Ex-Model Dressed to Kill Harlem Rezoning

Press Release

Ex-model dressed to kill Harlem rezoning

BY CAITLIN MILLAT

DAILY NEWS WRITER

Craig Schley B. Smith for News

Craig Schley

A Harlem man fighting plans to rezone his neighborhood is giving a new meaning to the term "model citizen."

Craig Schley, a former Wilhelmina fashion model, is the founder of Voices of the Everyday People (Vote People), an activist group working to freeze the city's proposed redevelopment of central Harlem.

If approved by the City Council, the plan will displace more than 70 small businesses on 125th St. from Second Ave. to Broadway to make room for a new high-rise commercial and residential complex.

To Schley, the rezoning is bigger than just business. "The city is writing Harlem's death warrant," he said. "You erase 125th St., you erase Harlem. Period."

Schley and the rest of the Vote People research team last week found a century-old clause in the City Charter that could slow the rezoning process. The clause says that if the owners of at least 20% of the land either adjacent to or across from the area being rezoned disapprove of the development, 75% - not a simple majority - of the Council must approve the rezoning for the process to continue.

"We've been cold-calling, knocking doors, anything we can do to get this ball rolling," Schley said.

Schley has been a central Harlem resident since 1993, when he moved there to pursue a professional modeling career after working for five years as a firefighter in Atlanta.

He put himself through New York University, where he majored in political science, with his Wilhelmina paychecks.

"Modeling afforded me the opportunity to get an education and to help make the changes I wanted to see in the world," he said.

He founded Vote People in 2001 after realizing the need for a community-based outreach organization that worked to protect local interests.

City Planning Commission officials said the proposed new buildings will provide more jobs and housing and increase local retail sales.

Schley is skeptical.

"The only thing they're going to give us is an eviction notice," he said. "The city should probably pack a lunch. We're going to fight to the end."

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