New York, NY —

After three years of legal battles, the future of New York's 600 city-owned community gardens is no longer in doubt. Under an agreement between Mayor Michael Bloomberg and State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, hundreds of them will be protected from development. Others will be used for affordable housing. WNYC's Amy Eddings reports.

The agreement settles a fight that began in 1999, when former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani chose 115 community gardens to auction off to the highest bidder. Most of those gardens were spared when two not-for-profit land trust groups offered to buy them. At that time, State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer got a restraining order, preventing the city from touching a single flower on its remaining 600 gardens. This agreement lifts that restraining order, allowing the city to immediately build affordable housing on 38 gardens .while protecting 400 others from future development. Mayor Michael Bloomberg sees the agreement as an end to what was often a thorny debate between the need for housing, and the need for open space.

Bloomberg: The demand for affordable housing in New York is undeniable and this agreement lets essential development go forward, providing construction jobs and a boost to our city's economy. And we are not only providing permanent protection to hundreds of community gardens thoughout the city,. We are also establishing a fair process for the review of future proposals to develop other garden properties.

There are still about 115 gardens that may be developed by the city, or sold. The new "garden review process" will apply to them. That process requires the city to conduct an environmental review, and to offer affected gardeners other vacant properties. It also will provide developers and city officials with information about the garden, before land use decisions are made. Jane Weissman is the former director of the city's community garden program, Operation Green Thumb.

Weissman: This agreement is absolutely stupendous. When the city identifies a garden it wants to develop, there is a fair and equitable process in place where that garden will be reviewed. So in effect, there is a planning process. And this is something that greening advocates have lobbied for for years and years.

The agreement closes a colorful chapter in the city's history, one that pitted Mayor Giuliani, who was determined to get some revenue from these lots, against garden advocates, who often protested while dressed as sunflowers and ladybugs. Advocates say a change in administrations has made all the difference in the negotiations. But Mayor Bloomberg praised the Giuliani Administration, and said the agreement was in keeping with Giuliani's efforts to balance gardens with housing. State Attorney General Spitzer was asked if he agreed.

Spitzer: I don't want to comment on the prior administration. All I will say affirmatively is that we've had a good working relationship with Mayor Bloomberg and his counsel..
Bloomberg: and I think it's also fair to say that the attorney general and I have been friends for a long time. We see each other on the streets and friendship always makes it easier to get together.

On East 13th Street, between Avenues A and B, Bob Lasher and Carolyn McCrory were gathering green beans in the Dias Y Flores Community Garden. The cool, leafy haven was created in 1978. Both gardeners were happy to hear about the agreement, and that Dias Y Flores is one of the gardens that will be protected.

Bob Lasher: We have a totem in one of the members' gardens to prevent developers from coming in. So I think it works, and we'd better go we'd better go give a donation.
Carolyn McCrory: We feel like, omigod, we're ecstatic, that maybe we're gonna be saved and be permanent. But we're also really sad that any of them have to go, since they're probably all, in some way, meaningful to their communities.

McCrory says she is intentionally saying that the garden may be saved, despite its listing in the agreement as a protected garden. She says the difficult negotations in the past have taught her not to get her hopes up too high. But she was smiling, nonetheless. For WNYC, I'm Amy Eddings.