Our Town - December 27, 2018

The local paper for the Upper East Side

WEEK OF DECEMBER - JANUARY

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A MASTERPIECE FINDS ITS MATE AT THE FRICK

2018 - 2019

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THE NEWSLETTER THAT SAVED A LIFE COMMUNITY Or how a 49-page monthly bulletin for Upper East Siders helped one resident detect, deter and defeat a deadly disease.

Mayor Bill de Blasio and Council Member Keith Powers hold a town hall meeting at Hunter College during City Hall In Your Borough: Manhattan, on Wednesday, December 19, 2018. Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office

MAYOR HOSTS EAST SIDE TOWN HALL ISSUES Concerns of residents in Council Member Keith Powers’ district take center stage

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

Mayor Bill de Blasio and Council Member Keith Powers fielded questions from East Side constituents on affordable housing, overdevelopment, L train shutdown mitigation plans, street safety and more at a Dec. 19 town hall meeting at Hunter College. Excerpted below are the mayor’s responses on a handful of topics:

On bike safety: “I do believe there’s a really important place for bicycles, but we also need enforcement and we need to make sure people are safe. […] Anyone who needs to get somewhere in New York City on a bicycle still can follow the same rules that other vehicles follow.”

On idling vehicles: “There’s a lot more we need to do. […] We are […] a couple of months away from presenting a bigger antiidling plan [with] NYPD and other

agencies, because it clearly is one of the things we need to do in terms of climate change, its quality-oflife, it’s air quality, it’s everything.

People should not be idling unless there’s a damn good reason.”

On NYCHA’s $32 billion budget shortfall, and the administration’s decision to raise money for the public housing agency by allowing private developers to build on NYCHA land: “Public housing in this city used to be wonderful, and then the federal government stopped investing in it. […] We have to get all the revenue we can possibly get for public housing, and this development is one of the only ways to get new revenue in.”

On the Amazon deal and its $3 billion in subsidies: “The bottom line ... is it’s a nine-toone revenue-to-expenditure deal.

We get nine dollars back for every dollar they got in incentives ... The helicopter pad bothers all of us ... I don’t love the optics, and I don’t love that there even are some of these incentive programs ... The upside is a huge number of jobs ... and a huge amount of revenue that will pay for the other things we need and believe in in this city.”

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Crime Watch Voices NYC Now City Arts

BY DOUGLAS FEIDEN

The 10 scariest words in the English language, Ronald Reagan used to joke, are these: “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help you.”

Kathleen L. Steed embraces a very different world view. Officialdom, she believes, can offer comfort, company, support and holiday cheer.

And every once in a while, it can even rescue you from mortal peril.

“The word ‘miracle’ is overused and overworked,” said the 73-year-old Yorkville woman, a retired private investigator and hospital fundraiser.

“But this really is a story about a miracle,” she added.

It surfaced on Dec. 13 at the annual holiday party of Upper East Side City Council Member Ben Kallos as some 70-plus constituents mingled in his district office on East 93rd Street.

Over baked ziti from the Italian Village Pizza on First Avenue and gallons of apple cider and other nonalcoholic beverages, Steed buttonholed Josh Jamieson, the communications director for Council District 5.

“Your newsletter saved my life,” she said simply.

Jamieson said he was stunned.

Thus began a conversation between a pair of newsletter aficionados.

Jamieson has worked for Kallos for nearly three years, and his duties include writing, editing and curating most of the document, which reaches thousands of constituents online and in a hefty print edition that can range from 30 to 50 pages.

It’s so comprehensive and laborintensive that he’s regularly on the receiving end of good-natured rib-

3 8 10 12

Restaurant Ratings Business Real Estate 15 Minutes

14 16 17 21

Kathleen Steed speaks to City Council Member Ben Kallos at his recent holiday party for constituents — about how his community newsletter gave her a new lease on life.

Photo courtesy of Ben Kallos’ office bing from Kallos and Jesse Towsen, his chief of staff, over both the newsletter’s length and its encyclopedic scope.

A recent issue, for instance, was chockablock full with listings for UES events, lectures, exhibits, book groups, support groups, writing circles, yoga workshops, dance rehearsals, ballet workshops, exercise classes, cooking classes, legal clinics, medical services and homeless services.

Not to mention the screenings of “Casablanca,” symposium about the 1830s, drag queen story hours and discussions of the U-boat attacks on allied shipping in the North Atlantic during World War II.

CONTINUED ON PAGE 7

This is one story I will not be forgetting anytime soon.”

City Council Member Ben Kallos

Jewish women and girls light up the world by lighting the Shabbat candles every Friday evening 18 minutes before sunset.

Friday, December 28 – 4:18 pm.

For more information visit www.chabaduppereastside.com

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DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR On streets, bikes and iconic buildings The Menace of E-Bikes Re “End to E-Bike Ban in Sight?�

(Dec, 6), this has to be the most insane, bone-headed and dangerous proposal in years.

Early this decade, the City Council ďŹ nally passed a law banning e-bikes.

Sadly, the law was not well-written, and did not give clear instructions to law enforcement as to what they could and could not do with respect to conďŹ scating them. So while there were some conďŹ scations, there was also great confusion that led to most precincts not enforcing the law at all.

What is needed is not a law to permit e-bikes, but a much stronger, betterwritten law banning them entirely.

Such a law should give law enforcement the right not only to conďŹ scate e-bikes on sight, but also to conďŹ scate the motors that get attached to regular bikes to make them into e-bikes (used mostly by food delivery people).

And huge ďŹ nes should be imposed on restaurants and other merchants who use e-bikes for deliveries.

The menace of e-bikes is the menace of regular bikes on steroids: if legalized, they will still go the wrong way on one-way streets, go through red lights, and even ride on sidewalks (they already do) — but at twice to

s ar ce ye ien 34 per ex

three times the speed of a regular bike.

I understand and appreciate that e-bikes represent a “green� form of transportation, something we can certainly use more of. However, if ebikes are ever going to be legalized, it should only be done if they are treated like all other motorized vehicles: licenses — and license plates — should be required, and moving traffic summonses should be issued by law enforcement.

Otherwise, this proposal should die on the vine, and any politician who supports it will be complicit in the injuries, and possible deaths, that are almost certain to occur if it is passed.

Ian Alterman Manhattan

So This is Progress?

First I said a very teary goodbye to Lord & Taylor and then another goodbye to an iconic building of architectural charm and history: Henri Bendel. Then I went home and walked into my 20-story apartment building, where I faced an enormous wall of cartons at least 5 feet tall and well over 12 feet wide.

There was a glut of cartons and more cartons, cartons that ďŹ lled the entire upper portion of the lobby. This double wall of cartons then continued all the

E-bikes remain illegal and were conďŹ scated by police over 1,000 times last year, but legislation now under consideration in the City Council would legalize the motorized bicycles. Photo: NYPD, via Twitter way to the elevators and mailroom.

So what do they contain? Clothing, electronics, dog food, steaks, toilet paper, whims, and one giant 85-inch box holding a television managed to turn my lobby into what all this stuff put out of business: Retail stores! How appropriate given that shopping online has emptied the stores.

Sandy Jaffe Upper East Side

PERSONALIZED HOME CARE

Safety First In response to Bette Dewing’s column, “Never Thought I’d Hate the Bicycle,â€? and [her] advice to walkers trying to make a safe trip home, I offer another safety-ďŹ rst rule. In my nightly walking commute from 81st Street down to the 59th Street bus stop, I walk southbound down First Ave. so I can see northbound drivers coming toward me when they turn onto the side streets. I’m a long-range

commuter and my eventual destination is New Jersey. There is a general application with your article about bicycle safety because I’m always looking out for them too. Sometimes they ride the opposite way. Always looking forward to [Dewing’s] next column on pedestrian safety.

Michael Kearney Toms River, NJ

ACTIVITIES FOR THE FERTILE MIND

thoughtgallery.org NEW YORK CITY

CUSTOMIZED CARE

New Year’s Eve Concert for Peace 2018

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End the year on a harmonious note with this performance, founded by Leonard Bernstein in 1984.

The concert includes Robert Convery’s setting of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s I have a dream, the New York premiere of Wayne Oquin’s Allelulia, and music by Mozart and Bach (free).

Popovers and Candlelight: Marcia Biederman

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 2ND, 6:30PM Mid-Manhattan Library | 476 Fifth Ave. | 212-340-0863 | nypl.org Author Marcia Biederman talks about restaurateur Patricia Murphy’s rise and fall, from Depressionera depths to Brooklyn success to eight other Patricia Murphy’s Candlelight Restaurants and then to her empire’s equally dramatic collapse (free).

Just Announced | Culinary Maestro Manhattan: Danny Meyer

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 6TH, 7PM Temple Emanu-El | 1 E. 65th St. | 888-718-4253 | emanuelnyc.org Budd Mishkin moderates a night with restaurateur Danny Meyer (Union Square Cafe, Shake Shack), whose restaurants and chefs have earned 28 James Beard Awards. Meyer will talk about childhood eating, his ďŹ ght against tipping, and his book Setting the Table ($36, includes book).

For more information about lectures, readings and other intellectually stimulating events throughout NYC,

sign up for the weekly Thought Gallery newsletter at thoughtgallery.org.

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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CRIME WATCH BY JERRY DANZIG CABBIE ASSAULTED AND ROBBED Two men in their 30s flagged down a taxi on Tuesday afternoon, Dec. 18 and asked to be dropped off at Fifth Ave. and 89th St. When they arrived at that location one of the passengers got out of the cab, approached the driver’s door and wrapped his hand around the 65-year-old cabbie’s neck, obstructing his breathing. He then grabbed $80 in cash and the pair fled east on 89th Street. A detective on duty in the area was alerted and pursued one of the men, but lost him at Park Ave. and 88th St.

the corner of Madison Ave and 88th Street, from where an EMS team transported the mother and daughter to New York hospital for treatment. A search of the neighborhood failed to turn up the two assailants.

SENIOR SCAMMED FOR THOUSANDS On Sunday, Dec. 9, an 81-year-old man on the Upper East Side was contacted by a stranger about an alleged virus on his computer. The unknown individual threatened to

delete the man’s internet and take money from his account. To have the virus removed, the Upper East Sider was instructed to purchase Google Play cards. He was also promised a refund after payment. The victim purchased and transferred 27 cards with a total value of $13,500. At the time of this report, no refund has been paid. Police remind the public that any time a stranger asks you to pay for something with a gift card, you’re probably being scammed. That’s because crooks prefer gift card payments,which can’t be traced.

CELL HELL IN AN UBER An apparent lack of cell phone etiquette led to a rolling ruckus recently.

According to police, on Wednesday, Dec. 12, a 38-year-old woman and her 18-year-old daughter were sharing a ride in an Uber vehicle with two other women, heading to the Bronx. The daughter was talking on her cell phone in the front seat, when the two female passengers sharing the backseat with the mother grew agitated and began yelling and pulling on the daughter’s hair. When the mother tried to break up the fight the two women turned their attention to her, punching her her on the back and head. The ride ended at

STATS FOR THE WEEK Reported crimes from the 19th precinct for the week ending Dec 16 Week to Date

Year to Date

2018 2017

% Change

2018

2017

% Change

Murder

0

0

n/a

1

0

n/a

Rape

0

0

n/a

15

16

-6.3

Robbery

2

5

-60.0

132

121

9.1

Felony Assault

3

1

200.0

145

123

17.9

Burglary

3

4

-25.0

217

196

10.7

Grand Larceny

36

33

9.1

1,389 1,372 1.2

Grand Larceny Auto

0

0

n/a

71

WATCH YOUR WALLET Remember, shoppers: never, ever leave your wallet unattended, not even for a second! On Dec. 19 a woman purchased groceries at the Gristedes at 1208 First Ave, then put down her wallet at the checkout counter and went back to get an item she forgot to buy. When she returned to pay for the item, the wallet, which contained her driver’s license, debit, credit and gift cards, was gone. Fortunately, no fraudulent charges turned up on her

53

34.0

debit or credit cards, but the stolen gift cards totalled %115.

A PAIR OF PICKPOCKETS Police say two teenaged boys pulled a fast one at a fruit and vegetable stand on the corner of York Ave and 86th St..

On Saturday, Dec.15, at 9:20 p.m., the boys approached the operator of the stand and picked his pocket, taking $95 in cash. Police searched the area but did not locate the teens.

Photo by Tony Webster, via Flickr

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Useful Contacts

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

Drawing Board

POLICE NYPD 19th Precinct

153 E. 67th St.

212-452-0600

BY PETER PEREIRA

FIRE FDNY 22 Ladder Co 13

159 E. 85th St.

311

FDNY Engine 39/Ladder 16

157 E. 67th St.

311

FDNY Engine 53/Ladder 43

1836 Third Ave.

311

FDNY Engine 44

221 E. 75th St.

311

CITY COUNCIL Councilmember Keith Powers

211 E. 43rd St. #1205

212-818-0580

Councilmember Ben Kallos

244 E. 93rd St.

212-860-1950

STATE LEGISLATORS State Sen. Jose M. Serrano

1916 Park Ave. #202

212-828-5829

State Senator Liz Krueger

1850 Second Ave.

212-490-9535

Assembly Member Dan Quart

360 E. 57th St.

212-605-0937

Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright

1485 York Ave.

212-288-4607

COMMUNITY BOARD 8

505 Park Ave. #620

212-758-4340

LIBRARIES Yorkville

222 E. 79th St.

212-744-5824

96th Street

112 E. 96th St.

212-289-0908

67th Street

328 E. 67th St.

212-734-1717

Webster Library

1465 York Ave.

212-288-5049

100 E. 77th St.

212-434-2000

HOSPITALS Lenox Hill NY-Presbyterian / Weill Cornell

525 E. 68th St.

212-746-5454

Mount Sinai

E. 99th St. & Madison Ave.

212-241-6500

NYU Langone

550 First Ave.

212-263-7300

CON EDISON

4 Irving Place

212-460-4600

POST OFFICES US Post Office

1283 First Ave.

212-517-8361

US Post Office

1617 Third Ave.

212-369-2747

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A WAR FOR INDEPENDENCE TRANSPORTATION New York’s disabled wage legal battles to improve subway and sidewalk access

BY MEREDITH KURZ

Dustin Jones got off the subway at Union Station, rolled onto the platform and discovered that the elevator that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) claimed was in service was out of order. He was stuck, several flights of stairs underground.

Catching the next train would take him far beyond his destination, and there was a strong chance the elevator at that station would also be inoperable.

There is an average of 25 elevator outages per day in the New York subway system. The median outage is 4 hours, but many last months. Signs or audio announcements about the outages are rare. While the MTA provides bus service during extensive station issues, they don’t or can’t provide alternative accommodations to people who rely on their elevators. And as a recent lawsuit stated, “Even when functioning, subway elevators are often unclean, odiferous, and littered with trash, urine, or feces.” If you’ve ever taken one, this is not news.

Since the American Disabilities Act (ADA) passed in 1990, many cities have improved their public transportation accessibility. New York City has not. We’re one of the worst, ranked 130 of 150 cities. Only 20 percent of our stations have elevators, which are often and erratically malfunctioning, and only 20 percent of our sidewalks have curb cuts. We are far behind ADA standards.

If you live in one of the many neighborhoods without these essentials, you face a life of limited possibilities in a city of infinite ones.

The lack of mobility leads to high unemployment and above average poverty among our disabled residents.

Ironically, according to the Disability Quality Index, a created by a group made up of business leaders and policymakers, companies who hire more people with disabilities enjoy 28 percent higher revenue, double net income, 30 percent higher economic profit margins and have twice the likelihood of financially outperforming their peers. Yet residents with disabilities in New York City have an unemployment rate of over 65 percent, compared to the city’s 4.3 percent average.

This is a war of law, protest and

?

Victories are a fundamental piece of independence.

Sometimes you need a legal right and a legal remedy.”

Susan Dooha executive director, CIDNY persuasion. Lawsuits resolve ADA violations, explained Susan Dooha, Executive Director of The Center for Independence of the Disabled (CIDNY), one of several organizations fighting to force the city to comply with the ADA. “Victories are a fundamental piece of independence,” Dooha said. “Sometimes you need a legal right and a legal remedy.”

CIDNY, a nonprofit, advocates for the disabled and provides services and counseling, in addition to its legal activity on behalf of the disabled.

“It’s the testimony of those affected by the dismal state of city transportation that has added credibility to the cause,” said Dooha. “For the dignity of the community and self-empowerment, it’s critical to be able to describe their experience, to link it with the actual changes that are required.”

Serving on the frontlnes in the ongoing battles for accessibility are attorneys like Daniel Brown. His first case, filed in 1998, challenged the policies of the New York Road Runners. His brother was one of the eight plaintiffs, and when the case settled the New York City Marathon’s first official wheelchair division was created. Brown continues to work on cases fighting what he calls “egregious civil rights violations”.

Currently there are two ongoing elevator-related lawsuits citing the MTA’s “failure to make the subway system accessible for persons whose mobility ... restrict them from using stairs.” Brown says there will “most likely be a trial in early 2019.”

A separate suit about sidewalk curb cuts alleges that the city is in violation of federal disability civil rights laws.

A lack of curb cuts, and poorly maintained curb cuts, costs lives. A friend of Dooha’s was struck and killed by a truck when there was no curb cut and she was forced to roll her wheelchair in the street. The City attempted to have the suit dismissed, Brown said, but that motion was denied.

“We believe we’re close to reaching a settlement, which handicap rights advocates and the city will present to the court shortly,” said Brown. “That

settlement will commit the city to make a plan to have all the sidewalks accessible.”

In yet a third lawsuit, this one about taxi accessibility, the city complied in part, reducing biennial renewal fees by two thirds as an incentive to owners of medallion taxis that are handicapped-accessible.

The MTA has a major proposal, called Fast Forward, which addresses many flaws in the system. The budget for the program will be hammered out beginning in January, with the state legislature’s first 2019 session.

Fast Forward includes the MTA’s “Accelerate Accessibility” program. The plans include “increasing the rate at which elevators are being installed at stations to make them accessible, from 19 in the current five-year Capital Program to more than 50 in the next 5 year program, with the goal of achieving maximum possible accessibility in 15 years.” According to the MTA, the improvements will ensure that, within five years, all subway customers are no more than two stations away from an accessible station.

Fortunately for Dustin Jones, who was stuck many flights of stairs underground in the subway, he had the upper body strength to reach the street.

While a good Samaritan carried his wheelchair, Jones, in a sitting position, used his arms to lift himself up, stair by filthy stair. He was late to his CIDNY board meeting, but he didn’t give up. He couldn’t give up.

Demonstrator makes his point about subway elevators at a November fare hike protest at Baruch College. Photo: Meredith Kurz

DO YOU HAVE SOMETHING YOU’D LIKE US TO LOOK INTO? EMAIL US AT NEWS@STRAUSNEWS.COM

Transit advocates held a demonstration on West 72nd Street May 7, 2018 to protest the MTA’s failure to install elevators as part of a station improvement project. Photo: Michael Garofalo

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DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

YOU READ IT HERE FIRST 10-19-18

12-8-18

SCANDAL? WHAT SCANDAL? IOWA BECKONS

LEADERSHIP Even before he’s sworn in for a second term, Mayor Bill de Blasio will hit the Hawkeye State to rev up his national profile — despite intense blowback from bogus leadpaint inspections at public housing

BY DOUGLAS FEIDEN

When the going gets tough, Mayor Bill de Blasio gets going — as far away from City Hall as politically, geograph-

ically and logistically possible.

It’s been a four-year pattern. And now, even as his administration reels from a mushrooming scandal at the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), it is about to repeat itself: The mayor next month packs his bags for Iowa, home of the first-in-thenation caucuses — and graveyard-inthe-cornfields for outsized dreams and overreaching politicians.

Fresh from his reelection triumph and two weeks before his swearing-in for a second term, he’ll headline the fifth annual holiday party for the lib-

10-19-18

A rendering of the 50-story residential building to be built between the two 25-story towers of NYCHA’s Holmes Towers public housing development. Image courtesy of NYCHA

11-20-18

‘GRAMMAR ZEN’ IN VERDI SQUARE

HOUSING

COMMUNITY

Community board raises housing, zoning and environmental concerns with private development to built on NYCHA land

New Yorkers talk tricky tenses, punctuation passions and more at Ellen Jovin’s UWS pop-up table

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

Are you prepositionally challenged? Hesitant around hyphens? Undergoing a comma crisis? Simply enraptured by the beauty of a well-placed ellipsis?

Ellen Jovin wants to talk grammar with you.

Jovin has become familiar to Upper West Side word lovers in recent weeks as the face and founder of Grammar Table — a public forum for open-ended discussion of all things language. Armed with a folding

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO table and an array of reference books and style guides, Jovin sets up shop near the northern entrance to the 72nd Street subway station on Broadway to dole out complimentary (with an “i”) pointers, guidance and emotional support to all comers, from devoted syntacticians to the downright grammar-averse.

“Hi, this looks lit,” a young woman said on a recent after-

1-25-18

11-27-18

NEW DETAILS ON DISPUTED ESPLANADE BRIDGE WATERFRONT EDC presents basis for proposed 54th Street bridge location, which has stirred opposition from some Sutton Area residents

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

A plan to install a pedestrian bridge in a small park near 54th Street and Sutton Place that would provide access to a new section of the East Midtown Waterfront Esplanade has become a source of neighborhood controversy.

Representatives from the New York City Economic Development Corporation, the lead agency on the project, laid out the rationale for the location of the proposed bridge at a Jan. 22 meeting of Community Board 6’s land use and waterfront committee.

The “flyover,” as EDC officials have termed the proposed span, would create an access point bridging the FDR

CB8 SEEKS ANSWERS ON HOLMES TOWERS PROJECT

Drive to the new span of riverfront esplanade set to be built between 53rd and 60th Streets on the East River.

The entrance to the bridge would occupy much of what is now the northern portion of Sutton Place Park South, a small area of green space with riverfront views along Sutton Place South between 53rd and 54th Streets.

The proposed bridge is opposed by some residents, who fear that the entrance ramp would have a negative impact on the park’s character, resulting in a loss of walking space and benches, drawing additional bicycle and pedestrian traffic to Sutton Place,

FIRST IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD (212) 868 - 0190

The Upper East Side’s Community Board 8 hopes a public hearing next month will bring additional scrutiny to the city’s controversial proposal to allow a private developer to build a residential tower on the grounds of a Yorkville public housing development.

Under the city’s plan, Fetner Properties would build a 500-foot-tall building between the two existing 25-story buildings of the New York City Housing Authority’s Holmes Towers development at East 92nd Street and First Avenue.

Half of the new building’s approximately 339 residential units would be publicly subsidized affordable housing. The new building, which would sit on a parcel of open space that now holds a playground, would feature an 18,000-square-foot recreational center in its base to be operated by Asphalt Green.

The arrangement is part of the city’s NextGeneration NYCHA initiative to raise sorely needed funds for the public housing agency by selling rights to build so-called “infill” development in open space on public housing campuses.

NYCHA will receive $25 mil-

lion from Fetner in exchange for a 99-year lease of the Holmes Towers site. NYCHA’s unfunded capital needs over the next five years total nearly $32 billion. The Holmes Towers site alone has nearly $59 million in capital needs.

Community Board 8 will hold a hearing on the Holmes Towers development Jan. 30 at 6:30 p.m. at Stanley M. Isaacs Neighborhood Center, 415 E. 93rd St. Representatives of the mayor’s office, NYCHA and Fetner are expected to attend.

The community board submitted its questions regarding the project in Dec. 20 letter to Mayor Bill de Blasio, Stanley Brezenoff, NYCHA’s interim chair and CEO, and Hal Fetner, president and CEO of Fetner Properties.

Among other questions regarding the revenue generated by the deal, community board members requested specifics regarding how and when the money NYCHA is slated to receive from Fetner will be used to fund repairs at Holmes Towers. “How will NYCHA ensure that the funds are used for capital improvements?” the letter reads. “How will accountability be determined and who will be accountable if capital improvements are not made?”

Also at issue is whether the $25 million negotiated by the city adequately reflects the value of a 99-year lease at the site.

“The community is concerned that the deal for this development is far less than market value estimates, which is exacerbated by the developer re-

ceiving subsidies and tax benefits,” the Community Board 8 letter reads. The community board asks the city whether an appraisal of the land’s the fair market value was performed before the city issued the request for proposals for the site.

“If so, what was the assessed value of this parcel?” the letter asks.

The letter also raises a number of questions regarding the potential environmental impact of the project, which will require Brownfield remediation due to the site’s industrial history.

The 500-foot-tall tower, as planned, would not adhere to local zoning requirements.

The mayor is expected to use a mechanism known as a mayoral zoning override to waive height and setback restrictions that would otherwise make the project impossible.

CB8 voted in December to request that the mayor not use an zoning override for the project, stating its preference that the administration instead engage in the city’s extensive Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, or ULURP, “if it feels that a zoning change is necessary to effectuate the infill development of this site.”

A ULURP application for the site would allow for formal input from the community board, the borough president and the City Council. Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and local Council Member Ben Kallos have each criticized aspects of NYCHA’s deal with Fetner.

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

NEWSLETTER CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 Steed, who has lived in the same rent-stabilized, walk-up apartment on Third Avenue since 1977, is every elected official’s dream: She’s a self-professed “information junkie” who actually reads all their newsletters. Voraciously.

As an active senior who lives alone and likes to keep busy, she can often be found at gatherings, parties and other activities for the elderly that she’s spotted in the newsletters of Kallos, state Senator Liz Krueger, state Assembly Member Rebecca Seawright and U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney, as well as nonprofits like the Lenox Hill Neighborhood Association and Health Advocates for Older People.

Of those six community newsletters, Kallos’ is by far the longest, while Krueger’s is a close second, Steed said.

“Sometimes,” she confessed, “I don’t read it all the way through ... I just scan it!”

Nonetheless, she made it to page 46 of the 49-page July newsletter and focused on an event listing: “In honor of World Head and Neck Cancer Day,” it said, “please join us for free head and neck cancer screenings offered through Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.”

GAULOISES NOT AS ROMANTIC AS THEY SOUND Steed had started smoking as a 15-year-old growing up on a farm in Colorado in 1960.

She kept at it when she moved to Haight-Ashbury after high

Our Town|Eastsider ourtownny.com school. And when she arrived by bus in Manhattan in 1966.

Gauloises, the French cigarette, was her preferred brand, and hers was a 2.5 pack-a-day habit, she said. It continued during her career in book publishing at Pantheon in the 1970s and in her investigative work with private firms in the early 1980s.

After 25 years of 50 cigarettes a day, Steed finally quit in 1985, and she hasn’t smoked in 33 years.

Still, she feared the damage had been done. So on July 27, she headed uptown to the Ralph Lauren Center for Cancer on Madison Avenue at East 124th Street in Harlem for the free screening — a 10-minute exam to check for a type of cancer that can afflict the nasal passages, mouth, throat or voice box of smokers.

In short order, Dr. Laura Wang found a suspicious lesion on Steed’s upper gum, and referred her to Dr. Jennifer Cracchiolo, a surgeon at Memorial Sloan Kettering, who conducted a biopsy that found she had cancer of the gum tissue on the right upper jaw.

Oral cancer makes up only three percent of new cancer cases, and it’s often overlooked, even by dentists, because of its location and initial innocuous appearance, which makes it seem more like a nuisance than a potential lethal malady.

In many cases, it will have spread to the lymph nodes by the time it’s detected, a Stage 2 condition in which 35 percent of patients die after five years, or metastasized into

a Stage 3 condition, which is even more fatal.

Steed was one of the lucky ones. Thanks to the screening, and the newsletter, her cancer had been discovered at an early stage.

Six weeks later, on Sept. 10, she went into surgery at Memorial to remove her maxillary, or upper jaw, and a part of her palate. Doctors have since deemed her completely cancer-free.

“Kathleen sounded grateful and determined and full of life,” Jamieson said as he recalled their encounter.

Steed said she now has three goals: “To educate people about oral cancer, to emphasize the importance of attending as many free health screenings as possible — and to note how newsletters from elected officials can change lives.”

And she added, “If anyone ever questions the necessity of having 49 pages of listings, please remember that one of those listings saved my life.”

Kallos said he was always curious about the utility of his newsletter and whether it could be a tad too long, a subject he enjoys raising with Jamieson.

“Some might argue that less can be more,” he said. “But this is the argument against a shorter work product.”

“I am incredibly happy Ms. Steed is here to tell her story,” Kallos added. “This is one story, and one holiday party, that I will not be forgetting anytime soon.” invreporter@strausnews.com

“THERE MUST BE SOMEONE WHO CAN GIVE MORE KIDS THE CHANCE TO GO TO COLLEGE.” Fernanda New York Cares Volunteer

BE THE SOMEONE.

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Voices

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

SKINNY BUILDINGS AND STOPPED CLOCKS EAST SIDE OBSERVER

BY ARLENE KAYATT

Slivery slot on a vacant lot - Brick, mortar and bucks are what it takes to build. And build they will, no matter how slim the space. That vacant lot on East 93rd Street between First and Second Avenues, located between two old Yorkville five-story buildings, is getting a six-story residential building with one apartment unit per floor - translation: six apartments in the 60-foot tall building. Older buildings in the immediate vicinity, which were built in the early 1900’s, have five stories and a total of about 20 units per building. The new building’s plans, filed with the Department of Build-

ings for the slivery site, include bike storage, storage rooms for tenants, and a rooftop space for recreation.

Doesn’t sound like affordable housing to me.

Where time stands still - It’s 2 o’clock twice a day. We all know that. But for the early 20th century Yorkville clock standing on Third Avenue between 84th and 85th Streets on Third Avenue, it’s that time all the time. The 17-foot tall clock was designated a city landmark and in 1996 Our Town wrote about its 100th anniversary and the clock’s restoration. Fortunately, the fire that broke out earlier this month, and possibly destroyed the Highlands Cafe diner on the corner of 85th Street, didn’t damage the clock or other business-

es on the avenue. However, Jacques Bistro, located next to Highlands on its 85th Street side, was also affected by the fire. Occupied apartments above Highlands were evacuated and reports are that there were no injuries or fatalities. Time will tell the fate of the restaurants. And time will continue to stand still on the Yorkville clock, unless there’s a landmark intervention.

Lucky Luna - Luna, an upstate dog who faced death because of a dog bite incident, was spared the death penalty by Governor Cuomo. Luna was confined to the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society after she bit another dog and its owner. Under the city’s dangerous dog law, Luna was ordered to be put down. Al-

though the law has since changed, Luna was still subject to the old law’s death penalty. It took a judge’s order to stay Luna’s execution and the governor’s pardon to spare the six-year-old pit bull. Lucky for Luna, she had the sympathy and support of upstate Senator Jim Tedisco, who advocated for sparing Luna the death penalty. The senator reached out to the governor last week to pardon Luna. He did so after Luna’s owners entered into an agreement with the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society. The agreement requires that Luna be kept on a leash, wear a muzzle while off her owner’s property and that she be spayed and microchipped before departing the Humane Society. In addition, the owners must pay a $1,500 fine. Af-

ter two years, if there is full compliance, Luna’s case will be dismissed.

Lucky for Luna that she’ll be home for Christmas.

Bad news maybe not so bad - Turns out the Third Avenue Garden, which I reported was closing in my last column, isn’t closing after all. The good news is it’s still open for business.

But it still looks like it’s going out of business. Maybe. Maybe not. This time nobody’s talking. Except for fresh produce, flowers and perhaps deli meats and unpackaged breads, empty shelves are not replenished.

And daily and weekend newspapers are not delivered. While the fate of the market/bodega/grocery remains unknown to the public, I’ll keep shopping the Garden.

RIGHT AND WRONG ON RED

BY CAROL ANN RINZLER

As the New Year approaches, take a quiet moment to mark the 39th anniversary of the day on which Americans lost their moral certainty: January 1, 1980, when all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico adopted laws permitting drivers to make right turns on a red light.

Our sense of right and left — sorry — right and wrong, has never been the same.

From the start, in mid-19th century London, virtually all traffic lights used universal railroad signals: Green for “go,” and red for “stop.” Except in New York City. When the first traffic light tower went up at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street in 1916, a police officer standing inside a booth above the road turned a set of 500 watt colored lamps in the familiar red and green, but here red stopped traffic in all directions. Green halted cars and pedestrians going north and south to let the cross-town traffic cross. Amber halted cross-town traffic to let the north-south flow through.

Got that? Many out-of-town drivers and pedestrians didn’t. Swamped with complaints, New Yorkers shrugged their

Photo: Fredrick Rubensson, via flickr

collective shoulders and in 1924 switched signals. After that, green really did mean “go,” and red really did mean “stop.” It was the kind of thing you could count on, like the sun’s rising in the East and setting in the West.

Until the East (Middle) decided to get even with the West (us). In the wake of the Arab oil embargo of 1973-1974, emboldened American conservationists urged right turn on red (RTOR) laws as a way to cut back on engine idling, thus conserving fuel, reducing air pollution and maybe even moving traffic along.

Naturally, California led the way, giving Woody Allen the chance to complain in Annie Hall (1977) that he didn’t want to move to a city where “the only cultural advantage is being able to make a right turn on a red light.” It was a neat quip but a losing battle. Soon the new rules went nationwide. Yes, we did save gas. In Houston, for example, the city fathers estimated that RTOR cut consumption by about a million gallons a year. But there was this pesky blip in pedestrian-bashing by rightturning motorists, and worse yet, our national sense of right and wrong suffered.

The divorce rate zoomed. So did teen

pregnancies. As for drug use, how could you just say “no” if you don’t know just what “no” meant? For example, Maine allows you to turn right turn on red — but not if there’s a pedestrian or bicyclist crossing in front of you. Utah doesn’t allow right turn on a steady red arrow.

Right turns on red arrows are permitted in Illinois, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Oregon, South Carolina, Utah, Washington State and Wyoming, but not in Alaska, California, Colorado, the District Of Columbia, Georgia, Idaho, Maine, Minnesota, or Puerto Rico.

In short, lacking clear stop-and-go directions, America’s moral climate has deteriorated to the tsk-tsk level. Or in the case of some political candidates and issues, lower yet.

Except in the Big Apple. Today, there may be red states and blue states, but we’re still one city that almost unambiguously forbids right turns on red. In New York City, absent a sign giving you specific permission to make this one single particular turn, if the light is red, you better stop. Unless, of course, you are on foot and really, really need to cross the street.

President & Publisher, Jeanne Straus nyoffice@strausnews.com

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David Gillchrist, Executive Director of Project FIND, in Midtown. Photo: Megan Conn

SENIORS FIND HOME IN HISTORIC HOTEL AGING In Times Square, the Woodstock center for those in need will open single-room units next summer

BY MEGAN CONN

For a few struggling seniors, 13 will soon be their lucky number. Next summer, ten affordable single-room units — plus a roof terrace with views of Times Square — will open on the thirteenth oor of the Project FIND Woodstock Senior Center. The center is already home to 280 seniors, most of whom were formerly homeless, and has assisted 2,400 needy seniors this year. “Ten units may not seem like a big number, but every unit matters,â€? said Caryn Resnick, Acting Commissioner of the Department for the Aging, which operates the senior center on the building’s second oor. “One of the great things here is having services right in the building – hot meals, activities, computers. It really adds to the quality of life.â€?

The new residential units, funded by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, have been years in the making. After the Woodstock Hotel was converted to a senior center in 1977, the penthouse oor gradually became crammed with old furniture and equipment.

David Gillchrist, Executive Director of Project FIND, has

It’s an unusual neighborhood to find us in, but now we’re part of the landscape.�

David Gillchrist, Executive Director, Project FIND

worked to convert the top oor into housing for years, but expensive engineering challenges delayed the project. The ceiling was too low to pass a city inspection, so engineers had to lower the oor to increase the total height.

Each of the new units will include a private bathroom, a microwave and a minifridge.

The units provide a long-term solution to the basic needs that bring homeless New Yorkers to the senior center in the ďŹ rst place.

Dale Evans, 68, used to be one of those seniors in need.

In 2012, after a long illness claimed his wife and nearly all of their savings, he resorted to sleeping in a nearby plaza and selling his drawings in Central Park. After he began visiting Woodstock to get a shower and a hot meal, he was surprised to ďŹ nd that there were also affordable housing units in such prime real estate. “I thought it was all office buildings here,â€? Evans said. “It’s a very strange place for housing.â€?

Before long, a case worker helped him get his own room in the building. “It was like winning the lottery,â€? Evans said. He stayed for nearly three years, until he secured the subsidized studio apartment he now calls home. According to Evans, having a case worker guide him through the application process was essential. “The vast majority of people in ďŹ nancial straits can’t put the pieces together — that’s why we need counselors,â€? he said. “Otherwise, people give up because they don’t have a concrete reason to believe they’ll get a beneďŹ t from it.â€?

The Department for the Aging says the need for both senior services and dedicated housing will intensify in the coming years. “The senior population is growing exponentially,� said Resnick. “By 2030 there will be 1.7 million older adults in New York City — more than the number of school-age children.�

This wave of aging means neighborhoods across the city will see a growing demand for affordable units like Woodstock. As the owner of the Woodstock building, and the valuable air rights that go with it, Project FIND is confident they will be able to sustain an affordable housing cluster here — even as sleek offices and chic hotels continue sprouting up on all sides. “It’s an unusual neighborhood to find us in, but now we’re part of the landscape,� said Gillchrist.

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Discover the world around the corner.

Find community events, gallery openings, book launches and much more: Go to nycnow.com

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EDITOR’S PICK ART WORKSHOP: CHARACTER PUPPETS FOR CHAGALL Thu 27- Fri 28 & Sun 30 The Jewish Museum, 1109 Fifth Ave 1 p.m. Free with museum admission/children free thejewishmuseum.org 212-423-3200 Turn a character from your imagination into a hand puppet inspired by paintings in the exhibition “Chagall, Lissitzky, Malevich: The Russian Avant Garde in Vitebsk, 1918-1922.” Make your puppet move, dance and soar like the figures in the paintings.

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► FILM SCREENING: ‘FIRST LOVE’

▲ WINTER ACTIVITY: SNOW STORM IN A JAR

AMNH PRESENTS: KWANZAA 2018

96th Street Library 112 East 96 St. 2 p.m. Free Start the holidays off with a blast from the past. This 1939 Academy Award-nominated film starring Deanna Durbin, Robert Stack and Eugene Pallette is about a teenage girl who moves in with her uncle and falls in love with the boy next door. nypl.org 212-289-0908

Webster Library 1465 York Ave. Noon, Free Looking for a fun kid-friendly science activity over winter break? Experiment with household items to create a mini winter wonderland. Participants should bring a 16 ounce jar or larger with a lid, if possible, to create these mini snowstorms. nypl.org 212-288-5049

American Museum of Natural History, 79 Street Transverse and West 81st Street Noon, Free with museum admission This festival features a local artisan marketplace, a livedrawing performance hosted by the Black Comics Collective, Afro-Cuban music and dance performed by Oyu Oro and more.

This Kwanzaa celebration is hosted by scholar and storyteller Linda H. Humes. amnh.org 212-769-5100

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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Cathedral of St. John the Divine, 1047 Amsterdam Ave. 7 p.m. Free general admission/reserved seats $40-$100 Founded by Leonard Bernstein in 1984, the Concert for Peace is a signature of the Cathedral. This year’s concert includes William Boyce’s “Symphony No. 1 in B-at.â€?

Soloist Sidney Outlaw joins the choir for a powerful setting of Martin Luther King, Jr’s “I have a dream,� followed by the New York premier of Wayne Oquin’s “Alleluia.� stjohndivine.org 212-316-7540

David Geffen Hall 10 Lincoln Center Plaza 2:30 p.m. $55 Usher in the New Year with a glittery celebration of singing and dancing that will delight the senses. “Salute to Vienna� recreates the beauty of Vienna’s golden era and its elegant charms. salutetovienna.com 212-875-5030

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DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

A MASTERPIECE FINDS ITS MATE AT THE FRICK COLLECTION Devotional Art from a Medieval Carthusian Monastery

BY MARY GREGORY

WHAT: “The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus, and Jan Vos” WHERE: The Frick Collection 10 East 71st St. WHEN: Through Jan. 13 frick.org

Even among the many treasures of the Frick Collection, Jan van Eyck’s painting “The Virgin and Child with St. Barbara, St. Elizabeth, and Jan Vos” is a sparkling jewel. It’s im- sians renounced the world and chose possible for me to visit the museum to lead sober and contemplative without making a small pilgrimage lives, one of the requirements for ento stand before it. Now, this master- try into the order was descent from piece, iece, one of the most exquisite and nobility. So, coming from and supbeautiful eautiful paintings in New York, is ported by wealth, while they prayed, they gazed upon startlingthe he centerpiece of a special ly beautiful works of art. exhibition xhibition at the Frick.

“The Virgin and Child The show, called “The with St. Barbara, St. Charterhouse of BrugElizabeth, and Jan es: s: Jan Van Eyck, PeVos,” was meant trus rus Christus, and to en gender Jan an Vos,” which prayer – both runs uns through th rough t he pr ior ’s Ja nua r y 13, and others’. shines hines a light I n fact, he on n the paintarranged to ing, ng, which was have an inlikely ikely the final dulgence, or work of van Eyck, religious dispenthe he leading artist sation, attached off his day, who is to the work, stating widely credited with that each prayer said the he invention of oil paintin the painting’s presing. ng. The painting, a sumpence would hasten tuous uous example of early Vos’ ascension afNetherlandish art, ter death. Close was commissioned to 600 years in n 1441 by Jan Vos, after its crea Ca r t hu sia n ation, standmonk, on his ing before the appointment ppointment painting still ass prior of the makes one feel charterhouse harterhouse a bit closer to (as as monasterheaven. ies es were called) in n Bruges. It was At only 18 x 24 inches, it completed ompleted after requires near van an Eyck’s death viewing. Once by y his workshop, it draws the but ut bears the brileye, it rewards liant iant conception Adam Dircksz and Workshop, Prayer a nd execution bead for the Carthusian François du Puy, t h e v i e w e r with endless of his greatest ca. 1517-21, Boxwood, Diameter: 1 7/8 works. inches, Private collection. Photo: courtesy enticements.

Using oil, as Though Carthu- The Frick Collection

“The Charterhouse of Bruges: Jan van Eyck, Petrus Christus, and Jan Vos” at The Frick Collection. Photo: courtesy The Frick Collection. opposed to tempera or other media, meant the paint could be worked for a longer time. Pigment could be thinned and used in many layers, creating brilliance, depth and a newfound transparency. Under van Eyck’s hand, the technique, joined with absolute virtuosity with the brush, made possible miracles of representation. Five figures, joined in a holy moment, are enclosed in a portico, overlooking Bruges. The details, from glittering gems decorating shimmering velvet garments to a miniature cityscape in the distance with tiny ships and miniscule swans in the river, are a delight to discover and re-discover.

Just as delicate and detailed is another painting, “The Virgin and Child with St. Barbara and Jan Vos,”

by Petrus Christus, another leading artist of the day in Bruges. Painted some years after the van Eyck, and just a little over 5 x 7 inches, it was meant for the prior’s private devotions. Though both paintings were commissioned by Jan Vos and resided in the Bruges Carthusian charterhouse, this is only the second time in their long histories that they have been reunited. Seeing two such extraordinary works, and learning they story of their shared history, is a rare treat.

In addition to the two star paintings, the exhibition includes a portrait of a different Carthusian monk, also by Petrus Christus, rendered with such finesse that it appears as if he is about to speak to the viewer.

There is also “The Virgin and Child by a Fountain,” from the workshop of Jan van Eyck. It’s small, resplendent in tones of sapphire and ruby, filled with almost photorealistic details.

It’s on loan from a private collection, so if you miss it, you’ve missed it for good.

The exhibition, organized by Emma Capron, is mounted in the Frick’s tiny Cabinet Gallery, to evoke a monk’s cell. A rare decorated hymn book that was used in the Bruges monastery, a carved, boxwood prayer bead covered with infinitesimal Carthusian images and symbols, a delicate clay relief sculpture of the Virgin and Child, a Christus drawing, and two marble sculptures of kneeling monks at prayer, complete a picture of the quietude, sanctity and beauty to be found in a 15th century Carthusian monk’s life.

It’s a stunning, inspiring show, a respite from the harried hustle the holidays sometimes bring. Catch it while you can.

Unknown artist, Utrecht, “Relief with the Virgin and Child (The Virgin of Zoeterwoude),” 2nd half of 15th century, clay, 16 13/16 × 8 11/16 × 1 inches, Museum Catharijneconvent, Utrecht.

Photo: courtesy The Frick Collection

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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RESTAURANT INSPECTION RATINGS DEC 12 - 18, 2018 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.

CITY SHARES FEW DETAILS ON NEW JAIL LAW ENFORCEMENT

PJ Bernstein Deli & Restaurant

1215 Third Avenue

A

Frankies Cafe

170 E 70th St

Not Yet Graded (62) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Food Protection Certificate not held by supervisor of food operations. No facilities available to wash, rinse and sanitize utensils and/or equipment.

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.

Sweetgreen

1321 1st Ave

A

Gracie-Mews Restaurant

1550 1 Avenue

Grade Pending (24) Hot food item not held at or above 140º F. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Live roaches present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.

Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

Gracie’s On 2nd

300 E 86th St

Grade Pending (16) Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas.

Sushi Para Manhattan

1461 3rd Ave

Grade Pending (33) Appropriately scaled metal stem-type thermometer or thermocouple not provided or used to evaluate temperatures of potentially hazardous foods during cooking, cooling, reheating and holding. Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Wiping cloths soiled or not stored in sanitizing solution.

Van Leeuwen Ice Cream

1625 2nd Ave

A

Indian Tandoor Oven

175 E 83rd St

Not Yet Graded (21) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked fish and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Food not cooled by an approved method whereby the internal product temperature is reduced from 140º F to 70º F or less within 2 hours, and from 70º F to 41º F or less within 4 additional hours. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

Green Kitchen

1619 2nd Ave

Not Yet Graded (34) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked fish and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Evidence of rats or live rats present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Food not protected from potential source of contamination during storage, preparation, transportation, display or service.

Bluestone Lane

2 E 90th St

A

Au Jus

1762 1st Ave

A

Franklin Hotel

164 East 87 Street

A

Shorty’s

1678 1st Ave

A

Wok 88

1570 3rd Ave

Grade Pending (18) Evidence of mice or live mice present in facility’s food and/or non-food areas. Food contact surface not properly washed, rinsed and sanitized after each use and following any activity when contamination may have occurred.

Brisas Del Mar Seafood Market

1785-1787 Lexington Avenue

A

Perk Kafe

1867 2nd Ave

A

Mrs. An

173 E 99th St

Grade Pending (18) Cold food item held above 41º F (smoked fish and reduced oxygen packaged foods above 38 ºF) except during necessary preparation. Food worker does not use proper utensil to eliminate bare hand contact with food that will not receive adequate additional heat treatment.

Blue Coco

153 E 106th St

A

Amid transparency complaints, mayor meets privately with Lower Manhattan leaders to discuss plans for new detention center

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to build a new city jail in Lower Manhattan is a crucial piece of his initiative to shutter the scandal-plagued detention facilities at Rikers Island by 2027. But his administration’s efforts to build the new facility have been a source of frustration to many in the downtown community, even among supporters of the plan to close Rikers, who complain that the city’s process has left them sidelined.

The mayor held a private meeting with downtown elected officials and community leaders on Dec. 18 to discuss his administration’s latest proposal, which calls for a new Manhattan jail at 125 White St. The administration has publicly shared few details of its plan, which would replace the existing jail at the site — the Manhattan Detention Complex, commonly known as the Tombs — with a significantly larger facility.

The proposal to build at 125 White St. represents a shift from the city’s initial plan, released in August, to locate the new jail a few blocks south at 80 Centre Street. The change in sites, which was hastily announced and was not accompanied by updates to detailed official documentation prepared for the

The city plans to renovate and expand the Manhattan Detention Complex, known informally as “The Tombs,” as part efforts to close the jail facilities on Rikers Island.

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

“We are effectively now in a public engagement process about a 500-foot-tall proposed jail that is not even described in any public documents in any formal way.”

State Senator Brian Kavanagh Centre Street location, has prompted procedural complaints from some downtown residents and elected officials, many of whom still harbor lingering concerns about construction noise, traffic disruptions, parking and safety.

“I think the basic problem with the process here is that the city made many of the big decisions before doing outreach to the communities that would be affected and before there was any formal opportunity for people to comment,” said State Senator Brian Kavanagh, who represents the

neighborhood and attended the closed-door meeting.

Under de Blasio’s plan to close Rikers, the notoriously violent East River detention facility will be replaced with four new borough-based jails to house defendants awaiting trial and sentencing, one of which will be located in Manhattan. The three remaining facilities will be sited in Brooklyn, the Bronx and Queens.

The city’s plan follows many of the recommendations of a 2017 report on incarceration reform in New York City issued by an independent commission headed by former New York State Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman. The commission recommended the closure of the Rikers Island jail facilities, which it called “inhumane and violent” and “an international symbol of despair and damage.”

In August, the administration issued a single draft scope of work document for all four of the new

CONTINUED ON PAGE 18

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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Subscribe today to Eastsider News of Your Neighborhood that you can’t get anywhere else A local group challenging the American Museum of Natural History’s Gilder Center expansion project has appealed a lower court’s decision to dismiss its lawsuit. Rendering: AMNH

COURT ORDER LIMITS AMNH EXPANSION WORK MUSEUMS Museum barred from removing canopy trees in Theodore Roosevelt Park during appeal of Gilder Center lawsuit

BY MICHAEL GAROFALO

Weeks after a judge dismissed an Upper West Side group’s lawsuit challenging the American Museum of Natural History’s planned Gilder Center expansion, a higher court has ordered that the museum limit work on the project pending the outcome of the group’s appeal.

Community United to Protect Theodore Roosevelt Park, the group that filed the lawsuit, argues that the city acted incorrectly in authorizing the museum to build the 190,000-square-foot expansion, part of which would occupy what is now public land within Theodore Roosevelt Park.

In a Dec. 10 ruling, Justice Lynn R. Kotler of the Supreme Court of the State of New York ruled in the museum’s favor,

dismissing the lawsuit. Community United appealed to the Supreme Court’s Appellate Division a week later.

A Dec. 18 order issued by Justice Judith J. Gische of the Appellate Division’s First Department prevents the museum from removing seven canopy trees in Theodore Roosevelt Park to make way for the expansion, pending Community United’s appeal. The order allows the museum to proceed with certain other planned work at the site not involving tree removal — including installing construction trailers, relocating some park benches and beginning demolition work on existing museum buildings, among other actions — “to the extent that the green space in the park will not be adversely affected.”

Museum officials had notified the public days earlier that work to remove the trees would soon begin.

Bill Raudenbush, the chairman of Community United to Protect Theodore Roosevelt Park, hailed the order as “a momentous victory” in an email to supporters, writing, “it clearly signals court’s belief that our case warrants a more thorough

and comprehensive consideration of the many legal arguments previously overlooked or misunderstood by the lower court’s ruling.”

In an emailed statement, a museum spokesperson wrote, “The Museum is confident that Judge Kotler’s December 10, 2018 clear decision on the merits, which dismissed the entire case, will be affirmed on appeal. Yesterday’s interim stay order is essentially confined to seven trees.”

“The Museum will continue to focus on the numerous aspects of the project that are already moving forward and on its commitment to bringing to New Yorkers and visitors from around the world the expanded educational and scientific resources made possible by the Gilder Center for Science, Education, and Innovation,” the statement continued.

The Gilder Center expansion, which museum officials aim to complete by 2021, would add new classroom and exhibition space on the west side of the museum, and would also create a new entrance facing Columbus Avenue near West 79th Street.

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CORNELIA STREET CAFÉ TO CLOSE

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

Business

HANGOUTS Legendary Greenwich Village artists’ spot had a long and colorful run

BY JASON COHEN

For more than four decades, the Cornelia Street Café in Greenwich Village has been home to musicians and artists. Sadly, it will be shuttering its doors in 2019.

The café, located at 29 Cornelia Street, will be closing Jan. 2. It was started in 1977 by three people in the arts: Robin Hirsch, an English actor, Charles McKenna, an Irish-American actor and Raphaela Pivetta, an ItalianArgentinian-Canadian visual artist.

Hirsch, the last remaining partner, said he never imagined it would be in business this long.

“The three of us, who were all artists, started a little one room café with a toaster oven,” Hirsch recalled.

“Because we were artists, all kinds of other artists sort of naturally gravitated towards us. It was on a very small scale embedded in the history of what Greenwich Village had always been about.”

Hirsch joked that he wasn’t sure how they would pay $450 rent, but quickly that was an afterthought.

“When we opened and signed the lease at $450 a month I was scared to death,” he said. “I didn’t know how we would raise that money.”

After three and a half years the café

It’s not just the food. It’s not just the drink. It’s that we have been home for countless artists and it’s a community.”

Robin Hirsch, co-founder, Cornelia Street Café

expanded into the space next door.

The additional space allowed them to introduce their “breakfast theater,” where artists would read from neglected playwrights. There were also puppet shows, poetry readings and on Monday nights, songwriters would perform songs that were written that week only.

In fact, those Monday night sessions spawned 500 new songs, which and led to an album appropriately titled, “Cornelia Street: The Songwriters Exchange,” which was also the first and only non-jazz album put out by the now-defunct jazz label, Stash Records.

The buzz in the community only continued to grow in the 70s, 80s and 90s.

Musicians and artists flocked there locally, nationally and worldwide. Senator Eugene McCarthy spoke there, Eve Ensler launched “The Vagina Monologues” and Philippe Petit (“Man on Wire”) strung a wire from the tree outside the café and danced across it

Shuttering its doors on Jan. 2. Photo: Jason Cohen juggling.

Those artists along with comedians such as John Oliver and Amy Schumer have performed in what is known as the Cornelia Street Underground, where there are 700 shows annually.

Hirsch recalled how when they first opened, they would steam their eggs on a cappuccino machine and had a toaster oven that was always breaking. As word about the café spread, more space was required. In time they took over the back room, renovated the basement and built a kitchen.

“Eventually we had to break down and get a kitchen,” Hirsch explained.

“It was scary because you have to hire people for real wages.”

The café also became known for its food and wine. Hirsch describes it as an American bistro with moderate prices. Some of its good items include the meatballs, Polish sausage and 35 wines.

“It’s not just the food,” he said. “It’s not just the drink. It’s that we have been home for countless artists and it’s a community.”

Hirsch said he began to see the writing on the wall during the past few years when five of the 10 restaurants on Cornelia closed. In addition, his chef of 17 years recently left to open his own place and the rent is now 84 times what it was when it opened.

Hirsch explained that when his 30year lease expired in 2007, the new

landlords, who bought the building around 2002, were anxiously waiting to jack up the price. Today, the rent has ballooned to about $40,000 a month, according to Hirsch.

“It is the rent that determines everything,” he said. “When new landlords took over, I knew I couldn’t sustain.”

So he gave the landlord notice about a year ago and quickly word began to spread in the community. Hirsch, whose family barely escaped Nazi Germany, never in his wildest dreams pictured owning a café for 41 years in the Village.

“It’s very hard to wrap my head around it,” he said. “I’m not completely sure this is happening.”

CITY COUNCIL APPROVES ZONING CHANGES IN GARMENT DISTRICT MANUFACTURING More office space — but also help for apparel producers

BY VERENA DOBNIK

The New York City Council has approved zoning changes in Manhattan’s garment district to allow more space for use by a variety of businesses, while boosting what’s left of apparel production in a neighborhood that once clothed many Americans.

Council members voted unanimously Thursday in favor of easing a 1987 rule that required landlords to lease a certain amount of square footage to the fashion industry. They’ll now be able to convert more buildings into office space — an acknowledgment of the dwindling number of clothing workshops.

But landlords setting aside at least 25,000 square feet for garment manufacturers’ long-term leases will get a tax break. And the city will use $20 million to acquire a building dedicated to clothes production at below-

market rents. A grant program will be expanded to buy new equipment.

Democratic Mayor Bill de Blasio said the Council’s action ensures that the area just south of Times Square — from about West 35th to West 40th streets and from Broadway to Ninth Avenue — “will continue to thrive as a mixed-use neighborhood.”

In recent years, China has absorbed much of the U.S. apparel production, leaving only several thousand garment workers in the Manhattan neighborhood and a lot of empty space that had been zoned specifi-

cally for such work. New boutique hotels, chic restaurants and commercial offices have moved in — some with short-term leases uncertain how long they could stay while the city considered the outdated zoning requirements.

The 1987 zoning reserved about 4 million square feet in the district’s high-rises for apparel businesses.

Today’s garment workshops occupy only an estimated 700,000 square feet, according to the city’s Economic Development Corp.

Barbara Blair, president of the Gar-

ment District Alliance, a not-for-profit representing fashion businesses, thanked property owners “for playing a critical role in developing a plan that would preserve apparel manufacturing while positioning our neighborhood for continued growth.”

Current garment workshops tend to serve higher-end designers compared to those going back more than a century, filled with elbow-to-elbow, underpaid workers who toiled long hours.

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

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jails, the first step in the extensive city land use and environmental quality review process required to site the new facilities. The document contemplated a 1,510-bed jail at 80 Centre Street, currently a state office building that houses courtrooms and offices of the Manhattan District Attorney, City Clerk, Manhattan Marriage Bureau and other city agencies. The document dismissed the possibility of expanding existing city jails such as the Tombs, which currently has capacity of approximately 1,000. Existing facilities, the city’s scoping review found, “cannot be expanded to meet the needs of the contemporary facilities envisioned.”

In September, the administration held a public scoping meeting in Manhattan to solicit formal public input on the proposal for 80 Centre Street, one of several public forums following the announcement that Chinatown residents packed to voice their displeasure with the plan and protest the lack of public engagement prior to the announcement of the site.

CHANGING COURSE But weeks after the official public comment period on the city’s scoping process ended, the mayor’s office abruptly changed course, announcing in November that it planned instead to build the new jail at 125 White Street. The administration cited challenges associated with relocating the existing offices at 80 Centre St., rather than community opposition, as the reason for the shift.

The mayor made no reference to the site change in brief public remarks before the Dec. 18 roundtable meeting at American Legion Post 1291 on Canal Street, which was closed to the press, instead saying, “the locations where we have existing jails, since the Lippman Report, have always been the logical place to focus the discussion.”

“This is part of a vision of getting off Rikers, having four community-based jails of similar size,” de Blasio said. “We know they must be safe for the surrounding communities and we have a track record that shows us that can be done very well.”

Despite the change in site, the de Blasio administration does not intend to update the draft scope of work for the new jails — the 56-page document required under the city’s environmental review process that

Chinatown residents turned out at a Sept. 12 meeting at P.S. 124 to voice their opposition to the city’s plan to build a 1,510-bed jail at 80 Centre Street. Photo: Michael Garofalo outlines the extent of the project — nor will it hold additional scoping meetings to field comments from the public.

“While there will not be a new scoping meeting or draft scope of work given the close proximity of the two locations, there will be significant time for public comment that will be addressed throughout the [Uniform Land Use Review Process],” mayoral spokesperson Raul Contreras wrote in an emailed statement. Contreras did not respond to an inquiry about the potential height of the new facility, which, according to individuals briefed on the plans, could be as tall as 50 stories.

“We are effectively now in a public engagement process about a 500-foot-tall proposed jail that is not even described in any public documents in any formal way,” Kavanagh said.

Kavanagh and a number of other elected officials, including Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer and Council Member Margaret Chin, whose district includes the neighborhood, have called on the administration to reopen the scoping process and submit separate ULURP applications for each of the four jails sites rather than pursuing the projects through a single land use review.

“The logical thing to do would be to disseminate an amended version of [the draft scope of work] that specifies what they’re planning to do on White Street with the same level of detail that the previous document did for the Centre Street site,” Kavanagh said.

Yuh-Line Niou, who represents the neighborhood in the State Assembly, called the mayor’s private briefing “disappointing.”

“Closed processes and closed meetings are not actions of good government,” Niou wrote on Twitter, adding, “This meeting does not deserve the check mark of ‘public engagement’.”

Anthony Notaro, who serves as chair of Community Board 1 and attended the meeting, agreed that the city should revisit the scoping process in light of the site change. “It was positive that they mayor and his team took the time to meet with the community,” Notaro said. “The thing that still concerns me is that we need to have a more inclusive and substantive dialog about the decision and the process.”

Council Speaker Corey Johnson said at a Dec. 19 press conference he was “glad to see that they mayor is talking to the community about this.”

“Closing Rikers remains a priority for me,” Johnson said, adding that the Council, borough president, and Community Board 1 will have an opportunity to address local concerns with the project as it proceeds through ULURP. “This is not done yet,” Johnson said. “I support a site being in Manhattan, but the conversation around what happens on that site—the height and density and what happens on the street and the neighborhood and what other things can be done for parks and transportation and other facilities in the community — I think is an important conversation to have.”

Nancy Kong, the co-founder of Neighbors United Below Canal, a local group that participated in the meeting, wrote in an emailed statement, “We hope that the Mayor’s visit on Tuesday does not stand in place of a scoping hearing, or any part of the process which must include meaningful community engagement and with a larger representation of the community than this meeting. We want to work with the City to develop a solution that balances the need for criminal justice reform, a new physical structure and for minimizing the impact to a diverse, unique and historic community.”

DECEMBER 27-JANUARY 2,2019

19

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HOW ‘NEW YORK BY NEW YORK’ WAS BORN PUBLISHING The backstory of a new book that’s a “joint love letter to the greatestt city in the world”

BY WENDELL JAMIESON AMIESON

It was a frantic day on deadline dline at The New York Times when the e email popped into my in-box. It almost st had a French accent.

“I am a publisher based in NY. Y. I would be very happy to meett you to explain an important project that we are starting now for next year.

I think that you will like it and d be the best writer for it.”

The writer of the email wass Martine Assouline, and she ran n Assouline publishing, a company ny she founded in France with her husband, sband, Prosper, that produces gorgeous, us, very heavy art and design books, as well as luxury items for home libraries. es. (It’s pronounced Ah-soo-LEEN.) I’ve admired their books many times. But what would someone like that want with me, an ink-stained wretch? So I went to meet her. Also, she said I could have a nice coffee.

And that’s how my new book, “New York By New York,” was born, and how the impeccably stylish Parisraised publisher of state-of-the-art luxury books teamed up with the Brooklyn-raised Metro editor of The Times to create our joint love letter to the greatest city in the world. She’s a transplant: this is her home now. I’m a native. But we are both New Yorkers all the same.

Flashback to September, 2017. Sipping that espresso, admiring the view of the Chrysler Building from her office, I listened as Martine explained her vision in person: A series of essays p y touching on various moments in 20th century New York history. I’d write 15,000

Photos courtesy of Assouline

was the scourge of sc crack cocaine, and coc the horrible Dehorr cember night was n John Lennon was Lenn words. Her team would then go to the ends of the earth to collect practically every iconic image of New York. I suggested we do a chapter on the Gilded Age. She loved it. How about Dutch times? Not so much. We agreed to not only focus on Manhattan but on the boroughs as well, where many of today’s hotspots and fastgrowing communities thrive.

I got cracking. I’ve covered New York City since I joined New York Newsday in April, 1991. I have bookcases filled with tomes about the city where I was born in 1966 in New York Hospital.

I dug into my books. I hit the public library. I did deep dives online. On weekends and at night I walked the streets of the neighborhoods I sought to describe. And I enlisted the help of some of my colleagues at The Times who had expertise in areas where mine was lacking g – immigration, g , Broadway, skyscrapers.

This wasn’t my first book. In 2007 I

published a non-fiction memoir called “Father Knows Less” about answering the wacky questions of my then-young son, Dean. That got me on Martha Stewart. But this was different. How could I capture all of this boiling, broiling, onrushing city in just 15,000 words?

By writing 30,000 words, that’s how.

And adding more chapters: ocean liners, Film Noir, the 1980s. The book got bigger and bigger. I added plenty of grit, too. Martine wanted a real vision of New York City, not something white-washed and sugar-coated. That I could do. Back when I was a police reporter, I wrote about roughly 600 homicides. So the crime of the ‘70s and ‘80s, when arson lit the sky because landlords found that torching was more lucrative than selling, was included. So o was the terrible treatment of immigrants immigrrants from China Chin na in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. e Centu uries. And so

shot and killed.

Not your average fare for a coffee table book.

I wanted “New York By New York” to be personal, too. So I added my own stories here and there. How my parents took me and my sister to SoHo on Sundays in the mid-1970s to see the art galleries. How my girlfriend and I went to a place on the Lower East Side in the 1990s called Lansky Lounge that harkened back to the Prohibition era. How living in Brooklyn, as I do, was looked down upon – cabs wouldn’t even take you home at night when I was growing up — until it became the coolest thing.

And I didn’t want it to be only about the past. I visited those places today that I wrote about, like Ladies Mile on Avenue of the Americas in the West 20s where shopping first became a pastime and still is. I wanted to bring the reader into the present. I spent nights in Chinatown. I strolled up

and down Park Avenue so I could describe the incredible sense of diminishing perspective just right. I stood outside the shuttered Chelsea Hotel, peering into the dark interior, to see if I could feel the literary and musical ghosts lingering within.

I handed in my text and let the designers go to work. They held nothing back. And then Martine’s and my baby was born at an astonishing 11 pounds.

It was quite an experience to see my words, words I’d banged out on a laptop on the kitchen table, on such beautiful paper, among such spectacular images, cossetted within such a beautiful cover.

But the thought didn’t change. It was the same thought that propelled me as Metro editor. New York City is the greatest city in the world, a city of contradictions that is always changing yet always the same, and that’s the great contradiction of them all.

Wendell Jamieson is a former Metro editor of The New York Times. If you would like to contact him, please visit his website. “New New York by New York” and “Father Knows Less” can be purchased on Amazon.

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One Person’s Manhattan

AT 94, A SINGING SENSATION How jazz singer Jo Marchese inspires audiences all across Manhattan

vice manager for American Airlines.

She traveled around the world but her favorite location was Mexico, where she dated the pilot for the president of

BY HARVEY COHEN Mexico and then married a Mexican musician.

The Mexican musician was goodShe was born in 1924. Before there was frozen food. Before actors talked in looking, maybe too good-looking, as she tells it. Because he was not very faithful. movies. Before penicillin.

But Marchese was pretty philosophiBut a few times every week she gets up and sings before live audiences in cal about the whole thing, telling him clubs. Clubs right in her neighborhood that if he wanted other women he on the Upper West Side and the Upper should “just go for it.” She left with their East Side, Midtown and even trendy two kids and never looked back.

Twelve years later she got married downtown.

Jo Marchese not only doesn’t look her again, this time to a rich man who age, but she definitely doesn’t act it. owned a supermarket and quite a bit of When asked how it feels to be 94, Mar- real estate. They lived in a big mansion chese’s answer is, “I wouldn’t know, I in Manhasset that had formerly been owned by tennis player Bobby Riggs. It feel like 36.”

Her life has had its ups and for sure its was a rocky marriage that lasted eight years. And Marchese was divorced downs. again.

She was born in Astoria, But the two divorces were and her father died when not the greatest tragedies in she was just two-and-a-half When asked Jo’s life. At the age of 36, her years old. And as an Italian how it feels son took his own life, leavgrowing up way back then, to be 94, ing a wife and two kids. she often had problems with Marchese’s Marchese was devastated. the Irish immigrants who answer is: And literally fed her depreslived nearby. But she did sion, gaining 60 pounds. learn to knit and crochet “I wouldn’t She was depressed and lost from the older Jewish womknow, I feel — not knowing who to turn en in the neighborhood. like 36.” to or what to do. She needed Yet there were good times a change desperately. too, back in Astoria. MarSo she moved to Arizona where she chese loved listening to the radio, met Tony Bennett and dreamed about flying began painting and lost all the weight she had gained. In time, she was ready just like her idol Amelia Earhart.

During World War II, Marchese want- to come back to New York.

Marchese found an apartment on 73rd ed to help the war effort. She moved to San Francisco and took a civilian job Street and Columbus Avenue — the with the Marines, shipping guns and apartment she still lives in today.

That’s when she says “my life took another war materials.

After the war she moved back to New other detour, and detours can take you York and worked as a customer ser- to great places.”

Marchese (second from right) at lunch with friends. Photo courtesy of Jo Marchese One day a friend asked Jo to go dancing. She really didn’t want to go but said yes anyway.

The moment she walked into the dance hall she fell in love, not with a man but with the music. It was a sixteen-piece orchestra and it spoke to her like nothing before.

At the urging of a man she met at that dance, she started taking singing lessons. She was doubtful of her decision but said, “what the hell, I’m 83, why not just do it.”

She began singing at open mics. At first nervous and insecure, later more confident, she won praise from band leaders and audiences.

Two times she was approached by audience members and offered professional singing jobs, one in Florida and the other in Paris.

Marchese turned them both down, preferring to stay on the Upper West Side and just appearing as an amateur in her favorite clubs and restaurants in New York City.

She has now recorded two CDs and

usually sings two to three times a week.

She performs solo as well as with a trio consisting of a piano and a bass player.

Her favorite singer is Frank Sinatra.

She says she loves everything he has recorded. She notes the excellence of his phrasing and points out that her phrasing is pretty good too.

She’s also still quite a fan of Tony Bennett and loves his song about San Francisco as it takes her back to the time she worked there for the U.S. Marines.

One thing that gets her fired up is that so many people forget how valuable older folks can be.

She says “give older people a chance, they’re not all in rocking chairs.”

(Though she will tell you that a lot of the men she knows really just want to go to bed at 7 o’clock.)

Marchese, on the other hand, usually goes to bed past midnight, even on nights she is not singing. She loves going to restaurants, museums and performances. And, of course, she still loves to dance. In fact, at 94, she still loves to do just about everything.

SINGING AROUND TOWN Places where Jo Marchese has performed.

(Call to see when she might be appearing again.)

Cleopatra’s Needle 2485 Broadway 212-769-6969 Thalia 828 Eighth Ave. 212-399-4444 Kitano’s 66 Park Avenue 212-885-7123 Arturo’s 106 West Houston St. 212-677-3820 Sound Bites 737 Ninth Ave. 917-409-5868 Spoon Fed 331 West 51st St. 646-368-1854 Ethical Culture Society 2 West 64th St. 212-368-1854

Jo Marchese (left) lives on the Upper West Side. Photo courtesy of Jo Marchese

Marchese enjoys appearing in her favorite clubs and restaurants in New York City. Photo courtesy of Jo Marchese

Know someone we should profile in One Person’s Manhattan?

Call 212-868-0190 or email nyoffice@strausnews.com

Birdland 315 West 44th St. 212-581-3080

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CROSSWORD

Eastsider

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WORD SEARCH by Myles Mellor

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SUDOKU by Myles Mellor and Susan Flanagan

by Myles Mellor

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