By Jennifer Warren
Members of Community Board 6 voted unanimously last week to convert the flow of traffic on two Forest Hills streets to one way after an appeal by board member Joann Ciorciari at the monthly meeting.
Until the city Department of Transportation gives its approval, however, the streets will remain two way.
City Councilman John Sabini (D-Jackson Heights), who made a appearance at the Jan. 24 meeting, joked, “I represent six streets along Queens Boulevard. When you change the direction of two of them, I was eager to hear about it.”
Councilwoman Kathryn Freed (D-Manhattan) also attended the meeting at the invitation of the board to speak on issues, including an unsuccessful bill she proposed several years ago that would have banned the distribution of advertisement fliers beneath car windshields. Freed also spoke of the city's chronically late payments to social service contractors, which often lag by as much as nine months.
The two roads under consideration are 62nd Avenue between Queens Boulevard and 93rd Street, which would flow eastbound only and 93rd Street from 62nd Avenue to the Horace Harding Expressway, which would flow only northbound.
“It's not a street that you would really notice,” said Ciorciari, chairwoman of the transportation committee, “but to get down this narrow street there are constant near misses.”
Parked cars line both sides of the street, Ciorciari said, noting that as someone who works in the area, she had witnessed many accidents on the road.
The board voted 23-0 on the proposal, which has already been submitted to a public hearing and will next be reviewed by the DOT, said Kathleen Reilly, district manager of Community Board 6.
Freed was invited by the board's Sanitation and Environmental Committee to speak about the windshield flier legislation she had co-sponsored several years ago.
The legislation would have forbidden the placement of advertisements beneath cars' windshield wipers and presumably other areas of private property. But it never advanced, said Tom Castele, a representative from Freed's office.
“The legal department thought it wouldn't hold up in court,” Castele said.
But Freed spent most of her time discussing the city's poor history of paying human service contractors. These agencies, many of which are based in the outer boroughs, provide medical, housing, legal and employment services to the city's neediest residents. But with a three-to-nine-month backlog for issuing checks, Freed said, many of these small operators and their clients are suffering.
The employees of such agencies were living month-to-month on their paychecks, she said.
“They were literally hocking their jewelry so they could pay their rent,” Freed said.
The city held the overdue funds in interest-bearing accounts, Freed said, and was balancing its budget “on the backs of the small businesses.”
