SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE

OF NEW YORK
Index No.
COUNTY OF KINGS

In the Matter of the Petition of

ANDREW C. SNYDER, ROY BEN- Hon.
MOSHE, TOBY SANCHEZ,
MURRAY LANTNER, CAMPUS
ROAD COMMUNITY GARDEN
VERIFIED PETITION AND
COMPLAINT FOR DECLARATORY
Petitioners/Plaintiffs JUDGEMENT

v.

KAREN L. GOULD as President of

Brooklyn College, STEVE LITTLE as
Vice-President of Brooklyn College,
JOANNA OLIVER as Environmental
Manager for Dormitory Authority of the
State of New York, DORMITORY
AUTHORITY OF THE STATE OF
NEW YORK, BROOKLYN
COLLEGE

Respondents/Defendants

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Petitioners/Plaintiffs (“Petitioners”), by the undersigned Pro se representation as an Article
78 proceeding, for their verified petition and complaint for declaratory judgment allege as
follows:

I. Preliminary Statement

1. The Campus Road Community Garden was welcomed to its present location on the
perimeter of the campus of Brooklyn College in March 1997. The College helped grade
and put paths on the original nucleus of the approximately 4500 square foot garden. Toby
Sanchez, representing the Campus Road Gardeners, with the South Midwood Residents as
a financial agent signed a revocable lease with the College in 1997.

2. Following the release of the Dormitory of the State of New York’s negative declaration
Tuesday, May 18, 2010 the College evicted the Gardeners and has closed the garden (as of
9:30pm May 20, 2010) and hired professional landscapers to begin dismantling the garden.
Gardeners have been told that very soon it will be bulldozed and completely flattened.

3. The College has announced plans to create a new “Brooklyn College Garden” on 2500
square feet, barring trees, shrubs, and bushes, utilizing raised bed planters. The rest of the
former garden area will be paved for a parking lot.

4. Gardeners petition the court for immediate relief from this sudden and irreversible
destruction of a garden that took 13 years to develop.

5. The DASNY determination of a negative ruling included several

elements that were capricious, arbitrary, and illegal. Petitioners request
that the dismantling and bulldozing of the garden be restrained through a
Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) and a Preliminary Injunction and that
the Court require the College to produce an Environmental Impact
Statement (EIS) that would accurately address the true environmental
impact of this planned and imminent destruction of a precious community
resource, aesthetic public open space, and ecologically important land.

6. We support the Athletic Field's construction, in so far as that construction is not

planned to interfere in any way with the current Campus Road Community Garden. Our
objections are confined only to issues affecting the Campus Road Community Garden, and
therefore only the parking portion of the current Athletic Field Plan.

II. Parties

A. Petitioners

7. Andrew C. Snyder has been a community gardener at the Campus Road Community
Garden since 2008. He strongly values the experience of working collaboratively with
other gardeners to support the flora, fauna, and habitat in Brooklyn, and has planted
numerous butterfly host and pollinator-attractors in his garden plot. He is opposed to the
College’s precipitous and calamitous actions because of the severe adverse impacts it will

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have on the local physical environment, irrevocably altering the community character.

8. Roy Ben-Moshe has been a Brooklyn College student since 2004 and became a
gardener during the current growing season. He strongly values the experience of creating
a green oasis in this heavily paved portion of Brooklyn. He is opposed to the College’s
decision to bulldoze the community garden because it contradicts the College’s announced
commitment to sustainability and place-based education.

9. Murray Lantner has been a community gardener at the Campus Road Community
Garden since 2008. He lives three blocks from the garden site and has been working his
plot with his wife and newly born daughter. He is opposed to the College’s destruction of
the Community Garden because it will mean the terrible diminishment of the only
community garden in a radius of more than a mile, and because he values the
intergenerational and college/community interactions that the garden has enabled.

10. Toby Sanchez is the founder and leader of the Campus Road Community Garden.
She lives within a mile of the garden and her and her late husband, Roy Sanchez, were the
key initiators and organizers of the garden. Together they contributed thousands of
volunteer hours to turn an ugly strip of grass into a lush and beautiful garden. She is
opposed to the College's plans to bulldoze the community garden because she values the
opportunity it offers neighborhood residents to make friendships, to mentor youth, and to
enjoy a beautiful green spot in a busy urban environment.

11. The Campus Road Community Garden at Brooklyn College was founded and is led
by Toby Sanchez and has included thousands of volunteer hours of collaborative gardening
since 1997. The organization includes more than 20 active and experienced gardeners,
many new gardeners, and a waiting list of more than 50 individuals. The Gardeners have
worked to find solutions to the College's parking issues, have dedicated their time to
supporting the College's announced mission of sustainability and place-based education,
and have particpated in numerous forums and town halls on related subjects. They oppose
the destruction of the garden because that destruction is the end of years of shared labor,
the end of a place that helped them raise children, mourn loved ones, and find
intergenerational, interethnic, and interfaith friendships that enrich their lives. They also
oppose the shrinking of the garden, and its confinement to tiny raised squares, and the
elimination of bushes, because the new, small, “Brooklyn College Garden”, will not enable
the College's efforts to prioritize place-based education, sustainability, and
community/college interaction. For example, the Brooklyn College “College Now!”
program, which has been run every summer for more than 5 years, has mentored more
than 100 high school students in community development, healthy eating, ecology, and
college-readiness. This program depends absolutely on a functioning and vibrant
community garden and will be practically destroyed by the bulldozing of the garden and its
replacement by a large parking lot and a small flattened set of planters.

B. Respondents

12. Respondent Karen L. Gould is the President of Brooklyn College and, upon
information and belief, is responsible for policy and planning decisions.

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13. Steve Little is Vice-President for Finance and Administration at Brooklyn College and,
upon information and belief, has implemented the College's administrative efforts to evict
the Community Garden.

14. Joanna Oliver is Environmental Manager of the Dormitory Authority of the State of
New York which issued the negative declaration for the College’s destruction of the
Community Garden as part of their Brooklyn College Athletic Field Project.

15. Dormitory Authority of the State of New York provides "financing and construction
services" to institutions intended to serve the public good in New York.

16. Brooklyn College is a part of the City University of New York, the publicly funded
university system of the City of New York. Construction began at its present location in
1935.

III. Statement of Facts

17. In 2009 the College announced that they were proceeding with plans to expand the
athletic field, which had long been discussed, and the gardeners began to plan the moving
of the garden and to negotiate for a new space on campus. In 2009 the gardeners realized
that the actual plan was to situate the expansion Athletic Field perpendicular to the garden
and that the actual plan for our beloved Garden was to become just another asphalt
parking lot.

18. The Gardeners began attempts to negotiate the preservation of the Garden with the
College. A highlight included a meeting with President Gould and her staff in October
2009 in which she promised that we could preserve approximately 2500 square feet of the
existing garden. Further negotiation sessions and a collaborative solution were promised
but the College did not return requests for meetings. Students attempted to present
petitions for the preservation of the Garden to administrators with hundreds of student and
faculty and community signatories. The petitions were refused on the basis that they didn’t
include social security numbers. The Gardeners cooperated with faculty supporters to
organize Town Hall Meetings on the topic that were attended by more than one hundred
community members, faculty, students, and staff. Each of the two Town Hall Meetings
overwhelmingly supported the preservation of the existing garden in all its vibrancy. At a
March 31 meeting Vice-President Steve Little asked the gardeners help in restarting
negotiations with the Target Parking Garage, situated across the street from the College,
and promised that if the negotiation was successful an additional amount of the garden
could be preserved.

19. Gardeners, working with the support of elected officials, successfully began
negotiations with the representatives of Central Parking Systems and Target to negotiate
set-aside parking in the Target Parking Garage, a multi-level parking garage across the street
from the College. At one point, the negotiation of 50 or more spots, for daytime work
days, was being discussed for Brooklyn College faculty use. At that point, approximately
May 1, 2010, the College reassumed the lead in negotiation and excluded public
representatives and Gardeners from the still ongoing negotiation.

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20. The Dormitory Authority of the State of New York issued its State Environmental
Quality Review (SEQR) and provided a negative declaration claiming no adverse impacts
from the proposed project, May 18, 2010, signed by Joanna Oliver.

21. Steve Little, Vice-President for Administration and Finance, emailed the Policy
Council of Brooklyn College May 18, 2010 defending the destruction of the existing
garden. On Monday morning, May 17, 2010 gardeners were locked out of the garden
until a week of time to remove particular plants was negotiated. Later Gardeners were
informed by Steve Little that 8pm, Thursday, May 20, 2010 would be the last time they’d
be allowed to enter the garden. Eight campus security officers threatened arrest to clear
gardeners and students and closed the garden that evening.

22. Brooklyn College has evicted the Community Garden – stationing security guards to
prevent anyone from entering the garden after 8pm Thursday, May 20, 2010. Upon
information and belief, the entire garden will be dismantled by hired and landscapers and
will be bulldozed, perhaps as early as Friday, May 21, 2010.

IV. Causes of Action

23. According to New York State legislation the purpose of the SEQR process - is " §617.1
Authority, intent and purpose

... (b) In adopting SEQR, it was the Legislature's intention that all agencies conduct their
affairs with an awareness that they are stewards of the air, water, land, and living resources,
and that they have an obligation to protect the environment for the use and enjoyment of
this and all future generations.
(c) The basic purpose of SEQR is to incorporate the consideration of environmental
factors into the existing planning, review and decision-making processes of state, regional
and local government agencies at the earliest possible time. To accomplish this goal, SEQR
requires that all agencies determine whether the actions they directly undertake, fund or
approve may have a significant impact on the environment, and, if it is determined that the
action may have a significant adverse impact, prepare or request an environmental impact
statement.
(d) It was the intention of the Legislature that the protection and enhancement of the
environment, human and community resources should be given appropriate weight with
social and economic considerations in determining public policy, and that those factors be
considered together in reaching decisions on proposed activities. Accordingly, it is the
intention of this Part that a suitable balance of social, economic and environmental factors
be incorporated into the planning and decision-making processes of state, regional and
local agencies..."

24. This purpose has been capriciously, arbitrarily, and illegally undermined and betrayed
by the DASNY Negative Declaration regarding the destruction of the Campus Road
Community Garden by not requiring a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) – as
particularly shown in the following counts – Impact on Aesthetic Resources, Public

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Controversy, Impact on Open Space and Recreation, and Impact on Growth and
Character of the Neighborhood, and Parking.

Count 1: Impact on Aesthetic Resources

25. The DASNY SEQR arbitrarily and capriciously claims that the bulldozing of a
beautiful 6500 square foot garden will not significantly impact the aesthetic resources of the
surrounding neighborhood. In order to justify that claim the SEQR arbitrarily and
capriciously claimed that the "Proposed land use ... not in sharp contrast to current
surrounding land use patterns" and that there are no "Proposed land uses, or project
components visible to users of aesthetic resources which will eliminate or significantly
reduce their enjoyment of the aesthetic qualities of that resource."

26. The College's plan for the space is, in fact, a sharp contrast to current surrounding land
use patterns and will, in fact, significantly diminish the enjoyment of the aesthetic qualities
of the land.

27. The existing 6500 foot garden space is on the perimeter of the campus. It is the
primary visible space when entering the College's Avenue H entrance. It is lushly vibrant
with trees, shrubs, roses, irises, lilies, and other beautiful and enjoyable things to look at,
which attracts butterflies, birds, and other enjoyable things to watch. Passerby on the
streets and inhabitants of the neighboring and overlooking building regularly congratulate
gardeners and express their gratitude for the enjoyable aesthetic resource provided. In
sharp contrast the College's plan, attached as part of the SEQR, calls for the demolition
and bulldozing of the entire space - removing all plants. Most of the land will be paved and
turned into a standard ugly parking lot facing the neighborhood. This alone would mark
an obvious and significant degradation of the aesthetic resources of the neighborhood
which only a capricious, arbitrary, and illegal SEQR process would ignore.

28. In addition, the College's current plans for the remaining 2500 square foot "new"
"Brooklyn College Garden" would also represent an obvious and significant degradation of
the enjoyability of the aesthetics for the neighborhood. The College's plans allow no trees
or shrubs, and set up an ugly agglomeration of 4x4 square raised planters where previously
shrubs, butterflies, large rose bushes, and a peach tree currently stand.

Count 2: Public Controversy

29. In the attached checklist summary of the DASNY SEQR the author was required to
answer the question, "20. Is there, or is there likely to be, public controversy related to
potential adverse environmental impacts." The author checked "NO" and explained, "Note:
The Dormitory Authority notes that in its opinion while there is no controversy related to
adverse environmental impacts, there is community concern as it relates to the termination
of the use of a temporary garden area on the Brooklyn College campus that is governed by
the terms of a 1997 revocable License Agreement. However, the garden area is not a
publicly-accessible open space resource as defined by the CEQR Technical Manual."

30. This representation is arbitrary, capricious, and illegal in several ways. The SEQR

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attempts to make several distinctions without a difference in the interests of justifying the
"no" claim regarding controversy over adverse environmental impacts.

31. The SEQR attempts to define the controversy over the destruction of this significant
environmental resource as non-environmental because the garden is alleged to be "not a
publicly-accessible open space resource". This is false. The Garden has always been
open to the public. It was certified as a Green Thumb garden, with no objection from the
College, and Green Thumb gardens are required to be open to the public. In the last
year there have been regularly scheduled "Especially Open" hours which were hosted by
Mentor Gardeners for the edification and participation of the public. Anyone who wanted
to be part of the Garden could sign up and become a gardener. Thus, the garden area
has been, in fact, a publicly-accessible open space.

32. The SEQR attempts to label the "controversy" over the garden as merely a "concern".
Given that the level of concern includes the outrage of hundreds of
signatories to petitions, multiple public meetings attended by hundreds of
people, the involvement of public officials (including City Councilor
Jumani Williams, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, and
Nancy Pascal of the Public Advocate's office), threats of arrest during the
garden's closure, multiple news articles in major media such as the Daily
News, and the presence of New York Times reporter Kareem Fahim on the
last day allowed for entry by Vice-President Little, clearly this "controversy"
can only be arbitrarily and capriciously marginalized as "concern."

33. As the DASNY SEQR falsely represented the presence and likelihood of controversy
and falsely represented the status of the public open space, as noted above, it is clearly a
capricious, arbitrary, and illegal Negative Declaration of impact. Their conduct in
concluding that an Environmental Impact Statement was not required is arbitrary,
capricious, and an abuse of discretion.

Count 3: Impact on Open Space and Recreation

34. The DASNY SEQR capriciously, arbitrarily, and illegally misrepresents the impacts of
the planned destruction of the Campus Road Community Garden as insignificant in
reference to "Open Space and Recreation." The author of the report checked "NO" (#13)
although an example provided of a "YES" answer is the startlingly apt description, "A major
reduction of an open space important to the community."

35. The paving for a parking lot of 60% of a community garden would by
any reasonable standard be considered "A major reduction of an open
space important to the community." The importance to the community is well-
demonstrated by participation in public forums and public outcry over the garden's
destruction. The "major reduction" is obvious to anyone conversant with percentages.
Thus the attempt by the DASNY to obviate the required EIS is a clearly arbitrary,
capricious, and illegal usurpation of the SEQR process.

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Count 4: Parking Issues

36 The DASNY SEQR improperly finds that the parking issues impacted by the project
are not significantly adverse to the neighborhood. Multiple issues are glossed over or
ignored in order to justify the Negative Declaration.

37. The College has attempted in public communications to misrepresent the conflict
between the Campus Road Community Garden and the College administration as being
about the expansion of the athletic field. As noted above, petitioners have no objections to
the Athletic Field in so far as the Athletic Field is not planned to adversely impact the
Garden. In fact, the College's plan is to pave most of the garden for a parking lot, just as
Joni Mitchell sang about. College representatives, while privately discussing the issue with
Gardeners and other College employees have claimed that the College is legislatively
required to increase parking availability and that the destruction of the Garden is an
unfortunate but necessary result of this non-negotiable legislative requirement.

38. In fact, as revealed in the SEQR, the current plan involves the remediation of parking
problems caused not just by expansion of the Athletic Field, the project reviewed by the
instant SEQR, but also 16 spaces lost in construction during the recent West Quad Project.
Also revealed in the SEQR, contrary to repeated representations by College
representatives, is that the campus "cannot meet the parking requirements established per
the ZR. However, this is not considered a significant adverse impact to parking as its is a
long standing pre-existing condition and is recognized by the enforcing agency (SEQR
Supplemental Report, page 2-29)." Thus, there is NO significant reason for the
College to pave an existing community garden for parking, and the failure
of the DASNY SEQR to emphasize that fact is an arbitrary, capricious, and
illegal perversion of the SEQR process that can only be resolved through a
full EIS. Even under the current plan the College still loses two additional parking
spaces, thus falling further behind its ZR Requirements, demonstrating the flexibility
available to the Respondents.

39. Most importantly the intent of the SEQR process is to identify adverse
impacts in advance so that they can be mitigated. This intent was perfectly
embodied by the efforts of Gardeners to find alternate parking for the College that would
address the College's legitimate and legislatively-required needs while preserving the
existing rare and significant ecological, aesthetic, and open space resources offered by the
Campus Road Community Garden. The Gardeners several solutions to the parking issue,
including a parcel of unused campus land on the nearby corner of Ocean Avenue and
Avenue H. Gardeners successfully re-opened abandoned negotiations between the College
and the multi-level parking garage across the street from the College and were able to
generate interest and excitement from principal decision-makers in the parking
corporation. Being discussed was the possibility of approximately fifty below-market-rate
designated spaces for Brooklyn College faculty and staff. There was, and is, a
possibility for a wonderful "win-win" situation - the College would secure
legislatively required parking, the parking garage would secure needed
consistent tenants, and the Garden could be protected from pavement.

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40. Despite promises, the College has failed to consider this negotiating success in its
written plans for the destruction of the Community Garden and prohibited Gardeners and
involved public officials from further participation in the negotiations. This failure to
implement alternative solutions that would mitigate the environmental,
social, and aesthetic impacts of a project is a direct contradiction of the
SEQR process. Thus, the failure to include available information regarding the parking
solutions offered by the Garden was a capricious, illegal, and arbitrary act.

V. No Prior Applications

41. No prior applications for this or any similar relief have been made in this court.

VI. Request for Relief

42. WHEREFORE, Petitioners/Plaintiffs respectfully request relief as follows;

a. A Temporary Restraining Order to prevent the College from destroying the existing
Campus Road Community Garden.

b. Enjoining Respondents from carrying out the destruction of the existing Campus Road
Community Garden pending completion of a full Environmental Impact Statement.

c. An order to Brooklyn College to carry out a full Environmental Impact Statement.

d. An order requiring the College to provide unimpeded entry and use of the Campus
Road Community Garden to students, faculty, gardeners, and other community members
as a return to the status quo before the DASNY SEQR Negative Declaration.

e. Granting such other and further relief as the Court deems proper.

Dated: May 21, 2010

Brooklyn, NY

______________

Andrew C. Snyder (Pro se)