The council's nightlife report also recommended cracking down on fake-ID manufacturers and their underage-drinking patrons by closing down operations like downtown novelty shops that double as fake-ID factories. It also suggested allowing police to bring fake-ID users down to the precinct for a call home to mom and dad.

Some are skeptical that such measures will bring results. "Less shops means less fake IDs, the harder it is to drink," said one campus fake-ID dealer who wished to remain anonymous. "Those [fake-ID] businesses on campus will end up having an up in their business."

"It will hurt the general idea of underage drinking-the amount, at least, that's outside of the dorms," he added.

Another recommendation would license and regulate party promoters, who, the report states, are often responsible for filling clubs with underage drinkers.

Party promoter Calvin Sun, CC '08, said the Columbia student promoters he knows already look for clubs where the policy is "18 to party, 21 to drink," and that at most of the clubs he frequents, "bouncers are better at checking for fake IDs than at a very chill bar or lounge."

Tax Break Overhaul

Developers building in Morningside Heights and West Harlem and looking for a tax break from the city will have to make 20 percent of their apartment units affordable-if the state legislature follows the city council's lead on the issue.

In the last weeks of 2006, the city council passed a bill that would overhaul 421-a, a popular program that offers tax breaks to city land-developers who build affordable housing units in their complexes.

The tax break program began during the 1970s to spur the growth of a depressed housing market. In the '80s, as New York's real estate market recovered, the rules of 421-a were changed to spark the creation of affordable housing. Those developers building in designated hot markets in parts of Manhattan and Brooklyn would have to make 20 percent of their units affordable, either on or off site, in order to get the tax break.

Council members voted last month to include neighborhoods up to 135th Street in West Harlem and neighborhoods in Lower Manhattan, Brooklyn, and parts of Queens in the exclusionary zone where developers must include affordable housing units on site to qualify for the tax break.

The council considered several proposals, including city mayor Michael Bloomberg's pro-development plan and the proposals of some council members looking to blanket the entire city in the exclusionary zone. Quinn rallied support behind her winning plan, billed as a compromise between the council and the mayor.

"We found a strategy that both increased affordable housing units across the city without crippling development," Collins said.

Councilmember Inez Dickens, D-Harlem, said she managed to draw the lines in West Harlem up to 135th Street but didn't succeed in her goal to increase the ratio of affordable apartments to 30 percent. "In legislation, you're negotiating, bartering," she said.

But some say the compromise was not enough. The real estate lobby advocated for a smaller exclusionary zone, while opponents argued that the whole city could be considered a "hot market."

The Pratt Center for Community Development estimates that development projects already in the works in neighborhoods not inside the proposed exclusionary zone will receive $500 million in lifetime tax breaks without being required to construct affordable housing units.

"Who has to pick up that slack in the property tax?" asked Councilman Tony Avella, D-Queens, who voted no on the compromise bill. "You and I."

The Real Estate Board of New York City did not return calls for comment.

According to spokeswoman La-Verna Fountain, Columbia has not yet reviewed the city council's bill to determine how, if at all, the legislation would impact plans for Columbia's expansion in Manhattanville.

The council's recommendations have to be approved by the state legislature before taking effect. According to political consultant George Arzt, legislators in Albany are expected to pass the city council's bill with only some "tinkering around the edges."

But state Sen. Bill Perkins, D-Harlem, said that the state senate may be looking to do more than tinker. Perkins and other senators have discussed increasing the required ratio of affordable housing and including more neighborhoods in the program, he said.

"There is an interest in ... making the definition of 'affordable' more realistic," he said. Currently, the definition of affordable is tied to the whole city's median income. Critics of the current policy suggest using neighborhood average median income instead.