Bargaining for Benefits
The Dilemmas of Implementing the West Harlem Community Benefits Agreement
Nicholas Robinson (Otterbein University)
Over the last 25 years, community benefits agreements (CBAs) have become a means for residents of low-income communities to demand a greater share of the benefits of urban development projects. CBAs are bargaining agreements that are signed by a developer that commit to delivering a range of material benefits to affected residents in exchange for community support for the proposed project. Much scholarly and broader public attention has been focused on how unequal developer-resident negotiating conditions undermine their responsiveness to community concerns. Rather than focusing on the fairness of the negotiation process, this paper focuses on how effectively CBAs are implemented throughout the duration of the agreement. My paper evaluates Columbia University’s expansion into West Harlem, and the subsequent CBA that was signed between Columbia University and the West Harlem Development Corporation (WHDC) in 2009. The principal conclusions find:
Decisions that shape implementation significantly influence the outcome. Roughly 15 years into implementation of this CBA, many West Harlem residents are unaware of their entitlements under the benefits agreement. Since residents cannot demand benefits they do not know about, this lack of awareness creates an accountability problem.
To make them more accountable, CBA advocates should prioritize continuous efforts to publicize residents’ entitlements to community benefits. In addition, organizers should also emphasize greater participation among residents in decisions regarding the distribution of community benefits.
To gain a better understanding of Columbia’s expansion into West Harlem, I needed to learn more
about how the agreement was designed. Specifically, how much discretion did the WHDC have in dispersing CBA dollars? What was Columbia’s role in the implementation process? And, lastly how did decisions over agreement design influence implementation? To this end, I conducted four interviews with persons with intimate knowledge of the West Harlem Community Benefits Agreement (WHCBA) and the politics of New York City. While I knew that the role of the WHDC was to administer CBA dollars that came from Columbia, I needed to know more about the relationship between Columbia and the development corporation. To do this, I relied upon financial reporting documents such as audited financial statements, grant forms, WHDC bylaws, and the text of the benefits agreement itself.
My primary findings examine the particular decisions made by prominent actors involved in implementing the WHCBA. However, it is important to underscore that since CBAs do not challenge the politics of growth, their ability to solve the underlying issues of those organizing them is constrained. For example, the biggest anxieties among unaffiliated West Harlem residents concerning Columbia’s satellite campus revolved around the already-existing crisis around housing affordability. To address this, the WHDC established an Affordable Housing Fund. Despite this, nine years into implementation, 1 percent of this fund was spent. In fact, relative to other spending categories such as youth programs arts and culture, and elderly services, WHDC housing-related spending is substantially smaller. I contend that, while individual decisions matter, the development corporation faced structural constraints when aiming to construct affordable housing in the face of institutionally-driven gentrification.
Moreover, the paper goes into greater detail regarding the larger political environment that propelled support among the city’s policymakers for Columbia’s expansion. Led by then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his Deputy Mayor for Development Daniel Doctoroff, the city’s elites began an organized campaign to use policy tools to aggressively brand the city as a haven for competition, cosmopolitanism, and meritocracy. For his part, Columbia’s President Lee Bollinger recognized how this broader urban agenda could usefully complement the university’s expansionary ambitions. From the start of his tenure, Bollinger put physical expansion at the top of his list of priorities. Thus, the city’s growth agenda was harmonious with Bollinger’s insistence on Columbia’s need to compete with its Ivy League counterparts.
I want to acknowledge those who have helped me throughout the development of this paper. In particular, the interviewees whose insights were indispensable. Additionally, without the invaluable feedback that I received from the editors and anonymous reviewers, this paper would have never materialized. Finally, I want to thank the reader for taking time to read this blog, and if you have the opportunity, the paper in its entirety.
Nicholas A. Robinson is an assistant professor of Political Science at Otterbein University. His research focuses on developer-resident relations, community benefits agreements, and urban distributive justice.