Contact: Jo Anne Simon – 917.685.3747; Gib Veconi – 917.881.0401

BROOKLYN, NY, November 29, 2010: On Wednesday, November 24, several BrooklynSpeaks sponsor organizations filed a motion with New York State Supreme Court seeking to halt construction activities at the Atlantic Yards site. The motion comes after a November 9 decision from Justice Marcy Friedman finding that the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) lacked a rational basis for assuming that Atlantic Yards project would be completed in ten years when the agency approved the project’s 2009 Modified General Project Plan (MGPP). Justice Friedman ordered the ESDC to reconsider the need for a supplemental environmental impact statement based on the schedule provisions of the Development Agreement between ESDC and Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC). That Agreement was made public only after a January 2010 court hearing during which the ESDC misrepresented its ability under the Development Agreement to ensure Atlantic Yards would be completed within ten years.

Contact: Jo Anne Simon – 917.685.3747; Gib Veconi – 917.881.0401

BROOKLYN, NY, November 9, 2010: Today, New York State Supreme Court Justice Marcy Friedman found that the Empire State Development Corporation (ESDC) unreasonably failed to properly assess the impacts of twenty-five years of extended construction at the Atlantic Yards site in Brooklyn. Judge Friedman’s ruling was entered following a motion by BrooklynSpeaks petitioners to reargue an earlier decision by the Court in favor of ESDC and Forest City Ratner Companies (FCRC). The BrooklynSpeaks petitioners asked Judge Friedman to review the Development Agreements executed subsequent to the ESDC’s approval of the Modified General Project Plan but which were withheld from public disclosure until after oral argument on the petitioners' original motion.

Yesterday, Forest City Ratner Companies CEO Bruce Ratner acknowledged that Atlantic Yards won’t be built in ten years. Speaking to reporters at a presentation of the design for the “interim” plaza replacing the planned “Urban Room” in the project, Mr. Ratner said of the ten-year construction schedule promised and consistently confirmed by his company since the original unveiling of Atlantic Yards in 2003, “It was never supposed to be the time we were supposed to build them in.” Instead, he said, “It's really market-dependent as to when it will really be completed.”