City Halts Construction of Eco House Over Courtyard Dispute

The underground storage room in the front yard of 22 Second Street in Carroll Gardens was about a week away from completion when the house’s owner, Gennaro Brooks-Church, president of green contractor and design firm Eco Brooklyn, received a stop-work notice and a 15-day letter of intent to revoke permits in the mail.

The letter from New York City’s Department of Buildings came as a shock. Just a month earlier, Brooks-Church received a permit from the city approving the project that called for the excavation of his front yard and the extension of his cellar into an underground storage unit, he said.

But as it turns out, the front courtyards of the street’s brownstones belong to the city, not the homes' owners; therefore, Brooks-Church was prohibited from unearthing his front yard.

Brooks-Church's home also serves as a green show house for Eco Brooklyn -- the four-story brownstone is an on-going experiment with green living. The stop work order was first reported on the local blog Pardon Me For Asking. 

The dispute is another in a long line of recent courtyard related battles. Last year, residents grew disgruntled with the improper use of the Carroll Gardens courtyards as parking spots, and recently this year, residents complained about businesses trying to use their courtyards. Under city zoning, the front yards are to be used as courtyards only.

The issue is a major one, with many residents concerned about protecting the character of the neighborhood. Recently, Councilmember Lander met with representatives of the Department of Transportation, the Department of Buildings and others to figure out how to best work with the community on determining rules and enforcement regarding the proper use of the courtyards. 

Brooks-Church says he knew his courtyard was city property when he applied for the permit, but when the permit was approved, he didn’t question it.

“I figured they knew what they were doing. But that wasn’t the case. It’s unfortunate that this whole thing had to blow up,” he says.

DOB spokeswoman Jennifer Gilbert says the DOB had a meeting with Brooks-Church scheduled for March 25 to discuss the work performed on Brooks-Church's yard and the permits issued. Brooks-Church cancelled the meeting, because his engineer was out of town. A make-up date has yet to be set.

While the DOB has not technically revoked his permit, Brooks-Church has all but given up on the underground storage room. He has since covered the 12-foot by 12-foot by 8-foot hole with concrete and salvaged steel beams, negating most of the $20,000 worth of work he'd already put into the project. 

Brooks-Church says his main concern was getting the DOB to lift the stop work order as soon as possible because of he wanted to get back to work on other projects.

After he received the stop work notice, Brooks-Church says his friends and co-workers told him that the courtyard excavation project was a lost cause since the courtyard is public property. So he resolved to cover the hole, hoping that if he conceded the excavation project to the DOB,  his stop work order would be removed sooner than if he fought for the excavation project. Then he could continue to work on other green projects around his house, which is already outfitted with a green roof, a few clay walls, wooden floor panels and joists that were salvaged from dumpsters and a greywater system that collects water used in the house's sinks and showers and uses it for flushing the toilets.

"I guess I was being proactive," he says of covering the hole. 

There's a small possibility that the excavation project could still happen for Brooks-Church. He says the DOB has suggested he try to purchase his courtyard from the Department of Transportation. At the very least, he’s hoping he’ll be able to build stairs from the yard down to his cellar, which was part of his original plan.

Brooks-Church was initially livid about the city's orders to stop work , writing on his blog, “If you make a mistake with the DOB, you pay for it. If the DOB makes a mistake, you pay for it.” Now sitting at his kitchen table, looking out onto his front yard where the hole is covered by large blue tarp, Brooks-Church voices only disappointment that his latest green experiment never reached completion. 

By excavating the front yard and extending his cellar out to the sidewalk, Brooks-Church wanted to make room for an underground storage unit that would house his family’s outdoor equipment and bikes. Brooks-Church planned to build the unit using only salvaged materials and to cover its roof with soil for an eco-friendly garden.

"From the street, it would have looked like any other front yard," he says.

He broke ground on the project in mid-February and the three-man construction crew was making good progress until an inspector for the DOB arrived on site in early March and told Brooks-Church that someone in the neighborhood had called 311 to say that the construction in the courtyard was illegal.

Brooks-Church says that even after examining the site, the inspector told him that his permit was valid and that he could continue construction. 

“I think when he returned to his office, he realized that the construction wasn’t legal," Brooks-Church says. He received the stop work notice a few days later. 

As for which one of his neighbors complained to the city about the construction, Brooks-Church doesn’t have a clue. He says a few residents on Second Street have voiced displeasure with the construction, callig it an eyesore, but Brooks-Church says he’s “on good terms with everyone on this street.”

Two of Brooks-Church’s neighbors were well aware of the construction but hadn’t heard about the permit controversy.

“There are always dumpsters going to and from the house and that disrupts the street,” says one neighbor, who asked not to be identified. “I just want the construction to be done.”

Another neighbor, who also declined to give his name, says he's noticed the work Brooks-Church does on his house but isn’t bothered by it, calling it the "quietest" construction site he's ever been around.

Brooks-Church is still holding out a bit of hope that the Department of Transportation will sell him the courtyard, but for now, he's moving on to smaller projects.

"The [DOB] made a mistake; I made a mistake," he says. "I'm trying to do things that haven't been done before, and that always carries an element of risk."