Published: February 12, 2009

It appears that Fordham intends to proceed with the proposed Master plan despite widespread community opposition to the expansion. After the community board’s unanimous rejection of the proposal, the university wrote to students and faculty urging them to alert city officials of their support for the plan as it stands.

On Jan. 21, Community Board 7 (CB7), representing the seventh District of Manhattan, voted against approving Fordham’s proposed Master Plan 31-0, reflecting the dissatisfaction with the proposed plan that has been growing in the community for over three years.

“City Planning and the [City] Council have the authority to approve or not approve [the plans], ultimately,” said Rev. Joseph M. McShane, S.J., president of Fordham. CB7, however, is only an advisory committee—meaning it does not have ultimate power to veto the plan.

“[CB7’s] vote was, for us, a disappointment, because we have been in close dialogue and close conversation with the community board for several years now, and we have been quite responsive to a number of their concerns and requests,” he said. McShane noted that Fordham is “disappointed” at the community’s vote, “but not despairing, and certainly not put off in the great task of the challenge of getting it through.”

Fordham responded to the vote by sending a university-wide email stating, “It is urgent that you email [Manhattan] Borough President [Scott] Stringer immediately and urge him to support the Fordham plan.” The email, signed by McShane, gives students and faculty four bullet points with which they can use to argue the plan to Stringer. “Your efforts will be important in convincing the elected officials to make the right decision,” the letter states.

In addition to the letter, the administration plans to ask students to help man tables in Lowenstein to hand out postcards which can be signed and mailed to Stringer to encourage him to approve the Master Plan, said Keith Eldredge, dean of students at Fordham College at Lincoln Center (FCLC).

“[The student support] will stand as a voice to counter voices outside that are against [the expansion plan],” he said.

According to Eldredge, the school is trying to get the plan passed as it stands despite the lack of community support, and will negotiate if they are unable to accomplish this.

“I personally disagree with some of the concerns expressed by CB7,” he said. “And I think that some of the people in the community are not recognizing the positives and benefits that the expansion will bring to the community as a whole.” This sentiment was echoed in McShane’s email, which said that “Fordham is a good neighbor,” citing the free legal clinics provided by the law school and the professional services students of the School of Social Service provide to the community.

Supplementary to the CB7 vote, eight residential buildings around FCLC have joined together in opposition to form the Fordham Neighbors United (FNU). Michael Groll is a member of the FNU and spoke on behalf of the organization.

“We are not against Fordham developing the property,” Groll said. “We are against overdevelopment that will significantly impact the local infrastructure and have a negative impact on the overall quality of life.”

According to Groll, the size, bulk and density of the proposed project “far exceeds what is appropriate or even viable for this area,” and he cited increased traffic, overflowing schools and the sale of property meant for educational purposes to private developers as grievances. “[Fordham’s non-compliance with the desires of the community] is unconscionable,” he said and called the plan as it stands “a slap in the face to the community.”

Sidney Goldfischer, president of the Board of Managers at one of the member buildings of the FNU, the Alfred Condominium, located on 61st Street east of Amsterdam, said that Fordham initially presented the plan to locals at an open community board meeting in early 2005.

“[In 2005,] they basically said, ‘This is the university’s property, and we will build what we want, when we want and where we want.’ It was not a discussion; it was a lecture.” Goldfischer said that the community pressed to meet with McShane, but this request was not granted until February 2008. According to Goldfischer, McShane was very “gracious” at the meeting and listened to the concerns the community presented, but there was no follow-up conversation after that meeting.

CB7’s resolution in response to the Jan. 21 vote included this same complaint; it stated that after the 2005 meeting, the Board “alerted both Fordham and the Chair of the Planning Commission of a multitude of objections to the then proposed Master Plan… Despite [their] comments and innumerable meetings with Fordham, only cosmetic changes were made in the plan prior to its certification in November 2008.”

Goldfischer cited architect Robert Moses’s original plan for the school in 1956, which called for low buildings that would be linked with Lincoln Center “programmatically and aesthetically.” He said that what Fordham is now proposing is “totally out of sync with that concept.”

According to Helen Rosenthal, chairperson of CB7, the two biggest concerns that CB7 have are the size of the proposed buildings, including their “fortress-like” characteristics, and the fact that most of the buildings have not been fully designed as of yet. Rosenthal said that there are preliminary designs for “one or two” of the buildings, but the rest will not be solidified for years.

“We don’t know whether or not these buildings will conform to the rest of the community or if they will be totally out of place,” he said.

McShane argued against the claim that the proposed plan will make FCLC “fortress-like.”

He said, “There will be ongoing access to the gardens in the center of the campus, which we have always made available to the community, and there will be grand entrances to it, unlike the hidden entrances which we now have.” He said that the proposed staircases leading up to the garden would make it more accessible than it currently is.

Prior to McShane’s letter, Thomas Dunne, vice president for government relations and urban affairs at Fordham, released a statement that said that Fordham hopes to continue negotiations with city officials. Dunne said that the university is “hopeful that Fordham, the community and city officials will reach a resolution that satisfies the needs of the university and wider
community.”