Disgraced former state Sen. Carl Kruger slammed a city offi cial over a
proposed area rezoning. Associated Press / Louis Lanzano
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BY CHANDLER KIDD
Disgraced former state Sen. Carl
Kruger chewed out a rep from
the Department of City Planning
at a community meeting in
Bergen Beach on June 19.
The corrupt one-time pol
ripped into the agency’s hapless
messenger as she attempted to
brief area residents on a proposed
area rezoning, which
would require all new and some
existing buildings be raised off
the ground to accommodate
new federal fl ood standards.
And, while locals aren’t
thrilled by the prospect of lifting
their properties 12 feet
above the street, the idea of a
convicted felon excoriating a
civil servant for doing her job
didn’t sit right with some community
members.
“People were receptive to the
idea behind his message, but
not receptive of him,” said Rohan
Dewar, a member of Community
Board 18. “They knew
his background and weren’t too
happy with what he had done. I
never got the feeling he was the
champion for the people, I got
that he was stumping.”
The city is proposing a rezoning
of coastal areas within
Community Board 18 — including
Marine Park, Mill Basin,
Canarsie, Bergen Beach, and
Gerritsen Beach — in order to
accommodate new federal fl ood
maps, which are being revised
as a direct result of the devastating
tidal surges that inundated
southern Brooklyn during
Hurricane Sandy in 2012.
In addition to codifying the
temporary zoning changes
made in the wake of the deadly
super storm — such as granting
developers additional height allowances
to accommodate the
installation of rooftop mechanical
equipment — the proposed
rezoning would require all new
construction be raised as much
as 12 feet off the ground to comply
with the new federal guidelines.
The owners of existing buildings
undergoing renovations
valued at 50 percent or more of
the existing structure’s market
value would be required to
raise their properties as well.
During the meeting, Kruger
— who was sentenced to seven
years in prison for accepting
bribes from local businesses in
exchange for political favors as
part of a classic quid-pro-quo
corruption scheme — railed at
the City Planning rep, shouting
that area seniors would have
diffi culty reaching their own
front doors as a result of the
new height requirement, and
that the city should instead focus
on building sea walls to prevent
future fl ooding.
But the idea that the city
can simply build a sea gate capable
of protecting all southern
Brooklyn is a fantasy, according
to an expert on the resiliency
crisis, who said the city
simply doesn’t have the funding
to accomplish the colossal engineering
feet.
“Building a wall against the
north Atlantic is not going to
work,” said Elizabeth Malone,
a resiliency expert at the nonprofi
t group National Housing
Services Brooklyn, which hosts
workshops to educate Brooklynites
on fl ood insurance and
home resiliency.
The real issue facing local
Felon rails at
city fl ood rep
property owners, according to
Malone, is the huge cost associated
with raising hundreds of
multi-family dwellings, many
of which date back to the 1930s,
located within the new federal
fl ood zones, or else face astronomical
premiums on federal
fl ood insurance, which can top
more than $10,000 per year.
And unless something is
done to mitigate the costs for
middle-income families to raise
their homes, Malone predicted
southern Brooklyn neighborhoods
would devolve into ghost
towns, with residents fl eeing
the harsh new realities imposed
as a result of the 2012 super
storm.
“The worst case scenario is
going belly-up — they are going
to abandon and walk away,” Malone
said, “which is sad because
there is no place like home.”
The felon’s tirade follows
threatening remarks he allegedly
made to a small-business
owner after she requested the
community’s blessing to expand
her event’s business following
a meeting in April.
“After the meeting, Carl
Kruger told us it was never going
to happen, and not to waste
my time.
“He was kind of threatening
us,” Khadidra Muhammad,
owner of Priceless Event Planning,
told this paper in April.
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