The New York City Housing Authority has sent lease termination notices to a handful of public housing tenants who are refusing to relocate to make way for a $1.2 billion project to demolish and rebuild some deteriorating buildings in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood.
Working with private sector developers, the Housing Authority plans to take down 18 buildings in three developments — the Fulton, Elliott and Chelsea Houses — and replace them with six towers that will house the 2,056 tenants who live there now. Nine more buildings will be built at the site that will include 1,000 permanently affordable units and another 2,500 market-rate apartments NYCHA says make the project financially feasible.
To pull off this transformation, NYCHA is requiring tenants at two of the buildings set for demolition first — one of the Fulton Houses buildings, known as Fulton 11, and a seniors-only development called Chelsea Addition — to relocate until the demolition and rebuilding of the first new tower is complete. That is expected to take three years…