Coney Island Community Board Throws Cold Water On Proposed Casino
Brooklyn's Community Board 13 voted against a rezoning proposal for Thor Equities' proposed Coney Island casino project, making the developer's path to groundbreaking more difficult.
The final tally was 24 votes against the proposal versus 11 votes in favor on Jan. 22, the Brooklyn Paper reported. And while the vote doesn’t knock Thor out of the running for one of the three downstate casino licenses New York state is planning to award, it could complicate processes going forward.
CB13’s vote means the developers don’t have the community’s backing to rezone their lots in order to develop their $3B casino project known as The Coney. The project is expected to feature sky bridges, a 2,500-seat concert venue, a 500-room hotel, a 92K SF convention center and more than 70K SF of retail space in addition to the gambling facility in the historic South Brooklyn neighborhood.
The developers plan to continue discussions with stakeholders but also plan to push forward, adding that Community Board votes on whether the developers’ rezoning proposals should be approved are advisory, a spokesperson for The Coney said in a statement.
“As the outright owners of the fully developable lots, The Coney remains the bid most poised to put shovels in the ground on day one to kick start what will be an economic revival for Coney Island and Southern Brooklyn,” the spokesperson told Bisnow by email.
The rezoning would mostly affect the planned sky bridges and The Coney’s plans to make the surrounding streets more pedestrian-friendly and flood-resistant.
The outcome may not have been surprising for Thor and its partners on the project, Saratoga Casino Holdings and the Chickasaw Nation, following a resolution overwhelmingly passed by CB13 in April 2023 to reject plans for the casino.
Additionally, the proposal sits on land overseen by two community boards, meaning Brooklyn’s Community Board 11, which previously voted in favor of the project, will also have a say.
But without community approval, the process to obtain a casino license could get much harder. Every casino proposal must be heard by a six-member community advisory committee, two-thirds of which must agree the proposal would be in the community’s best interests.
Gov. Kathy Hochul, Mayor Eric Adams, the local senate and assembly members, the local city council members and the borough president nominate the members of the committee. And in the past year, local groups have played key roles in tanking political support for proposed casinos near Citi Field in Queens and close to the High Line in lower Manhattan.
