Flushing CSA

10/28/2026

The city’s Public Design Commission unanimously voted to table its vote on the design of a public-facing portion of billionaire Steve Cohen's Metropolitan Park Casino after a number of people testifying in opposition to the project raised concerns about the $8 billion complex’s impact on the local environment.

The commission, which is tasked with reviewing and approving the design of buildings proposed on city-owned property, delayed its vote on a crucial section of Cohen’s Metropolitan Park Casino and entertainment complex following a public hearing.

Their reluctance to vote on the project came after a vast majority of those testifying said they opposed Cohen's Metropolitan Park Casino, including some who claimed the complex would do little to mitigate flooding issues that already plague the northwestern section of the World’s Borough.

The commission initially set out to review only a section of the project’s design – the stairway and balcony area of the Casino, which would connect with the public park slated to be built between the complex and Citi Field. But after dozens of Queens residents told the commission about their fears about the project, including its alleged potential to worsen flooding in the already-flood-prone area, the commission’s view shifted.

“We can't really think about this until we make sure that we understand what the site as a whole is doing,” PDC President Deborah Marton said. “It's just the sequence of things that makes it so that we don't understand the underlying conditions.”

The PDC previously voted to approve other sections of the project, including its master plan, lighting proposals and a parking garage. But commissioners said they were surprised, concerned and also heartened by the large number of people who showed up to testify both against and in support of Cohen's Metropolitan Park Casino this week. Laurie Hawkinson, who has served on the commission for a decade, said she couldn’t recall a meeting that had drawn more public interest.

Much of the testimony shared during the hearing varied little from remarks given at the dozens of public hearings held on Cohen's Metropolitan Park Casino over the past half decade. And much of it didn’t necessarily fall under the commission’s purview.

Those opposed said the project would be a plague on the community, enticing local residents to gamble away their hard-earned money. They also urged the city to find a more public use for the proposed site on public parkland, which is owned by the city but now leased to Cohen and Hard Rock.

One person said that while they liked the look of the public park, it would be overshadowed by the “huge honking mass of a casino” at the center of the complex.

At one point, the crush of negative testimony led one commission member to question the PDC’s role in the public review process.
“I feel like there's this huge elephant, and we're talking about what kind of saddle we're going to put on the elephant or what we're going to feed the elephant – but the elephant is this massive gambling operation,” Kenseth Armstead, a member of the commission, said. “We're tiny, and if people keep showing up like this, that means that whatever community board you went to, that did not work. That did not achieve the goal of getting community buy-in, and I think we need time to consider that.”

But the commission’s ultimate pushback centered around its concerns about its lack of understanding of the Casino’s environmental impact.

While the city ruled in February 2025 that the Casino’s “benefits…outweigh the adverse environmental impacts,” the PDC said they wanted to learn more about the impacts before voting on individual design features.

Cohen's Casino was awarded one of three downstate casino licenses by the New York State Gaming Commission in 2025, and was also granted a number of permissions to build the project by the city.

Construction of the project has begun, but the project is running behind schedule.

The Casino's developers had yet to begin testing the foundation of the parking lot the casino will be built on, despite telling the Gaming Commission they had planned to do so by Jan. 1. Construction of the casino, which was scheduled to begin in April, was subsequently pushed back.

The city’s Public Design Commission unanimously voted to table its vote on the design of a public-facing portion of the Metropolitan Park casino after a number of people testifying in opposition to the project on Tuesday raised concerns about the $8 billion complex’s impact on the local environm...

10/14/2026

If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, how do we pave the way for peace and reconciliation?

What is the Road to Reconciliation Paved with?

09/23/2026

Hundreds of Jewish New Yorkers marked Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of Atonement, on Monday (Sept. 21) with a mourning ritual memorializing Palestinians killed in the Israel-Hamas war. A few days before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s highly anticipated visit for the U.N. General Assembly, the gathering also served to denounce how the Israeli government has handled the war.

Brad Lander, a New York Democratic nominee for Congress, who is Jewish, addressed the crowd gathered at Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza by denouncing Netanyahu’s visit and what he described as a “genocide” happening in Gaza.

He said he belonged to a group of Jews “who say no to ethnic cleansing, who say no to human-made famine, who say no to the use of U.S. tax dollars to bomb entire families, who say no to war criminals in our city this holy week or any week.”

In the city that’s home to the largest Jewish population in the U.S., Netanyahu’s visit has prompted divides — especially after Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a staunch Israel critic, in July reignited the debate over Netanyahu’s visit to the U.S. despite the International Criminal Court’s efforts to arrest him for what it deemed were war crimes committed in Gaza. The mayor called Netanyahu a “war criminal” but backtracked on his campaign promise of arresting him, citing the city’s lack of legal authority — which Netanyahu dismissed as comments “fomenting hate” and fueling antisemitism.

Netanyahu’s visit is expected to prompt a number of protests, which the mayor encouraged New Yorkers to participate in over the summer. However, according to The Forward, last week he said he “never encouraged them to protest,” but said they “have the right to do so in the city.” Last week, a group of Modern Orthodox Jewish teens protested the mayor’s stance on Israel in front of the mayor’s residence at Gracie Mansion. Showcasing their support for the Jewish state, the teens prayed with tefillin, the black leather threads attached to boxes containing Torah verses worn by observant Jewish men during prayers.

Now in its third year, the public remembrance service has become a space for Jewish New Yorkers opposed to the war in Gaza to voice their criticism and lament the devastation caused by the conflict. It was organized by Jews For Racial & Economic Justice, a left-wing Jewish organization of which Lander is a member, and Rabbis for Ceasefire, a collective of 450 Jewish faith leaders demanding an end to the war. The demonstration was co-sponsored by Jewish Voice for Peace, IfNotNow and the American Council for Judaism.

NEW YORK (RNS) — As the highly anticipated US visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu approaches this week, attendees denounced how the Israeli government has handled the war.

09/09/2026

This summer, Friends visited Palestine and met with peacemakers from the Jewish, Christian and Muslim communities. Find out what they witnessed: What did they see and learn? What do the people of Palestine want us to know? What is life like under the occupation today? Please join us Wednesday, September 16th at 7:30 p.m. ET online for their report-back and presentation, "Spirit Moves at the Margins in Palestine." RSVP @ https://cutt.ly/1yjc78EN

09/02/2026

Our Palestine solidarity delegation will report-back on Wednesday, September 16, 7:30pm EST. Register @ https://cutt.ly/1yjc78EN

08/04/2026

How do you translate inner peace into ‘outer’ peace, or peace in the world? We might think of peace work beginning inside of ourselves and creating a ripple effect into the shared spaces of our lives. Sometimes that outward effect happens through grace, or in unexpected ways, but we may also encounter discord between our inner-peace practices and the happenings of the world around us. What steps do you take to bridge that gap?

Finding a daily spiritual spiritual practice that's right for you can bring freedom, joy, inspiration, and grounding.

06/03/2026

Apartheid-Free Communities is a network of people and communities around the world working to end apartheid. Come learn, share, and help us grow the movement for a world free of apartheid.

Join Apartheid-Free Communities for an inspiring event of movement-building and story-telling. Learn about how multiple communities across Turtle Island are living into the pledge - from student groups and businesses, to faith groups and congregations. **In commemoration of the initiative's birthday...

05/28/2026

Arrested for reading a book during a thunderstorm: John Choe was driving through Athens, Georgia, when a storm prompted him to stop at a gas station to wait out the thunder. This video features bodycam footage from Officer John LaValley and other police officers responding to the situation. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/arrested-for-reading-a-book-during-a-thunderstorm/vi-AA23Fmk https://gofund.me/7cb1fecb4

John Choe was driving through Athens, Georgia, when a storm prompted him to stop at a gas station to wait out the thunder. This video features raw bodycam footage from Officer John LaValley responding to the situation.

05/06/2026

We Shall Overcome!

2.3K likes, 171 comments. "WE SHALL OVERCOME: LOVE WILL RISE AGAIN | nimo patel & daniel nahmod | Empty Hands Music"

04/22/2026

Hon. Nicholas W. Moyne recused himself from overseeing a lawsuit filed by Queens residents against the New York State Gaming Commission on March 20, citing a “social relationship with a member of respondent” as his reason for recusal on court documentation filed on April 2.

The lawsuit stems from criticisms over the gaming commission’s unanimous decision on Dec. 15 to issue a commercial casino license to the Metropolitan Park casino team, led by Hard Rock International and billionaire Steve Cohen, owner of the New York Mets.

The casino is slated to be built next to Citi Field in Flushing, and preparations for its construction are currently underway.

Petitioners allege that the gaming commission failed in its duty to ensure the integrity of the casino sponsors — Cohen and Hard Rock — as required by law.

They cited Cohen’s hedge fund, SAC Capital Advisors, which pleaded guilty in the nation’s largest insider-trading scandal and agreed to pay a record $1.8 billion fine.

While the Metropolitan Park casino team noted that Cohen himself was not charged with any wrongdoing, the billionaire was barred from managing clients’ money for two years in a separate civil action.

ProPublica also released a report in December 2024 that Cohen used his new hedge fund, Point72, to utilize a tax loophole that helped the billionaire avoid approximately $11 million in Medicare taxes in 2014 and 2015.

At the time, ProPublica reported that Cohen and two other billionaires referenced in the story said they “followed the law as written.”

As for Hard Rock, the petitioners noted that last August, the company fired its senior vice president for Hotel and Casino Operations, Alex Pariente, following an internal investigation of charges that included money-laundering practices.

Petitioners’ second point of contention argued that the gaming commission did not conduct fair public hearings and systematically silenced voices that opposed the casino project. Petitioners submitted evidence citing the two public hearings — one on Sept. 9 that lasted from 4-7 p.m. and one on Sept. 16 that was shortened from three hours to two hours and took place from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. — as the two shortest scheduled sessions of any of the other casino teams conducting hearings for their proposals at the time, most of which were scheduled for at least four hours long.

In addition, they claimed the notice sent out by the gaming commission ahead of the Sept. 16 hearing was misleading because it instructed members of the public not to arrive before 9:30 a.m.

Attendees said members of the public were let in much earlier than 9:30 a.m., with one petitioner claiming there was already a line of about 50 people when he arrived at 9:10 a.m.

According to documentation filed in the court case, 54 speakers had testified that day — 43 of which were in support of the casino. Only four of the first 35 speakers were against the casino.

The lawsuit stems from criticisms over the gaming commission’s unanimous decision on Dec. 15 to issue a commercial casino license to the Metropolitan Park