AP News, February 21st, 2007
Gov. Eliot Spitzer, who once derided the planned 1,776-foot Freedom Tower at ground zero as a "white elephant," has decided to back the multibillion-dollar skyscraper.
Spitzer, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine and Mayor Michael Bloomberg appeared together Tuesday to sign off on the delayed and redesigned building that has been under construction for more than nine months.
Spitzer said a booming commercial real estate market and the need to move forward with long-delayed rebuilding at ground zero changed his mind.
"We're confident that this is not only viable, but profitable," said Spitzer. The federal and state government has promised to lease half of the tower's office space and the skyscraper _ which will cost more than $2.4 billion to build _ is on budget, he said.
But Spitzer added, "I don't have any opposition" to selling the tower, which is scheduled to open in 2011. "We will entertain these options if and when they arise."
Corzine said that selling the tower "would be good public policy." He said the governmental agency that owns the tower might be better off staying away from real estate.
Work on the Freedom Tower got under way last year after the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey renegotiated developer Larry Silverstein's lease to rebuild on the site.
The Port Authority, a transportation agency that runs area airports, bridges and tunnels, approved a new lease for Silverstein, giving the agency control of renting out the tower and one of four other planned skyscrapers.
No design changes are foreseen for the Freedom Tower, despite critics' complaints that the tower's height makes it too much of a terrorist target and that a 20-story, windowless base makes the building look too forbidding.
Spitzer called the design a compromise "between the security needs that are real and pure aesthetics." Bloomberg added: "I don't think it will look like a fortress."
