Editorial Calls for the Gentrification of East New York

A Crain's editorial that sums up its proposed housing policy thusly: "Instead of relocating poor people to wealthy neighborhoods, attract wealthier people to poor ones." Noting that such a strategy is typically understood as gentrification, the op-ed points to other parts of the city as examples where such a process has been occurring naturally. The difference in the case study examined by the op-ed: "The de Blasio administration now hopes to jump-start this phenomenon in East New York, a forlorn area at the far end of Brooklyn that has missed out on the borough’s renaissance. On Sept. 21, the Department of City Planning will start a seven-month public review of its proposal to allow more housing in the low-scale, semi-industrial neighborhood." The op-ed is clear in its support of the policy—for East New York as well as other underachieving neighborhoods around the city.

Andrew J. Hawkins followed up by reporting on the responses provoked by the editorial, surveying soundbites from researchers, land use consultants, and anonymous Internet commenters. For instance, David Madden, as assistant professor of sociology at the London School of Economics and Political Science, tweeted that the op-ed was "All of the illusions and omissions of liberal urbanism distilled into one editorial."