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8 THE QUEENS COURIER • MARCH 7, 2019 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT WWW.QNS.COM LIC biz owners petition & plead to revive Amazon plan BY BILL PARRY bparry@schnepsmedia.com @QNS Gianna Cerbone threw herself into the eff ort to pave the way for Amazon to become part of the only neighborhood Photo courtesy of Rob Basch $99 $99 $99 $99 DESIGNER FRAMES PLUS FREE 2ND PAIR Frames & Lenses Offer ends 3/31/19 ��brand clear sphericalLenses/*Contact lens fitting additional. Not valid for Toric lenses. Not valid with Some restrictions apply, see store for details. Offer ends 3/31/19 Select frames with clear plastic, single vision lensas vision plans or packages. Must present prior to purchase. see store for details Offer ends 3/31/19 ST. PATTY'S DAY SALES With the purchase of glasses, contact lens e l. 2 Boxes of Lenses Encore Premium Brand $100 OFF * $200 minimum purchase on first pair of designer frames. Second pair frame from select group with vision plans or packages. Offer ends 3/31/19 No-Line Bifocals Lenses with Metal Frame * $200 minimum purchase on first pair of designer frames. Second pair frame from select group with vision plans or packages. Offer ends 3/31/19 she’s ever known, even if it cost her some regular customers at her Vernon Boulevard restaurant, Manducatis Rustica, in Long Island City. The 51-year-old served on the Community Advisory Committee and hosted several get-togethers between small business owners and Amazon executives knowing their enormous HQ2 campus would serve as an anchor for the community. Th at’s why she was shocked, devastated, upset and disappointed when the e-commerce giant walked away from the deal on Valentine’s Day — and now fi ghting to get Amazon to revive its plans for Queens. “I’ve invested my entire life in this neighborhood and I know this is exactly what the community needs and the economic impact would be enormous, not just for us but all of Queens,” Cerbone said. “Everyone is using the wrong verbiage, and it’s costing us 25,000 jobs and $28 billion in new tax revenues that could fi x the infrastructure here.” Th at is why Cerbone was proud to sign her name along with many of her neighbors and community leaders on an open letter to Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos published in Th e New York Times on March 1 urging him “to reconsider, so that we can move forward together.” Eric Benaim, the co-founder and CEO of Modern Spaces, modifi ed an online petition he started two weeks ago to show support for Amazon’s HQ2, with the open letter to Bezos, which he also signed. Th e petition on Change.org is closing in on 5,000 signatures. “I think we have a 5 to 10 percent chance to bring them back,” Benaim said. “I’ve been working for two weeks to bring them back and you never say never. Businesspeople always walk away from the table, and sometimes they come back.” Several of the LIC residents that signed the letter have expressed disappointment with state Senator Michael Gianaris and Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer for being fi erce opponents of the deal and causing Amazon’s retreat. “When we expect our leaders to do the right thing they go and do just the opposite,” Hunters Point Community Development Corporation President Mark Christie said. “In doing so, they seem to forget the silent majority.” Th at sentiment was seconded by Queens Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Th omas Grech, who also signed the letter, blaming the grass-roots organizations such as Make the Road New York, New York Communities for Change and Queens Neighborhoods United for protesting the Amazon deal during City Council hearings. “To think a small band of loud and short-sighted people can shout down the silent majority,” Grech said. “Since Feb. 15, myself and a large number business and community leaders have banded together to push back against vitriol and instead push and cajole the governor to do everything he can to get Amazon back to the table.” Governor Cuomo has place numerous phone calls to Bezos and other Amazon executives in the hopes of doing just that. And then he added, “We should never chase 25,000 jobs out of our city and our county.” File photo Eric Benaim is once again circulating a petition to revive the Amazon HQ2 project in Long Island City. LIC community leader laments loss of Amazon due to misinformation BY BILL PARRY bparry@schnepsmedia.com @QNS When weekend service on the 7 train was suspended recently, Rob Basch rode a Citi Bike across the Queensboro Bridge on his way home to Long Island City. As he cruised down Vernon Boulevard toward 44th Road, the president of the Hunters Point Parks Conservancy began to get angry. “I just saw how desolate this area of the neighborhood is with nobody around and I thought, ‘Th is is what it’s going to be like here without the Amazon HQ2 campus for at least the next three to fi ve years,’” Basch said. “No complex full of workers, no 600- seat school, no $27 billion in tax revenue to fi x our infrastructure, especially the 7 train.” Basch had spent a lot of time and energy supporting Amazon’s planned move to his neighborhood serving as a co-chair of the Neighborhood Infrastructure Subcommittee on the Community Advisory Committee. “We had a meeting the very morning Amazon announced they were walking away from the project,” Basch said. “It took everyone by surprise, including their own executives.” Basch said he was disappointed by the decision, but also by the way the rollout was handled by the state and the city back in November. “Th e announcement got off to a bad start and generated many misconceptions which unfortunately were never corrected,” Basch said. “Had the facts been more prominently communicated, the outcome could have been diff erent. Instead, the negative comment won the day.” Basch blamed the neighborhood’s representatives for promoting the biggest misconception, that “we are giving 3 billion dollars to the richest man in the world when our mass transit is failing, NYCHA is in disrepair and we need these funds for numerous city services.” He said that money was based on jobs being created and calculated in lieu of taxes paid out over 10-plus years and that the majority of those tax incentives were already passed as law and the city and state need them to remain competitive with other municipalities. “As a resident of LIC I’m anxious to see if we will now be getting the $3 billion to spend on our infrastructure, mass transit, schools, parks, public housing and their needed upgrades that is not going to Amazon,” Basch said. “I will not be holding my breath.” Read more at QNS.com. in Queens /Change.org link /WWW.QNS.COM link /QNS.com link link