Critics Say Ratner Is Bankrolling Supporters
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

Critics of developer Bruce Ratner’s $3.5 billion project to construct a basketball arena and soaring residential and office towers in the Prospect Heights section of Brooklyn charged yesterday that the developer had bankrolled a neighborhood group that has enthusiastically supported the project.
Brooklyn United for Innovative Local Development’s application to the IRS for nonprofit status, submitted in December 2004, stated that the organization expected its sole source of income in 2005 and 2006 would be more than $5 million from Forest City Ratner Companies.
Develop-Don’t-Destroy-Brooklyn, a neighborhood group that has opposed the Atlantic Yards project on the grounds that it is out of scale with the low-rise neighborhood, released the IRS documents and said they showed Mr. Ratner had already given $5 million to BUILD.
BUILD, which recently earned nonprofit status, has helped craft a community benefits agreement that binds Forest City Ratner to create affordable housing and sponsor job training programs if it goes ahead with the Atlantic Yards project.
A spokesman for Develop-Don’t-Destroy, Daniel Goldstein, said at a press conference on the steps of City Hall, “It is clear that Mr. Ratner has fabricated the appearance of community support by paying BUILD to be his leading foot soldiers.”
The attorney that submitted BUILD’s application to the IRS, Sharai Erima, told The New York Sun that the $5 million in projected contributions from Mr. Ratner had been determined without consulting the developer.
Mr. Erima said the IRS application was an attempt to match the projected cost of the programs the group wanted to administer with an expected revenue stream from the most logical source – the project developer.
“We had a budget, what we proposed the programs would cost,” Mr. Erima said. Based on other community benefit agreements, he said he thought the developer generally provided the money for community programs.
Mr. Erima, who appeared to be angered by yesterday’s press conference, where he interrupted Mr. Goldstein more than once, said the salaries of BUILD’s officers were projected for 2005 and 2006 and had not yet been paid. The IRS statement showed three salaries of more than $100,000.
A spokesman for Forest City Ratner, Joseph DePlasco, said in a statement that the developer gives funding to nonprofits that provide community benefits, including BUILD, but that no dollar amounts had yet been determined, as BUILD’s IRS document suggested.