Last week the city announced that it would be cutting over $500,000 from a fund to protect renters in Greenpoint and Williamsburg from being pushed out by escalating rents. The fund was a key part of winning community approval for the massive rezoning of the neighborhoods that took place in 2005.

Let this be a warning.

The tenant displacement fund was already a bit of a raw deal. The $2 million looked good on paper, but in talking with housing advocates in the area, the money was hard to access, the sum was paltry, and quite frankly it came too late, as many longtime residents were already feeling the housing crunch and were forced out of their homes.

This should serve as a wake-up call to other neighborhoods that are facing similar rezonings and similar promises. Just because you get the provision in writing, doesn’t mean that it is going to come to fruition when the situation changes a few years down the road.