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Controversy Continues to Roil Ratner Trip to China

Right around the time the Nets arrive in Beijing next Monday, Bruce Ratner will be pitching investments in Atlantic Yards to Chinese businessmen at a hotel in the Chinese capital.  Ratner is hoping to raise a quarter billion dollars to help him build out his overall project. The city and state endorse the effort.

Barclays Center, the first element in the project, is fully funded, but Ratner is seeking funds to finance the rebuilt railyard next door and pay off a loan on a piece of property outside the arena footprint.  He's doing so under a controversial program that offers investors green cards in return for $500,000 in financing...and the middleman he's using to attract investors is using the Nets' visit to promote the effort.

The controversy has attracted so much attention that Brooklyn Boro President Marty Markowitz, an Atlantic Yards supporter, has decided not to accompany Ratner to Beijing.