Community leaders hailed the city’s selection of Pratt Area Community Council as one of three groups that will develop the site of the former Navy Brig on the border of Fort Greene and Clinton Hill.
“It’s an excellent thing,” said Phillip Kellogg, chair of the Fort Greene Association. “It’s a community-based project, and PACC is a great partner,” adding that Fort Greene and Clinton “desperately” need affordable housing.
Councilwoman Letitia James (D–Fort Greene), who often finds herself at odds with developers, called the project “a high-quality sustainable design, community planning and affordable housing.”
The city announced last week that three groups, including the affordable housing advocates PACC, will build more than 400 residential units, plus commercial and open space, and a community facility on the site of the former Navy Brig, which was demolished in 2005.
The city has promised that 77 percent of the units will be affordable to families of four with a household income between $21,250 and $92,170 and from $14,900 to $64,480 for single-person households. The development will also be LEED certified, an industry standard for environmentally sound construction.
The land is bounded by Flushing, Clermont, Park, and Vanderbilt avenues in the Wallabout section of Fort Greene. The lot was the site of the naval prison from the 1940s to the 1960s, when it became an immigration detention center.
