Joint Comments On Trinity Place School

We, State Senator Daniel Squadron, Congressmember Jerrold Nadler, Borough President Gale Brewer, and Councilmember Margaret Chin, represent the Lower Manhattan area. Earlier this year, we came together to reconvene the Lower Manhattan School Overcrowding Task Force, which started many years ago to address the ongoing school overcrowding issue we face in Lower Manhattan. We want to thank Community Board 1 (CB1) for hosting and the School Construction Authority (SCA) for the opportunity to provide comments this evening.

We commend the SCA for proposing this particular school site in Lower Manhattan. As you know, we, along with CB1, Community Education Council 2, and parents, have been fighting for additional seats in Lower Manhattan for years. Furthermore, the school’s location in the Financial District is home to one of the largest growing residential communities in the city. In addition to serving the growing school population, this school will be an important gathering center for this community. The Trinity Place School, a site which we advocated for, has a projected capacity for 476 seats and will help address the overcrowding concerns of this community.

We also want to highlight the discussion at the last School Overcrowding Task Force meeting regarding building usage. It is unclear to parents and other community members if the Trinity Place school would be able to expand to a full K-8 or provide space for both a gymnasium and auditorium.

Finally, we want to note the ongoing need for additional elementary school seats south of Canal Street in District 2. At the last Task Force meeting, CB1 presented its population study, which indicated there will be over 4,000 new residential units under construction in Lower Manhattan by 2017. Even using the most conservative estimates, new residential construction leads to a need for 521 new elementary school seats. We urge the SCA to continue to work with the Task Force and the community to revise its current capital plan to ensure that Lower Manhattan seats are built before the school overcrowding crisis becomes severe again.

Once again, we thank you again for the opportunity to provide comments today.