Upcoming Events
Stay tuned for upcoming events here!
Past Events
Don’t Believe the Hype: OneLIC Speak Out and Press Conference
A coalition of Queens residents and community groups held a community speak out and press conference on Thursday, October 23 at Jacob Riis Circle in Queensbridge Houses (10-25 41st Avenue). This event was held ahead of City Council’s final vote on the OneLIC Rezoning Plan on October 30th to highlight the consequential misconceptions about the rezoning. We demanded that Council Member Julie Won and the rest of City Council vote “NO” unless significant changes are made to the plan.
See some press coverage here.
Hamilton Rebooted Premiere
Hamilton Rebooted – a hip hop musical written & directed by Memo Salazar and featuring some of Queens’ brightest and best MC’s — Trasonia, Roque, and Reflect — debuted at Jacob Riis Neighborhood Settlement on Wednesday, October 22 at 7pm. In this counter-narrative to the hit Broadway musical Hamilton, audience members learned the real history of Alexander Hamilton- a slave trader who brought us both Wall Street and Donald Trump. As the first Secretary of the Treasury, he laid down the foundation for the capitalist economy that still dominates today.
October 4, 2025: Our 5-year Anniversary Party!
We celebrated our milestone five-year anniversary with 140+ friends and allies from our Queens community, NYCCLI, and CLTs from around the City – from East NY to Manhattan and Far Rockaway.
We thank everyone who made it to our party, and all who have been party to our fight for housing and land justice over the years. Thanks to the outpouring of support, we exceeded our fundraising goal, raising $12,000 to power our organizing campaign to secure our first property.
We want to give special thanks to:
- Our special friend and architect Nandini Bagchee who we honored for relentlessly uplifting our community’s vision for the Queensboro People’s Space.
- Amazing bands Powdermaker and The Obi Strips who literally rocked the house
- Our generous host and their incredible team at Sanger Hall.
- Talented photographer Neha Gautam who captured the night. (See more of her beautiful photos here.)
- And the many generous Queens businesses who donated to our silent auction and raffle
There are more people than we can shout out, so thank you ALL who have been part of this continuous fight for decommodified land and bringing deeply affordable housing and commercial space to our Queens communities. Every single member, supporter, and advocate involved brings us closer to realizing our community’s powerful vision – and we’re so excited to continue this work with you.
Missed the fundraiser? Donate to support our work today.
May 4, 2025: Jane’s Walk in Long Island City
On May 4th we hosted a “Jane’s Walk” walking tour of the LIC waterfront. Sponsored by the Municipal Art Society of New York, Jane’s Walks are annual opportunities for community groups or passionate individuals to host walking tours about specific areas of New York City and educate people about urban issues in the spirit of urbanist Jane Jacobs.
We began by showing people 3D renderings of the buildings proposed in the OneLIC rezoning using the magic of InCitU’s augmented virtual reality app. Standing on the corner of 21st street and 41st Ave, tour attendees were able to visualize the massive proposed towers across from Queensbridge Houses using augmented reality. Then, we walked down to the waterfront and passed by the landmarked terracotta factory, ending the tour a few blocks south at the Department of Education building. At Gordon Triangle we again used augmented reality to show people the towers that would block city views and cast shadows over trees and vegetation in the small park.
Sep 14, 2024: Queensboro People’s Space Sleepout and Potluck
More than 100 of our neighbors joined us for a sidewalk teach-in and potluck to break bread and learn about our community’s vision for the Department of Education (DoE) building – a massive public site that the City almost gave away to Amazon. Many of us stayed for a sleepout in a powerful action to stake our claim and demand that the City keep public land out of the hands of private developers – and support the WQCLT’s Queensboro People’s Space plan.
Our action was inspired by the two-week sleepout and hunger strike by community activist Suga Ray Marston last year to draw attention to the Queensboro People’s Space plan.
Heartfelt thanks to our beautiful community and all who made this action possible. And special thanks to Rude Mechanical Orchestra for the uplifting live music! And Mum’s Kitchen for providing gourmet brownies!
Read more about the Queensboro People’s Space, and sign our petition to win this site today!
June 1, 2024: Queensboro People’s Space Block Party
On June 1st, we hosted a rocking block party outside the city-owned Department of Education building on the former Amazon HQ site in LIC, Queens. This vibrant event demonstrated the deep need for affordable space in western Queens, and made it clear that we want a Community Land Trust to steward this massive publicly-owned building, not more luxury development. We are fighting to make the Queensboro People’s Space (QPS) a reality! On a beautiful sunny afternoon, hundreds of community members browsed and purchased goods from food vendors, artists, and local entrepreneurs, as well as community organizations sharing their important work. We had incredible music, dance, deejaying, and even a fashion show! There were too many performers, vendors and artists to list individually, but check them all out here. We are a diverse, powerful community!
Special shoutout to Suga Ray Marston and DJ Kodak for emceeing the performances and speakers: we could not have done this without you. And WQCLT was able to raise over $1,000 thanks to a raffle, made possible by our generous community donors: Long Island City Ballet, Queens Jiu Jitsu, Ora La Casa De Las Flores floral arranger, Yoga Agora studio , and the Queens Botanical Gardens: thank you to our local small businesses and public garden!
We’re also grateful to have political support from many of our local elected officials who were either present or sent representation at the block party: Julie Won, Zohran Mamdani, Kristen Gonzalez, and Nydia Velazquez.
This event was made possible, in part, with funds from the Statewide Community Regrant program, a program of the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature and administered by Flushing Town Hall.
March 23, 2024: Community-Led Town Hall in Long Island City
WQCLT organized a people’s town hall to discuss the impacts of the proposed OneLIC rezoning on the Long Island City waterfront. Participants learned about how past real-estate development and rezonings transformed the neighborhood, causing racialized displacement due to rising rents. Concerns were raised about the upcoming city-led development plan OneLIC, which many feared will only create more luxury towers with almost no affordability. Participants discussed what the community truly needs, providing feedback via an open mic, giving interviews, and writing their ideas on a community “bulletin board.”
May 27, 2023: Woodside Queens Festival
WQCLT co-sponsored Woodside on the Move’s Woodside Street Festival on May 27. Festival goers checked out the QPS building model, learned about CLTs, and got their own WQCLT T-shirts for a small donation. Our very own Memo Salazar and Suga Ray Marston spoke at the event. There were also performances by CLT board member Daniela Cardona (Rude Mechanical Orchestra) and CLT member Ernie Brooks (Tape Hiss).
March 7, 2023: Queens Community Land Act Town Hall
On March 7, we co-hosted the Queens CLA Town Hall with NYCCLI, the New Economy Project and Chhaya in Jackson Heights. We had a full house with a stellar line-up of Queens CLT superstars including our very own Memo Salazar and Jenny Dubnau, Jessica Balgobin (of Chhaya & Queens CLT), Lorenzo Brea & Shemika Jones (of Ravenswood CLT), and Alexis Smallwood Foote (of the Real Edgemere CLT). Many electeds also came out in support of the CLA including Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas (NYS Assemblymember, District 34), Shekar Krishnan (NYC Council Member, District 25), Isaac Blasenstein (from NYC CM Julie Won’s office, District 26), and Jumaane Williams (NYC Public Advocate). NYCCLI made an easy to use action page for people to send emails to their Council Members. So, please send one to your rep and feel free to share this link with your friends and networks: Take action!
If you missed the event, you can watch it all here: video
Feb 28th to March 14th, 2023: Suga Ray’s hunger strike and sleep out
From February 28th to March 14th, Suga Ray Marston staged a hunger strike and sleep out in front of the DoE building that we want to turn into the Queensboro People’s Space. Many WQCLT members visited Suga Ray over the two weeks, as did our City Council Member Julie Won, to express their support of the WQCLT plan to convert the 600,000+ square foot building into a community space for small businesses. On the last Sunday, he was joined by many musicians and friends to call on Mayor Adams to meet with the WQCLT.
You can read more about it here: Hellgate, Gothamist, Patch
Our co-chair Memo Salazar cut a short video about it that you can watch here:
May 14, 2022: Queensboro People’s Space Public Launch
On Saturday, May 14th at the DoE Building in LIC, we were joined by an incredible group of local Queens activists, non-profit organizations, small business leaders and city-wide CLT members who spoke in support of the Queensboro People’s Space.
We are immensely grateful to all who came and made the event such a success. Shout-out to New York City Community Land Initiative (NYCCLI) and land trust organizers from across the city who demonstrated there is a growing land justice movement. And much gratitude to our local NYC Council Members Julie Won, Shekar Krishnan and Tiffany Cabán who also spoke in support of our QPS project. We collaborated with the Street Vendor Project to give away dozens of free meals, heard fabulous freestyle from hip hop artist Eddie Krueger, and rallied the community around our collective vision for the Queensboro People’s Space.
Read more about the event in Patch.
Sept 18, 2021: Public Land in People’s Hands Community Festival
Thank you so much to the Justice For All Coalition, Ravenswood CLT, Connected Chef, Street Vendor Project, and Woodside on the Move as well as all of the amazing volunteers, musicians and artists who brought their energy, support and ideas to this celebration!
We gave away over 200 meals, had tons of insightful conversations and heard your vision for a collectively-owned and managed Department of Education building.
Jan 21, 2020: WQCLT First Public Meeting at Jacob Riis Center
It was great to have such an enthusiastic group of community members committed to a vision and structure of Western Queens that truly benefits us all!
We discussed the CLT’s vision for a community-led manufacturing, artists, and community space hub in the publicly-owned Department of Education building on the LIC waterfront. The meeting also featured an in depth presentation by professor James Defilippis’ grad students, who studied the DOE building for a semester.
We also shared other potential CLT sites in Western Queens, including residential units. Between the speakers, the questions, and the crowd, it couldn’t have been a more dynamic beginning to this endeavor.
