There are currently 38,574 homeless people living in New York City and 400 of them are at the center of a debate raging in Prospect Heights.

Just a year and a half ago residents formed the Prospect Heights Action Coalition to protest the conversion of two neighborhood buildings into back-to-back, for-profit homeless shelters at 768 Pacific St, and 603 Dean St.

But now the group is fighting to keep the 93-unit shelter open as real estate developer Bruce Ratner is trying to knock them down to make way for his $2.5 billion residential and retail village centered around a 19,000 seat arena to house his newly purchased New Jersey Nets.

The plan would require the taking of approximately 70 buildings by eminent domain, the power of the state to seize private property for public benefit.

According to PHAC spokeswoman Patti Hagan, 863 people would be displaced along the blocks from Atlantic and Flatbush avenues stretching east into Prospect Heights.

But that number includes the 400 residents of the homeless shelter.

“[They] are using the homeless they fought so hard to keep out of Prospect Heights to pad the number of individuals they claim will be forced to move,” Borough President Marty Markowitz wrote in a letter to The Brooklyn Papers.

Markowitz, an ardent backer of Ratner’s Development, who contacted Ratner more than a year ago to talk about bringing a professional sports team to Brooklyn, has been butting heads with PHAC for months.

Asked about “padding” the numbers, Hagan said the families had been living in the facilities for almost a year, longer then some of the residents in two new, recently converted condominium buildings.

“According to law, if you have been in a place for 30 days you have tenants rights, you are a resident,” said Hagan. “Is Marty Markowitz trying to say that these people do not exist?”

Many of the families live in the shelter for up to a year, according to Jim Anderson, a spokesman for the Department of Homeless Services.

The shelters are operated by Interim Housing Inc., a for-profit offshoot of Praxis Housing Initiatives, which has come under fire for alleged misuse of funds including posting $5,000 bail for a Latin Kings gang leader and charging hundreds of dollars in personal items.

The city Department of Homeless Services pays approximately $3,000 per month — or $90 per night — for each family living in the facility.

When the shelters opened in the area, opponents joined then-Councilman James Davis — who was assassinated last summer in City Hall by a crazed political rival — in protest.

Victor Salsa, director of social services for the Prospect Heights shelter, referred all calls to homeless shelter spokesman James Capalino.

Capalino did not return several calls seeking comment.

©2004 Community Newspaper Group