Preservation advocacy... in NYC!

The Historic Districts Council in NYC has added a blog to their web presence. While looking at it, I discovered that all is not well with the state of preservation in NYC (I knew some of this; in certain respects, DC's laws regarding preservation are stronger, and the City Council cannot overturn landmark decisions, although decisions can be appealed to the Mayor's Agent, which functions as a court of appeals for the historic preservation process in the city).

To push forward preservation in NYC (in a realm of massive developer projects, money, and scale--which makes the Growth Machine in DC look like pikers) a group has come together to create the Citizens Emergency Committee to Preserve Preservation. According to their website, the campaign was created:

to focus attention on our city’s landmark emergency and to implement a campaign to aggressively reform the city's broken landmarks process. Over the next year or two, we intend to:

* Ensure Fairness: The City's Landmark's Preservation Commission (LPC), the agency charged with designating and regulating the city's landmarks, needs new procedures to improve openness and responsiveness to the public. No more deals behind closed doors!

* Reestablish Commission Independence: Landmarks Commissioners, who are appointed by the Mayor, should be properly qualified when they are chosen for the job. Once appointed, they should be free to make the decisions that they think are right.

* Secure Appropriate Resources: The LPC needs more staff and funding to meet the mandates spelled out in the city's Landmarks Law.

SaveLPC.org is one of the tools we inted to use to bring attention to the city's growing landmarks emergency. What you are reading right now is our official blog. Stop by every day to read the latest on our campaign and to learn more about landmark concerns in all five boroughs.

They are doing fundraising and organized a preservation policy summit as well. In DC, we definitely have the same kind of funding and staffing problem. Fortunately, the process for designating a building, site, or district is open and transparent. And unlike a lot of laws from other communities, it doesn't require owner consent.

Index Keywords: historic-preservation