In addition to a gaming facility, “The Coney” would feature a 250,000-square-foot, 500-room hotel, a 2,500-seat concert venue, 92,000-square-foot convention center, a dozen restaurants, room for local businesses, public open space and more, according to newly shared specifics.

The development team — consisting of Thor Equities, Saratoga Casino Holdings, Legends and the Chickasaw Nation — has already spent a year and a half trying to sweeten the pot for reluctant locals with the promise of thousands of jobs.

“We have heard time and time again that Coney Island needs a project that provides year-round economic support while also lifting up the infrastructure in one of the most densely traveled areas of the community,” Sam Gerrity, CEO of Saratoga, said in a statement. “The Coney does just that.”

The entertainment hub would be right by the iconic Boardwalk and include more than an acre of public space, most of which would be part of a rooftop garden.

But the plan is far from a sure bet. The Coney is among about 10 contenders across the city vying for one of three highly competitive casino licenses on offer from the state in 2025. Five proposals are in Midtown Manhattan, one at Ferry Point in the Bronx and a pair in Queens: one by Citi Field and another at the existing Resorts World “racino.”

The casino competitors have been trying to woo their respective communities in the lead-up to state applications opening next year. Developers have offered public benefits ranging from green space to affordable housing in an effort to break away from the pack.

The Coney team has been campaigning hard since 2022, hiring the area’s former Council member and even sponsoring youth sports. Many Brooklynites have nonetheless been skeptical about a casino, with a report released last July by the borough president finding most locals were against it.

Gerrity still hopes the neighborhood will roll the dice.

“We believe that no other project would create as big of a lift as ours in terms of lifting up the local economy, which, again, right now is seasonal,” he told the Daily News.

“You’re right there on the beach and it’s just this beautiful landscape, the Boardwalk. It’s got so much history and we’re going to use its already existing unique character and weave our project into the district.”

The New York City Fire Museum at 278 Spring St. in Hudson Square was evacuated about 9:45 a.m. on Saturday when employees who were preparing to open for the day heard loud banging and felt the building vibrate, according to Executive Director Patti Murphy.

“It’s closed off until we can get a structural engineer to ensure the safety of anybody entering the building,” Murphy told the Daily News. She said that the collection of 10,000-odd artifacts did not appear to be damaged.

“The safety of our visitors and staff is our utmost priority, and this closure is a precautionary measure while we await clearance,” read a notice on the museum’s website.

A 311 complaint to the city Buildings Department suggested a nearby construction crane may have been a factor, but a spokesman said the agency did not find issues related to the building shaking or any evidence that crane activity had caused any structural damage.

The department has issued an order for the museum to have a professional engineer inspect the facade.

“The New York City Fire Museum plays an important role in honoring the department’s history, and the FDNY is in touch with museum leadership and we are working closely with our agency partners to ensure its safety,” said FDNY Commissioner Laura Kavanagh.

“The department will work with the museum and our partners in the public and private sector to make sure the collection remains open to the public for years to come.”

The Fire Museum has been at the Spring St. location since 1987 and dates to 1870. The 1904 Beaux Arts building was once the firehouse of Engine Co. 30 and is home to a permanent 9/11 exhibit memorializing the 343 members of the FDNY who died in the terror attacks.

Murphy said it’s unclear how long the museum will have to stay closed, but that the closure would likely have a “significant impact” financially on the independent, self-funded nonprofit, which relies heavily on admissions, gift shop sales and events (the museum was about to host a children’s birthday party when the incident happened).

“Closing down right now is going to have an impact on our operations of course,” she said.

Councilman Justin Brannan told Department of Housing Preservation and Development leadership at a marathon budget hearing Tuesday that he and his colleagues were “disappointed” no new money for affordable housing capital was added to the budget — despite the Council’s previous ask for further funding amid the ongoing housing crisis.

“It’s not rocket science — one obvious and big way to get started reducing homelessness, driving down rents and helping working families thrive is to build more housing,” Brannan said in a statement.

“Our Council recognizes the deep and far-ranging impact of expanding the availability of truly affordable housing across all five boroughs. This is really a no-brainer: People need a place to live, and everything else follows.”

A report from the New York Housing Conference released Monday found cuts in the mayor’s executive budget would lead to a 32% drop in the number of affordable apartments paid for with capital subsidy — findings the Council cited in calling for additional funding but which the administration disputed.

HPD Commissioner Adolfo Carrión Jr. said the report “got it wrong” and pushed back when asked how much more the agency’s $1.84 billion proposed budget might need to meet capital targets.

“The resources that are needed, as we go through the process, will be available to us,” he said.

But he admitted that the 750 housing projects currently in the HPD pipeline — 300 new construction projects and 450 preservation projects — were not progressing as quickly as hoped.

“Based on the resources available, we can sort of trickle these projects out at a rate that we wish was much faster, but it’s not because we have the imposition of reality on us,” Carrión said. “We’d like to see more, faster.”

The Council wants a $732 million annual increase in funding for programs “to meet affordability needs and fulfill the mayor’s pledge of $2.5 billion in capital funding per year for affordable housing.” That adds up to an extra $3.66 billion over the next five years, which the Council says would preserve or build some 60,000 affordable units.

“If the mayor cared as much as he claims about affordable housing, your all’s budget would look a lot different than it does,” said Councilman Lincoln Restler.

Mayor Adams has made the housing crisis a policy priority, and recently launched his signature “City of Yes for Housing Opportunity” zoning plan. It comes after Albany passed its own long-awaited housing deal last month as part of the state budget deal.

Two key HPD programs the Council wants to earmark $250 million each for are Open Doors and Neighborhood Pillars. Open Doors funds construction of units affordable for middle-class ownership, while Neighborhood Pillars provides loans for nonprofits to rehab apartments to keep them permanently affordable.

Neighborhood Pillars has been stuck in limbo since 2019 but Carrión said it remains a “priority” for the agency and they hope to relaunch it by the end of the year after doing some “reengineering.”

“I think the broader point that many of us are trying to make is that it seems that HPD’s capital budget is still insufficient to meet the demand to meet the desired production levels that we have in the city of New York,” said Pierina Sanchez, who heads the Committee on Housing and Buildings. “We want to see the agency doing more.”

The landmarked Bronx Borough Courthouse takes up a full block at the intersection of E. 161st St. between Third and Brook Aves. in Melrose and has been vacant for nearly 50 years. It was listed for sale in March with an asking price of $40 million, which was recently cut to $35 million.

“It’s gorgeous, it’s a piece of history,” said broker Shlomi Bagdadi of Tri State Commercial Realty.

Today, the 121,000-square-foot Beaux-Arts building boasts a grand lobby, intricate stonework and new electric and mechanical systems. The granite structure was nicknamed “the Gray Lady,” supposedly in honor of a famous marble statue on the facade depicting Lady Justice without a blindfold.

Built between 1905 and 1915, the Courthouse was once a civic hub for the borough. It housed three courts, a coroner’s office and a jail until 1934, when most city services relocated to the newly built courthouse on Grand Concourse. It served as a criminal court until 1977 and was vacated a year later as the South Bronx fell into decline.

Over the years, community organizations tried and failed to acquire the Courthouse, and the city put it up for auction twice before it was bought by Liberty Square Realty in 1998. It has remained empty aside from a brief stint hosting an art exhibition in 2015.

In 2017, the charter school operator Success Academy announced plans to transform the property into a high school, but the deal collapsed amid litigation that remains ongoing, according to court records.

Bagdadi said zoning prohibits the building from turning residential, but he voiced hope that the city might be interested in reacquiring it.

“The only fitting buyer, in my opinion, is someone that either works with the government, a government contract or a government agency that is going to actually restore this into the use of the local community,” he said.

The Courthouse isn’t the only borough landmark up for sale. The Bronx General Post Office on Grand Concourse was recently listed for $70 million, five years after a previous deal fell through.

The delay puts the creation of hundreds of promised affordable apartments in jeopardy amid New York’s ongoing housing shortage.

“Any way that the influence of the state will result in the building of more housing, I’m all in,” Hochul said at a press conference Thursday, when asked about the status of Atlantic Yards.

The multibillion-dollar plan, also known as Pacific Park, is a public-private partnership between developers and the state that has been in the works since 2003. It brought the Barclays Center and thousands of new homes to the Prospect Heights area, but many of the assurances made around housing and open space remain unfulfilled due to myriad complications.

A key auction to spin off the rights for six sites was rescheduled for the third time last month when no bidders came forward to potentially assume responsibility for the beleaguered project.

The challenge is that any developer that takes over would have to deal with the financial and logistical problems of building a platform across the LIRR tracks at Vanderbilt Yards before breaking ground on the housing, already a costly process.

An existing community agreement also means if they fail to build the remaining 876 units of affordable housing promised by mid-2025 — as seems inevitable — they’ll be saddled with hefty fines.

“The practical problem is that the project right now isn’t marketable … and it can’t become marketable until there’s some kind of renegotiation,” said Gib Veconi, chair of the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council.

“It’s difficult right now to see how any other developer would be willing to take on the project with that deadline out there,” he said, adding that it would likely be up to Hochul to change the terms so that Atlantic Yards can move forward.

The original plan was to build a new home for the Brooklyn Nets, 16 new apartment and retail buildings and eight acres of open space across a 22-acre swath of Prospect Heights and surrounding neighborhoods, including on top of the “blighted” train tracks.

Over the 20 years-plus since Atlantic Yards was announced, the Barclays Center has proven a success, but only three of the eight acres of pledged open space have been developed and the rail yard remains uncovered.

Eight residential buildings have gone up, with just under half of the 6,430 apartments promised, including 1,374 of 2,250 affordable units.

Watchdogs and local stakeholders have been calling for accountability around Atlantic Yards. But they say the odds of the remaining housing and open space commitments being fully met are dwindling due to the project’s troubled history.

Last year the developer, Greenland USA, defaulted on $350 million in loans tied to six stalled sites, and the rights to build on them have been trapped in limbo ever since because no other group has stepped forward at auction.

“In a situation where both the governor and the mayor are very concerned about creating additional housing in New York City, this is a place where a lot of housing could be created right away if the governor was willing to take action,” Veconi said of Pacific Park.

Both Hochul and Mayor Adams have stressed the need to build more to alleviate the current housing crisis, and the Albany legislature passed a long-awaited housing deal last month.

Veconi sits on the board of directors of the Atlantic Yards Community Development Corporation (AYCDC), which advises Empire State Development, the governor-controlled state economic development body that oversees the megaproject and would need to approve a new developer — if they’re ever presented with one.

“ESD remains committed to the successful completion of the Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park project,” a spokesperson said in a statement. “Building the remaining housing, including affordable units, remains a top priority and ESD will continue to keep the community’s best interests at the forefront as we push towards the completion of this project.”

At an AYCDC board meeting last month several directors expressed their frustration at the current impasse.

“All of this sounds very bleak and I’m hoping here’s another way to approach this,” said Ethel Tyus, who brought up the possibility of using eminent domain “to take over the project as a whole and move it forward rather than limping along, hoping for the best and not knowing where the hell we’re going.”

With Tim Balk

That’s according to a monthly analysis by real estate company Douglas Elliman and appraisal firm Miller Samuel released Thursday, which also found new lease signings “surged” across the city.

“This is the third time in the four months of 2024 that we’ve seen rental prices rise year-over-year,” author Jonathan Miller told the Daily News. “And this is increasing the odds — because rents don’t peak until the summer — that we could actually see last year’s July/August record broken.”

Median Manhattan rent was $4,250 last month, a 3.7% monthly increase and 0.2% annual increase. It was the third time in four months it’s gone up year-over-year, and was also a whopping 26.7% higher than prepandemic average in April 2019. Studio apartments rose to $3,250 while two-bedroom units dipped to $5,195.

Both median rent and listing inventory jumped year-over-year for the third time in Brooklyn, hitting $3,599, roughly 3% more than it was the previous month and year. Like Manhattan, that figure was 26.7% above what it was in April 2019. Studios went for $3,050 and two-bedrooms were $3,800.

In northwest Queens, median rent reached the second-highest April on the books at $3,244, a 1.4% bump from March and 8% decrease from April 2023, but 15.1% more than April 2019. Studio apartments in the area reached a median of $3,083 and two-bedrooms went for $4,000.

But Miller warned the April numbers could rise even further over the summer, when leasing activity typically peaks.

The sky-high rents come amid a historically bad housing crunch and affordability crisis in New York. A recent city comptroller report found that food insecurity is worsening across the state, with one in nine households unable to get enough food. Meanwhile, a StreetEasy/Zillow analysis published Tuesday found that New York City has the largest gap between wage and rent growth in the country, with rents growing over seven times faster than wages did last year.

The rest of the Rent Guidelines Board, a nine-person panel appointed by the mayor that also includes two owner reps and five public ones, approved rent hikes between 2% and 4% for one-year leases and 4% and 6.5% for two-year leases, numbers that will be finalized at a vote on June 17. The decision was 5-2 with two abstentions after tenant representatives Genesis Aquino and Adán Soltren abandoned the vote, with Soltren declaring “the only vote we’ll be making tonight is one of no confidence in this mayor and in this board.”

It comes amid a historically bad housing shortage and ongoing affordability crisis where just half of New Yorkers are earning enough to make a living.

Tuesday’s vote, hosted at LaGuardia Community College in Long Island City, was part of the fraught annual ritual of tenant and landlord groups lobbying the board for rent reductions and rent increases, respectively, that would affect about 1 million apartments across the city.

The frustration was palpable among the hundreds of tenants who rallied at the event, speaking, chanting and brandishing banners in four languages. Board chair Nestor Davidson was drowned out entirely by an endless chant of boos and cries of “Rent rollback.”

“If you ask me if the voices of the New York City tenants matter in this process, I would say no,” Aquino said. “The process is a sham.”

Crystal Velasquez, 48, has lived in a rent-stabilized apartment in Flushing for 15 years.

“There’s just no way that the average person can keep up with these rent increases,” she said. “Rent stabilization is the best deal we’ve got, and even that is not complete protection.”

Ramón Méndez-Rivas, 31, is a tenant leader with the nonprofit Woodside on the Move.

“Landlords, they always get a second chance, but tenants never get a second chance,” he said. “If landlords can’t afford their buildings then they shouldn’t have their buildings. … Why are these people getting rents increased year after year after year?”

As in years past, tenants and advocates have pointed to surges in homelessness and eviction rates, rent burden, inflation and the soaring cost of living in calling for rents to be rolled back or frozen.

The landlord lobby, in turn, wants significant rent raises to offset operating expenses for their buildings, particularly older ones and those in outer boroughs.

“Stabilized building owners are relying on the [Board] to trust its own data to support necessary rent increases to help them meet constantly escalating operating costs. Rents are failing to meet these costs,” Steve Mangione, spokesperson for the Rent Stabilization Association, said in a statement. “This trend has to change for the sake of owners, tenants, and the city’s affordable housing stock.”

The rent adjustment ranges decided in the preliminary vote typically align with the board’s final numbers. Rent hikes were relatively low during the de Blasio era and were frozen during parts of the pandemic.

“I must be clear that a 6.5% increase goes far beyond what is reasonable to ask tenants to take on at this time,” Mayor Adams said in a statement following Tuesday’s vote.

In 2022, the board approved a 3.25% raise for one-year leases from a preliminary range of 2%-4%, and a 5% increase for two-year leases from a range of 4%-6%. Last year it was 3% for one-year leases from a 2%-5% range and 2.75% for the first half of a two-year lease and 3.2% for the second from an initial range of 4%-7%.

The board will next host a series of meetings across the city to hear from the public ahead of the final vote, scheduled for June 17. Any changes would go into effect starting Oct. 1.

“City of Yes for Housing Opportunity” is the mayor’s central strategy to tackle New York’s ongoing housing crisis. It’s designed to spur 58,200 to 108,900 new units over 15 years by relaxing decades-old zoning restrictions that currently limit how and where new homes get built.

“We’re saying yes to more housing, yes to addressing the rent burden which 50% of New Yorkers are experiencing,” Mayor Adams said at a rally on the City Hall steps. “We need to build environments in communities where everyone can have an opportunity to enjoy what this city has to offer.”

Monday’s official launch kick-starts months of review beginning with all 59 community boards and culminating in an all-important City Council vote sometime before the end of the year.

But it will likely be an uphill battle: “Housing Opportunity” has faced criticism from the get-go, particularly from development-averse community boards outside Manhattan that have expressed a wariness toward the potential changes.

“Housing Opportunity” is being spearheaded by the Department of City Planning, and Director Dan Garodnick described it as “a critical initiative for the future of New York City” at a meeting Monday.

“The invisible walls that prevent housing in too many of our neighborhoods are driving high rents, displacement pressure, homelessness, and creating an imbalance of power between landlords and tenants, but our housing shortage is a policy choice,” he said in a statement. “We look forward to talking with communities across the city about how this proposal would help lower housing costs across the board.”

Citywide proposed changes include making it easier to convert offices to apartments and lifting — but not banning — parking mandates for new housing.

In quieter, low-density neighborhoods there are provisions for adding two to four stories of housing above ground-floor stores; allowing three-to-five-story apartment buildings in lots near trains and subway stations, and permitting “accessory dwelling units” such as converted garages, attics and basements.

In denser, busier areas, new housing could be built 20% bigger than normally allowed, if the extra space is permanently affordable.

City Planning estimates the proposal could generate $58.2 billion in economic impact over 30 years and create some 260,000 jobs in the construction and service industries.

Adams first announced the plan in September, but the nearly 800-page draft text and draft environmental impact statement weren’t released until this month.

It comes as New York is facing a dramatic housing shortage: Apartment vacancy rates are at 1.4%, the lowest level in decades, with a particular scarcity of affordable homes.

The legislative ball is back in the city’s court after Adams spent months imploring Albany to pass a housing deal, which finally came together this month.

“Housing Opportunity” is the third and final component of the “City of Yes” package aimed at overhauling outdated zoning rules. The first, centered on eco-friendly fixes, passed last year, and the second, focused on the economy, will have a final vote this spring.

The nine-person board, appointed by the mayor and tasked with deciding on annual rent rates, heard familiar arguments from both sides during the marathon meeting: landlords asking for significant rent hikes to offset expenses and tenants asking for a rent freeze or rollback in light of a major affordability crisis and historic housing crunch.

The hearing came ahead of the board’s preliminary vote, scheduled for Tuesday in Long Island City, Queens, where they are expected to decide on a tentative range for proposed rent hikes.

A recent study by the board’s staff found rent increases of 2.5% to 4% for one-year leases and 4% to 7% for two-year leases would be needed for landlords to be unaffected by rising costs — figures immediately rejected by both sides. Landlords claim the lower figures would be insufficient, while the tenant side pointed out overall landlord incomes climbed 10.4% last year, according to a recent Rent Guidelines Board report.

Real estate industry representatives, who testified first, pointed out that that growth was concentrated in Manhattan and that some outer borough landlords with older buildings were struggling with maintenance and operating costs.

“Without sufficient rent adjustments, these buildings have no future,” said Jay Martin, executive director of the Community Housing Improvement Program. “The longer this board waits to address the fiscal reality facing pre-1974 rent-stabilized buildings, the worse things will get, until we reach a point where there will be no affordable housing left in the city.”

Housing advocates cited grim rates of homelessness, evictions, rent burden, food insecurity and the lasting impact of the pandemic in calling for a rent freeze.

“The situation is incredibly serious and dire,” said Lucy Block of the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development. “Tenants took a huge hit during the pandemic. And while there was [Emergency Rental Assistance Program] and there was temporary assistance, there just is not a recovery.”

Leah Goodridge, a former tenant representative on the board and a tenants’ rights attorney, was critical of the power dynamic at play.

“The reality is that no one is forced to be a landlord of a rent-stabilized building,” she said. “A lot of the framework that’s provided is this sort of equivalency of someone [who] is facing homelessness, can’t afford the rent [versus] someone [who] has made a business decision that isn’t generating profits.”

The hearing was part of a series held each year to gather input on possible rent hikes. The board will also hold public meetings — typically heated events marked by emotional renter testimony — in each borough ahead of a final vote in the summer.

At last year’s raucous deciding vote, the board approved 3% hikes for one-year leases and 2.75% to 3.2% hikes over two-year leases, amid jeers and boos from protesters.

That’s according to preliminary filings made this month with the Department of City Planning by developer Bruce Teitelbaum that were obtained by the Daily News. The documents mark one of the first steps in a rezoning process he will eventually need to clear before he can build on his property at 145th St. and Malcolm X Blvd. — a process from which he withdrew in 2022 amid pushback from the local City Council member over affordability concerns.

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The renewed effort to make One45 a reality could serve as a litmus test for the city’s appetite for building new homes amid an ongoing housing crisis.

This time around, a number of factors may work in Teitelbaum’s favor: openness from the new, more development-friendly Council member, the recently agreed state housing deal and Mayor Adams’ edict to “build, build, build” to combat the historic housing shortage.

“It’s taken way too long for us to build 1,000 new homes in Harlem, but since there’s now light at the end of the tunnel — and with the cooperation of City officials who have been terrific and also the good working relationship we have with the Council member” — Yusef Salaam — “we decided to re-start the arduous process,” Teitelbaum told the Daily News.

“Needless to say, I wouldn’t be moving forward if we haven’t already had very good discussions with Council member Salaam and I thought we couldn’t find common ground,” he added.

The recently filed “Pre-Application Statement” provides a first look at the latest plan.

It includes three buildings with 922 total units, half of which would be marked as affordable.

One tower, on the corner of Malcolm X Blvd., would be 33 stories tall and have 461 market-rate apartments and 36 affordable ones, along with retail on the ground floor and an events space at the top.

The other tower would be 35 stories tall and have 300 affordable units and 125 supportive ones, with a three-story community facility attached.

There is also a newly introduced single-story building detached from the towers that would be designated for retail.

Under the plans, the two residential towers would be built first, followed by the small commercial property, with an estimated completion date of 2029. Project specifics will likely shift during the rezoning process.

Compared to previous versions of One45, the latest proposal has taller towers, more affordable units, more square footage earmarked for housing — and no parking.

The initial plan featured up to 939 total apartments, with 30% affordable housing — a figure that was later bumped to 50% during negotiations — and up to 141 parking spaces. A civil rights museum to be led by Rev. Al Sharpton was central to the original vision, but he backed out.

Many Harlem locals have vehemently opposed the project since it was first reported in 2021, citing concerns around gentrification, height and affordability.

The last rezoning attempt collapsed in 2022 in the face of opposition from then-Council member Kristin Richardson Jordan, who wanted One45 to be 100% affordable and whose role essentially decided whether the rezoning would pass.

Teitelbaum, who once served as chief of staff to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani, pulled the application before it could formally be voted down.

Richardson Jordan subsequently dropped her reelection bid and was succeeded by Salaam, who came into office this year and has indicated he’s more open to the idea.

“It is clear that one of Harlem’s most pressing needs is housing, both in number of units being developed and in the affordability of those units,” Salaam said in a statement.

“As such, I’ve welcomed conversations with developers that are looking to build in Harlem — productive conversations that are centered on the needs of our neighborhoods. I look forward to continue having conversations with developers, such as Mr. Teitelbaum and the One45 team.”

The L-shaped property is currently home to several small shops, including a community center serving many recently arrived migrants and an unpopular truck depot that Teitelbaum opened last year to protests.

In January The News reported One45 was showing signs of life as Teitelbaum’s team was helping a mosque on the site relocate within Harlem.

One45’s comeback attempt faces a long, uncertain road as it approaches the formal rezoning process, which is likely months away. Teitelbaum told The News he hasn’t decided whether the project will take advantage of a recently revived state tax break to finance the construction.

“We have had very good conversations with the councilmember [and] other members of the community,” he said. “We still believe strongly in the project, and I think that’s really the bottom line.”