Study: Sunset Park Is a 'Neighborhood on the Rise'

SUNSET PARK, BROOKLYN — A new study by New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli found that Sunset Park and Windsor Terrace are home to rapid job and population growth — but some local officials and activists say too little is known about what kinds of jobs are being created in the area, and who is benefiting.

The study, discussed Wednesday at a Brooklyn Army Terminal press conference, used employment data from the Department of Labor and demographic data from the U.S. Census to provide an "economic snapshot" of the greater Sunset Park area, which includes Windsor Terrace.

Graphics courtesy of the New York State Comptroller's Office

The full report is embedded at the bottom of this post. Here are its key findings:

• The area's population has increased by 150,000 — or 34 percent — since 1990.
• 49 percent of the area's population is made up of immigrants, primarily from Latin America and Asia.
• A quarter of the neighborhood's residents are under the age of 19.
• Between 2000 and 2014, the number of local businesses increased by 56 percent, hitting 3,840. Of those, 65 percent had fewer than 5 workers, and 80 percent had fewer than 10 workers.
• Private sector employment in greater Sunset Park peaked at 39,920 in 2015 — its highest level ever measured. That's an increase of 6,900 jobs since 2004.

• The number of manufacturing jobs in the area sank 52 percent from 2000 to 2012, but has rebounded "slowly" since then. By 2015, there were 4,500 manufacturing jobs in the area.
• Wages for private sector jobs grew 67 percent from 2004 to 2015. The area's average salary in 2015 was $46,460.
• 75,293 neighborhood residents were employed in 2014. Nearly half of them reported working in Brooklyn.
• The area's median household income was $48,050 in 2014. However, about 26 percent of households were still at poverty level.

The report also found that housing costs continue to rise rapidly in Sunset Park and Windsor Terrace — far outpacing any rise in wages. In 2014, more than half of homes in the study area spent over 30 percent of their income on rent — passing the threshold to designate them "rent burdened."

Standing inside Brooklyn Army Terminal's cavernous Building B on Wednesday, DiNapoli, the state comptroller, described Sunset Park as "a neighborhood on the rise" with a "diverse," "young" population and a "dynamic" economy.

The Terminal is a city-owned property, recently redeveloped by the New York City Economic Development Corporation using tens of millions of dollars ($15 million for the terminal's Annex building alone). The once-abandoned facility now hosts more than 100 businesses, according to EDC.

The agency's president, Maria Torres-Springer, called the Brooklyn Army Terminal "the epicenter of the city's manufacturing renaissance" — a space where New York City's "revitalized manufacturing sector" is creating jobs and offering "solid pathways through the middle class."

"We don't need luxury condos and hotels to do what we're already doing," New York City Councilman Carlos Menchaca, who represents Sunset Park at City Hall, said at the event. "We are the future of New York City."

Menchaca also called on the businesses setting up shop in Sunset Park properties like the Brooklyn Army Terminal to "redouble their efforts to hire local residents."

To that point, though, several attendees at Wednesday's event raised concerns that locals weren't the ones being hired.

DiNapoli said his department's study was designed to provide an overall snapshot of Sunset Park's economy. However, he said it did not provide hard numbers on who exactly is being hired, where they're from and what conditions they're working in.

For example: While the study found that total wages for private sector jobs in the Sunset Park area grew 67 percent between 2004 and 2015, it didn't specify how many of those jobs went to Sunset Park residents (or Brooklyn residents in general).

And of the area's 75,293 employed residents, while 6.6 percent were found to work in manufacturing — the highest such percentage of any neighborhood in the city, according to the comptroller's office — the study didn't state how many of those workers held manufacturing jobs in Sunset Park itself.

Asked about how many local jobs — and what kinds of jobs — had been created at rapidly expanding hubs like Industry City and the Brooklyn Army Terminal, DiNapoli couldn't provide specifics. He said his staffers had produced "a more macro look at [the] neighborhood."

A spokeswoman for DiNapoli later said the study's authors didn't have access to the "confidential personal info" they would need to assess exactly who was being hired in Sunset Park.

On Wednesday, the EDC could not immediately provide data connecting hiring at the Brooklyn Army Terminal to the local community. An agency spokeswoman highlighted the Workforce1 job placement center, which opened at the Terminal in May, as a demonstration of EDC's commitment to finding jobs for locals. However, a spokesman for the city's Department of Small Business Services, which runs the center, couldn't immediately provide data on how many jobs, or what kind of jobs, had been found for local residents.

At Wednesday's press conference, DiNapoli highlighted retailer Uncommon Goods, a tenant at the Terminal, as an example of a company creating jobs in the area.

A spokeswoman for Uncommon Goods put the company's year-round staffing number at 200, adding that it intends "to onboard four to five times of that amount of seasonal team members for the holiday season." The spokeswoman also said employees make at least $14 per hour. But again, she said the company didn't have information on how many of its employees live in Sunset Park.

"We have really specific concerns about [hiring] data," Elizabeth Yeampierre, the leader of Sunset Park activist group UPROSE, told Patch. "What kind of jobs are these? Growth is good, but what does that mean? Will people be able to work here but not be able to afford to live here?"

State Assemblyman Félix W. Ortiz, who represents the area, praised the attention the comptroller's office had paid to Sunset Park, but agreed more hiring information was needed.

"I will be looking into legislation to require that any businesses that hires 20 people or more should provide the number of people hired from the community," Ortiz said. If the city can obtain granular data on other topics, such as public health threats, he said, it should be able to produce highly local employment data as well.

Economic Snapshot of Greater Sunset Park Area by JVS Patch on Scribd

Pictured at top: State Assemblyman Félix W. Ortiz speaks Wednesday, while New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli listens at right. Photo by John V. Santore