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North Seventh Street rezoning seeks 28 units, 7 permanently affordable; applicants cite strong local support
Summary
Applicants seeking a rezoning on North Seventh Street in Williamsburg presented plans for a six‑story mixed building with roughly 28 apartments including seven permanently income‑restricted units; the subcommittee closed the hearing and laid the items over.
An applicant team presented a rezoning application for eight lots on the south side of North Seventh Street between Bedford and Berry Streets in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, seeking a return to R6A contextual mapping and a Mandatory Inclusionary Housing (MIH) text amendment to allow MIH mapping options 1 and 2. The applicants said the project would result in a six‑story, roughly 26,000‑square‑foot mixed commercial and residential building with about 28 apartments, of which roughly seven would be permanently income‑restricted.
Richard Lobel of the law firm Sheldon Lobel introduced the application and said it had unanimous support from Community Board 1 and unconditional approval from the Brooklyn Borough President. Victor Efremenkov and Alexander Zrutnick described site context, design and a unit mix that the applicants said was “85% of the units 1 bedroom or above”: four studios, 14 one‑bedrooms and 10 two‑bedrooms. The proposed project would include ground‑floor commercial space and three parking spaces.
Council members asked for clarification on floor‑area ratio (FAR), tenant impacts and timeline. The applicants said the project was designed on a 3.0 FAR baseline and that the total FAR would be about 3.54—close to but not fully utilizing the latest rezoning allowance of 3.9 FAR. The applicants said most of the eight existing residential units were vacant or their leases expire this summer; they committed to help with moving expenses and to offer returning tenants a discounted apartment in the future. The team estimated that, if rezoned and financed, Department of Buildings filings and approvals would take time and that construction would not likely begin for a minimum of a year with expected construction lasting about 18–24 months.
