City Delays Garment District Rezoning

SUNSET PARK, BROOKLYN — In the wake of a new slate of recommendations made the by Garment District Steering Committee, the city has decided to delay its rezoning of the Garment District.

The Garment District Steering Committee — composed of local elected officials and Garment District stakeholders — released its final report last week, which contained 13 recommendations for the city.

The committee's main recommendation: Manufacturing zoning protections in the Garment District should not be removed or replaced until the city can guarantee that manufacturing space in or near the district will be preserved in the long term.

The proposed rezoning, critics said, would have cause a mass exodus from the historic district and into places such as Sunset Park, where the city is pushing for manufacturers at its "Made In NY" campus.

"Virtually every garment industry-connected Steering Committee member understands that we can’t scrap our last defense against commercial conversions until we’ve preserved a reasonable minimum amount of space to keep this industry successful," Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, who created the committee, said in a statement.

Brewer said in a statement that "a large majority" of steering committee members favor a "phase-in" of the city's favored zoning changes tied to the preservation of a set amount of space for garment manufacturing through "purchase or long-term leases."

The "phase-in" provision was not popular among some of the Garment District's business leaders, the Real Deal reported.

"This was an item that not only did not have consensus," Barbara Blair, president of the Garment District Alliance, told the Real Deal. "But the difference of the positions was also significant."

The city's Economic Development Corporation had initially proposed removing a special zoning district in the Garment District that requires certain protections for garment manufacturing use. The lifting of restrictions protecting manufacturing in the Garment District was proposed by the EDC in order to build garment hubs around the city — such as the "Made in New York" manufacturing campus in Sunset Park.

The city EDC had previously told officials that the public review of the Garment District rezoning would begin April 3, but that date was pushed back. The plan was once again delayed as of last week's steering committee recommendations.

A recent survey conducted by The Municipal Art Society found that garment manufacturers are not in favor of moving business to Sunset Park.

The Garment District — a special-purpose zoning district covering several blocks from West 35th to West 40th streets located west of Broadway — was originally created to protect New York City's status as a leader in the fashion industry.

Photo by Mike Licht via Flickr/Creative Commons

Story by Brendan Krisel, Patch Staff