honest86 t1_itlk8c6 wrote on October 24, 2022 at 3:22 PM

This entire proposal is an astroturf campaign. There is a well funded PR company putting this together. They have been running thousands of ads across multiple social media sites. They don't disclose who their clients are or indicate who is actually behind and funding the campaign. There is nothing grass roots about this proposal. If I had to guess it is by the same landlords who have been fighting against the governors proposal and who spent thousands of dollars on the last election trying to get a puppet candidate elected.

Arleare13 t1_itln0ji wrote on October 24, 2022 at 3:41 PM

Seems to be even weirder than that. According to the website it's a project of the National Civic Art Society, which is this weird Trump-affiliated non-profit devoted to "classical" architecture, at the exclusion of all other styles. They were in the news a couple of years back for instigating Trump's short-lived executive order banning all other styles of architecture for federal projects.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/07/arts/design/federal-building-architecture.html

Redoing Penn Station is a worthwhile area of discussion, but I'd be very suspicious of this organization's motives and affiliations.

Riccma02 t1_itoy9sq wrote on October 25, 2022 at 6:32 AM

Yeah, Trump has no fucking idea what comprises classical architecture. I've seen his buildings.

[deleted] t1_itlwfoc wrote on October 24, 2022 at 4:43 PM

The Form 990 available on guidestar says otherwise. Those amounts are like a rounding error if it was well funded. Look up the 16 names on there of the board.

karmapuhlease t1_itmrbeg wrote on October 24, 2022 at 8:02 PM

They're also trying to kill the bigger, more functional project that NYS is already planning (the one Hochul talks about). This group is basically trying to say "that project is too modern, so let's just do this historic restoration version instead - pay no attention to how much smaller and less useful it is!"

ChrisFromLongIsland t1_itlpq7b wrote on October 24, 2022 at 3:59 PM

They probably are trying to kill the current proposal as it suits their needs whoever it is.