Elizabeth Street Garden served eviction notice by NYC officials. Advocates still plan to fight to stay open
NEW YORK — The Elizabeth Street Garden in New York City's Little Italy has been served an eviction notice by the city Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD).
The city says the nonprofit who runs the garden has two weeks to vacate the property. The city's plan for the property is to build 123 units of affordable housing for seniors, with 40% of the units going to people who have experienced homelessness and are coming out of shelters.
More than 400,000 letters, including one from actor Robert De Niro, have been sent to city officials asking to save the garden.
Advocates call on NYC to preserve Elizabeth Street Garden
The gates plan to close for good on Oct. 17, but those who cherish the garden still have hope.
"It's just peaceful and amazing. You just want to spend some time here," one visitor said.
"It's terrible. It's terrible. It's a garden for New York. It shouldn't be taken away," another person said.
"They have an opportunity to really build affordable housing in this district and use spaces that would otherwise be market rate housing and preserve Elizabeth Street Garden," said Joseph Reiver, executive director of the Elizabeth Street Garden.
City officials say space is needed for affordable housing
City officials say they need all the space they can get and the lot belongs to them.
"It's going to help populations that are having a tough and difficult time dealing with housing access and affordability in a city where we have a vacancy rate of 1.4 percent," said Ahmed Tigani, with the HPD.
He added, "The housing crisis is so deep and so severe that we can't just not build one place and go somewhere else. We have to look at all the spaces."
The city says the lot is 20,000 square feet, and 140,000 of it will still be green space, but some say that's not enough.
"We need every square footage of green space that we can get because it protects against the affects of climate change," one person said.
"We're not done fighting. There's 14 days. We have expected this. We were hopeful that the mayor would consider these private site proposals that we put before him," Reiver said.
