Our presentation to the Public Design Commission.

Yesterday, the Public Design Commission of New York City met to consider the proposed plan for altering Riverside and Fort Washington Parks that the New York City Parks Department has been trying to push forward for some time now. As previously reported, they do not have the funds to go ahead with all aspects of the plan at this time, but it remains an aspiration to implement the entire plan, even if they can only manage small parts of it now. Having had the entire plan approved by Community Board 12, they still need approval from the PDC, which is primarily concerned with the potential aesthetic impacts of changes made to public places. The PDC voted to approve the plan as presented yesterday, but a more detailed presentation must still be made to them before the Parks Department can move forward. The PDC can, if it wishes, make its final approval contingent on changes being made to the plan.

These meetings are open to the public, but only brief statements may be made by concerned individual citizens, or groups. The following presentation was made on behalf of Friends of Fort Washington Park.

To members of the Public Design Commission:

Regarding the plan for a new asphalt path running north between the 158th Street entrance ramp and the three athletic fields:

While most of the asphalt ribbon that runs through Ft. Washington Park is adjacent to the riprap, traveling north along the path, one is confronted at 158th Street with a large expanse of green lawn between the path and the river. The immenseness of this field of green next to the blue hue of the water is as visually striking during the summer, as it is when the field is brown against the green water of the spring and as it is when the field is covered with an unsullied white blanket of snow juxtaposed to the steely white-capped winter water. The impact of this site is especially high among residents of the immediate neighborhood who would otherwise have to travel to another part of the city to see such an expanse, or visit a museum to look at a Mark Rothko or Barnett Newman painting and imagine the inspiration. The bisection and compartmentalization of this field in the plan, even with a net gain of green square footage, deadens the impact of this space.

For those who stroll or jog across the field just to feel earth instead of the city's usual concrete and asphalt beneath their feet or to escape the onslaught of bicycles and vehicles, the experiential aesthetic will be reduced to traveling along a highway divider. For the children playing in a freeing and seemingly endless space, the current plan introduces too many picnic table obstacles and too much vehicular traffic along newly dangerous boundaries. These additional constant safety considerations that must be kept in mind changes the state of mind with which one experiences the park.

Much of the same can be said regarding the plan for a new path along the west side of the athletic fields. With its expansive views of the Hudson River and the George Washington Bridge, even in the dead cold of winter under bare trees, a first visit by a Community Board 12 officer inspired her to agree that it was "arguably the most beautiful spot in the park." The construction of a roadway and the introduction of vehicular traffic in this particular location, known for its quiet beauty and seeming isolation is unnecessary, and would be shameful.

Finally, regarding the plan for paving the path running south along the river from the Dykman Street Marina: Ian Frazier boasted in Outdoor Magazine's Great Cities Series that "you can find uncrowded, quiet, remote-seeming landscapes within sight of the skyscrapers. For example, the strip of Hudson River shoreline below the George Washington Bridge...Any city that endures accommodates, somehow or other, the vaster world outdoors. New York City makes you feel you could be anyplace before the sun goes down." While this path does need renovation and improved access, asphalt and concrete are not appropriate materials. ADA compliant materials that will maintain the natural aesthetic of this area exist and are in use in privately-maintained public parks in Manhattan. Although aesthetic appreciation always takes a little time and is often subjective, the desire to maintain a natural aesthetic is timeless and was the number one desire of park users surveyed by Partnership for Parks in addition to being attested to by over 1200 park adjacent neighbors who submitted a petition stating as much to CB12.

Thank you.

Another bend in the road.

It's been a tough month for FFWP--apologies for the lack of updates, but we've been catching our breaths since the General Meeting on April 28th--where, as expected, Community Board 12 voted decisively to approve the Parks Department's proposed changes to Fort Washington Park, excessive paving and all.

We did our best to speak out against the more damaging elements of the plan, but were hamstrung by a baffling decision to limit comments from concerned members of the community to two minutes each--the normal limit is three minutes. At a typical cb12 general meeting, the charmingly addled gentleman who stands up and introduces himself as the Rightful Mayor of New York gets three minutes. We got two minutes apiece, and even with some people graciously ceding their minutes to those of us who had prepared presentations to make, there simply was not enough time to make our arguments--and money would have talked louder, in any event.

One community board member, in a fit of hyperbole, spoke of sixty million dollars being spent in our community--the total budget for the entire parks improvement project was slightly less than forty million dollars, much of which was earmarked for Upper Riverside Park (which isn't in Community Board 12), and I'm curious as to why anyone would assume all or even most of that money would be spent inside our community. Some, certainly.

But whatever our share of the pie would be, the pie itself just got a lot smaller.

We have just recently learned that funding for the PlaNYC improvements to Upper Riverside and Fort Washington Parks has been cut--drastically cut. It's not hard to guess why, if you've been following the financial news lately. The city is badly strapped for cash, and it's been baffling to many why Mayor Bloomberg would be spending millions on optional (and sometimes controversial) changes to our parks when the Parks Department as a whole is seeing major budget cuts, not to mention the severe budgetary shortfalls afflicting mass transit, education, policing, etc.

This is not to say nothing should be planned or built during a time of financial crisis, and you could make a case that continuing with the planned reconstruction of the parks could fall under the broad heading of economic stimulus--but don't subways, schools, and safety come first?

Faced with ever-tightening options, the city has opted to withdraw much of the funding for this particular aspect of PlaNYC. We do not know by how much--specifics are still hazy. A little information was provided at this past Tuesday's meeting of the cb12 Parks & Cultural Affairs Committee--which I will mention as an aside could have been a little better publicized--in the sense that it wasn't publicized at all. But never mind that now.

Liz Ritter, chair of that committee, was as much in the dark as anyone else as to what was happening, and asked Daniel Mercado (the only parks employee present) to try and get some specifics from Jennifer Hoppa, administrator for North Manhattan Parks. He went off with his BlackBerry, and returned much later with a few scraps of intel. To wit:

1)The funding has indeed been significantly cut, by city edict. The decision is apparently final.

2)The Parks Department is now engaged in figuring out what money they can find in their own budget, along with state and federal funds they can lay claim to, so they can go ahead with what they see as the priority Phase I projects--basically, improving park entrance points, and widening the paved path for better bicycle access--the Greenway, in other words. Would the changes be exactly the same ones they proposed? Including the changes over a thousand residents of Community Board 12 opposed by signing our petition? Unknown.

3)As of now, it seems that every other aspect of the plan for Fort Washington Park--a new playground, more volleyball courts, a rebuilt playing field for baseball and soccer, improvements to the dog/kayak beach, wheelchair-friendly picnic tables, new water fountains, and pretty much every other community-serving idea they had proposed, which had in their entirety formed the principal argument in favor of the plan--backburnered. Indefinitely. They remain in the plan as an aspiration, but not as an imminent reality.

I am still waiting for more information from the Parks Department, which I requested in person at the meeting, and then by email the following day, and which has not thus far been forthcoming--Liz Ritter has also promised to provide us with more details, as they become available to her. Much is obviously unclear at the present time, even to the Parks Department itself.

If I have misrepresented the facts in any way in this article, however unintentionally, I would ask representatives of the Parks Department to set the record straight--this blog will happily report whatever they have to say on this subject.

But even with the limited data now available, the question must be posed--is this the project that was presented to our community? Is this the project the community board approved? Is this a project worth shutting down Fort Washington Park for months at a time? Because we were told, over and over, that the plan as proposed would mean the park would be closed to the public for as much as a year. That was made extremely clear to us, and we were asked to let local residents know about it--it's a rather unpleasant pill for all of us to swallow, made somewhat sweeter by the promise of improved park facilities for all. Only now the improvements that still have a chance of being implemented in the near future would primarily benefit bicyclists passing through the park on their way to somewhere else.

The access points could be improved without shutting down the park, because the most important entrance to Fort Washington Park--the 158th St. Ramp/Stairway--has already been repaired and greatly enhanced, thanks in no small part to the efforts of our City Councilman, Herman D. Farrell. Most of that work would be going on in areas the public does not heavily use.

But widening the paved paths in the park would almost certainly mean closing the park to the public--perhaps not for a year, but for a considerable period of time.

And at that project's completion, we would have--a wider paved road--smaller and more fragmented open grassy spaces--more speeding bicycles. The park's natural beauty marred for the purpose of making it a slightly more serviceable leg of an existing transportation corridor.

Most of us didn't want that to begin with--and now that's ALL we're going to get?

And then, if the money to implement the other changes becomes available further on down the road, we get to have our park shut down again?

We look forward to further clarification from NYC Parks.

General Meeting of Community Board 12, April 28th (tomorrow night!), 7:00pm

Once again at the Russ Berrie Medical Science Pavilion, on St. Nicholas Avenue, between 167th & 168th St. Just walk in from St. Nicholas, and the auditorium is on your left.

The resolution in support of the Parks Department's plan to renovate Fort Washington Park, substantially increasing the amount of paved surface, and diminishing green space, will almost certainly be voted on by the community board tomorrow night. Members of the public can't vote on the resolution, but they can exercise significant influence on the community board members by showing up and making their opinions known.

There will be a sign-up sheet (not to be confused with the overall attendance sheet) where people can sign up to speak for three minutes. Everyone is encouraged to do this.

However things turn out tomorrow night, we are not done. But tomorrow night may quite well be the last time that a large turnout of concerned citizens can have any serious impact on the parks plan. Please make every effort to attend, and to bring other concerned people with you. The longer you wait to speak up, the less impact your voice will have.

The First Press Release from Friends of Fort Washington Park

Friends of Fort Washington Park
Press Release
For Immediate Release: April 16, 2009


COMMUNITY BOARD 12 PARKS COMMITTEE IGNORES PUBLIC OBJECTIONS, VOTES TO PAVE GREEN SPACES.


At the April 13 meeting of the Community Board 12 Parks and Cultural Affairs Committee, the Committee voted 3 to 1 to pass a resolution to support the Department of Parks and Recreation plan to reconstruct Fort Washington and Upper Riverside Parks. Committee chair Elizabeth Ritter was joined by Emilia Cardona and David Kach, the Committee's newest member in his first official vote, in voting for the resolution. George Nelson Preston abstained. Committee members Ninoska Uribe, Jennifer Araujo, Ariel Hart and Rafael Osoria were again absent.

The resolution had initially been presented at the March meeting of the Committee, and was sent back to the committee by the CB12 General Meeting due to the presentation by Friends of Fort Washington Park of an almost 1,200 signature petition opposed to certain aspects of the plan and the failure of the Committee to pass a resolution in the presence of a quorum of members.

After an introduction in which Committee Chair Elizabeth Ritter cautioned the public to remember that landscape and design professionals use jargon and technical language that at times differs from layman's definitions, citing the example that the professional definition of a building with an overhead door that is used to store motor vehicles is different than the public's idea of a "garage," Doug Nash of DPR presented the park plan.

DPR presented a plan that was identical to the plan presented at the February Committee meeting and stunning for both its failure to address why community opposition at the March CB12 General Meeting was ignored and its failure to mention community opposition at all. Committee members similarly ignored the fact that 1,200people had signed a petition opposing the construction of a second path across the grassy field and west of the ballfields between 158th and 162nd Streets and asphalt pavement on the path by the river south of Dyckman Street when the discussion was opened for comment.

During a raucous public discussion in which members of the committee hurled personal insults and swore at members of the public, causing people on both sides of the issue to leave, members of the public asked why opposition to the plan had been ignored. Committee members responded that "many changes had been made to the plan as a result of public input," which led to challenges of "Which ones?" and "Name one!" from the public. "Many changes," repeated some Committee members without further elaboration. DPR officials Mr. Nash, Jennifer Hoppa, and Steve Simon made no attempt to answer, either. Mr. Preston observed that "poor design" on the part of DPR was responsible for community opposition to the plan.

Members of the public voted against the resolution by a margin greater than 2 to 1.

Community Board 12 will vote on the resolution at its General meeting, Tuesday, April 28th, 7:00pm, Russ Berrie Pavilion, 1150 St. Nicholas Ave, between W. 167th St. and W. 168th St.

If the plan for Fort Washington Park is so good, why is it so hard to see?

At the March 3rd Community Board 12 Parks and Cultural Affairs Committee (PCAC) meeting, representatives of the NYC Department of Parks and Recreation (DPR) and their contractor, Stantec, made a presentation, using Microsoft PowerPoint, of their most recent plan to dramatically reduce green spaces in Fort Washington & Upper Riverside Parks by laying significant amounts of asphalt over grassy multipurpose fields and natural areas of the Park.

Over many months throughout the planning process, we had asked the committee and the DPR to broadly advertise the presentation of the plan, as they had done for the input sessions back in the summer and fall of 2007. Although several of us had signed up to receive future email alerts at those planning sessions, we had never received any emails from DPR about the future of the Park. We brought this to the attention of the PCAC at the February meeting, and the Committee extracted a promise from DPR to send an email blast to their list before the next PCAC meeting. That email did eventually make its way to some of our email boxes --less than 24 hours before the meeting.

By its actions, DPR has made clear that public participation in the redesign of Fort Washington & Upper Riverside Parks is not a priority. How else to explain that the public scoping session for the plan, for which we had been waiting for notice since the beginning of the fall, was held on short notice in the Park on one of the coldest days of the year, 3 days before Christmas?

At the March 3rd PCAC meeting, we were stunned when the Stantec presentation revealed that the DPR's "compromise position" was to reduce the width of hardscaping in one small area of the Park by a single foot. We ended the meeting by requesting that DPR make the Stantec March 3rd plan public by posting it on the web as they had done with the November plan . They said that they would "look into it."

We predicted that the DPR would not post the plan on the web, so we were forced to take what little we had of it to the public ourselves. We showed you a piece of the plan in the Park and on the streets of our neighborhoods, and we learned that the plan was as unpopular with you as it was with us. Over 1,200 of you signed our petition to Community Board 12 to send the plan back to the DPR. On March 24th, CB12 did send the plan back to the PCAC on a technicality, but our message was heard.

And we were right. DPR never made the March 3rd Stantec plan public. In fact, we learned at the March 24th meeting that a copy of the plan was not even available to CB12 members, who were supposed to have voted on it that night. It is shocking that the Community Board members would allow an issue on their agenda to vote on a plan that was unavailable to them. We tried to get a copy of the plan from Stantec, but they referred us back to DPR. DPR told us that all information had to be released by the borough office. So we sent an email to Steve Simon, the Manhattan Chief of Staff for DPR. Here is the text of the letter:

March 25, 2009

In order to answer several questions posed to me by CB12 members after the presentation of our petition last night, I would like to refer to the Stantec Powerpoint Presentation made at the last Parks Committee meeting. We have politely asked at the last two monthly Parks Committee meetings that the current proposal be made public online, as was the initial proposal. I was stunned last night to be told that no copy was even available to Board members.

I called [the Stantec guy], who had previously told me to call him if I needed any information, at Stantec today, and he referred me to [the guy] at the Parks Department. [Parks Department guy] told me that any release of information had to come from the borough office, and he referred me to you.

Not to be rude, but I truly don't understand why a presentation that was already made to the public in an open forum and which can be emailed with the click of a button is still unavailable weeks after our polite request and after the Community Board had already been scheduled to vote on a resolution approving it.

Could you please facilitate my receipt of a copy of this presentation? Thank you in advance."

While neither Mr. Simon nor anyone at DPR has gotten back to us, we did hear from a Board member who we cc'd on the email. Here is an edited excerpt:

"Apparently, Steve just got the full thing in e-mailable format yesterday afternoon [the day of the CB12 meeting]. He tried to send it, but it is so large it bounced back from the server. The CB 12 has part of it on a flash drive, but the whole thing wouldn't fit."

Indeed, PowerPoint presentations are very large. And besides, not everyone has Powerpoint. And it's expensive. You'd think that people who were on a design team would consider the features most important to the loyal users of their product. Well, Microsoft did. At least by my old 2004 version. So if any of you encounter this problem in the future, here is a tutorial of 3 simple ways to get your MS PowerPoint presentation onto someone else's display. All three methods here have the advantage of being platform neutral, which Powerpoint sometimes isn't. If you are not interested in the tutorial, skip to the end:

1. POST IT ON THE WEB
Under the "FILE" menu, select "Save as Web Page". PowerPoint will generate a folder/directory with all of the necessary files and a ".htm" file. Upload both onto the public space of your web server, and send the filepath for the .htm file to anyone you want.

2. CONVERT EACH PAGE TO A JPEG
Under the "FILE" menu, select "Save as..". In the new window, use the pull-down "Format" menu to select "JPEG". PowerPoint will generate a JPEG file for each slide in your presentation. JPEGs are generally small enough to send via email, and you can send each page individually if you need to.

3. CONVERT THE PRESENTATION TO A PDF FILE
This little utility lives in different places on different versions of PowerPoint. On some, it's under the "Print" menu. Under the "FILE" menu, select "Print". In the new window, Click the "PDF" button and select "Save as PDF". Almost everyone has Adobe Reader, and it's free! PDFs can be emailed and uploaded to the web.

So, we still haven't been able to get a copy of a presentation that was made public back on March 3rd, and we aren't holding our breath. We hope that the DPR will make a new presentation at the April 13th PCAC meeting that addresses the issues highlighted in our petition and our presentation. Some Community Board 12 members have told us that is their hope, too. We will ask for a copy of any new presentation in advance, but we won't hold our breath for that, either. We hope to see some of you there. Details will follow.

How things went at the General Meeting of Community Board 12.

Here's a bit of good news--we didn't lose. The vote was postponed for technical reasons. We did get to read and present our petition (1,181 signatures, with many more still to be added), and speak to the Community Board for about nine minutes, altogether (reading out loud the same words you can find just below this article). It would be fair to say we made a strong impression.

The Parks Department resolution to approve their plan, which was never voted on by a full quorum at the committee level, is going back to committee, and then back to the general meeting. Next month. So this is not over. And if you were hoping you'd still have a chance to speak up about this issue, and defend open green space in our North Manhattan riverfront parks--you do.

Our Presentation at the General Meeting of Community Board 12, Tuesday, March 24th.

(click to enlarge graphic)



TO THE MEMBERS OF COMMUNITY BOARD 12:

The most recent publicly presented version of the PlaNYC Phase I plan for Upper Riverside and Fort Washington Parks contains many worthwhile improvements. These include repair and enhancement of park entrances, improved lighting, new gardens, additional comfort stations and water fountains, repair and addition of playing fields, new facilities and accessible bathrooms for disabled people, new access to historic markers and the long-overdue return of a children's playground. However,

§ BECAUSE the latest plan contains a previously unmentioned truck garage that can be located elsewhere (ex., under the highway) instead of encroaching on centrally located open space,

§ BECAUSE the proposed separation of bicycle and pedestrian paths is too brief to reduce conflict between pedestrians and cyclists and introduces two dangerous merge points (including a blind spot for northbound cyclists north of the ball fields), after the separation encourages cyclists to speed up,

§ BECAUSE the newly proposed, but unenforceable, "pedestrian only" path bisects the single largest open space in the park between 159th and 162nd Streets,

§ BECAUSE preservation and restoration of natural and open areas was the single most desired improvement in the Ft. Washington & Upper Riverside Parks PlaNYC Survey Results, and the proposed plan calls for a significant expansion of paved areas that will encroach on every natural and open area in the park,

§ BECAUSE the proposed, new 11 ft. wide roadway that will run along the western perimeter of the ball fields would destroy a unique feature and experience of the park and what one CB12 board member called "arguably the most beautiful spot in the park,"

§ BECAUSE we believe that the so-called "desire line" to the west of the ball fields represents a desire to walk along the river on natural ground rather than a desire for asphalt to be laid,

§ BECAUSE all of the key improvements in the Stantec plan that the community wants can be accomplished without destroying the unique nature of the park,

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED [now over 1,200] RESIDENTS OF THE COMMUNITY, urge Community Board 12 to reject the current proposal and further urge the Board to demand from the Department of Parks and Recreation a plan that respects open spaces, and that does not diminish the landscape, beauty and essential nature of the Park.



Because 100% of the petitions were signed face to face, we wish to share more information that we learned from our neighbors about their specific concerns:

In the southern region of the park our neighbors are opposed to an excessively wide greenway. In the central region, our neighbors are opposed to the construction of a second paved path. In the northern region, our neighbors are opposed to the extension of pavement along the river south of the Dyckman Marina. How do we know? That is why they signed the petition and that is what they told us.

In Upper Riverside Park, the current plan calls for widening the existing path by an unknown amount between 2 and 8 feet. That widening is not illustrated on the plan, and the 6-foot margin of additional hardscaping is significant when the grassy area between the path and the river in some places is only 6 to 10 feet wide. The margin actually equals all of the green space in some areas. If we are honest, there is no way to tell what unexpected contingencies may arise during the construction phase, and planned green space may be unavoidably lost. This is not merely an unlikely supposition, but a real possibility, as demonstrated by the planned dog run on 143rd Street which was lost to a margin of error in the plan during the reconstruction of the Riverside Drive just a few years ago. Rather than leaving it to chance, Petition signers would like to know exactly how much wider the expanded path would be.

In the Parks Dept. survey, the single most desired physical improvement was the preservation and restoration of natural areas, supported by 62% of respondents. Fewer than 43 people chose expanded bike paths or separate walking and bike paths as a top three choice. By contrast, 1,181 petition signers universally oppose additional asphalt paths in the mid-park cluster. By opposing new asphalt paths by a 28 to 1 margin, the community has made its desire known.

In the northern neighborhoods of the park, community members are almost without exception opposed to the laying of asphalt on the path that runs south of the Dyckman marina. Most residents would like that path to remain essentially unchanged. However, when asked about the possibility of changing the surface to an ADA- compliant natural material such as a hard packed earth surface or Fibar, engineered wood fibers that knit together to form a surface that meets all the access rules of the Americans With Disabilities Act, support for the creation of Manhattan's only ADA accessible hiking trail is nearly universal. While the creation of transportation alternatives is a worthy goal, neighborhood residents feel that the routing of a transportation corridor through the park is incompatible with the use of this area as a park and question the need to reroute the Greenway through this natural area.

Given the importance the Parks Department places on paving over "desire" lines in so many areas of the Park, and given that "access to the water" was the fifth most desired Physical Improvement in the Park Survey, it is astonishing that the only access to the water in the plan is the ramp we recently suggested at the Dog Beach. Fishing is one of the most common active sports practiced in the park. The treacherous climb down the desire lines and jerry-rigged stairs to the shelves that jut out from the riprap is difficult for even the "temporarily able bodied." Although these shelves are currently only occupied by fishermen, staircases built into the cliffs along the riverbank would also provide additional kayak resting points, and access for people who just wanted to be close to the water. Additionally, fishing is the only active sport currently unavailable to disabled persons in the park solely due to the lack of access. It is incumbent upon us to provide this access through the addition of an ADA-compliant fixed or floating fishing dock, common in our state and national parks, to our park. Such docks would be completely in the character of Ft. Washington Park, as demonstrated by the derelict pilings in the water near the ADA ramp at the foot of 158th Street as well as along the waterfront south of the marina.

We dispute several of the provisions within the resolution before you tonight.

First
While there was significant outreach during the survey phase of this project, no similar promised public outreach occurred for public comment on the plan and the "significant public discussion" consisted of fewer than a score of community members on average. The "onsite scoping meeting" was held on the coldest day of the year, three days before Christmas, with no significant public notice. We bring you here the documentation that proves that the public rejects this resolution. More than 120 times the number of members of the public at the onsite scoping meeting, and more than 120 times the number of members of the public at the Parks committee meeting that produced this resolution have voted through this petition to reject the resolution before you now.

Second
The revised plan incorporates only minor changes in response to public feedback, for example, shaving one foot of hardscaping off the width of the unwanted path west of three fields. and the ramp between the riprap at the Dog Beach.

Third
Is a less pastoral view available to all a greater public good or a false choice? By paving the grassy field south of the mid park cluster for a new pedestrian path, the DPR would be taking something now available for shared uses and specifying its use for designated purposes. Even if there were to be no net loss of green space, compartmentalizing it will deaden its impact for all.

Fourth
While we agree that we are adamantly opposed to the installation of additional asphalt paths in the park, and while we strongly believe that additional paving destroys the natural character and essential nature of the park, we will no longer tolerate being called a minority. More than twice as many people signed our petition to reject this resolution as even responded to the Department of Parks-PlaNYC survey. 93% of petition signers reside in park adjacent neighborhoods of Harlem, Washington Heights and Inwood. Petition signers are equally distributed throughout the boundaries of Community Board 12. 1181 petition signers and 332 Park survey respondents clearly demonstrate that a majority of the community opposes the replacement of green, grassy and natural spaces with asphalt.

If the Community Board will truly represent the desires of the community tonight it will send the resolution back to the Parks Committee to demand that DPR submit a plan that respects open spaces, that does not diminish the landscape, beauty, and essential nature of the park, and respects the desires of the majority of the community.

The only question left for the Friends of Fort Washington Park is whether our inaugural press release is headlined "Community Board 12 Rejects Public Sentiment in Approving Park Plan" or "Community Board 12 Champions Upper Manhattan's Green Spaces."

Thank You.