For its February breakfast, the Long Island City/Astoria Chamber of Commerce met on the ground floor of Court Square Place. The main activities at the meeting were showing the chamber’s new logo and hearing from a candidate for Queens borough president. There was also an announcement of another meeting just a week later, to discuss economic development strategies and social enterprise. Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer’s new chief of staff reviewed the Hunters Point traffic matters—making one street one-way and arranging for alternate side parking on several others—for those who might not have attended the special Hunters Point meeting in January or the Community Board 2 meeting earlier this month.
The logo for the LIC/Astoria chamber had been the subject of a contest that came down to a vote on the final entries by the executive committee and the full board. Both were emphatic about the winning entry, an avian figure that hovers above the typeface spelling out the chamber’s name. Chamber President Arthur Rosenfield said he was eager to get it in circulation, so it could become familiar throughout Queens. He introduced the winner, Marvin Berk, creative director of Westgroup Creative in Hunters Point. Berk said he had a phoenix in mind when he designed the logo, though perhaps it is one that rises not from ashes but from the briny dampness of Superstorm Sandy. Rosenfield gave him a letter of commendation from Renos Kourtides of Alma Bank, sponsor of the contest, with award of $500 to follow.
Melinda Katz, one of the candidates to succeed Helen Marshall as Queens borough president, was elected to the City Council in 2001, from her district in Forest Hills, where she grew up and still lives. She became chairwoman of the Land Use Committee and held that post until leaving the council in 2009 to run for comptroller. Having lost the primary election, she entered private law practice.
She told the meeting, “I’m a proud product of the New York City public schools,” including Hillcrest H.S. After the University of Massachusetts and St. John’s Law School and a period at Weil, Gotshal Manges, she ran for, and was elected to, the state Assembly in 1993, at the age of 28. In 1998, she ran unsuccessfully in a primary to choose a candidate for U.S. representative, but soon became an assistant to Borough President Claire Shulman, whom she praised highly as a political mentor, saying she trained her to be director of the borough’s community boards. She left in 2001 to seek and win the city council seat in the 30th district.
During her time as head of the land use committee, places like Red Hook in Brooklyn and Willets Point in Queens were rezoned for transformation. She said her experience on the council can be used in the borough president’s office, on such matters as the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, or ULURP. She said a borough president must “opine” and add suggestions to a conversation on development (or, if the BP is Marty Markowitz of Brooklyn, she said, he must “know how to knock heads”, should it come to that). When asked about Superstorm Sandy, she said that the paramount consideration is the protection of people, now and in the future. Though she praised the creation of Queens West and Hunters Point South, and Long Island City development in general, she said that they were built unmindful of “hundred year storms that happen three times a decade” these days. Thus we have to repair flaws “that we helped create”. She hopes that when she campaigns as an expert on land use in the borough, voters will be impressed.
She said that her several opponents (including other Councilmembers Peter Vallone Jr. and Leroy Comrie, and her successor as head of the Land Use Committee and state Senator José Peralta) are friends of hers, so a harsh and bitter campaign is not expected. She simply advises voters: “Look to see what they have done” as they ask for your vote. Obviously, she believes that what she has done puts her at the head of the pack.
Matt Wallace, representing Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer, began his review of the Hunters Point meetings of this month and last by saying that 5th Street from 46th to 50th Avenues will soon be one way, the chief purpose of that change being reduction of the traffic hazard for local schoolchildren. The announcement drew applause from Berk, the logo designer and a neighborhood resident. Wallace also spoke of the text amendment by the Department of City Planning that should allow more sidewalk cafés in the area by the time warmer weather comes this year. As for the contentious issue of alternate side parking, there are currently petitions circulating, in favor of, and opposed to it, so resolution is indefinite.
Rosenfield announced there would be a community symposium February 28 from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. at Court Square Place, 24-01 44th Road, 16th floor conference room. It is entitled, “Place Making: Economic Development Strategies and Social Enterprise”. It will feature panelists from politics and business, among them the returning Katz; Peter Vallone Sr., speaker of the city council, 1986-2001; David J. Wilk of Sperry Van Ness real estate; Martin Cottingham, of Avison Young real estate and Lindsay J. Thompson of Carey Business School, Johns Hopkins University. Keynote speaker is John Catsimatidis, businessman and candidate for this year’s mayoral nomination on the Republican line. Further information about the symposium is available from Rosenfield at [email protected] or 646-920-4652.
