Freedom Plaza Follows Pattern For New York Casino Hearings

During the fifth hour of Thursday night’s public hearing for residents to comment on the $11.1 billion Freedom Plaza casino proposal for the East Side of Manhattan, Ila Eckhoff posed the rhetorical question cutting to the heart of the matter.

“Would you want a casino a block away from where you live?”

While Eckhoff — a Murray Hill resident close to where the casino, apartments, museum, and park space would all be developed — and others do not want to see Freedom Plaza built, there was plenty of support from the 140 people who spoke at Scandinavia House over the course of the afternoon and into the evening.

Freedom Plaza, fronted by the Soloviev Group and Mohegan, is one of three Manhattan-based proposals among the eight overall vying for the three $500 million downstate casino licenses that could be awarded by the New York State Gaming Commission.

All three groups with designs for a casino in New York City have held their first public hearings, and the Freedom Plaza group will return to Scandinavia House for its second Sept. 15.

Familiar fault lines of support, opposition

The venue at 58 Park Ave. was host to a Community Advisory Committee (CAC) hearing for the second time in the downstate licensing process. Scandinavia House made more logistical sense Thursday than the Caesars Palace Times Square group holding its first hearing there Aug. 13 to discuss and listen to comments about its plans for 1515 Broadway.

As has been the case at every public hearing save for Resorts World — which overwhelmingly has the backing of its Queens-based community — the familiar fault lines of support from trade unions and civic groups and strident opposition from local residents emerged. The hearing was testy throughout, with the CAC organizer often imploring those in attendance not to applaud or jeer after speakers concluded their comments.

Unionized workers, many with ties to the Soloviev Group from its previous real estate developments on the East Side, provided full-throated support to the project with the potential to create 17,000 jobs between construction and gaming, including 8,000 permanent ones.

“This project is an investment in all of us,” said Samantha Mara, who described herself as a union carpenter and woman in construction. “It brings affordable housing, green spaces, and day care centers — things our communities need to thrive. And it’s not only about jobs today. It’s about long-term careers, training and stability.

“For women in trades, this is a chance to be recognized, respected, and hired. We’re not just building a casino. We’re building equity, inclusion, and a stronger New York.”

Many of the concerns voiced by Murray Hill and Tudor City residents centered around simply not having a casino in the neighborhood. It was noted the Soloviev Group has owned the parcel of land where it wants to build for more than two decades without any notable attempt to build the proposed housing now being offered with the casino and other amenities.

Others cited traffic concerns that three large-scale venues in close proximity would create, with the United Nations Plaza less than three blocks away to the north and Bellevue Health Center and NYU Langone Health less than 10 blocks to the south. The oft-stated concerns of crime and safety were also plentiful from residents, some of whom want the increased housing but not the casino.

“The Soloviev Group has owned this parcel of land for nearly 30 years with promises of affordable housing,” said resident and former Manhattan Community Board 6 Chairperson Kyle Athayde, “and they have yet to deliver a single unit despite building luxury apartments across the street.

“Now they’re trying to capitalize on our community’s need for affordable housing and open space to force through a casino. It’s offensive, it’s manipulative, and we shouldn’t fall for it.”

A generational divide emerges

Thursday night also provided glimpses of a generational divide during these hearings, with one such instance packaged in vintage New Yorker cynicism. Long-time resident Joan Boyle, an opponent of the proposal, called it “deja vu all over again” as she recalled promises of building up the East Side from the Soloviev Group that never materialized. She called the proposed area “a wild kingdom, [with] fat rats crossing 1st Avenue.”

Boyle sarcastically added that one has to “applaud the genius of having so many kinds of religious and racial [groups] — I mean, everybody under the sun has come forward to rave about how great this is going to be for my neighborhood.

“I have to say, masterful design on the marketing on this.”

Immediately following her was an unidentified younger male who said he participates in outreach groups sponsored by Soloviev and resides in the 10017 zip code “for those in the back.” He threw shade on Boyle’s comments before speaking to concerns cited by others in his support of Freedom Plaza.

“If you think the youth are going to be affected by a casino within a 15-block radius of them, go on TikTok, go on Twitter, go see anything, any social media platform today, and you will see hate speech beyond belief that will affect our youth far more.

“What this project is, is an investment,” he continued. “It’s an investment in the youth of this area. You can’t tell me that a casino will bring more crime than the thousands of bars in the area. And you also can’t paint me a fiction that midtown Manhattan is a perfect utopia right now.”