City Hall plays cool on Central Park rink bid
The de Blasio’s administration has given an icy response to the Central Park Conservancy’s offer to take over the Wollman Rink from the Trump Organization.
The conservancy, which is credited with reviving the fabled park since the 1980s, has committed to spending $50 million operating the Wollman Rink, making sure the proceeds are reinvested in the park and reviving community perks like free skating days. The conservancy is already working on improvements to the Lasker Rink further uptown.
The organization asked the administration to can the customary request for proposals to get a new contractor for Wollman, but the Parks Department is moving ahead with the process anyway.
“We are very, very knowledgeable about Central Park and what it needs and how it works,” conservancy President Betsy Smith told the Daily News this week. “And we’re completely committed to the public good.”
The conservancy would restore some rink services that went out the window when the Trump Organization took over. Those include the free skating days and days reserved for locals.
The parks group would also open up bathrooms and food services to those who don’t come just to skate. There also would be a variety of cultural programming during the off-season.
Overall, the proposal marks a transformation of the rink from a profit center for private interests to sites helping the public good, Smith said.
“[Former President Donald Trump] used Wollman Rink as a basis of a lot of his argument for commercial acuity and ability,” she added. “Public property should not be used as a branding opportunity for private interest.”
The Jan. 6 siege of the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters prompted Mayor de Blasio to state the city wouldn’t renew its contracts for the Trump Organization to run the Central Park rinks after the skating season, which just ended. Hizzoner also promised to nix contracts for the Central Park Carousel and Trump Golf Links in the Bronx.
“As the protectors of our city parks, our goal is to have an experienced operator in place so that there is no disruption in this winter’s skating season at Wollman Rink,” Parks Department spokeswoman Crystal Howard said in an email. “The most dependable way to do that is through our competitive process.
“If we’d gone the route of exploring a sole source agreement with the Central Park Conservancy, we would have run a serious risk of not having skating this winter at both Wollman and Lasker rinks,” she added.