A private company managing a Brooklyn public housing complex was quietly fired late last year after the developer who hired the firm said it put tenant subsidies at risk, struggled to complete work on time and failed to get a handle on “ballooning” costs at the 1,300-unit campus.
“This decision is surprising and unexpected,” Velázquez wrote in a December 2023 letter to Pennrose and NYCHA seeking more information about the “red flags” that led to the switch. In contrast, over 90% of work orders were completed on time in that period at all other campuses converted to private management, according to the database.
The letter's claims didn’t surprise Anthony Sanchez, a public school teacher who said he recently moved out of Hope Gardens after living there for eight years. NYCHA and the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said Pennrose did not need their permission to pick a new management company. But she isn’t the only local elected official questioning the problems that led to Pinnacle’s ouster.