New-York tribune., 1903-03-06
FATORS AMENDMENTS.
1fr. De Forest against Those Nooc
'' ProDoSed. HoweUer.

Robert W. De Forest the Tenement House
Commissioner. spoke before the Brooklyn Re
publican Club. in Pierrepont-st. last night, on
the Tenement House law and the proposed
amendments introduced at Albany. He dweit
particularly on those parts of the law which
appertained especially to Brooklyn. saying in
Part:
am personally and ohisisy in favor % Of IS sCRs me
special conditions which exist in Brooklyn and Dor.
these boroughs whose integrity Of purpose cannot
make better: not amendments which viii destroy.
e Rs en- esS e Ss to Ff the ihf KIND s
To insist that there should be change in this
Earned in the first year Of it's enforcement by the
new. Tenement House Department, Nor is there
amendment. Our Governor-the same Governor
has Mayor Low So have and my deputy COM
missioners So have the gentlemen, whoever they
IDENTITY Of someS Who have framed the Bills now at
The real bf gqes0n in mot
and the scope of amendment to which the officers
which the officers of the Tenement House Depart
ment; as know. would assent, is. clearly that
stTuctursI conditions: Stl not diminish in any ap:
fire protection now insured under the law to the
great host Of tenement dwellers, who number more
ns and s% o p Pe
will be sanitary. in view of all expected uses. AS
lived h What mas n one IN Of s ne
private houses in fashionable neighborhood. The
house was later altered into apartments; When I
ing. French Flats FOR coiored People
Within what limits are amendments open to fair
question? Perhaps the best way Of approaching
these practical tic questions is through the so-casj
enactment would mean a return to the dark. the
very dark ages in a literal and not merely meta
It was known to he the expression OF the organ
Ied opposition Of last winter which kept up its ag-
tation through the year that infgHnced The goi,
Brooklyn at the recent election. and 1t bore unmfs-
taxable evidence OF conspiracy between these forces
In BROOKLYN and the opponents Of tenement reform
It has been said that the new law has absolutely
stopped tenement building I'm Brooklyn. In the
year 1902 there were 1S1 tenement houses built in
Brooklyn, at an estimated cost of $2o21.7 100 The
figures for greater New-York for the same period
of $50 S79 800.
No classes of tenements which now receive the
protection of tenement regula ton should be eX-
empted from the law so as to deprive them of this
protection.
To exempt such houses would mean in the
of all buildings of the excluded types.
which include more than half Of the new tene
would be practically without regulation light.
air space. hre protection and sanitation and with
contamina ton Of prostitutes It would mean. to
old buildings. that 6f the alterations
quired by law to make them little less dark and
their sanitary condition could be required.
There should be return to the narrow, discred-
tied airshaft even in the three story buildings.
There should be no diminution in the protection
from FIRE thrown by the law around fenements
There should be no decrease in the percentage Of
lot to be left for air and light unless it pos
m e same D pnce sS ne roofnzeS IN 9ns ST & a &
diminishing the court as the height Of the building
is diminished.