Tony Avella Talks Tough on Developers: ‘Some of Them Have Greed as Their Motto’

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Location: In your bid for mayor, as of January, you’d raised $180,000 compared with more than $4 million by one of your potential opponents.

Mr. Avella: I consider that a virtue.

People use the term ‘long shot.’

I agree. Absolutely. I’m bucking the system; I have been since 2002. I’m the independent voice. … The real estate industry, which is the biggest contributor giving to people for higher office, they aren’t giving to me.

How many hours a week do you work?

I’m going seven days a week; 60, 70, probably, easy.

You were in the Koch and Dinkins administrations. What did you do there?

For Koch, I was his Queens liaison, and worked out of a community assistance unit, and I basically did the same thing for Dinkins, but he didn’t have the same type of setup as Koch did, but it was being the Queens rep.

And how’d you get into that?

I was a civic activist; I always wanted to get into government. I was on my community board, and I actually started my first job working for Councilman Peter Vallone—this was before he was speaker. I actually worked for him for, like, six months and then went on to the mayor’s office.

What would it take you to get traction?

It’s just a matter of getting the word out. I’m going to have to do a real grass-roots campaign. … I think the word is out there, the issues that I’ve been working on. Not as much, obviously, as I would like, but that’s what I’ve got to work on.

If you don’t get the Democratic nomination, would you run as an independent?

I don’t know.

What role do you think the real estate industry plays in city politics?

I happen to think the real estate industry plays too big a role in what happens in the city. I believe we’ve allowed them to set the agenda for planning and development, and I think nine times out of 10, they get their way. And while I recognize the need for development, and the jobs that construction creates and the need for housing, what we’ve allowed to happen is abuse of the system—it’s development at any cost.

Is the city overdeveloping?

In certain neighborhoods, yes. The interesting thing, in my opinion, is we’re not going in the neighborhoods that really want the development or where the opportunities are because we’re allowing the developers to go where the biggest bang for the buck is.

Where would those be?

In neighborhoods like Jamaica, where they really want some development.

Where else?

You could go through any low-income neighborhood where they’re in need of jobs, where the employment level is very low, where they’re actually asking for some development. But what they want is development that increases economic opportunity, provides real affordable housing—because we’re not really doing affordable housing—but maintains the character of the neighborhood. We could talk about the 125th Street rezoning.

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