NYCHA boots project’s staff
Troubled development shakeup
A top-to-bottom housecleaning is unfolding at a Bronx public housing development where NYCHA discovered pervasive lead paint, with the entire staff ordered to hand in their keys and exit the property.
The clean sweep took place Friday at the Throggs Neck Houses and was ordered up by NYCHA General Manager Vito Mustaciuolo in response to a growing list of tenant complaints.
Officials declined to discuss the nature of these complaints at the huge development, which is near the Trump Golf Links at Ferry Point and consists of 29 buildings housing 2,711 tenants. It was built in 1953.
But the Daily News has detailed problems with addressing lead paint concerns at the project, which was built before lead paint was banned in New York City.
In December, tenant leaders told The News that New York City Housing Authority management had found lead paint in 78 apartments but didn't bother to inform the tenants who live there.
Sources told The News on Friday that the entire staff of the development will be replaced Monday in what appears to be an unprecedented and highly symbolic move in an effort to reform the notoriously mismanaged agency.
NYCHA spokeswoman Robin Levine declined to discuss Friday specifics of what triggered the dramatic overhaul, except to state, "As part of a top-to-bottom assessment NYCHA's new leadership is conducting across the authority, we are reorganizing staff to better serve the needs of our residents."
Two sources familiar with what happened say that at midday Friday, top managers from NYCHA headquarters in lower Manhattan showed up. They gathered all staffers in a room and announced that everyone had to turn in their keys and remove any belongings onsite and leave the property.
A transitional staff was put in place over the weekend, with a new permanent staff set to show up Monday morning. The former Throggs Neck staff will be reassigned to other developments.
Greg Floyd, president of Teamsters Local 237, which represents 8,000 NYCHA workers, said, “This is unusual for the Housing Authority to take this action on this scale at one development.”
He declined to further comment.
The lead paint problems at Throggs Neck are part of a broader pattern of neglect on this issue that has been at the heart of NYCHA's management failures, as documented by The News over the past three years.
In June, the city and NYCHA entered into an agreement with federal prosecutors after they filed an 80page complaint detailing how the agency lied and covered up its failures to address lead paint, mold and other issues.
NYCHA and Mayor de Blasio agreed to the appointment of a federal monitor to oversee the authority going forward. The monitor candidate has not yet been named, and a federal judge must still approve the appointment.