{"id":132705,"date":"2020-12-14T03:01:08","date_gmt":"2020-12-14T00:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/en.buradabiliyorum.com\/queens-biz-owners-haunted-by-amazon-loss-amid-pandemic\/"},"modified":"2020-12-14T03:01:08","modified_gmt":"2020-12-14T00:01:08","slug":"queens-biz-owners-haunted-by-amazon-loss-amid-pandemic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/queens-biz-owners-haunted-by-amazon-loss-amid-pandemic\/","title":{"rendered":"#Queens biz owners haunted by Amazon loss amid pandemic"},"content":{"rendered":"

“#Queens biz owners haunted by Amazon loss amid pandemic<\/strong>”
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In Long Island City, it\u2019s the scar that won\u2019t heal.<\/p>\n

Two years after Amazon pulled out from a proposal to build a massive headquarters along the Queens waterfront, the site is a vacant eyesore \u2014 and, to many locals, the squandered economic opportunity is even more painful amid the coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe site just sits there empty. It\u2019s terrible,\u201d said Donna Driver, owner of the Matted LIC art gallery and gift store. \u201cWe\u2019re in the middle of a pandemic. People say, \u2018If we only had Amazon.\u2019 We got nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The world\u2019s largest e-tailer abruptly cancelled its projected 25,000 job-producing campus after being taken aback by ferocious opposition from the local pols \u2014 including democratic social<\/a>ist Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and state Sen. Mike Gianaris.<\/p>\n

Nearly two years later, the massive site remains a desolate reminder of wasted potential, while COVID-19 has ravaged the city\u2019s economy, including the LIC-Western Queens area that would have benefitted from the influx of potential customers into the area.<\/p>\n

Seething LIC merchants and residents grapp<\/a>ling to survive during the pandemic told The Post the loss of Amazon haunts the community even more now.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really crazy what\u2019s going on. The city has no solutions. We have a do-nothing mayor,\u201d fumed Eric Benaim, CEO of Modern Spaces realty, who resides in the neighborhood and whose office is near the fallow site.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m watching AOC selling \u2018tax the rich T-shirts\u2019 for $58 while businesses are leaving New York. That\u2019s AOC\u2019s solution. Who is going to pay $58 for a T-shirt when you\u2019re out of a job?\u201d Benaim said.<\/p>\n

An alternative project called \u201cYour LIC\u201d that included residential-commercial towers at the site was also recently shot down amid not-in-my-backyard opposition and lack of support from City Hall. The plan claimed it would create 26,000 jobs, open space and cultural amenities.<\/p>\n

The Your LIC consortium included manufacturer Plaxall, the major property owner on the waterfront site along with the City of New York. <\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t to be.<\/p>\n

\u201cTheir plans weren\u2019t going to offer enough benefits to the community, and we\u2019re not going to let private developers ignore their obligations to New Yorkers,\u201d said Mitchell Schwartz, a spokesman for Mayor Bill de Blasio.<\/p>\n

Driver directed her fury at the local pols for letting down the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cAOC, Giannaris, Van Bramer [local councilman Jimmy] \u2014 wake up!\u201d she said. \u201cPeople are leaving. Businesses are closing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gianna Cerbone, owner of Manducatis Rustica restaurant, whose family has deep roots in LIC, said \u201cdelusional\u201d Democratic Socialists and anti-gentrifiers have hijacked Western Queens \u2014 and not for the better.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m angry at the stupidity. Everybody fears AOC, who has no idea what she\u2019s doing. Opposing Amazon benefitted other communities. Imagine if AOC did something positive with her big mouth,\u201d Cerbone said.<\/p>\n

She said Sen. Gianaris, whom she\u2019s known for years, was the most surprising betrayal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI believed in Gianaris. Mike believed in the community until he went so far up AOC\u2019s ass she couldn\u2019t s\u2013t him out,\u201d the salty restaurateur said.<\/p>\n

Bishop Mitchell Taylor, pastor of the Center of Hope International Church near the Queensbridge Houses, said the Amazon debacle followed by the pandemic is a double whammy to LIC\u2019s poorest residents.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s like we\u2019re living in the 1970s. Things are worse for poor people now,\u201d Rev. Taylor said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Amazon project provided a ray of hope to a lot of people. We didn\u2019t want a handout. The largest public housing project in the country wanted the opportunity to do business with the largest retailer in the country,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The head of the neighborhood\u2019s business group said it\u2019s time to develop the waterfront site.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing out of COVID-19, it\u2019s going to be more important than ever to activate this area to help the surrounding community. Because of the scale, you could really create significant new opportunities for jobs, housing, culture and open space, and link the whole Western Queens waterfront, bringing all of our neighbors closer together as a community,\u201d said Elizabeth Lusskin, president of the Long Island City Partnership.<\/p>\n

The biggest complaints about the Amazon project among critics was that it was hatched in secret with Gov. Andrew Cuomo and de Blasio, that it offered $3 billion in tax breaks and other subsidies to the wealthiest company on the planet while claiming the campus would have priced people out of the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

Gianaris, the state Senate deputy majority who used his power in Albany to help scuttle the Amazon deal in his district, and Ocasio-Cortez \u2014 who New Yorkers said outmaneuvered Cuomo \u2014 stood by their opposition.<\/p>\n

Gianaris said he\u2019s been vindicated \u2014 alluding to Amazon leasing space in Hudson Yards and acquiring the Lord & Taylor building in midtowns to create city jobs \u2014 after withdrawing its planned headquarters in LIC.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the last two years, Amazon has already added and announced more white collar jobs in New York City than were called for in the HQ2 plan, all without massive public subsidy,\u201d the senator said.<\/p>\n

He also claimed there are \u201cseveral good proposals\u201d being discussed for the waterfront site that the city should consider, including the shelved Your LIC plan.<\/p>\n

AOC spokeswoman Lauren Hitt said, \u201cBoth our primary and general<\/a> election challengers ran multi-million campaigns largely on this issue, in the middle of the pandemic, and both lost decisively.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Amazon project \u201cwould have given [residents] their hard-earned tax dollars to one of the wealthiest men in the world, in exchange for a campus that made no promises about hiring local residents or contracting with local businesses,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

The congresswoman also claimed housing costs have increased in the D.C. area where Amazon located a new campus and slammed the company\u2019s labor and safety recording during the pandemic.<\/p>\n

The aborted Amazon remains a divisive issue \u2014 even among merchants in the LIC neighborhood. Not all were on board with the project.<\/p>\n

Shawn Dixon, owner of Otis & Finn barbershop on 44th Road near the waterfront site, said he opposed the Amazon project because he leases his space and feared getting priced out when his lease was up for renewal.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe could have had the double whammy of COVID and market speculation,\u201d Dixon said.<\/p>\n

The barber also said infrastructure improvements haven\u2019t kept pace with development in LIC and asserted that issue wasn\u2019t adequately addressed in the Amazon plan.<\/p>\n

Dixon had his own idea: \u201cWhy doesn\u2019t Gov. Cuomo offer merchants a tax holiday to get through the winter?\u201d\n <\/p><\/div>\n

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Source<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“#Queens biz owners haunted by Amazon loss amid pandemic” In Long Island City, it\u2019s the scar that won\u2019t heal. Two years after Amazon pulled out from a proposal to build a massive headquarters along the Queens waterfront, the site is a vacant eyesore \u2014 and, to many locals, the squandered economic opportunity is even more…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":132706,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/nypost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2020\/12\/121120_Amazon_site_LIC_1A.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[70897],"tags":[83622,4997,2758,70344,76010,11247],"class_list":["post-132705","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-12-13-20","tag-alexandria-ocasio-cortez","tag-amazon","tag-coronavirus-in-ny","tag-long-island-city","tag-queens"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132705","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132705"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132705\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132706"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132705"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132705"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/buradabiliyorum.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132705"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}