Housing Developers Sue New York Officials For Trying To Keep Out Hasidic Jews
Hasidic Jewish boys at a tisch. Image by Avi Kaye/Hasidim in USA
(JTA) — The developers of a housing project in southeastern New York have sued public officials for trying to prevent the development to keep Hasidic Jews from moving in.
The lawsuit filed earlier this month by The Greens at Chester developers in federal court in White Plains, New York alleges that town and county residents and officials attempted to prevent the project’s development due to opposition to a Hasidic influx. The complaint included links to video clips and statements made at public and private meetings to bolster the claim, the Times Herald Record reported.
The developers have asked the court to reverse the town’s building-permit denials for homes that comply with approved plans. They also are seeking $80 million in compensatory damages, $20 million in punitive damages, and compensation for property they say the town effectively has taken away, according to the newspaper.
Greens at Chester, a 431-home development being built on a 110-acre site , is slated be a predominantly Hasidic community for up to 3,000 people.
Then-Chester Supervisor Alex Jamieson told the Times Herald-Record in September 2018 that local residents feared the neighboring Hasidic community of Kiryas Joel would expand into the town in order to explain why it was buying up large available property tracts in the town.
The plaintiffs bought the 117-acre development site for $12.1 million in October 2017. The project of 431 homes had been approved by the town Planning Board four years earlier.
Town officials met twice with the new buyers to convince them to switch from a residential development to a mall, promising “expedited approval,” the Times Herald Record reported. The following day, the town offered to buy the property for first $20 million and then $30 million, showing its “great desperation to keep Hasidic Jews out of Chester,” the lawsuit says, according to the newspaper.
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning journalism this Passover.
In this age of misinformation, our work is needed like never before. We report on the news that matters most to American Jews, driven by truth, not ideology.
At a time when newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall. That means for the first time in our 126-year history, Forward journalism is free to everyone, everywhere. With an ongoing war, rising antisemitism, and a flood of disinformation that may affect the upcoming election, we believe that free and open access to Jewish journalism is imperative.
Readers like you make it all possible. Right now, we’re in the middle of our Passover Pledge Drive and we still need 300 people to step up and make a gift to sustain our trustworthy, independent journalism.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
Only 300 more gifts needed by April 30
