Interview with Deborah Beck

Deborah Beck terms her removal from the RIOC Board of Directors an "ouster." She suspects that she was an "irritant," perhaps in her role as chair of the Board’s Real Estate Advisory Committee, to persons she refused to name.

Governor George Pataki sent her a three-sentence "thank you for your service" letter last month, removing her from the Board and replacing her with Charlee Miller, a resident of 455 Main Street, as part of his last round of appointments before leaving office.

In a wide-ranging interview with The Main Street WIRE this week, Beck, a Rivercross resident and former member of that building’s Board of Directors, cited several specific challenges facing RIOC and its Board – challenges she says she tried to work on. Among them:

• The need to resolve, or at least fully understand, the apparent conflict between the Island’s General Development Plan (GDP) and the Mitchell-Lama law. The GDP can be interpreted as requiring certain apartment-affordability ratios in Northtown in perpetuity. The Mitchell-Lama law provides for privatization and a release from income guidelines after 20 years. The issue is important because Eastwood has already privatized with market-rate apartments, and the remaining Northtown Mitchell-Lama buildings (Westview, Island House, and Rivercross, the WIR in references to "the WIRE buildings") are working on it. Beck says lawyers at the State Department of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR) refuse to cope with the question. "These are hot-potato issues," Beck said. "They have got to be addressed."

Deborah Beck’s successor on the RIOC Board, Charlee Miller, spoke to the Residents Association Common Council Wednesday night, then stayed to audit much of the meeting.

• The need for a long-range financial plan looking as far out as possible toward 2068, when the lease under which the State is developing Roosevelt Island (which is New York City property) ends. Beck says development becomes less critical if a financial plan can demonstrate RIOC viability over the longer period.

Beck experienced specific frustrations. Among them:

• RIOC has suffered a "lack of direction and leadership." She said, "The leaders we’ve had at RIOC since the beginning of the Pataki administration have not been community administrators... They don’t have the background you need if you want to run a residential community." That creates "a situation ripe for the kind of aggravations that many on the Island have expressed over the years..."

While other resident Board members have served terms well beyond their initial appointments, essentially on a month-to-month basis, Beck was terminated shortly after the end of her two-year term, which began in 2004. As The WIRE reported December 16, Governor Pataki named her replacement, Charlee Miller of Riverwalk Place, as his term was expiring. The law establishing RIOC provides for Board members to serve their terms, and thereafter until replaced.

One Board position remains open. Non-resident member John Mannix has resigned, but there is no indication yet that his resignation has been accepted – by Pataki or by Governor Eliot Spitzer. Spitzer’s administration has yet to take action on positions at RIOC or on its unpaid Board. Asked about his resignation, Mannix told The WIRE on Wednesday, "In September, I informed the Commissioner of my intention to resign after the elections, which I have done. I have not had any contact from the new administration concerning this matter. I am from a practical standpoint unable to devote the time required to serve on the Board. I hope that Governor Spitzer and his transition people have the good sense to find a real-estate professional to replace me, as there are many complex issues at hand which require both a high level of sophistication and devotion of time if they are to work out in the best interests of the Island and its residents."

The unabridged text of The WIRE’s interview with Beck is on Website NYC10044 (nyc10044.com) with this issue of The WIRE.