Skip to Content
Streetsblog New York City home
Streetsblog New York City home
Log In
Brooklyn

Shady Dealings Drive EDC Subsidies for Moisha’s Supermarket Parking Lot

Moisha's Discount Supermarket is set to expand with city assistance, but it'll be building more parking than supermarket. Image: Google Street View.

Wondering why the city is subsidizing 18,000 square feet of parking for a project that's supposed to make fresh food more accessible to low-income New Yorkers? Political favors seem to have something to do with it.

Moisha's Discount Supermarket is receiving $2 million in tax incentives to expand its operations and build parking for 45 cars under the FRESH program, intended to bring fruits and vegetables into underserved neighborhoods. But according to a report in the Daily News, there are 10 markets within five blocks of Moisha's and all of them sell fresh produce. The News points to $41,690 in donations from Moisha's owners to local politicians as an alternative explanation for Moisha's tax breaks.

An article in City Hall News, which has been taken off their website (we're looking into why), suggests more direct impropriety. They report that the district manager of Brooklyn Community Board 12 testified to the city's Industrial Development Agency that his board was completely behind the Moisha's expansion. But a member of CB12 said the board had never discussed the issue. The district manager and Moisha's owners are reported to have close ties to Assembly member and local power broker Dov Hikind.

Assembly Member Dov Hikind speaks at a CB12 meeting last December

All too often, political patronage is what determines how much parking New York City decides to build. From the city's decision to give more parking to the Yankees in return for a luxury suite in left field to the Finance Department's overruling of rank-and-file assessors to grant a politically-connected Jamaica parking operator non-profit status and millions in tax exemptions, too much of the city's mushrooming parking supply is built and subsidized because of sweetheart deals.

Even when political favors aren't at work, however, it's usually still politics that determines how much parking gets built, not any kind of thinking about transportation policy. Parking is routinely thrown in as a "sweetener" for new development, something that a developer or the city can offer a neighborhood to accept growth.

It's exceedingly rare for parking decisions to be made on the grounds of how much more traffic a garage will induce or how much air pollution it will add. No wonder the city keeps building acre after acre of it.

Stay in touch

Sign up for our free newsletter

More from Streetsblog New York City

More Tantrums: City Halts 34th Street Busway After Threat from Trump DOT

The feds threatened to cut city and state funding if New York doesn't halt all work on the 34th Street busway so the FHWA can review the project.

October 17, 2025

READY, AIM, ‘MISFIRE’: NYPD’s Bike Speed-Limit Effort Only Adds Confusion in Central Park

Two slowly ambling pedestrians were clocked at 19 miles per hour. So what's the point of this, exactly?

October 17, 2025

Friday Video: Drool Over This London School Street

That's cricket! Check out how London transformed a roadway around a big stadium into a play street.

October 17, 2025

Friday’s Headlines: Queen James Edition

State Attorney General Letitia James gave our national security desk reporters Dave Colon and David Meyer the ultimate hat tip. Plus other news.

October 17, 2025

Judge Orders Trump to Restore $34M in Security Funding to MTA

DHS overstepped its authority when it attempted to tie money from the Transit Security Grant Program to the Trump administration's efforts to deport immigrants, Judge Lewis Kaplan said.

October 16, 2025
See all posts