Our Town Downtown March 05th, 2015 by OurTown Downtown

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MARCH

5-11 2015

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SUBWAY SYSTEM AT CRITICAL JUNCTION

In Brief SCHOOL CELLPHONE BAN ENDS THIS WEEK

Politics threaten to derail critical upgrades and repairs to aging infrastructure BY MEGHAN BARR

It’s an ominous refrain, repeated endlessly in the same automated monotone: “Ladies and gentlemen, we are delayed because of train traffic ahead of us.” Every New Yorker who rides the subway to work each day — all 6 million, on the busiest days — has heard that message echoed over loudspeakers when a train car comes to an unexpected halt. What most commuters don’t realize is that those delays are tied to a contentious political fight playing out over the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s ﬁve-year capital budget plan, which will fund critical improvements and repairs to the city’s sprawling transit system. Right now, the MTA is struggling to ﬁnd funding sources for about half of that $32 billion plan. The agency could be forced to refund money to contractors on expansion projects like the East Side access project — which will connect the Long Island Rail Road to Grand Central Terminal — if the budget debate isn’t resolved 18 months from now, MTA Chairman Thomas Prendergast said at a board meeting last week. “A year or two, we’re OK,” Prendergast said. “But as you start to get down that path, we get to the point where we don’t have that money, we can’t award design contracts, we can’t award construction projects.” Another major project at risk is the new subway line that will run along Second Avenue, Prendergast said. “Could we start the next phase of the Second Avenue subway? That would be one that would be up on the table,” he said. But Prendergast said the agency has never found itself in that position before, and he doesn’t expect it will happen this time around. “New York gets the money it needs

CONTINUED ON PAGE 5

The Gansevoort Market, circa 1899. Photo courtesy of New-York Historical Society.

MEATPACKING MECCA PACKS IN HISTORY HISTORY From immense farmers’ market to cool fashion hub, the district continues to evolve BY PENELOPE BAREAU

Why is it called the Meatpacking District when there are only six meat packers there, down from about 250? Inertia, most likely. Located on the shore of the Hudson River, it’s a relatively small district in Manhattan stretching from Gansevoort Street at the foot of the High

Line north to and including West 14th Street and from the river three blocks east to Hudson Street. Until its recent life as a go-to high fashion mecca, it was for almost 150 years a working market: dirty, gritty, and blood-stained. For decades it was a market hosting farmers from miles around who came to sell their wares, much as they do today in farmers’ markets across the city. Farmers started gathering in the 1860s, migrating from overcrowded markets farther south. They set up at the corner of Gansevoort and Greenwich streets,

spontaneously creating the Gansevoort Farmers’ Market. Gansevoort Street has a pretty interesting history itself. It was originally an Indian footpath to the river, following the same route it has today. In the 18th and 19th centuries it was known variously as Old Kill, Great Kill and Great Kiln road. A kiln—pronounced at the time and in some quarters still with a silent “n”—was an oven or furnace, which in this case burned oyster shells to reduce them to mortar, an essential

CONTINUED ON PAGE 4

Good news for parents, bad news for teachers: New York City’s 1.1 million students once again will be able to bring cellphones to school. The cellphone ban in city schools had been put in place by former Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who feared they would interfere with classes. Bloomberg, who knows something about the impact of technology, was in some ways prescient: since the ban was installed, texting and Snapchat and Instagram have taken over teens’ lives, to the annoyance of parents and educators. But the ban also had downsides, ultimately leading Mayor Bill de Blasio to lift it as of March 2. Parents complained that the absence of phones made it tough to reach their kids, particularly in family emergencies. In addition, the ban created a bizarre cottage industry of cellphone babysitters -- vans parked outside of schools that charged students a daily fee to watch their phones while they were in class. Some parents, particularly from less-wealthy neighborhoods, complained the ban imposed an unnecessary cost. In announcing the end of the ban, the Department of Education left it up to parents, and principals, to set the rules for when phones can be used, and where. “Parents and families should contact their principal or parent coordinator for information about their school’s speciﬁc cellphone use and conﬁscation policy,” according the DOE’s website. For the moment, no one is talking about allowing cellphone usage in class. Students most likely will be allowed to use their phones during lunch or in designated areas. Otherwise, they’re supposed to be kept in student backpacks and lockers. Good luck enforcing that. Look for under-the-desk texting and photo-sharing, starting this week.

4 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

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MEATPACKING MECCA PACKS IN HISTORY

NYPD 10th Precinct

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CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

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ELECTED OFFICIALS Councilmember Margaret Chin

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State Senator Daniel Squadron

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ingredient for the bricks-andmortar building trade. In 1811, expecting a war with Britain, the city created landﬁll at the foot of Old Kill and erected a fort there. It was called Fort Gansevoort in honor of a Revolutionary War hero, Peter Gansevoort, who much later became the grandfather of the author Herman Melville. The street was renamed for the fort in 1937, even though the fort had been pulled down 90 years earlier. In the early 1830s, the Hudson River shoreline ran along Washington Street north of Jane Street, jutting out where the fort stood. Elsewhere, construction began in 1846 on the Hudson River Railroad with a terminus planned on Gansevoort Street for a train yard and freight depot. The fort was leveled at that time in order to accommodate it. The city created landﬁll extending all the way up to Midtown and farther. West Street and beyond it, 13th Avenue, were created, and farmers moved west to share that land. Piers, docks and wharves were built in the river–an 1854 map shows lumber, coal and stone yards on both sides of West Street. Exactly when meat marketers joined the farmers is not known, but most likely it happened little by little over time.

The 9th Avenue el was built in the late 1860s to bring in produce and people who commuted to the area. Residential construction was undertaken for the increased numbers of workers, modest houses four and five stories high. Also in the late 1860s the Hudson River Railroad abandoned its train yard, and the market took over that space entirely. Crowded doesn’t begin to describe it. In 1889 the city built West Washington Market, wholesale facilities for meat, poultry, eggs and dairy products across West Street on 13th Avenue to rent to farmers. More wholesalers applied for space than could possibly be accommodated, and the situation became even more frenetic the following year when brine-cooled water began to be pumped under West Street to provide refrigeration. About 30 of the houses built in the area didn’t last very long, but were reduced over a period of about 50 years starting in the 1880s, knocked down to two or three stories. Sometimes two or three houses were joined, and instead of front rooms, kitchens, sitting rooms and bedrooms, the houses were gutted to create large interior spaces in which food could be handled and people could work. Once party walls were removed, those large open spaces could not support upper stories, so they were taken down to allow the load to meet capacity and the buildings were altered to two or three ﬂoors—offices upstairs—becoming what you

see now as the characteristic building type in the district. To many of those buildings, canopies were added with hooks on conveyor belts so that carcasses, when they were delivered (the animals were slaughtered and skinned elsewhere) could be loaded on the hooks and trundled inside, where they were dressed, i.e. cut into chops and roasts for retail sale. Those canopies—minus the hooks—are considered a characteristic feature of the district and remain. Early in the 20th century, technology enabled the building of steamships and ocean liners with greater load capacity, which in turn meant deeper drafts. Nineteenth-century landfill obstructed them, so, rather than lose lucrative docking tariffs to competing ports, New York City dredged the same landﬁll it had created, allowing the new ships to enter and demolishing 13th Avenue in the process. That’s why you don’t see it any more. The disadvantages of the Gansevoort Market were beginning to be felt in the late 1930s. For one thing, organized gangs were extorting money for good spaces, or any space at all, and it was pretty much impossible to move around. For another, 99-year warehouse leases began to expire. When they could, farmers migrated to other markets farther downtown, in Brooklyn or the Bronx. Some farmers continued to sell produce across West Street until mid-century, but they didn’t pay the city much

for their stalls. Meat marketers paid more, and possibly for that reason, the city made plans to build special market buildings for them and turn the Gansevoort Market into a citywide meat distribution center. It was finished in 1950, occupying city-owned land where Fort Gansevoort had stood. It was demolished very recently for the new Whitney Museum, which is almost finished, the third major piece of construction in 200 years to occupy the site of the old Fort Gansevoort. Meat marketers one by one ﬁnally joined their fellow food producers in the Bronx starting in the 1990s, and that is why there are so few meat packers left in the Meatpacking District. In 2002 the Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the meatpacking district as the Gansevoort Market Historic District, and many other types of businesses, especially those in the high-end fashion world, began to headquarter there. Those little two story buildings have been altered once again to accommodate new market uses, and life goes on. In some cases, life goes on as before; just last year, a new “Gansevoort Market” food hall opened on Gansevoort Street. This article originally appeared on 6sqft, a website dedicated to delivering the latest on real estate, architecture, and design, straight from New York City. View the original at www.6sqft.com. Reprinted with permission.

MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 5

Sports WIN FOR CHELSEA PIERS GYMNASTS

The Chelsea Piers boys and girls gymnastics teams dominated the second annual Winter Challenge held this past weekend at Chelsea Piers Connecticut. In addition to seven team wins across various levels, Chelsea Piers gymnasts also had strong individual performances, including an impressive 24 first place finishes. The Girls Team walked away with four team wins in Levels 3, 7, 8 and 10. The Boys Team finished first in Levels 4, 5 and 7. Additionally, Girls Team gymnasts claimed more than 22 first place finishes as well as five all-around champions, while members of the Boys Team took home two first place finishes and had eight all-around champions.

SUBWAY SYSTEM CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 to get the MTA to keep running,” he said. “Probably more so than any other entity in the United States.” Experts say the city’s aging trains and buses, which already lag far behind other global metropolises, will deteriorate considerably if the transit authority is unable to digitize a century-old subway signaling system, replace miles of subway tracks and cars and ﬁx tunnel lighting, among many critical repairs. “We will start sliding backwards,” said Richard Barone, director of transportation programs for the Regional Plan Association, an independent civic group that shapes transit policy across the tristate area. “Stations will be looking worse. We won’t have the money to maintain the track infrastructure to where it should be, and therefore it will result in greater delays. If we don’t upgrade our signaling system, well, that’s really bad because these are signals that are in some cases over 80 years old.” Mayor Bill de Blasio also weighed in on the funding crisis in Albany last week,

calling the MTA’s capital plan “woefully underfunded.” The mayor criticized Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s current contribution of $750 million toward the budget, saying it does not begin to address the transit authority’s critical needs. “We cannot ask riders alone to sustain the system with fare increases,” de Blasio said. Politicians and policymakers are divided over how to come up with the remaining $15 billion needed to fund the plan. Cuomo, who controls the MTA, has described it as “bloated,” which implies that he will expect signiﬁcant cuts in order for it to pass muster in the Legislature this summer. But the consensus among transportation experts is that the price tag actually isn’t high enough to cover the massive amount of work that needs to be done. Cuomo’s office declined to comment on how the governor believes the budget ought to be funded. None of the options are politically popular: raising taxes, tolls or fares, for example. Funding also could be diverted from

other state projects and funneled toward transportation. The most fully formed alternative funding plan was announced last month by a coalition spearheaded by former transportation commissioner Sam Schwartz, known as “Gridlock Sam.” The group proposed implementing tolls for all cars that cross 60th Street and the free bridges spanning the East River. That plan was endorsed by several local politicians and major transportation groups, but notably did not receive support from either Cuomo or de Blasio. For subway riders, perhaps the most important improvement included in the capital plan is the installation of communications-based train control system on several

subway lines, which will effectively digitize the trains. That means they’ll be able to run much closer together and more efficiently, rather than stopping and waiting for other trains to pass ahead of them. “I ride the R train regularly. If this capital program passes, I’m gonna get a shot at getting those countdown clocks (that offer next-train arrival times), so I don’t have to sit on the platform and wonder when the train is going to come,” said Gene Russianoff, staff attorney for the Straphangers Campaign, an advocacy group for subway riders. “Less crowding, more reliable service, more information — that’s what’s at stake.”

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2 Our Town Downtownâ&#x20AC;&#x201A;MARCH 5-11,2015

WHATâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;S MAKING NEWS IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD area burglaries. Among the recent incidents, a 27-year old returned home from a doctorâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s appointment at 9:50 am Jan. 12th and found his East 12th street patio door open and his roommatesâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; passports, $1,000 in cash as well as other property missing, according to DNAinfo. The website also reported that a 40-year-old woman on Perry Street had her purse, money, Apple products and her health insurance card along with other belongings stolen from her home as she and her boyfriend slept on Jan. 25th. This time last year, area residents faced a similar string of burglaries.

ANGRY TENANTS SUE STANTON STREET LANDLORD CROWDSOURCING CAMPAIGN LOBBIES FOR SMALL-BUSINESS PROTECTIONS Jeremiah Moss, blogger for the Vanishing New York website, is launching a crowdsourcing campaign, #SaveNYC, to convince politicians to enact legislation that would help sustain small businesses in

the city. Supporters can tag or post to the website pictures, videos and stories about small businesses at risk of shutting down or already closed. Moss hopes the legislation would provide rent protection to businesses that residents believe are essential. The blogger has been reporting on closed businesses for years and hopes the campaign could help

protect mom-and-pop shops from stiff competition from chains.

BURGLARS TARGET UNLOCKED VILLAGE APARTMENTS Police at the 6th Precinct are asking residents in Greenwich village to lock their apartment doors following a spike in

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Tenants of 113 Stanton Street are suing landlord Samy Mahfar of SMA Equities for endangering their lives by leaving them unprotected from renovation work. A Department of Health report last month was critical of renovation work, according to The LoDown news site. Attorney Garrett Wright asked the housing court judge to discontinue â&#x20AC;&#x153;illegal constructionâ&#x20AC;? which was â&#x20AC;&#x153;creating a hazardous environment and endangering (the tenantsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;) health and safety,â&#x20AC;? reported the LoDown. A judge lifted a temporary restraining order on Feb. 27 that had put a stop to construction, but ordered Mahfar to abide by building safer guidelines. Marfar purchased the building for $5.2 million last year. The tenantsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; lawsuit claims that Mahfar â&#x20AC;&#x153;violated every single health and safety

protocol. It cited â&#x20AC;&#x153;the lack of a building department permit to work in the buildingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s basementâ&#x20AC;? and also allege heat and water outages and intolerable noise. The parties next appear in court on March 6.

WEBSITE GATHERS INFORMATION ON LANDLORDS TO HELP TENANTS The rental listing site Apartable has launched a new website to help renters and house hunters ďŹ nd the legal history of homes they are interested in. The site compiles data from public records dating to 2009 from the Department of Buildings, the Department of Housing Preservation and Development and the Department of. Renters can call up violations, permits and complaints pertaining to certain rentals. The website also includes tenant reviews of landlords and management companies. Avishai Weiss, founder of Apartable, says renters always provide background information to landlords, yet the reverse never occurs. According to DNAinfo, information on the other buildings landlords own as well as who is behind an LLC, is available through the site.

NYC PUBLIC SCHOOLS TO SERVE ANTIBIOTICFREE CHICKEN New York Public Schools will be serving antibiotic-free chicken for lunch as early as spring 2016, according to Department of Education

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officials. Chicken is included in 626,000 lunches in city schools, with the school system spending $27 million on chicken during the recent ďŹ scal year. Other districts nationwide that are part of the Urban School Food Alliance, including in Los Angeles, Chicago, Dallas, will also make the switch to antibiotic-free chickens. The DOE has yet to announce an estimate cost for antibiotic-free chicken, but the department believes the move will be â&#x20AC;&#x153;economically efficientâ&#x20AC;? because of joint buying via the food alliance, according to a DNAinfo report.

MAN THREATENS CHURCHGOERS WITH GUN, SAYS HE WAS â&#x20AC;&#x153;GOING TO KILL PEOPLEâ&#x20AC;? A man entered Advent Lutheran Church at Broadway and West 93rd Street last month and said he was â&#x20AC;&#x153;going to kill people,â&#x20AC;? police said. The man, said to be in his 30s, approached a 60-year old churchgoer, ďŹ&#x201A;ashed a black handgun at him at about 8:30 a.m. on Feb. 23rd, according to the Gothamist website. Police reported that the suspect did not ďŹ re his gun and left the church in unknown direction. The suspect was still at-large as of March 2, police said. The suspect was described as being 5-feet, 8-inches tall and weighing 180 pounds. He was last seen wearing a gray jacket with blue jeans. Anyone with information is asked to call Crime Stoppers at (800) 577TIPS or (8477).

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MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 3

CRIME WATCH BY JERRY DANZIG

CABBIE SUSPENDED AFTER PULLING PREGNANT WOMAN OUT OF TAXI A New York City cabbie’s license has been suspended after surveillance video showed him pulling a pregnant passenger out of his vehicle and driving off. CBS New York reports that passenger Leslie Cooper says she climbed into the cab in Manhattan last week, and the driver told her his credit card reader was broken. She offered to stop at an ATM near her home, and he told her to get out of the cab. It was cold, and she refused. Surveillance video shows the driver pulling up to a curb, getting out and pulling Cooper from the car. She landed on the ground, and he drove off. “I was just in shock -- complete shock,” Cooper told the station. “I was really worried about my baby.” Cooper said she ﬁled a police report at the scene but had no visible physical injuries. The New York Police Department closed the case, the station reported. Cooper went to the hospital to be checked out and was cleared to go home. She went into labor a few days later and delivered her baby ﬁve weeks early. New York City’s Taxi and Limousine Commission said that the cabbie’s license has been suspended.

NO FIESTA AT LA BELLEZZA A thief took dough from a pizza shop, and it wasn’t the kind you make with ﬂour. At 6 p.m. on Friday, Feb. 20, a 28-year-old male manager of La Bellezza at 315 Broadway closed for the day. When he returned at 8 a.m. the next morning, he discovered that

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$1,000 in cash had been taken from the register and the tip box. Further investigation revealed the point of forced entry: a sheet rock wall shared by the pizzeria and nearby establishments had been busted through by an unknown perpetrator. A receipt printed from the register showed that the cash drawer had been opened at 2:11 a.m. Video cameras might have recorded the break-in.

What is a more tempting target to thieves than a man sleeping on the subway? Who is also intoxicated! At 2 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 18, a 30-year-old man snoozing on a southbound 1 train, later woke at the South Ferry station and found that someone had cut his right front pocket and then removed his wallet and other items. The man told police he had been intoxicated when he fell asleep. Police searched the station but could not locate his wallet or the robbers. Unauthorized charges appeared on the man’s Citibank debit card. The thief made off with $660 in cash, an LG Android phone valued at $200, a green leather handmade wallet priced at $120, a MetroCard worth $40, a New York State driver’s license, a Social Security card, and various credit and debit cards.

DISPATCHED AT DISTILLED If you do not attend to your laptop, a thief very well may. At 1:40 a.m. on Sunday, Feb. 15, a 26-year-old male employee of the Distilled, a restaurant at 211 W. Broadway, was working on his laptop and left it unattended for about 10 minutes. There was only one customer in the restaurant at the time, a 25-year-old woman. When he returned, his laptop was gone, and so was the customer. There is no video of the theft. Police searched the area but could locate neither the missing laptop nor the missing customer. The laptop, a 13inch MacBook Air, is valued at $1,500.

ATTENTION DEFICIT DISORDER What — students attending class must also attend to their wallets? At 9:30 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 18, a 23-yearold woman was attending class at the BMCC College. She had used the ID card in her wallet at the beginning of the class. After she left the class, she went to retrieve her wallet from her open purse and found that her wallet had been removed by an unknown person. She did not remember having been bumped or jostled. Subsequently, three unauthorized transactions totalling $59.90 turned up on her Capital One credit card, another for $99.80 and a third at an MTA vending machine for $2.75. The student cancelled her cards. In all, the items stolen included $300 in cash, a New York State driver’s license, a BMCC student ID, a library card, and various credit and debit cards.

CHOPPER CROPPER Winter is a tough season for motorcyclists, especially when a thief steals one’s ride. At 3 a.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 11, a man parked his bike at the southwest corner of Hudson and Jay Streets. When he returned at 6 p.m., he found his chopper was missing. He had neither chained, locked, nor covered the motorcycle, nor did the vehicle have LoJack. No cameras recorded the theft. Police could not ﬁnd the missing machine. The stolen bike is a green 2014 Kawasaki KLX250 with New Jersey plates 2NYT8, valued at $6,000.

BE THE NEW YORKER WHO REALLY DOES KNOW IT ALL. A LECTURE SERIES PRESENTED BY THE LAURA AND ISAAC PERLMUTTER CANCER CENTER. COLORECTAL CANCER RISK REDUCTION: THE IMPORTANCE OF EARLY DETECTION. Early detection is key for preventing colorectal cancer. Join us for a discussion on different screening options available, the importance of understanding your risk, and understanding the signs and symptoms of colorectal cancer. In collaboration with the Ofﬁce of Business Affairs at Woodhull Medical Center North Brooklyn Health Network. Date: Thursday, March 12, 12:00pm – 1:30pm. Lunch will be provided after the program.

Presenters: Stefan Balan, MD; Harry A. Winters, MD. Location: Woodhull Medical Center. Third Floor. Conference Room One. 760 Broadway, at the intersection of Broadway and Flushing Avenue, Brooklyn, NY.

RSVP: To attend call 718.963.8640.

CANCER SURVIVORSHIP LEARNING SERIES: EATING HEALTHY ON THE RUN.

STATS FOR THE WEEK

As a New Yorker on the run, you know the pitfalls of eating on the go: “grande” morning coffee drinks, pizza by the slice, and super-sized bagels. No matter the length of your commute or workday, you CAN eat healthy on the run! Learn how to snack healthy, avoid calorie disasters, and make restaurant deliveries really work for you. Date: Tuesday, March 17, 6:00pm – 7:00pm. Presenter: Amanda Buthmann, MS, RD. Location: Perlmutter Cancer Center.

Reported crimes from the 1st Precinct for Feb. 16 to Feb. 22

160 E. 34th Street, 11th Floor, Room 1121.

Week to Date

RSVP: To attend call 212.263.2266 or visit nyulmc.org/cancer-rsvp

Year to Date

2015

2014

% Change

2015

2014

% Change

Murder

n/a

Rape

n/a

Robbery

-100

-20

Felony Assault

-53.3

Burglary

-66.7

-4.2

Grand Larceny

-31.2

106

120

-11.7

Grand Larceny Auto

n/a

These lectures are free and open to the public, but you must RSVP. View past lectures at youtube.com/nyulmc

4 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

NYPD 7th Precinct

19 ½ Pitt St.

212-477-7311

NYPD 6th Precinct

233 W. 10th St.

212-741-4811

MEATPACKING MECCA PACKS IN HISTORY

NYPD 10th Precinct

230 W. 20th St.

212-741-8211

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

Useful Contacts POLICE

NYPD 13th Precinct

230 E. 21st St.

NYPD 1st Precinct

16 Ericsson Place

212-477-7411 212-334-0611

FIRE FDNY Engine 15

25 Pitt St.

311

FDNY Engine 24/Ladder 5

227 Sixth Ave.

311

FDNY Engine 28 Ladder 11

222 E. 2nd St.

311

FDNY Engine 4/Ladder 15

42 South St.

311

ELECTED OFFICIALS Councilmember Margaret Chin

165 Park Row #11

Councilmember Rosie Mendez

237 First Ave. #504

212-587-3159 212-677-1077

Councilmember Corey Johnson

224 W. 30th St.

212-564-7757

State Senator Daniel Squadron

250 Broadway #2011

212-298-5565

Community Board 1

49 Chambers St.

212-442-5050

Community Board 2

3 Washington Square Village

212-979-2272

Community Board 3

59 E. Fourth St.

212-533-5300

Community Board 4

330 W. 42nd St.

212-736-4536

Hudson Park

66 Leroy St.

212-243-6876

Ottendorfer

135 Second Ave.

212-674-0947

Elmer Holmes Bobst

70 Washington Square

212-998-2500

COMMUNITY BOARDS

LIBRARIES

HOSPITALS New York-Presbyterian

170 William St.

Mount Sinai-Beth Israel

10 Union Square East

212-844-8400

212-312-5110

CON EDISON

4 Irving Place

212-460-4600

TIME WARNER

46 E. 23rd St.

813-964-3839

US Post Office

201 Varick St.

212-645-0327

US Post Office

128 East Broadway

212-267-1543

US Post Office

93 Fourth Ave.

212-254-1390

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PREVIOUS OWNERS: Tom Allon, Isis Ventures, Ed Kayatt, Russ Smith, Bob Trentlyon, Jerry Finkelstein

MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 5

Sports WIN FOR CHELSEA PIERS GYMNASTS

Preventive health services offered in 2015 covered at 100%:

Talk to your doctor about new preventive services Medicare offers this year.

6 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

YOU READ IT HERE FIRST The local paper for the Upper East Side

Out & About More Events. Add Your Own: Go to otdowntown.com

6 NEW VOICE’S PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL: NO WAY HOME

November 5, 2014

April 17, 2014 The local paper for the Upper West Side

LOST DOG TALE, WITH A TWIST

ADVANT MUSIC FESTIVAL

LOCAL NEWS

A family hopes that Upper West Siders will help bring their Cavalier King Charles Spaniel back home Upper West Side For the past week, Eva Zaghari and her three children from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, have been papering the Upper West Side with over 1,300 ﬂyers asking for information on their beloved dog Cooper. ?We are devastated, please return our dog,? the sign implores. The catch though, is that Cooper didn?t technically get lost, or even stolen. He was given away. When she explains the story, sitting at Irving Farm coffee shop on West 79th Street before heading out to post more ﬂyers around the neighborhood, Eva and her kids are visibly distraught. About a month ago, on September 5th, her husband Ray had arranged to give the dog away, via a Craigslist ad. He mistakenly thought that removing a source of stress from his wife and kids ? walking and feeding and caring for a dog, tasks which had fallen mostly to Eva ? would make everyone happier

October 2, 2014

October 8, 2014

The local paper for the Upper East Side

ISLANDS: POETRY AND HISTORY OF CHINESE IMMIGRANTS ON ANGELS AND ELLIS

MILESTONES Shirley Zussman, who recently celebrated her 100th birthday, worked with Masters and Johnson, and still sees patients as a sex therapist BY KYLE POPE

UPPER EAST SIDE Some people’s life stories write themselves, and Shirley Zussman, the 100-year-old sex therapist of the Upper East Side, is one of those people. She was born in 1914 at the start of World War I (less than a month after the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand), lived in Berlin at the height of the Cabaret era, became a protege of the original Masters and Johnson, and, now into her second century, continues to see patients in an office in the ground ﬂoor of her apartment building on E. 79th Street. Last month, more than 50 people crowded Yefsi restaurant, a Greek place

August 7, 2014

August 20, 2014

FI R S T I N YOU R N E I G H BO R H O O D

(212) 868-0190 The local paper for the Upper West Side

The local paper for Downtown

The Wild Project, 195 E. Third St., between Avenues A and B. 8 p.m., $15 for student, $10 festival pass, $45. Imani Uzuri premieres a new cantata inspired by the eclectic composer’s rural Southern roots. 212-228-1195. www. thewildproject.com/ performances/index.shtml

A CENTURY OF SEX TALK ON THE EAST SIDE

The local paper for the Upper East Side

The Theater at The New School for Drama, 151 Bank St., at Bethune Street. 7 p.m., Free Directed by Lyto Triantafyllidou, this comedy deals with characters who experience issues of intimacy after their mother dies. 212-279-4200. http:// events.newschool.edu/ event/new_voices_ playwrights_festival_no_way_ home_2822#.VPTNJfnF9VI

ISLAND ▲ Chatham Square Library, 33 E. Broadway. 1 p.m., Free Learn about immigrants who through poetry written and carved on barrack walls. 212-673-6344. www.nypl.org/events/ calendar?location=15

CHELSEA ART GALLERY TOUR 526 W. 26th St., between 10th and 11th Ave. 1-3 p.m., $25. Check out some of Chelsea’s modern galleries with a tour led

by Rafael Risemberg. 212-946-1548. www. nygallerytours.com

8 YUNGCHEN LHAMO IN CONCERT ▼ Marble Collegiate Church, 1 West 29th St., at Fifth Avenue. 2:30 p.m., $15. Come hear Yungchen Lhamo in Concert, a Tibetan songwriter perform in concert with songs

MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 7

on soul searching and Buddhist themes. 212-686-2770. www. marblechurch.org/yungchen

HERMÈS STRING QUARTET The Auditorium at 66 West 12th St., Alvin Johnson/J.M. Kaplan Hall. 2 p.m.-5 p.m., $5-$17 The quartet, winner of 2012 Concert Artists Guild Victor Elmeleh Competition, performs work by Haydn, Schumann and Schubert. 212-229-5873. http:// events.newschool.edu/ calendar/day/2015/3/8

10 FREE SNAP (FORMERLY FOOD STAMP) APPLICATION ASSISTANCE FOR OLDER ADULTS Senior Center on the Square, 20 Washington Square North. 1-4 p.m., Free. LiveOnNY with AARP Foundation and Department for the Aging offers free snap and scrie (Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption) Application Assistance. Call 1-877-9268300 or email snap@liveon-ny. org. 212-398-6565, ext. 221.

Seventh Avenue, 7th Floor 6 p.m.-8 p.m., Free A recap of the chamber’s 2014 and a discussion of upcoming projects for 2015, as well as election of new board members. Light refreshments will be served. RSVP’s are required at gvcccannualmeeting15. eventbrite.com. 646-470-1773

THE POWER OF THE CROWD ECONOMY: A NEW ERA OF PEOPLE, PURPOSE AND PLATFORMS

Rudin Family Forum, 295 Lafayette St, 2nd ﬂoor. 6 p.m.-7:30 p.m., Free Charles Best, founder and CEO of DonorsChoose.org,, and Shannon Schuyler, principal and corporate responsibility leader, SYMPOSIUM: THE PwC, discuss how a new era of AFFORDABLE CARE HOMEWORK HELP social entrepreneurship — the ACT IN 2015 growing “crowd economy” — is connecting and mobilizing Hamilton Fish Park Library, Furman Hall, 9th Floor, 415 E Houston St and Columbia Lester Pollack Colloquium, 245 innovators. Street. Sullivan St. 2:30 p.m. 9 a.m. 3 p.m., Free but RSVP at https://nyu. Drop by for some homework qualtrics.com/jfe/form/ help after school. Volunteers SV_1QW9LtbB5pqjnhz from Bard High school Early College will get you up to speed; The symposium will feature for students from K-5. three panels on current issues surrounding the ACA, 212-673-2290. PRISON OBSCURA including Hobby Lobby and the www.nypl.org/events/ contraceptive mandate, the King EXHIBITION calendar?location=30 v. Burwell case, and concrete New School, Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Gallery, Sheila C. Johnson Design Center, 2 West 13th St. 12 p.m.-6 p.m., Free Rarely seen vernacular, surveillance, evidentiary, and prisoner-made photographs that, taken together, explore the country’s prisons and jails. http://www.newschool.edu/

NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARDS CEREMONY 2015 ▼ ARI HOENIG ▲ Smalls, 183 W 10th St between Seventh Ave South and W. Fourth St. 10:30 p.m., $20 Ari Hoenig along with his band play jazz. 212-252-5091. www. smallsjazzclub.com/indexnew. cfm

plans for continued health reform. Email wts211@nyu.edu for more information

11 ANNUAL MEETING, GREENWICH VILLAGE CHELSEA CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Opera America - 330

You Never Forget Who You Grew Up With. The rough touch of tree bark, the scent of freshly mowed grass, the gentle hum of pollinating bees as a flower blossoms — green spaces touch lives and all five senses. Green spaces are a vital part of growing up — they enhance lives, make memories and connect people with their neighborhoods and communities.

The Auditorium at 66 W, 12th St., Alvin Johnson/J.M. Kaplan Hall 6 p.m., Free, seating is firstcome, first-served basis. The National Book Critics Circle presents awards for the finest books published in English in the categories of fiction, general nonfiction, biography, autobiography, poetry and criticism. On Wednesday, finalists will read from their work.

Be a part of preserving and enhancing green spaces where we live, work and play. To volunteer, to learn how to help your community and to donate, visit ProjectEverGreen.org or call toll-free (877) 758-4835.

projectevergreen.org (877) 758-4835

8 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

Write to us: To share your thoughts and comments go to westsidespirit.com and click on submit a letter to the editor. Letter

MY STORY

Sunshine or No, I’ll Take New York BY LORRAINE DUFFY MERKL left the Upper East Side for the lower west side – of the country. That’s right, I spent a week in Los Angeles on a college road trip with my daughter, Meg. She, like many before her, thinks the place is paradise. I can see the allure. In the parlance of The Beverly Hillbillies: “Swimming pools, movie stars…” and of course, the weather. (We were basking in a sunny 72 in Southern California, while you all were freezing in New York City.) Yet, I could not wait to get back home. First of all, I had to drive everywhere. I truly missed living in a place where everything is around the corner, up the block, and across the street; where walking somewhere is not a long day’s journey, and if

Left to right, Frankie Dogramaci, Caroline Madaio and Willa Davis

AGAINST CAT DECLAWING To the Editor: I am a 9 3/4-year-old Girl Scout and I read your article, “Against Declawing Cats.” I completely agree with this article and think it is just cruel to declaw a cat. I love cats and believe that to declaw a cat is a hard process for the owner and the cat because it obviously hurts the cat and the owner has to deal with abnormal behaviors. Even though cats are our pets, they still have instincts and they can’t follow them if we declaw the cats. Imagine if you removed a dog’s sense of smell or if you removed a fish’s gills; in the dog’s case, you would be removing something very important, and in the fish’s case, you would be removing life from the poor little fish. The process of declawing a cat is more than a regular nail clip (which is one of the alternatives); declawing a cat is taking the whole claw out. I don’t wany any more cats to get hurt and hope that not declawing cats is turned into a law.

Voices hoofing it gets tiresome you can hail a taxi. There is Uber in L.A. and a smattering of cabs, but it is most definitely a driving city, where it appears that the only people who take the bus are ones who cannot actually afford a car. I like that we’re an equal opportunity city. I’ve seen the rich and famous on the Madison Avenue bus (Isabella Rosselli), the M79 crosstown (Stephan Baldwin), and 6 train (Ed Schlossberg), and YouTube footage of many more. Think anyone in L.A. ever sees George Clooney on public transportation? Once you do pick an area to spend time in, you can, of course, walk around. When crossing the street, just like we do, they have those same anxiety-producing countdowns at the light that make you feel like you’re participating in a track meet. But get this: Californians actually wait for the light to turn green before they step off the curb. Oh indeed, this chronic jaywalking New Yorker was a fish out of water. Meg wanted to go shopping on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills, the west

coast version of the Upper East Side. (It was more of a window-shopping experience and FYI: they have all the same stores out there that we have here.) She thought we were going to see the real housewives in Starbucks or Kristen Stewart and Taylor Swift trying on clothes at Intermix. Unlike the impression given by TMZ and US Weekly, these people are not strolling around “just like us.” Most likely they are sitting in traffic, as seems to be the city’s pastime. Yes, it’s a nice place to visit (sort of), but, unlike Meg, I wouldn’t want to live there. I’ve got it too good here, even though the fate of the Marine Transfer Station is still up in the air, the construction on Second Avenue is never-ending, and there are way too many empty stores on East 86th Street. While I was gone, though, it seems a Whole Foods opened on Third Avenue and 87th. Even though NYC is always NYC, it’s also ever-changing, which is part of the excitement of living here. That’s our ray of sunshine, no matter of degrees.

Willa, Girl Scout Troop 3463

To the Editor: My name is Frankie Dogramaci. I am a 10-year-old junior Girl Scout and I think your article, “Against Declawing Cats,” makes a very good point. Cats without their claws are defenseless. With this in mind, cats love to use scratching posts and without claws they can’t do this. Lastly, they can’t use their litter box properly because they have to dig in the litter box and when you delcaw a cat their paws hurt them for the rest of their life. And that is unncessary pain. Getting back to the litter box, if owners declaw their cat to keep scratches off the furniture, then if the cats can’t use a litter box, then what should have been in the litter box will be on the owners’ furniture and in my opinion, little scratches on a couch versus poop and pee everywhere, little scratches wins. In conclusion, I think declawing cats is a very bad idea and agree with the article. Frankie Dogramaci

STRAUS MEDIA-MANHATTAN President, Jeanne Straus nyoffice@strausnews.com Vice President/CFO Otilia Bertolotti Vice President/CRO Vincent A. Gardino advertising@strausnews.com

Associate Publishers, Seth L. Miller, Ceil Ainsworth

Sr. Account Executive, Tania Cade Account Executive Fred Almonte, Susan Wynn

Editor In Chief, Kyle Pope editor.ot@strausnews.com Deputy Editor, Richard Khavkine editor.dt@strausnews.com

Staff Reporters, Gabrielle Alfiero, Daniel Fitzsimmons

Block Mayors, Ann Morris, Upper West Side Jennifer Peterson, Upper East Side Gail Dubov, Upper West Side Edith Marks, Upper West Side

MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 9

6th Borough

The kids are alright

BY BECCA TUCKER hey’re starting to smell,” said husband Joe. I nodded wordlessly. “Starting” was generous. We hadn’t intended to cohabitate with goats. We hadn’t completely thought it through when we picked up two twoday-old kids from Edgwick Farm, a goat cheese operation in Cornwall. It was a spur of the moment decision, which is the kind I tend to make. We

just knew that since our three goats are all related, it would be good to get some new blood in the mix. It’s not easy to find goats from a reputable source for a good price, so when the opportunity came along, we jumped. The only hitch was, it was January. Too cold to keep the kids in the barn without a mother to curl up with. At first we kept them in a dog crate in the foyer, lined with newspaper and hay, where they snoozed a lot. We’d let them out for thrice-daily bottle feedings, during which we tried to contain them to a plastic tub until they peed and pooped, before giving them free range of the downstairs for a little frolic. But these are born climbers; soon the tub ceased to hold them and accidents happened. This distressed Joe, who has always maintained a strict division between indoor and outdoor activities. One of his favorite things about our new house is the generously sized mud room, “a filter for the whole house,” he calls it. That filter is now being majorly bypassed. Eventually I fenced off the foyer leading from the front

door, which we don’t use much, to the living room and covered the floor in there with newspaper. Joe’s rule was: no wood visible. Any time the floor showed through we threw down more New York Times, balled up the soiled paper and threw it in the compost. Sometimes we tossed toddler Kai in there, too, for jumping lessons. To fill their bottles, we’re experimenting with a mix of milk replacer (powdered stuff from Tractor Supply) and raw cow’s milk, warmed in the microwave. Last night, we came home to find the boy bloated and refusing the bottle — a potentially deadly condition. I massaged his belly until 11 p.m. while an unsupervised Kai stuffed her face with cheesecake, got him to take a little watered down baking soda, and by morning he was fine. As a result of the bloat scare, we’re slowly reducing the percentage of milk replacer, which is the likely offender, and moving to a mostly raw milk diet. Don’t forget to leave a chocolate on their pillows, Joe said sardonically.

Yes, these are, as my dad put it (after a dinner visit found him bottle feeding a kid while ﬁelding a business call on his cell), “boutique goats.” I admit it. We are developing time-saving strategies (namely, Joe’s sock-feeding system, in which he slides the kids’ full bottles into old socks that have holes in the toe so that the nipples come through the holes, hangs the socks from a chair on the porch, and the goats can feed themselves), but even so, caring for these ﬂoppy-eared cabritos constitutes a liberal slice of our daily energy-pie. On top of the feeding and cleaning, now there are post-prandial belly

HELP KEEP YOUR PET HEALTHY Take Fido on your errands, and nine other tips to manage your 4-legged friend’s weight BY THE NORTH SHORE ANIMAL LEAGUE AMERICA

Over 50 percent of pets are considered overweight or obese, with numbers climbing steadily. Just as with people, pet obesity has become an epidemic in the U.S. Dr. Mark Verdino, North Shore Animal League America vice president and chief of veterinary staff, said, “The most common cause for obesity in animals is over-feeding and lack of exercise. In this regard, most overweight animals can easily be put on a path to lose weight”. North Shore Animal League America would like to share some important pet health tips for you to incorporate into your four-legged family member’s life: • Have your pet evaluated by a

veterinarian to develop a plan for healthy living. Unchecked obesity in pets can lead to debilitating diseases such as arthritis, diabetes, cancer and other ailments. • We love to snack, and so do our pets. Although satisfying, unhealthy snacking can put on a couple of unnecessary pounds. Avoid feeding snacks and table scraps to your cat or dog. • Exercise with your pet. From running an errand to going for a jog, take your dog with you. Exercise is essential for your pet’s health as it increases strength and longevity. • Wellness through water. Water is key for digesting food and will help your pet’s body absorb important nutrients. Make sure your pet’s bowl is ﬁlled with clean, clear water. • Feed on a schedule. Avoid accidental overfeeding by sticking to your pet’s recommended daily feeding

guide. • While preparing and cooking your own meals, it is best to keep your pet in another room. • Make sure additional food is not just lying around as it will only encourage your pet to eat more than his/her daily diet suggests. • If you are going away, make sure to leave clear diet/feeding instructions with the person who will be looking after your pet. • If you have more than one pet, feed them separately. • When purchasing pet food, look for the words “complete and balanced nutrition” on the label. Consult with your veterinarian for more information regarding your pet’s speciﬁc diet. To learn more about keeping your pets safe and healthy at all times, visit www.AnimalLeague.org.

massage sessions too. We’re a week in, and — although they’re spending incrementally longer intervals outside — they may be sleeping in the house for two months, according to my amateur prognostications. I haven’t mentioned that to Joe since I fear it would not do much for his spirits, and it’s a not-very-educated guess to begin with. Worth it? Let me count the ways. Goats bear kids for 10 years or so, usually producing at least two per litter, so this pair is the Adam and Eve that will improve our stock and bring forth the homestead herd that will provide us with

milk and meat, brush removal, and lively company. The pitter patter of tiny hooves slipping on hardwood is better than a babysitter at keeping Kai entertained — until they get too enthused about eating her tutu. The grossness factor, too, has diminished considerably since I located the source of the barn smell: pee seeping under the deceptively dry hay in their crate and pooling in the bottom tray. Yep! A cesspool. I cleaned the bejeezus out of that thing and now the foyer hardly smells. Or maybe we’re just getting used to it.

10 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

RENAISSANCE MAN At 76, UES Resident Earns First Solo Art Show BY GABRIELLE ALFIERO

Alvin “Al” Gordon, at his home on the Upper East Side. The 76-year-old painter has his ﬁrst ever exhibition of work at the E. 96th Street branch of the New York Public Library this month.

Painter Alvin Gordon, who goes by Al, lives in a cozy one-bedroom on E. 61st Street, not far from the East River. With eucalyptus branches in a vase on his coffee table and a neat arrangement of his own paintings on one wall, Gordon’s tidy living room and kitchen possess a homey order. His bedroom is another matter. The artist keeps his extra large easel in the adjacent bedroom, facing the room’s lone window. Coffee cans filled with stained paintbrushes and half-squeezed tubes of paint sit on top of the air conditioning unit, itself covered in splotches and smudges of blues, reds and oranges, as is the tiled floor. “It’ a total love experience,” Gordon said of his art, adding that he only feels hindered by the cost of materials and the size of his apartment, which doubles as a studio for both him and his partner, Ellen Hughes, also a painter. “I can’t describe it any other way.” At 76, Gordon is celebrating his first art exhibition at the 96th Street Library, which runs through March. Stacks of his abstract paintings lean against his bedroom walls, some labeled with index cards in preparation for the show. The bed, strewn with newspapers, seems an afterthought. Gordon grew up in Williamsburg with his mother and four older sisters. His father passed away when he was three and his family scraped by, often sleeping on the floor of the apartment or using a row of chairs as makeshift beds, he said. His mother got remarried to a man who was physically abusive to Gordon. As a boy, Gordon loved drawing and sketched seascapes and old ships, an occasional landscape, and lots of cartoons. He dreamed of attending the High School of Music and Art in Manhattan, which merged with the School of Performing Arts in 1984, becoming LaGuardia High School. But on the day of his interview at the school, his stepfather wouldn’t let him out of the apartment, he said. Art was not a career that paid the bills. “I gave up on everything,” Gordon said. “I just gave up.” At 17, he joined the Air Force and was stationed in Europe. As a child, he enjoyed singing—his mother was a vaudeville singer— and when stationed abroad he found his way to the stages of jazz clubs in Paris and Munich. After leaving the military, he returned to Europe to sing, and eventually moved to

Spain to work in Italian and Spanish films, he said. “Living in Europe was a total change of life for me,” said Gordon, who has thick white hair, dark eyebrows and a smile like a lemon wedge. “I understood that there were other people in the world and other things one could do, and that you could actually try to do what you wanted to do, despite one’s finances.” Throughout his time in Europe and his years on stage, Gordon sidelined his drawing, but six years ago, with performing behind him, he took his first art class and developed a small collection of drawings. Armed with that portfolio, Gordon walked into the Art Students League on W. 57th Street and inquired about taking classes, a move Hughes called “ballsy.” The school called him the next day, he said. “Al makes his own criticism,” said Heidi Johnson, Gordon’s painting instructor at Temple Emanu-El on E. 65th Street, near Central Park. “He’s self-determined, completely.” Hughes ran an antique restoration business on the Upper East Side with her husband, who was also an artist. She met Gordon in 2008 in the laundry room of the apartment building where they both lived, after her husband passed away. She knows art, she said, and she finds Gordon’s bold abstracts, lively strokes of color and excess globs of paint unique, especially for his limited experience. “He does everything in a big way,” she said. “His paintings are him. There’s something in there that tells you who he is as a person. This vibrant, strong person. He’s an exciting person. He’s full of life, full of zest.” He transitioned into painting partly because, Hughes thinks, he saw her at her easel. “It was scary to do that,” Gordon said. “I didn’t know if I could make that transition from pencil or charcoal to the brush. But I did.” Whatever hesitancy came from his inexperience was short lived. He’s a fast painter, sometimes completing a piece in 30 minutes, Johnson said, and now has over 100 finished canvases. His 27 paintings for the show at the library, many done with just a palette knife and generous helpings of paint, come mostly from his own imagination, and are as self-assured as his early drawings, done with very few and mostly contiguous dark lines. “I had a voice teacher once upon a time,” he said. “Who said to me, ‘can’t you ever do anything low? Why do you have to do it like you’re on stage?’ I said, ‘that’s the way I function.’”

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MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 11

FOR THE WEEK BY GABRIELLE ALFIERO OUR ARTS EDITOR

THEATER “VERITÉ”

Writer Nick Jones’ latest play stars Anna Camp, from HBO’s “True Blood” and the ﬁlm “Pitch Perfect,” as an aspiring writer and stay-at-home mother named Jo, who, while penning her memoir, ﬁnds her life taking a bizarre and dubious series of twists and turns, causing her to wonder if these new events are part of someone’s elaborate design. “Verité” Through March 14 Claire Tow Theater at Lincoln Center 150 W. 65 St., between Columbus and Amsterdam Avenues Assorted showtimes Tickets $20

DANCE “BALANCHINE AND IMAGINATION” Coinciding with the Frick Collection’s exhibition of illustrative paintings and tapestries by Charles Coypel, which depict scenes from “Don Quixote,” dance historian Jennifer Homans discusses the role Cervantes’ comic tale played in the world of ballet, including George Balanchine’s 1965 version of the story, choreographed to an original composition by Nicolas Nabokov. “Balanchine and Imagination” Friday, March 6 Frick Collection 1 E. 70th St., near Fifth Avenue 6 p.m. Tickets $40

FILM “GREY GARDENS” David and Albert Maysles’ 1976 documentary follows the reclusive Edith Bouvier Beale and her daughter “Little Edie” around their decrepit home in East Hampton, a sprawling 28-room mansion called Grey Gardens. The newly-restored

documentary was ﬁlmed over a ﬁve-week period when the eccentric pair (and aunt and cousin of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis) faced eviction from their squalid home, where they lived amongst cats, raccoons and clutter. “Grey Gardens” March 6-12 Film Forum 209 W. Houston St., near Varick Street Assorted show times Tickets $13

IN CONVERSATION “THE 21ST-CENTURY CINEPHILE” French and American film writers discuss the rapidly evolving world of entertainment media and how our viewing habits, from binging whole series through streaming services to watching feature films on our portable devices, affect our relationship to the world of film. “The 21st-Century Cinephile” Saturday, March 7 Film Society of Lincoln Center Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center’s Amphitheater 144 W. 65th St., between Broadway and Amsterdam Avenues 5:30 p.m. FREE To be included in the Top 5 go to otdowntown.com and click on submit a press release or announcement.

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Essayist, storyteller and Upper East Side resident Eve Lederman presents a free stage reading of her play “Let it Come Down,” which explores the complicated relationship between a therapist and a patient. Staged at Dixon Place during the fall of 2014, Lederman pulled inspiration for the show from deposition transcripts from a malpractice suit. RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/ theater-for-the-new-city-let-it-come-downtickets-15808919905 “Let It Come Down” Monday, March 9 Theater for the New City 155 First Ave., between E. 9th and E. 10th Streets 7 p.m. FREE

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“LET IT COME DOWN”

Email us at news@strausnews.com

12 Our Town Downtown MARCH 5-11,2015

RESTAURANT INSPECTION RATINGS FEB 20 - 23, 2015 The following listings were collected from the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene’s website and include the most recent inspection and grade reports listed. We have included every restaurant listed during this time within the zip codes of our neighborhoods. Some reports list numbers with their explanations; these are the number of violation points a restaurant has received. To see more information on restaurant grades, visit www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/services/restaurant-inspection.shtml. Santina

820 Washington St

Not Graded Yet (33) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Insufficient or no refrigerated or hot holding equipment to keep potentially hazardous foods at required temperatures. Personal cleanliness inadequate. Outer garment soiled with possible contaminant. Effective hair restraint not worn in an area where food is prepared. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

Hoy Wong Restaurant

81 Mott Street

Grade Pending (59) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked ﬁsh and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. No facilities available to wash, rinse and sanitize utensils and/ or equipment. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

VERIZON PROBLEMS SPOTTED ON E. SIDE Both sides of Central Park hit by phone and Internet outage BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS

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Verizon customers on both sides of Central Park continue to report outages for the fourth straight week. This newspaper ﬁrst reported widespread outages in the west-80s that affected phone and internet service, beginning Feb. 3, and caused some customers -- including West Side Councilmember Helen Rosenthal -- to abandon the company. A Verizon spokesperson initially said technicians were unaware of the problem on the west side, but later said that about 200 customers in the west-80s were affected by a problem with two underground cables between W. 73rd Street and W. 74th Street. “These two cable were affected by water entering these cables, not unusual during these severe weather months when we experience extreme moisture, melting snow and ice, and possibly ampliﬁed by the corrosive elements of road salt,” said Verizon spokesperson John Bonomo. While the problem is more pronounced on the Upper West Side, customers across the park on the Upper East Side said they’ve been experiencing outages. too. Bonomo said he’s unaware of the problem on the Upper East Side. The state’s Dept. of Public Services said it has received four complaints of outages in the neighborhood. As for the Upper West Side, Bonomo said the problem will be fixed by next week, but affected customers said the company frequently misses its own

deadlines for repairs. A spokesperson with the DPS said the department has received four complaints of outages on the Upper West Side. “The department is closely monitoring Verizon’s efforts to repair the Upper West Side copper cabling that failed on Feb. 3,” said a DPS spokesperson. “Verizon has restored nearly all of the customers impacted by the failure, and it expects to complete restoration efforts early next week.” Bonomo said the underground cable issue on the Upper West Side is unrelated to any issues affecting customers on the Upper East Side. The company continues to offer affected customers its Voice Link product free of charge, which provides phone service over their wireless network. None of Verizon’s fiber optic network customers were affected, according to Bonomo. Susan Dudley-Allen lives at 93rd Street and Lexington Avenue. She said she’s been without phone and internet service for at least a month, and has since switched to Time Warner. “It’s immoral, what they’re doing,” said Dudley-Allen. “I’d like to know what actually happened and why we were all left with no explanation.” Although she switched to a different phone company, Dudley-Allen retained her Verizon landline and now has two phone numbers. When asked speciﬁcally about her problem, Bonomo said it’s an isolated issue and has nothing to do with the integrity of Verizon’s copper cable network on the Upper East Side. “Evidently a cable that runs to a terminal box at the back

of her building, or an adjacent building, was damaged by we assume a contractor or someone. Not our doing,” said Bonomo, who noted technicians are working to fix the problem. “Another customer in her building is also affected. Two customers.” Another Upper East Sider contacted us two weeks ago to discuss an outage where she lives, on Park Avenue between 57th Street and 58th Street, said last Thursday that her phone service had been restored after about a month of it not working. After her phone service was restored, she received automated messages from Verizon apologizing for the outage and offering her the company’s Voice Link alternative. The woman, who asked that her name not be printed, said the muddled communication from the company is in keeping with her experience of trying to get a fixed date for repairs. “I’ve had so many calls that it’s been fixed or it will be fixed and they just don’t agree with the facts,” she said. “I think the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing.” But for some customers, like Councilmember Helen Rosenthal on the Upper West Side, repairs came too late. “Guess who finally showed up to my district office this morning?” tweeted Rosenthal on Feb. 27, referring to Verizon technicians who visited that day to address the outage. The tweet, which namechecked Verizon and local reporters, concluded with the hashtag, “switched carriers weeks ago.”

MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 13

Real Estate Sales Neighborhd

Address

Price

Battery Park City

300 Albany St.

$453,000

Bed Bath Agent

Battery Park City

2 South End Ave.

$525,000

Brown Harris Stevens

Chelsea

221 W 20 St.

$799,000

Chelsea

349 W 21 St.

$1,111,000

Chelsea

313 W 22 St.

$1,795,000

Chelsea

270 W 17 St.

$850,000

Chelsea

210 W 19 St.

$990,000

Chelsea

200 W 20 St.

$495,000

Chelsea

319 W 18 St.

$695,000

Chelsea

151 W 21 St.

$1,960,131

Chelsea

135 W 17 St.

$2,600,000

Civic Center

165 Park Row

$750,368

E Village

126 E 12 St.

E Village

Greenwich Village

40 E 9 St.

$1,115,000

Halstead Property

Greenwich Village

63 E 9 St.

$975,000

Halstead Property

Greenwich Village

250 Mercer St.

$19,927

Core

Greenwich Village

54 E 8 St.

$585,000

Mark Greenberg Real Estate

Town Residential

Greenwich Village

211 Thompson St.

$325,000

Douglas Elliman

Corcoran

Lower E Side

417 Grand St.

$575,000

Lower E Side

575 Grand St.

$470,000

Loho Realty

Lower E Side

210 E Broadway

$1,150,000

Douglas Elliman

Bond New York

Lower E Side

504 Grand St.

$650,000

Douglas Elliman

Lower E Side

530 Grand St.

$648,000

Halstead Property

Lower E Side

473 Fdr Drive

$442,000

Halstead Property

Douglas Elliman

Lower E Side

210 E Broadway

$545,000

Lower E Side

473 Fdr Drive

$510,000

Loho Realty

$690,000

Halstead Property

Noho

445 Lafayette St.

$3,100,000

Douglas Elliman

70 E 10 St.

$970,000

Douglas Elliman

Nolita

41 Spring St.

$920,000

Misrahi Realty

E Village

300 E 4Th St.

$49,032

Soho

508 Broadway

$2,825,000

E Village

211 E 13Th St.

$1,422,458

Soho

508 Broadway

$2,450,000

Soho

508 Broadway

$2,450,000 4

Sotheby’s

Financial District

80 John St.

$1,325,000

Douglas Elliman

Financial District

120 Greenwich St.

$625,000

Town Residential

Soho

508 Broadway

$2,675,000

Financial District

123 Washington St.

$2,775,000

Corcoran

Soho

387 W Broadway

$10,150,000

Financial District

55 Wall St.

$700,000

New York Residence

Soho

40 Mercer St.

$7,500,000

Financial District

75 Wall St.

$700,000

Douglas Elliman

Soho

199 Prince St.

$1,500,000

Halstead Property

Financial District

40 Broad St.

$2,275,000

Soho

210 Lafayette St.

$1,570,000

Corcoran

Financial District

88 Greenwich St.

$750,100

Douglas Elliman

Tribeca

7 Harrison St.

$8,349,650

Financial District

120 Greenwich St.

$695,118

Douglas Elliman

Tribeca

415 Greenwich St.

$8,250,000

The Marketing Directors

Flatiron

7 E 14 St.

$545,000

Douglas Elliman

Tribeca

366 Broadway

$3,125,000

Flatiron

254 Park Ave. South

$995,000

Douglas Elliman

Tribeca

260 W Broadway

$1,825,000

Core

Flatiron

17 W 14 St.

$995,000

Tribeca

66 Leonard St.

$2,750,000

Flatiron

23 E 22 St.

$4,325,000

Core

Tribeca

101 Leonard St.

$2,978,381

Douglas Elliman

Flatiron

280 Park Ave. South

$1,485,000

The Maher Group

Tribeca

7 Harrison St.

$5,040,337

Compass

$15,900,000 2

Nestseekers

Citi Mosaic

Flatiron

40 E 19 St.

$4,606,540

Tribeca

7 Hubert St.

Fulton/Seaport

99 John St.

$636,406

Metropolitan Living Ltd

Tribeca

52 Warren St.

$2,275,287

Fulton/Seaport

42 Ann St.

$3,526,891

Warburg

W Village

374 W 11 St.

$3,550,000

Fulton/Seaport

42 Ann St.

$3,212,578

W Village

140 W 10 St.

$580,000

Fulton/Seaport

99 John St.

$960,000

Nestseekers

W Village

84 Horatio St.

$426,000

Gramercy Park

142 E 16 St.

$910,000

Corcoran

W Village

59 Barrow St.

$4,450,000

Gramercy Park

301 E 22 St.

$616,000

Keller Williams Nyc

W Village

14 Horatio St.

$615,000

Coldwell Banker Bellmarc

Gramercy Park

145 E 15 St.

$535,000

0.5 1

Town Residential

W Village

29 Perry St.

$1,310,000

Brown Harris Stevens

Gramercy Park

305 2 Ave.

$2,189,237

Cantor And Pecorella

W Village

295 W 11 St.

$646,688

Gramercy Park

160 E 22Nd St.

$2,565,979

Toll Brothers

Gramercy Park

242 E 19 St.

$2,300,000

Halstead Property

Gramercy Park

201 E 17 St.

$705,000

Bond New York

Gramercy Park

301 E 22 St.

$356,000

Gramercy Park

160 E 22Nd St.

$2,637,257

Toll Brothers

Gramercy Park

160 E 22Nd St.

$1,680,102

Gramercy Park

235 E 22 St.

$875,000 2

Corcoran

$665,000

Corcoran

Greenwich Village

20 E 9 St.

$3,875,000

Brown Harris Stevens

Greenwich Village

88 Bleecker St.

$705,000

Greenwich Village

24 5 Ave.

$349,000

Nu Place Realty

Greenwich Village

105 W 13 St.

$1,612,500

Corcoran

Greenwich Village

60 W 13 St.

$1,300,000

Town Residential

Greenwich Village

135 W 3 St.

$2,995,000

Greenwich Village

50 W 9 St.

$1,510,000

Douglas Elliman

us to

into

$1,695,000

77 Bleecker St.

something

305 2 Ave.

Greenwich Village

have

Gramercy Park

St.Easy.com is New York’s most accurate and comprehensive real estate website, providing consumers detailed sales and rental information and the tools to manage that information to make educated decisions. The site has become the reference site for consumers, real estate professionals and the media and has been widely credited with bringing transparency to one of the world’s most important real estate markets.

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14 Our Town nD Downtown MARCH ow o wnt nto ow wn n MA M RCH 5-11,2015

YOUR 15 MINUTES

To read about other people who have had their “15 Minutes” go to otdowntown.com/15 minutes

EXPLORING JEWISH HISTORY IN THE CITY Q&A Paul Kaplan on his quest to provide an in-depth resource to Jewish history and culture in Manhattan BY ANGELA BARBUTI

PAUL’S FAVORITE PLACES TO ... Eat a knish: Yonah Shimmel’s Knish Bakery Have a bowl of matzo ball soup: Russ & Daughters Cafe Consume a pastrami sandwich: Pastrami Queen Worship: Romemu Learn Jewish history: Skirball Center for Adult Learning at Temple Emanu-El Experience Jewish culture: Jewish Community Center

To research his book, Jewish New York: A History and Guide to Neighborhoods, Synagogues, and Eateries, Paul Kaplan spent a year and a half interviewing museum curators, tour guides, nonproﬁt directors and historian. From Katz’s Deli to former Harlem synagogues and several not-so-celebrated locations -- as well as sites and places that no longer exist -- he ventured throughout Manhattan to document Jewish life both past and present. Kaplan sits on the board of directors for the Lower East Side Jewish Conservancy.

You have a marketing background. What made you start writing? My work during the day is around digital marketing and marketing strategy for various industries. I also pursue historical preservation. I feel it’s important to capture the essence of the city and document it for future generations. I noticed that there were so many different places of Jewish interest, but there was no one place where it was all together. And I thought it particularly important to tell the story behind the sites.

Why do you think, as you said, nothing of its kind has been written before? Well, what’s been written before tends to be very focused, on particular restaurants and places. There are deﬁnitely a lot of those books. I think that people tend not to think holistically. So this is taking a step back and trying to connect the dots.

What is your family’s history in New York? My parents are both from Brooklyn, and I was born in Manhattan, lived here until I was ﬁve, and then moved to New Jersey. I grew up in Princeton, but I came here a lot growing up, so I witnessed a lot of the changes.

What were some things you learned from writing this book? I didn’t know that Harlem was such a hotbed of Jewish activity from the 1880s until around 1920. And that a lot of Jews had moved there from the Lower East Side, and you can see a lot of old synagogues in Harlem, many of which are

churches today. You can observe some of the architectural relics of the past if you look closely. Another one would be that Second Avenue, between Houston and 14th Street, was like Broadway today for Yiddish theater. There was a real variety of quality in the theaters themselves. There was a Yiddish stars Walk of Fame, which was on the street, just like you have on Hollywood Boulevard. A lot of the buildings those theaters were in are still there today. For example, the theater that Stomp has been in for a really long time, was a Yiddish theater. There were 22 Yiddish theaters and two Yiddish vaudeville houses.

One of those Yiddish theaters became the Fillmore East. They used to call it “The Church of Rock ‘n’ Roll.” It was the former Commodore Theater, erected in 1926, on Sixth Street and Second Avenue. It is the only building in the world I think that has been a Yiddish theater, a cinema, a playhouse, a very famous rock ‘n’ roll venue, an exclusive gay club and now a local bank. I just found it amazing that not only has it had many uses, which you would expect, but how varied they were. John Lennon, Frank Zappa, Jefferson Airplane and Crosby, Stills and Nash played at the Fillmore East, and now you’re making your deposit at the bank. Hanging on the wall in the bank is a collage of photos and drawings from all the buildings that were there previously.

You hosted your book launch at the Eldridge Street Synagogue. Your story about its restoration is fascinating. That’s really a signiﬁcant story about historical renewal. It’s an important one to tell because a lot of times, unfortunately, many places fall into disrepair and that’s it. But this one has a very heartwarming story behind that. At its time, when it was erected in 1887, it was a very important synagogue, and a place where the poor and the rich sat together and worshiped. It was the ﬁrst immigrant-built synagogue in the U.S. The neighborhood changed profoundly in the 40s and 50s, with a lot of people moving away to the suburbs, and fewer immigrants coming in because of the changes in the law. Yes, you always had a little service there, but it was disused and the whole sanctuary fell into disrepair. There just weren’t funds to keep it going and essentially from the mid-50s to the early 80s, that main sanctuary

wasn’t used. In the early 70s, author Gerard Wolfe was very intrigued and had a caretaker let him into the synagogue and open it up and he said it was like a time capsule. There were many who helped with the restoration project and then it really took hold. They tried to restore it authentically so that it looks like it did in 1887.

Streit’s Matzo is one placed you toured. You wrote on your blog that it’s moving. They’re not going out of business, but they’re moving out of the Lower East Side, which is kind of sad. Just walking by, you can smell the matzo being made. To learn more, visit www.paulkaplanauthor. com Kaplan will be at the Mid-Manhattan branch of the New York Public Library on March 24th and the Upper West Side Jewish Community Center on March 29th for a Q&A and book signing

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MARCH 5-11,2015 Our Town Downtown 15

CLASSIFIEDS Classified Advertising Department Information Telephone: 212-868-0190 | Fax: 212-2868-0190 Email: classified2@strausnews.com Hours: Monday - Friday 9:00 am - 5:00 pm | Deadline: Monday 12 noon for same weeks’ issue ACCOUNTING/FINANCIAL SERVICES LOMTO Federal Credit Union It’s hard to beat our great rates! Deposits federally insured to at least $250K (212)947-3380 ext.3144

ADOPTION A childless young married couple, hands-on mom/devoted dad (she-31/he-37) seeks to adopt. Financial security. Expenses paid. Call/text. Mary & Adam. 1-800-790-5260. A dream is a wish your heart makes, our wish is a baby to love. We’re loving, educated, close family. Expenses paid. Danny/Lorraine 1-866-9977171 ANIMALS & PETS

Certiﬁed Dog Training in your home. Vet recommended. Bonded & Insured. Excellent References. Alex Himel, 516767-0747 or 516-633-3384. North Shore Animal League AnimalLeague.org 1-877-4-SAVE-PET Facebook.com/TheAnimalLeague ANNOUNCEMENTS

GrowNYC.org Recycle@GrowNYC.org 212-788-0225 ANTIQUES/COLLECTIBLES

Antique, Flea & Farmers Market, East 67 St Market (bet. First & York Ave). Open every Saturday, 6am-5pm, rain or shine. Indoor & Outdoor, Free Admission. Call Bob 718-8975992. Proceeds beneﬁt PS 183. AUCTIONS

AUCTION CHEMUNG COUNTY REAL PROPERTY TAX FORECLOSURES- 100+ Properties March 25 @11AM. Holiday Inn, Elmira, NY. 800-243-0061 HAR, Inc. & AAR, Inc. Free brochure: www.NYSAUCTIONS.com Exciting Neighborhood Auction Antiques & Collectibles, Paintings, Decorative Objects, Costume Jewelry. Sat March 7, 3pm. 1157 Lex Ave @ 80th St (garden ent next to All Souls) Prev & Reg 11am-3pm. Martine’s Auctions, 212-772-0900, martine-auctions@outlook.com

CAMPS/SCHOOLS Alexander Robertson School Independent School for Pre-K through Grade 5, 212-663-2844, 3 West 95th St. www.AlexanderRobertson.com Loyola School 646-346-8132 www.loyolanyc.org admissions@loyolanyc.org

CAMPS/SCHOOLS River Park Nursery School 212-663-1205, www.river parknurseryschool.com York Preparatory School 212-362-0400 ext 133 www.yorkprep.org admissions@yorkprep.org

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HELP WANTED

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MASSAGE BODYWORK by young, handsome, smooth, athletic Asian. InCall/OutCall. Phillip. 212-787-9116

Massage by Melissa (917)620-2787 MERCHANDISE FOR SALE

Fresh California Organic Walnuts, home grown, hand picked. Reduces the risk of heart disease. One of the best plant source of protein, Omega 3 and E &B vitamins. $12 a pound shelled, $5 a pound in shell, plus shipping. Perry Creek Walnuts 530-503-9705 perrycreekwalnuts.com perrycreekwalnuts@hotmail.com Pandora Jewelry Unforgettable Moments 412 W Broadway - Soho, NYC 212-226-3414

POLICY NOTICE: We make every effort to avoid mistakes in your classified ads. Check your ad the first week it runs. We will only accept responsibility for the first incorrect insertion. Manhattan Media Classifieds assumes no financial responsibility for errors or omissions. We reserve the right to edit, reject, or re-classify any ad. Contact your sales rep directly for copy changes. All classified ads are pre-paid. REAL ESTATE - RENT

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Call Mark @ Meringoff Properties 646.262.3900

16 Our Town Downtownâ&#x20AC;&#x201A;MARCH 5-11,2015

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