Weiner Attacks City's Deal on Bronx Market

By ROBIN SHULMAN and DIANE CARDWELL

Representative Anthony D. Weiner, a Democratic mayoral candidate, attacked the administration of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg yesterday for making what he called a "sweetheart deal" with a developer to turn the Bronx Terminal Market into a million-square-foot shopping mall.

The southwest Bronx wholesale market, which has been operating since the 1920's, is one of the largest ethnic food distributors on the East Coast. It fell into disrepair, and in 2004 the city signed a deal with the Related Companies and the market's operators to clear up litigation so that Related could develop the site.

At a news conference on the steps of the State Supreme Court building in the Bronx, Mr. Weiner said the deal was colored by Deputy Mayor Daniel L. Doctoroff's friendship with Stephen J. Ross, the president of Related, the city's largest developer, which paid $42.5 million to take over the lease.

The city should have allowed for competitive bidding, Mr. Weiner said, as he called for "an open process where the community gets a chance to be heard, where other developers get a chance to be heard."

City officials have said they had no opportunity to accept bids for developing the site because another party, the Buntzman family, controlled the lease. At a separate news conference, the mayor said yesterday that the Buntzmans basically made a private deal with Related.

Mr. Weiner also criticized the city's promise to repay Related the $42.5 million if public approvals necessary for a mall did not come through. He also said the developer got a good deal when it agreed to exchange part of the market site for an adjacent city site with a decrepit jail, the Bronx House of Detention for Men. The city wanted the site to build an Olympic velodrome, but because the city lost the Olympic bid, Related could get both properties.

"There will be negotiations, and there will be an appraisal done," said Michael Sherman, a spokesman for the city's Economic Development Corporation, which managed the deal.

Mayor Bloomberg defended the deal yesterday, saying, "The Bronx House of Detention is not something we can use anymore, and eliminating it will help development in that area, and that's exactly what the city should be doing."

"The Bronx needs a lot of development," Mr. Bloomberg said, adding that the area around the market was starved for jobs and housing. "And I'm just glad that somebody after all these years has seized the opportunity to develop it."

Another Democratic mayoral candidate, Fernando Ferrer, also campaigned in the Bronx yesterday, and his campaign released new advertisements, two on radio and one on cable television, that are similar to an earlier biographical spot.

The new television ad stresses that Mr. Ferrer has connections to middle-class New Yorkers and that his record includes strengthening civilian oversight of police, expanding after-school programs and helping build low-cost housing in the Bronx. The new TV spot comes as some of Mr. Ferrer's rivals, especially Gifford Miller, are running more aggressive ad campaigns on both cable and broadcast stations.

Nick Baldick, the campaign manager for Mr. Ferrer, took a swipe at Mr. Miller in responding to questions about how much the Ferrer campaign was advertising and whether it was being aggressive enough. "We have to be careful with all of our dollars," Mr. Baldick said, "because we are abiding under the rules and living under the caps, and we haven't been able to find as much exempt spending as other candidates."

Mr. Miller has asked the Campaign Finance Board to exempt $1.2 million of his campaign expenditures, an amount high enough to cause opponents and political experts to wonder whether he is trying to get around the spending cap.

Mr. Baldick added, "We think that we're doing everything we can within the spending limits to get every vote we can between now and Sept. 13."