A judge has ruled that the city must pay more than $13 million total to the daughter of late developer Horace Bullard, whose dreams of creating a year-round amusement park in Coney Island never came to fruition, after years ago seizing her property along the famous Brooklyn boardwalk, according to a notice that appeared in the city register Monday.
Comptroller Brad Lander will cut a check for $6.1 million plus interest — the city already paid $7.5 million nearly a decade ago after taking the property — to Jasmine Bullard of Wantanabe Realty Corp., whose father died of ALS in 2013. In 2016, using eminent domain, the city took control of three of her parcels, at 1520 Surf Ave. and 1507 and 1519 Boardwalk West, adjacent to the site of the original Thunderbolt roller coaster that former Mayor Rudy Giuliani controversially demolished in 2000.
After years of delays related to Covid and various appraisals of the then-vacant land, Kings County Supreme Court Judge Wayne Saitta finally issued a judgment. The comptroller will issue the check May 20, according to city records. James Greilsheimer, of the New York-based law firm Kramer Levin, who represented Bullard, told Crain’s neither side is planning to appeal, though Bullard isn’t very happy with the decision either.
“We had hoped for some more,” said Greilsheimer, who added that the city had hoped for less.
Bullard had owned about 150,000 square feet of property before the city seized roughly 55,000 square feet of it to create contiguous parkland in what’s known as the people’s playground.
But the question of what will become of the property she still owns — the site of the former Thunderbolt — remains. Dick Zigun, the self-styled “mayor of Coney Island” who founded Coney Island USA and the annual Mermaid Parade, said its value is high, thanks to a past rezoning allowing for a nearly 30-story hotel — but the community would love to see more rides there.
“We all want to know what she has planned for that. We all want her to sell it,” said Zigun. “It’s a big puzzling question mark in the neighborhood.”
More than two decades ago, Giuliani tore down the landmarked Thunderbolt roller coaster, which had become a Hollywood icon. A federal jury later ruled that Giuliani violated Horace Bullard’s rights and had no justification to tear down the coaster, which operated from 1925 until the early 1980s but was out of service when the former mayor had it torn down. Eventually, Bullard won a $1 million settlement from the city, which he reportedly never collected, according to The New York Times.
That wasn’t Bullard’s first run-in with Giuliani. A $450 million plan Bullard had dreamt up in the 1980s to revitalize the park was first thwarted by a financial crash that decade and later by Giuliani, who revoked approvals for the project — a move that Bullard, who was Black and Puerto Rican, later characterized as racist, the Times reported.
The city did not respond to a request for comment about its plans for the the sites or the judge’s decision. Attempts to speak with Bullard before press time were unsuccessful.
Julianne Cuba , 2024-05-13 19:53:25
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