Amid fierce debate over whether the Monitor Point project will actually be accessible to local residents, a 100% affordable housing building is coming to the Greenpoint waterfront.

Representatives from TF Cornerstone presented their plans at a Brooklyn Community Board 1 meeting on June 9. The proposed project consists of an affordable building at 2 Oak Street and a market-rate building at 10 Noble Street. The project, under the city’s 485-x tax abatement program, marks the developer’s debut in the neighborhood; they also purchased an adjacent lot at 15 Oak/57 West Street from the Guttman family last year, but those plans are still in the works.

The market-rate building at 10 Noble Street includes 792 units spread across two towers, which will reach 29 and 38 stories (on top of a four-story base). Next door, the affordable building at 2 Oak Street consists of 267 units and spans 14 stories. 50% of those units will be two-bedroom (required under the 485x program), with 66 studios and 67 one-bedroom units. 2 Oak will have bike storage on every floor and a laundry room. Both buildings will have a live-in superintendent and ground-floor commercial space.

TF Cornerstone is also developing an acre of publicly-accessible green space.

According to a CB1 meeting agenda, ‘[t]he affordable units will have a weighted average AMI of 59.96% with income bands at 40%, 60% and 70%.”

However, some board members and community members alike took umbrage at what they felt was a disparity between the market-rate and affordable sides of the project. As the two buildings are entirely separate, the affordable tenants do not have access to the amenities next door. Several board members called the developer’s presentation “offensive.”

“We worked so hard for people in this community to be treated well. All I can say is that if this is where the city is going…back to the old ways…we have a problem,” said one board member.

“You guys come here and think you are helping us out, and then do this,” said another.

Local fears about discrimination aren’t totally unfounded, especially on the Greenpoint waterfront. Residents of a neighboring affordable building at 40 Oak Street recently won a rate abatement against Halcyon Management, due to the company’s consistent neglect of the building. Representatives from TF Cornerstone tell Greenpointers that the building’s design should assuage some of those fears, with a trash chute and compactor keeping waste management internal, instead of the pileups that commonly plague similar projects (40 Oak also has a trash chute, which was often overstuffed). They plan to install lockers in the package room as a theft-prevention measure.

The developer has expressed interest in implementing social services for the affordable building, which they say can only be achieved through creating value on the market-rate building.

The project doesn’t require a rezoning, meaning the community board does not vote on it. TF Cornerstone plans to start work this fall, completing the affordable building and the green space before their other Greenpoint projects.

We reached out to the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development for additional information about affordable housing projects. While they confirmed that the developer is allowed to structure the project as two separate buildings, they did not answer our question about access to amenities.