The local paper for the Upper er East Side OUR ANNUAL GUIDE TO SUMMER < SPECIAL SECTION INSIDE
GRACIE MANSION GETS A MAKEOVER A nearly $4 million renovation will include a new roof, reconstruction of chimneys BY RICHARD KHAVKINE
The mayor’s mansion is getting a makeover, to the tune of nearly $4 million. According to permits filed with the city’s Department of Buildings, Gracie Mansion will get a new roof, and its decorative railings, skylights and chimneys will be rebuilt this summer. The project, in the works since 2010, will be paid through mayoral funding. Two-thirds of the projected $3.78 million cost of the renovations was budgeted by the Bloomberg administration, with the remaining amount by the de Blasio administration, according to Jonathan Mellon, a senior architectural conservator with the Historic House Trust, a not-for-profit that works with the city Parks & Recreation Department to preserve and promote 22 historic house museums in the city. The trust is project’s de facto general contractor. “We’re running a tight shop on this and should be able to keep costs down,” he said. Before the renovations can begin, asbestos material found in the roof membrane and elsewhere will be removed. According to the Parks & Recreation Department, which owns the mansion, the asbestos is among the more benign types. That work will begin later this month and last about four weeks.
MEETING NEEDS SINCE THE GREAT DEPRESSION S. Feldman Housewares, a one-stop shop that’s rolled with punches, and the times BY CODY GERARD
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Illustration by John S. Winkleman Goldsmith said. “You don’t get rich in one day and you don’t go broke in one day. In 2008 things got worse here but we were still running profitably.” Though S. Feldman remains successful, many nearby shops have been forced out, sometimes to oblivion, by rising real estate prices and skyrocketing rents. “Shoppingwise, a lot of businesses people used to depend on are all out of business,” Goldsmith, 58, said, adding that the last two stationary stores on Madison Avenue recently shuttered. Because of all the closures, Goldsmith said, “we try to have what anybody needs. If somebody asked for it before you, we probably have it.”
4-10 2015
Our Take
45 Years and Counting
Every week for the rest of the year, Our Town will celebrate our 45th anniversary by profiling a neighborhood business that has been around longer than we have. Know of a local business that should be on our list? Email us at news@strausnews.com On Madison Avenue, near 92nd Street, tucked into what is now a mostly residential neighborhood, is an Upper East Side fixture. Founded in 1929, at the start Great Depression, S. Feldman Housewares is a one-stop shop for pretty much anything you could need in your home, from hardware tools to pots and pans. Sam Feldman, a Russian immigrant, started the business as fiveand-dime and 25-cent store for people struggling during the economic collapse. More than 85 years later, the shop remains in the family, and is currently run by Sam Feldman’s grandson, Scott Goldsmith. Despite the neighborhood’s profound changes, as well as the economic turbulence and rising expenses rocking the city’s small businesses of late, the store has stood strong. “It’s remarkably steady here,”
WEEK OF JUNE
The key, he said, is simple: “We stand behind the merchandise.” Goldsmith said that the future of S. Feldman lies in staying local. He wants to brand S. Feldman as a tourist attraction, a one-of-a-kind, onlyin-New York small business. “We’re trying to get more business but it’s hard to get (tourists) to come up her without all the attractions,” he said. Goldsmith said he’s never considered expanding. “I don’t want to get greedy, that’s when you go broke,” he said. He hopes to keep the business in the family, and he might yet succeed: His youngest son, Jake, 22, is planning to start work in the store this summer.
BICKERING OVER A PLACE TO LIVE One of the most important legislative issues of the day is stuck in the grade-school bickering of our mayor and governor. The extension of the so-called 421a housing program, which gives developers a tax break in exchange for the construction of affordable housing units, expires this month, and needs renewal in Albany to stay alive. Though Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo are in sync on the philosophy behind the program -- adding more affordable housing at a time of a rent crisis in the city -- they inevitably have found details to bicker about, continuing a dysfunctional, sibling slapfighting that has infected nearly every issue they have tussled over. For news junkies, the fight is great political theater. De Blasio last week called the governor “disingenuous” for accusing him of caving to developers. Cuomo, slyly, is intimating that the mayor, who has been shuttling around the country positioning himself as a national progressive figure, actually is doing the bidding of the Real Estate Board of New York, which supports de Blasio’s approach. The betting for now is that Cuomo and de Blasio will agree on a short-term extension, extending their squabble into the summer. Jewish women and girls light up the world by lighting the Shabbat candles every Friday evening 18 minutes before sunset. Friday June 5 – 8:05 pm. For more information visit www.chabaduppereastside.com.
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