The Village Sun | April 2023

Old P.S. 64 owner declares bankruptcy to duck auction

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Protesters made a life-size voodoo doll of bidders on the old P.S. 64 / CHARAS El Bohio, stuffed it with flour and sawdust — then, to put a curse on the new owner, tore it to pieces in the entrance of the DoubleTree Hilton.

But, in the end, the expected sale of the landmarked former East Village school building, at 605 E. Ninth St., on March 22 was canceled after its current owner, Gregg Singer, declared bankruptcy. That means the foreclosure on the property by Singer’s lender, Madison Capital

Stanley Mieses, 70: Journo covered 9/11, ‘broke hearts’

BY MARY REINHOLZ

New York journalist Stanley Mieses, the son of Holocaust survivors and a former longtime writer for The New Yorker who witnessed the Twin Towers collapse from his Tribeca apartment and described the devastation in the surrounding neighborhood for National Public Radio, died in

February at a Downtown Manhattan Hospital. The cause of death was from the effects of COVID, pneumonia and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disorder (COPD), according to close friends.

Mieses was 70 and had lived his entire life in various city neighborhoods. His last stop was in Jackson

Continued on p. 8

Three years later: From behind the mask to…beyond the mask

BY KATE WALTER

Within three years, I’ve gone from behind the mask to beyond the mask. Last week I got on the 14th St. bus and reached into my pocket for my mask and I couldn’t find it! How did this happen? Every coat I wore had a mask in the pockets. I never left the house without one. I automatically replaced my

mask when I threw a used one away. Public transportation, especially the subway, is one situation where I still wear a mask.

During these past few months, I’ve realized everyone is in different stages with their physical and emotional recovery from the pandemic. That was c lear when I gave a pandemic writing prompt to the students in my memoir class at the se-

nior center. I was moved as they read their work that recalled the rituals and restrictions of the lockdown and the overall impact on their lives.

I wrote obsessively about the pandemic as a way of soothing my anxiety. This resulted in my memoir in essays “Behind the Mask: Living Alone in the Epicenter.” (Many of

Entering the art matrix at the Whitney Museum.

Photo by Milo Hess

From behind the mask to beyond the mask

Continued from p. 1

these pieces were originally published in The Village Sun). At the suggestion of my publicist, I included 12 pandemic writing prompts.

Writing can be healing and I think we need a lot of emotional healing from the pandemic, even if we’ve dropped the masks. Some people are still living in fear and are depressed and traumatized, especially if they lost someone. Some people still are afraid to eat inside a restaurant. A few folks still wear a mask outside. Others have pretty much resumed their lives.

W hat’s changed for me since I started documenting my pandemic experiences? Three years after the lockdown, I no longer think about the pandemic 24/7. In fact, I hardly think about it at all. Much to my relief, I resumed writing about other topics.

At one point I was totally obsessed with staying safe and not getting COVID, even after I was vaccinated and boosted. Now I assume my sneezing or sniffling is from allergies or a cold. If I really want to be sure, I take a home test. I started going to parties where guests are required to take a home test before they arrive. A small price to pay for being able to socialize indoors again. My church still requires masks.

On March 26, I attended the annual meeting of the Westbeth Artists Residents

Council in the community room. The majority of people were not wearing masks. The president of our board of directors addressed us, noting that the last time he spoke in this

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room was in March 2020 right before New York went into lockdown.

I was scared when I left that meeting three years ago. It was so early in the pandemic, we hadn’t even started masking yet. Masks soon became required in all the public areas of Westbeth. At my book launch in December 2021 in the community room, (which had been closed for over a year), everyone had to cover up. No refreshments allowed.

Today Westbeth is back to life and bursting with activity: gallery openings with wine and cheese, a concert series, puppet shows for the kids, a two-day installation dance festival coming up in April. Once again, we will have Staff Appreciation Day this spring. The first one was held in 2021 to thank our workers for protecting us during the pandemic. They did a great job.

Like everyone in New York City, and especially for those of us who stayed, my life was irrevocably changed by the pandemic. I was fearful for a year until I got the vaccination at the Javits Center. I emerged scarred, but with a new appreciation for life and for my resilience, a trait inherited from my feisty Irish mother.

I’m in good health, but I am a senior. I did not want to die, especially since I had retired right before COVID arrived. I had earned this time to enjoy myself. So I made decisions involving deprivation in order to stay safe. I missed holiday celebrations with family (which I have now resumed). I was lonely but played it safe.

I’m not sure when I slipped into my current “no more fear” lifestyle. I guess it happened gradually. Now I hate that I must wear a mask when I go for a doctor’s appointment, even though it makes total sense.

At one point, I was resentful of all the people who weren’t masking as much as I was. I hated the people who didn’t mask on the subway when it was the law. Now I don’t care what others do. What a difference three years makes.

Today my greatest fear is getting run over by a delivery guy on an e-bike speeding the wrong way. I recently had a close call at 14th St. and University Place. I had the right of way and was in the crosswalk. I had crossed the street and was about to step up on the curb when I spotted this maniac turning the wrong way into my space.

As I darted out of his way, I tripped on the curb and fell on the sidewalk. I was bruised but nothing was broken or dislocated. It could have been much worse. I thank my regular yoga teacher for helping me gain the agility to react fast. Three fellow New Yorkers rushed over to see if I was O.K. The bike rider sped east on 14th Street in the westbound lane.

When my mother was alive, she prayed every day for my safety on the streets of New York. I miss her prayers and could use them again.

This near collision shook me up. It is an understatement to say the sidewalks and streets are out of control with reckless delivery bike riders (thanks, de Blasio for legalizing e-bikes). This residual danger is worse than ever, now that New Yorkers have resumed our active lives walking to the store or bank or Greenmarket.

I put my right hand out to break my fall, an automatic reaction, and strained my shoulder. I’m treating my injury with acupuncture and massage (not covered by insurance). Can I send the mayor a bill?

It appears the city is doing no enforcement as motorized bikes or scooters go the wrong way. Maybe there is no crackdown because the delivery guys are seen as an industry that employs struggling people. I’m all for them getting better wages and better working conditions, but they must stop breaking the traffic laws. We should not have to fear for our safety while out running errands in the city where everyone walks.

I will exercise caution when walking and enjoying this warmer weather. I love spring in New York. The buds are popping in the parks and in the three marijuana commissaries in the Village. Two things to celebrate — flowers and legal weed.

Not long after my sidewalk fall, I was in that area to make my first legal purchase of marijuana from Union Square Travel Agency (love the name) on East 13th Street, off Broadway. I chatted with the budtender about various hybrids and took her recommendation. As I left with my purchase of “Wedding Cake,” the security guard wished me, “Safe travels.”

I plan to indulge at home. For sure, I will not be crossing the street stoned.

Walter is the author of “Behind the Mask: Living Alone in the Epicenter” (Heliotrope Books).

Not COVID anymore but whisking e-bikes going every which way is now one of the writer’s main safety concerns.

Photo by The Village Sun

Shed foes urge ‘equitable’ plan in their ‘Outdoor Dining Blueprint’

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

As the City Council was working obscurely behind closed doors on a plan to make outdoor dining permanent, community residents publicly unveiled their own plan. The ad hoc group CUEUP (Coalition United for Equitable Urban Policy) — a.k.a. the anti-shedders — last month released a “Community Blueprint for Outdoor Dining.”

As The Village Sun went to press, word was the Council was poised to vote this month on a bill, Intro. No. 31-A, to lock in Open Restaurants for the future.

CUEUP is comprised of block associations from some of the city’s most nightlife-saturated areas, including Greenwich Village, the East Village, Lower East Side, Chelsea, Chinatown, Williamsburg, Bushwick and Sunnyside.

Decrying Open Restaurants as “Mayor Adams’s broken plan” and “top-down, lobbyist-driven restaurant legislation,” the block association members are pitching their own alternative as“neighborhood friendly.”

The coalition’s 10-point blueprint, released March 24, calls for a complete end to roadway dining — plus implementation of a seasonal program with reduced hours of operation to ensure quiet in residential areas.

Ending roadway dining, CUEUP argues, would “enhance street cleaning, reduce emergency vehicle response times and reduce rat infestations.”

“End roadbed dining now,” the manifesto declares. “Take down the sheds, remove the decks.” The position paper notes that Sanitation street sweepers haven’t cleaned underneath the shed platforms in the restaurant-filled streets for two years now.

“Sunset all roadway sheds now,” their document urges, “then roll out citywide street cleaning and rat abatement programs.”

The group is calling for slashing the amount of outdoor dining by 50 percent — cutting the number down to 5,900 sidewalk cafes. Pre-pandemic there were around 1,200 sidewalk cafes citywide. Now, after the implementation of the pandemic emergency outdoor dining plan, there are more than 10 times that amount.

CUEUP stresses that any permanent outdoor dining plan must be equitable — as in, proportionate to different neighborhoods’ levels of bar and restaurant saturation.

“Some neighborhoods have just a few outdoor dining setups,” their blueprint says, “while others — Williamsburg, Astoria, the Village and the Lower East Side — are saturated beyond endurance. To avoid saturation in residential areas, ensure one block has no more than one or two licenses. Limit the number of cafe licenses in each community board to 100, or the number pre-pandemic, whichever is greater. This creates 5,900-plus outdoor dining sites — 5 times

the pre-pandemic number of sidewalk cafes — and gives restaurants new incentives to open in the outer boroughs.”

On noise, the coalition supports a much earlier curfew: “To respect the rights of New York residents to the quiet use of their homes, closing times for outdoor dining spaces in residential and mixed-use neighborhoods should be the later of 6 p.m. or sunset.”

Citing the global climate crisis, CUEUP says there should be no heating or cooling of outdoor dining spaces — which would not require such fossil-fuel-burning measures if the program were only seasonal.

“New York City declared a climate emergency!” the coalition notes. “So has France, where they’ve banned all outdoor heaters because of the effect on the climate. We must take climate change seriously and do the same. Seasonal open-air dining makes sense. Heating and cooling the outdoors does not.”

The proposal also advocates for community board input on outdoor dining sites, noting that the City Council’s bill reportedly would reduce the local boards’ oversight. Community boards should be given 45 days to review applications and consider neighborhood input, according to CUEUP.

In addition, restaurants should pay a sliding-scale fee for outdoor dining, the activists say, and that this fee should be based on “fair market value” — meaning much more expensive in Manhattan than versus the rest of the city.

Pedestrian right of way also must be restored, the CUEUP blueprint says: People on foot and wheelchair users must be ensured at least an 8-foot-wide sidewalk space or 50 percent of the sidewalk, whichever is greater.

In addition, CUEUP wants the Department of Transportation booted from oversight of outdoor dining — decrying its “failed management” of the program — to be replaced by the Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, which formerly ran the sidewalk cafe program.

Furthermore, the coalition argues, restaurants and bars should not be given exclusive dibs on coveted outdoor space.

“Give public space back to the public,” the 10-point plan declares. “Don’t let restaurants cut to the front of the line for curbside and sidewalk use.”

CUEUP suggests that other “genuine, noncommercial uses” also be considered for this outdoor space, such as loading zones — which are used by businesses and residents alike — bike parking “for non-rental bikes,” forward-thinking trash-removal techniques and residential and visitor parking permits.

“And while we’re at,” the blueprint offers, “let’s add more trees. Our streets can use the shade and beauty of more trees.”

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Design

Desperate owner avoids an auction of old P.S. 64

Continued from p. 1

Realty, cannot go forward. Singer reportedly filed for Chapter 11 — to try to reorganize his debts and assets — at the very last minute, the day right before the auction.

About 30 people turned out at the demonstration outside the Midtown hotel, at 51st Street and Fifth Avenue, where the private auction had been slated to be held.

Some of the protesters from the demonstration are now dubbing themselves Occupy CHARAS. One of them posted on Fa cebook: “Please stay tuned. OCCUPY CHARAS plans to OCCUPY CHARAS! Soon!”

Meanwhile, in a statement, the more “mainstream” group Save Our Community Center, CHARAS, former P.S. 64 — which did not support the protest — denounced what it called Singer’s “desperate attempt to stop the foreclosure auction” by filing for bankruptcy. As opposed to the protesters, this group actually strongly wanted the sale to occur. In addition, they called on Mayor Adams to take “immediate action” now to use eminent domain to reacquire the former home of CHARAS and return it to community use.

“Representatives of the coalition Save Our Community Center, CHARAS, former P.S. 64 (SOCCC-64), celebrated the planned Wednesday, March 22, auction of the building that once housed the beloved cultural center,” the statement said. “Taking the building out of the hands of Gregg Singer, who purchased the structure at public auction in June 1998, would have been met with jubilation, because it would have allowed the city to begin negotiations to reacquire the building and return it as a cultural and community center to the neighborhood.

“We learned today that, in a desperate attempt to stave off the auction, Singer submitted on March 21 a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, which gave an immediate stay to the sale. The bankruptcy will now proceed on a schedule, until and unless the lender seeks relief from the stay.

“This is yet another in a long series of frivolous court actions to tie up the property and try and force a settlement that would allo w Singer to violate the use restrictions on the building and construct a youth hostel that he is trying to pass off as a dormitory,” the group said.

On March 15, SOCCC-64, community leaders and residents hand-delivered a letter from local politicians — Councilmember Car lina Rivera, Congressman Dan Goldman, Assemblymember Harvey Epstein and state Senator Br ian Kavanagh — to City Hall, requesting a meeting as soon as possible to discuss reacquiring the center.

The building, located just east of Tompkins Square Park, that housed the former, Puer to Rican-led community center was sold at public auction by Mayor Rudy Giuliani in 1998 and has remained vacant ever since. Twenty-five years later, the owner was found to be in default on his payments to his lender and a judge ordered the auction to be held.

“Residents have fought for over 20 years to ensure compliance with the community-facility-use restrictions on the property and to maintain the landmarked building, which has been allowed to deteriorate to the point that the city stepped in to seal and secure it in December 2022,” SOCCC-64 said.

“In October 2017, at a town hall meeting in the Lower East Side, then-Mayor de Blasio announced that the sale of the belo ved community center was a historic mistake, and that he was ready to right the wrongs of the past and take steps to reacquire the building. He left office, however, without doing so, ” the group said. “LES’ers now ask Mayor Adams to keep the city’s promise and seize this opportunity to reacquire and restore the once-beloved community center.”

A spokesperson for Singer, as usual, did not respond to a request for comment.

Meanwhile, at press time, Kenny Toglia, who leads the Guardians of Loisaida, was pivoting his efforts to help try to save another local cultural touchstone, St. Mark’s Theatre 80. The iconic East Village venue is in bankruptcy reorganization, too, more than $12 million in debt from what its owner, Lorcan Otway, has described as predatory loans from Maverick Real Estate Partners. He and Genie Otway, his wife, have been ordered to vacate the premises by Wed., April 5.

Toglia is organizing a costume rally — “come as your favorite theater character” — at City Hall on Thurs., March 30, from noon to 2 p.m., to speak out about the old P.S. 64 and Theatre 80 situations. He’s calling for an all-day protest in front of Theatre 80, at 80 St. Mark’s Place, on Wed., April 5.

The clash: Drag Story mayhem in Village

On Sun., March 19, supporters and protesters faced off in the Village outside a “Drag Story Hour” event at the L.G.B.T. Center, at 208 W. 13th St. Inside, drag queens read aloud children’s books to a group of about a dozen families with small kids. Outside, one agitated man from the group Gays for Trump berated Councilmember Erik Bottcher, shouting, “What kind of sexually explicit material are you reading to them, Erik? Are they twerking? Are the drag queens twerking in front of them?” Video posted by Bottcher on Twitter showed a drag queen calmly reading to the kids, without any twerking. Separately, a punk rock group of trans women members, above, was simultaneously performing a few blocks away at the AIDS Memorial at the St. Vincent’s Triangle. They also had some children’s books displayed, including “The Pronoun Book” and “Beyond the Gender Binary.”

Photo by Kate Walter

Groper on loose; Designer’s death a homicide

POLICE BLOTTER

Followed, groped

Police are trying to track down a suspect in a forcible-touching incident in the West Village.

According to police, around 10 p.m. on Sun., Feb. 26, an unknown man followed a 24-year-old woman into her apartment building at Greenwich and Jane Streets. He approached the victim in a stairwell and grabbed her buttocks over her clothing. He then fled eastbound on Jane Street on foot. The woman did not sustain any injuries.

The suspect is described as roughly in his 30s, around 5 feet 10 inches tall and 180 pounds, with dark-colored eyes and dark-colored hair.

Police are asking anyone with information to call the N.Y.P.D.’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477) or for Spanish, 1-888-57-PISTA (74782). Tips can also be submitted on the Crime Stoppers Web site at crimestoppers.nypdonline.org or on Twitter at @NYPDTips. Tips can result in cash rewards of up to $3,500. All tips are strictly confidential.

Designer murdered

Police have deemed the death of A-list fashion designer Kathryn Marie Gallagher

this past summer in her Lower East Side home a homicide. Officers who responded to apartment No. 7 at 139 Eldridge St. on Sun., July 24, just before 9 p.m. found the 35-year-old unconscious and unresponsive, with no obvious signs of trauma, lying on her bed. E.M.S. pronounced her dead at the scene.

According to news reports, an autopsy by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner showed Gallagher died of acute intoxication from a mix of drugs, including fentanyl and alcohol. Police said she was also robbed.

Police are now linking the designer’s death to a string of robberies of victims who were given drugs and robbed after leaving nightclubs and bars. Some of them suffered fatal overdoses. According to cops, there are apparently a number of rings of criminals who are pulling these kinds of dangerous, drug-involved robberies.

F.D.R. hit-run arrest

Police have made an arrest in an alleged hit-and-run that left a man dead on the F.D.R. Drive at the start of fall.

On March 6, cops said that Mohammed Pasha, 64, of East Flatbush, Brooklyn, was arrested and charged with leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death, which carries a maximum penalty of up to seven years in prison, plus a fine of $2,000 to $5,000.

On Sun., Sept. 25, around 7:45 p.m., offi-

cers responded to a 911 call of a motor vehicle collision on the southbound F.D.R. Drive around 14th Street. Upon arrival, they found an unidentified male lying in the roadway with severe body trauma.

An investigation revealed the man was walking in the southbound roadway when the vehicle struck him, after which the driver did not stay at the scene.

Police still have not released any further information about the victim, pending family notification. A spokesperson said the man did have ID on him, but that sometimes it’s simply hard to locate family members. She said po-

lice did not have an address for where the man was living and that it was unknown if he was homeless. It was not clear why the man was on the F.D.R. or if he was trying to cross it.

Headphones stolen

Another unassuming twentysomething lost her headphones in a grab-and-dash robbery, police said.

Police said a 25-year-old woman was walking past The New School building at 65 W. 11th St., near Sixth Avenue, around 1:30 a.m. on Tues., March 7, when she was approached by three young males she did not know. One of them pushed her and snatched off her headphones.

The trio then sprinted northbound on Sixth Avenue into the Union Square subway station and boarded a northbound train to Herald Square. The suspects all wore black, hooded jackets. The victim did not sustain any injuries, cops said.

A police spokesperson did not immediately have information on whether the stolen headphones were the pricey and trendy, overthe-ear AirPods Maxes that a moped-riding crew were recently targeting in a wave of more than 20 drive-by robberies. A favorite among social-media influencers, the headphones go for around $500.

Police ask anyone with information to contact the Crime Stoppers Hotline.

The alleged groping suspect was caught on surveillance camera. NYPD

is a horror, tenants and pols cry

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

It was a tour of housing — not haunted houses — but tenants said their living conditions and what their landlord is trying to pull have been a nightmare.

Residents, housing activists and politicians last month went on a brief tour of East V illage buildings with so-called “Frankensteined,” as well as warehoused apartments.

They started in front of 27 St. Mark’s Place and took a six-minute walk to 325 E. 12th St.

Tenants of landlord Silverstone Property Group, a division of Madison Realty Capital, are calling on the city and state to end Frankensteining and warehousing, two landlord tactics they say have been used extensively in their buildings and that have come under fire recently.

The residents, members of the Tenants Taking Control Coalition (formerly known as the Toledano Tenants’ Coalition), say they faced months of mismanaged construction in their buildings, so severe that many had to leave their homes, while some affordable apartments have been warehoused and remained vacant for

years.

Tenants recently surveyed 13 of the 15 buildings in the portfolio. They reported that of the buildings’ 279 original, rent-regulated apartments, 166 — more than half — were Frankensteined into 83 high-rent apartments while 46 others are

currently sitting vacant.

During the height of the disruptive construction, the city’s Department of Health found elevated lead levels in dust in several of the buildings, including one where children live. Some of these children were placed in these units as a condition of a New York State attorney general’s settlement that called for several units in the portfolio to be set aside for formerly homeless families. The Department of Health also issued commissioner’s orders for construction dust to be cleaned up from common areas of several other buildings.

Frankensteining is one of the last remaining ways to significantly raise rents of rent-regulated apartments after New York State passed the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act in 2019. The tactic allows landlords to set a new firsttime rent after combining apartments — or even after combining just a portion of apartments.

As for warehousing, in one Silverstone building, 10 out of 37 apartments have been empty for years, according to tenants and the Cooper Square Committee, a tenant organizing group working with them.

“The amount of toxic dust and noise that we tenants had to suffer with since August 2021, continuing for months, was compounded by MRC employees not following safe work protocols,” charged Georgina Christ, a TTC leader. “The warehousing followed by Frankensteining we’ve experienced has been devastating. We demand SPG and MRC be held to account and that our elected officials close the Frankensteining loophole this year!”

“Since September of 2021 my building was subject to extensive demolition and

construction by Madison Realty Capital as they combined apartments and took away common areas in order to remove apartments from rent regulation,” railed Roy Zornow, a TTC leader. “During the COVID pandemic, the dust, noise and vibrations affected my health, well-being and ability to work from home. The Ne w York attorney general, in a previous settlement with MRC, determined that any vacant apartment in my building is presumed to contain lead dust. My apartment was coated in a fine layer of white dust from the demolition of these vacant apartments. The building dates from 1900. I’m worried that I have been exposed to lead and other toxins through the dust I was subjected to in the building.”

“Part of New York’s affordable housing crisis stems from the loss of rent-stabilized apartments, so we must do everything we can to protect the city’s rent-stabiliz ed stock,” said Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine. “Ending the warehousing and Frankensteining of these apartments is a crucial step in order to maximiz e housing supply and affordable rents.”

Councilmember Carlina Rivera, who recently gave birth to a baby, did not attend the walking tour, but a representative of hers read a statement by her.

“All New Yorkers deserve to live in peace and safety, and I commend the members of the Tenants Taking Control coalition and their neighbors for taking collective action against landlord mismanagement,” Rivera said in her statement. “My bill, Intro 195, will require the city to monitor vacant apartments and ensure they are not causing uninhabitable conditions and damage on occupied apartments in the building.”

“When notorious landlord Raphael Toledano bought these buildings in 2015 there were close to 300 rent-stabilized apartments,” Councilmember Gale Brewer noted. “Today roughly half of the units are warehoused or Frankensteined. These practices hold affordable apartments hostage and drive out tenants from neighboring units. Albany must fix this with legislation. ”

“Fewer than 1 percent of apartments that rent for less than $1,500 a month are listed on the market as available,” city Comptroller Brad Lander said. “At the same time, over 70,000 New Yorkers are currently living in a shelter or on the street, and the lack of affordable units forces many people to double-up or stay with family to avoid homelessness. Every single affordable apartment should be available to rent, so that someone can call it their home.”

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams also condemned warehousing and Frankensteining, stressing that the city needs more “deeply affordable housing.”

‘Frankensteining’

East Village tenants and Cooper Square Committee organizers took a stand against destructive landlord practices. CSC

Call for a Landmarks agency that ‘represents community’

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Two-dozen community and neighborhood organizations from around the city demonstrated near City Hall last month, calling for reforms to shield the Landmarks Preservation Commission from what they called the excessive influence of the real estate industry.

In addition to speakers from community groups, others giving remarks included Councilmember Christopher Marte, Assemblymember Grace Lee, former L.P.C. Commissioner Michael Devonshire and former L.P.C. staff member Jeremy Woodhoff.

The rally was held outside 250 Broadway, which includes the offices of New York City councilmembers. The City Council’s Subcommittee on Landmarks, Public Sitings and Dispositions — which was scheduled to meet at the time of the March 7 rally — was, coincidentally, postponed at the last minute.

Speakers, including Lynn Ellsworth, the president of Human-Scale NYC, repeatedly stressed that structural reforms are sorely needed at Landmarks to prevent real estate influence from manipulating the commission’s decisions. A white paper “Reform Needed at the Landmarks Preservation Commission of NYC,” is available at humanscale.nyc.

Seaport Coalition President Michael Kramer began the rally by stating, “We are all here today with the same ideas… . We all want to defend the integrity of the guardrails that keep our city safe and livable.”

Former L.P.C. staffer Woodhoff told the crowd, “The [Landmarks] commissioners who are supposed to be representatives of the public are being given recommendations that they think are from the professional preservationists staff, but actually are coming directly from the real estate lobby.”

Frampton Tolbert, the executive director of the Historic Districts Council, slammed L.P.C. for its flawed process in approving the Howard Hughes tower at 250 Water St., in

the South Street Seaport area, a project that has been a major flashpoint.

“[They] conducted a mock practice hearing with the applicant/developer and considered factors outside of their purview, such as financial benefits to the Seaport Museum and 70 units of affordable housing,” he said of the city agency.

Tolbert said that the mysteriously postponed oversight hearing on the agency absolutely must happen.

David Mulkins of the Bowery Residents Alliance added that, sadly, “Most of the proposals for landmarking at the L.P.C. do not get past the [chairperson’s] desk.”

In February, Mayor Adams reshuffled Landmarks by appointing several new commissioners.

Former L.P.C. Commissioner Devonshire said, “As you know, I’ve been booted from the commission,” adding that he and other L.P.C. commissioners removed by Adams were told that they were “the naysayers.”

“Another preservationist said to me that they booted three lions and replaced them with three lambs,” he noted. “REBNY [Real Estate Board of New York] has power but

it has nothing to do with the commissioners — it has to do with the [Adams] administration and with the way that the Landmarks Law was written. That’s what needs to be changed… . Because of the victory at 250 Water St., that is what precipitated the removal of all of the sitting commissioners. … Wait until you see what this mayor puts in its place.”

The crowd applauded Devonshire’s mention of the big 250 Water St. win, in January, in which a State Supreme Court justice, accusing L.P.C. of “violating its mandate,” slapped a stop-work order on the embattled Lower Manhattan construction project.

“No,” the ousted L.P.C. commissioner ominously cautioned the cheering crowd. “Wait until you see what this mayor puts in place.”

Devonshire predicted that Adams would wipe the L.P.C. slate clean and appoint all new commissioners — the assumption being the new members will be pro-development.

Councilmember Marte said, “There should be a full new board” at Landmarks, and that its current chairperson, Sarah Carroll, should resign. The councilmember called for reconfiguring the commission so that it’s no longer a rubber stamp for developers.

“We’re here to say, ‘Enough is enough!'” Marte declared. “We have shown people in New York that we can win, that we’re willing to fight. … This is just a wake-up call to L.P.C., that we’re not stopping the fight now just because of a few victories… . We’re going to keep fighting until we have a completely new board. And we’re calling on our mayor and this administration to listen to the people of New York, to get a L.P.C. that represents our community, and that’s willing to keep developers accountable.”

Frampton Tolbert, the director of the Historic Districts Council, spoke at the rally, flanked by Councilmember Christopher Marte, left, and Seaport activist Michael Kramer, right. Save Our Seaport

Friends remember writer/editor Stanley Mieses

Heights, Queens. A crony said Mieses bought a condo there in 2006 after a steep rent hike was imposed on his West Broadway studio next to the Odeon restaurant.

Mieses apparently contracted COPD by exposure to toxic chemicals and dust while living six and a half blocks from Ground Zero. He died Feb. 3 at Beth Israel Hospital, on E. 16th Street, where he had been sent by his doctor, said David Wallis, who once wrote for Mieses at New York Newsday and then became his editor at the New York Observer.

Wallis organized a GoFundMe campaign to raise $12,000 for Mieses’s burial, a Jewish service and a headstone at the Jewish/Austrian section of Mount Moriah Cemetery in Fairview, N.J., where his parents were buried.

“We had to act quickly because he died unexpectedly with few relatives left and he did not leave a will or any instructions” on where he wanted to be laid to rest, Wallis said. “It was a helluva situation.”

At last count, $8,000 had been raised by donations from more than 100 people, “all from Stanley’s family of friends,” Wallis said in a phone conversation with The ViIlage Sun, noting their contributions got Mieses “out of the morgue” on Feb. 14 and into his spot at Mt. Moriah. Five other friends helped Wallis organize the burial.

Around 40 friends of Stanley Mieses gathered for a March 14 evening memorial for the veteran writer and editor at the Greenwich Village apartment of author Susan Shapiro, a New School writing professor, and her husband, Charlie Rubin, a television writer and New York University professor.

Shapiro said most of the guests were friends and colleagues from the publications that employed Mieses in full-time jobs, notably The New Yorker, where he had penned pieces for its Talk of The Town section for 13 years. He was also a Part II features editor at New York Newsday and a book editor at the New York Post. Early in his career, he moved from copy boy to music columnist for the New York Daily News, later working for Atlantic Records and touring with the rock band Kiss, Shapiro noted in a tribute for Salon.

In her remembrance, she called Mieses a “mentor” and one-time romantic interest who had rescued her career after a job loss, and said he helped many struggling writers in the city. Shapiro also described him as “catnip to women,” who had an “illustrious reputation of leaving broken hearts strewn across all five boroughs.”

Virginia “Ginny” Reath recalled humorous anecdotes about Mieses in the neighborhood and how they met. She related how Mieses at one point lived on Sullivan Street right across from St. Anthony’s Church. During one Feast of St. Anthony Day, the devout were march-

ing in the street, carrying a blue-robed statue of the saint, to which they had pinned money. Mieses, freshly out of the shower, dripping wet and unclothed, appeared at his window and made eye contact with a young female. They both had their mouths agape. Everyone became entranced looking at both of them looking at each other. This went on for a while. Suddenly, the girl, who was about 14, shouted at Mieses, “Whatcha lookin at? You f—in’ fairy!” and he immediately ducked down.

Reath said she first met Mieses when they bumped into each other at the M&O Deli on Prince Street. He was wearing a funky hat and outfit and platform boots and she made a quip about him really needing to dress a bit more expressively. Later that day she found a note in her mailbox from Mieses that simply said, “Meet me at Butterfingers” and gave a time later that night. When she arrived at the Upper East Side restaurant, she found him — in what she called a “classic Stanley” moment — stuffing his pockets with shrimp, and learned they were going by white limousine to the premiere of the movie “The Man Who Fell to Earth” at the Coronet Theater.

Another friend, Carol Klenfer, who did P.R. for top rock bands, recalled a zany story of the time Mieses was going to do an interview for the National Star of the lead singer of a hot new Boston group.

The singer, Steven Tyler of Aerosmith, finally emerged only to admit, “Man, I’m wasted off my ass on acid.” They wisely called the whole thing off.

Another speaker recalled how Miles Davis was once a neighbor of Mieses and loved to always drop by his place to smoke weed — to the point where Mieses actually started trying to duck him.

At another moment during the memorial, Shapiro shared, “The funniest RSVP I got was [asking] where to send a pound [of pot].” Writer Arthur Levy chimed in that the cannabis should be used to help pay for the burial.

Learning that friends were continuing to raise money for Mieses’s headstone made this jaded newsie snivel as I remembered the man’s kindness and empathy for other people. I had written for one of his predecessors at New York Newsday and met with him at its Manhattan office in 1993 about six months after I had

been summarily fired right before Thanksgiving during a tryout on an Eastern Long Island weekly. Mieses made it plain he was interested in my ideas.

“I would be predisposed to look at an article on Ron Kuby,” he said to me in a majestic baritone when I pitched profiling the rising, ponytailed criminal defense lawyer. He headlined Kuby in my published piece as the “Hair Apparent” of civil liberties icon William Kunstler, his Greenwich Village partner.

Stanley published two other articles I wrote for him despite his telling me much later that he knew I had “fallen out of favor” years before with his Long Island supervisor. So I knew early on that Stanley Mieses had guts before we became personal friends when New York Newsday folded in 1995. I also knew he was a vulnerable and sensitive man in a brutal business, living in a city that was nearly brought to its knees on 9/11 when two hijacked planes slammed into the Twin Towers.

More than a decade later, Mieses began receiving treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder funded by the James Zadroga Health and Compensation Act, controversial legislation signed by President Obama in 2011 and named after a police officer who had worked amid the Lower Manhattan wreckage and later died allegedly from breathing problems.

That same year, Mieses told The New York Times that the police evacuated him from his West Broadway studio but that he would return every few days to feed his cats.

“Dead people were blowing into my apartment off the windowsills,” he said, remembering the ash, “because the landlord was too cheap to clean it.”

In another interview, Mieses told the now-deceased Neal Conan on NPR that 9/11 affected him more than the death at 80 in February that year of his Berlin-born mother, Charlotte Mieses, a retired Dean Witter executive, who was taken to England via Kindertransport in 1939 and emigrated to New York in 1947. Her late husband, Janusz, born in Austria, escaped the Nazis by joining the French Foreign Legion and became a furrier when he emigrated to New York City. Their only child, Stanley spoke German, Spanish and Yiddish. He graduated from Boston University.

My way of keeping Stanley Mieses alive is reading his published work, most recently what I could get from a May 1978 Talk of the Town piece in The New Yorker about a counterman named Leo Ratnofsky who was retiring after 40 years at B&H Dairy, at 127 Second Ave., in the East Village. Ratnofsky recalled how that Downtown boulevard was once like a “Yiddish Broadway.” Mieses recounted how the counterman spent his last day at B&H squeezing five cartons of oranges starting at 5 a.m. in the morning and working a total of 14 hours.

“I’m just an old-fashioned worker,” he told the writer, who seemed to understand him. “Look, can I get you a glass of juice, or something?”

With reporting by Lincoln Anderson

Stanley Mieses in his younger days, presumably when he was at The New Yorker, where he penned Talk of the Town columns for 13 years.

Lower East Side pitches in to help migrants

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Lower East Siders came together in early March to hold a resource fair at P.S. 20 for recently arrived migrants. Local activist Lilah Mejia was the event’s lead organizer, but stressed that it was an all-around community effort.

“As president of the Community Education Council for District 1, I have been working alongside Carry Chan, our superintendent, looking at our school numbers and waiting for migrants to show up since we did see an influx in other districts,” Mejia said.

“In December we had about one or two, and in a matter of a couple of months that number kept increasing. The superintendent wanted to do something to support these families and she asked for help. I came up with the idea of having a resource fair.”

Mejia reached out to a slew of organizations to table at the Essex Street school to provide “tangible resources” for the attendees.

“We used the C.E.C. 1 platform and put out a call through our schools for donations and we had parents donate toiletries and clothes,” she said. “Our superintendent had an organization in New Jersey donate toiletries, alongside a synagogue that donated, as well.

“This was a community-led effort that I just happened to spearhead. Our volunteers were people from the community, alongside parent coordinators who brought their families and stayed to help out. We had students volunteer.

“We saw foot traffic of 500-plus people who came to our event. Families received clothing, shoes, food, toys, books and haircuts, toiletries.

Blessed for the partnership with P.S. 20, who helped to make the event successful. Principal Pinto and custodian Gil were instrumental in helping with this event.”

Participating organizations included University Settlement, Henry Street Settlement, Grand Street Settlement, Educational Alliance, GOLES, Lower Eastside Girls Club, New York

City Human Resources Administration, East Harlem Tutorial and Ryan-NENA Community Health Center. Local politicians also had tables at the event, including Congressmember Dan Goldman, Assemblymember Harvey Epstein and Councilmember Carlina Rivera. Assemblymember Grace Lee also attended but did not have an information table.

Migrants got free haircuts at the P.S. 20 resource fair.

Photo by Destiny Mata

EDITORIAL

Local news matters

Community news provides a vital service, routinely covering many critically important — or simply newsworthy and interesting and community building — local stories that the mainstream media (MSM) overlooks.

Take, for example, the construction accident on lower Fifth Avenue that we reported on in February, when foundation drilling for a new 18-story, luxury tower in the Greenwich Village Historic District caused frightening cracks to open on the facade of a neighboring building, 10 Fifth Ave., and caused another to move, according to the Department of Buildings.

There wasn’t much other coverage on this one. An outlet called Engineering News-Record posted something a few days later. Village Preservation sent e-mails to its members. Sure, if 10 Fifth Ave. had fully or even partially collapsed, if people had been seriously hurt or worse, it would have moved the needle enough for the MSM to jump on it.

But just because serious disasters were averted doesn’t mean it wasn’t a story. Thirty tenants were displaced. Plus, the troubling incident raised a new round of questions and criticism about the Landmarks Preservation Commission having O.K.’d both the demolition of the landmarked 14-16 Fifth Ave. in the first place and its replacement with the new project. In short, this was a “good story” to cover. (Thanks to reader Marguerite Martin for the news tip!)

Or, to give another example, take The Village Sun’s serial reporting on the WestView News saga, starting at the end of last year, when some of the monthly newspaper’s contributors and staff formed the look-alike New WestView News, which now — after a cease-and-desist order — is called Village View. This was a story that the MSM — New York magazine/Curbed, The New York Times, The New Yorker — eventually picked up on, too. Hyperlocal media enriches the larger news and cultural landscape by identifying and covering stories that the MSM might not otherwise get onto. (Please, though — attribution and a hyperlink!)

George Capsis, WestView’s 95-year-old publisher, recently had a health scare, having to spend a brief stint in a hospital — to his outrage, an Upper East Side hospital. One of Capsis’s most vocal causes has been the restoration of a full-service hospital to the Greenwich Village/Lower West Side area, which lacks one since St. Vincent’s closed in 2010. Admittedly, not everyone might like all of WestView’s coverage (e.g., stories on 7 World Trade Center “controlled demolition”).

Similarly, attorney Arthur Schwartz, Village View’s senior editor, has fought in the courts and in the pages of local community newspapers to keep Mount Sinai Health System from closing Beth Israel Hospital in Gramercy and replacing it with a new mini-hospital — and also closing its New York Eye and Ear Infirmary.

Hey…The Village Sun even broke the story of the turf war between tricycle-riding tykes and space-hogging pickleball players in Seravalli Playground — which the MSM soon followed. Just sayin’ . And how many outlets are consistently covering the ongoing old P.S. 64/CHARAS struggle? The Village Sun, EVGrieve, “The Torch”...not that many.

In short, local newspapers are making valuable contributions. That’s why people should support the Local Journalism Sustainability Act, which was due to be passed with the state budget by April 1, which might miss the deadline, though, as the governor and Dems reconcile policy and funding issues. The L.J.S.A., sponsored by state Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal and Assemblymember Carrie Woerner, would provide deep tax credits for newsroom salaries (50 percent the first year, 30 percent the next four).

If when you read this, the state budget still has not passed, call your state lawmakers and tell them you support the Local Journalism Sustainability Act. Help keep those Web sites and print presses going!

LETTERS

N.Y.U. not ‘blaming’

To The Editor:

Re “N.Y.U. center has array of uses, but no market”:

It was something of a surprise — or, if not a surprise, then certainly a disappointment — to see The V illage Sun characterize — or, more accurately, mischaracterize — the comments I provided in response to its questions about the Paulson Center and the supermarket.

To be c lear, I was asked by the Sun in January why there wasn’t a space for the supermarket in the Paulson Center, and I promptly responded with an explanation of the history of what had transpired. I quite intentionally didn’t ascribe blame to anyone or any entity, nor did I intimate fault or failing, and certainly not the city’s.

Quite the contrary, New York University has been working with local elected officials and the city in a good and productive partnership to explore potential solutions to preserve a supermarket at or near the current loc ation if the New York City School Construction Authority exercises its option on the site. Those good-faith efforts are clearly demonstrated by the extension that was agreed to in 2022 by N.Y.U. in order to provide time to resolve the issues involving the site.

John Beckman Beckman is senior vice president for public affairs, New York University

‘Cuttingedge’ residential

Construction on a new 19-story mixed-use building at 59 Henry St. on the Lower East Side topped out in mid-March. The 227-foot-tall project, located between Catherine and Market Streets, will have 80 residences and 26 parking spaces, with a little under half of the building’s total space — the first five floors — set aside for community-facility use.

‘Shaken to the core’

To The Editor:

Re “Breaking — literally: 5th Ave. work causes evacuation” (news article, March):

This incident sent shivers up my spine. I reside in one of four townhouses near the intersection of Third Street and Second Avenue. Our homes were shaken to the core with last year’s demolition of the former Church of the Nativity, its rectory and half of the former La Salle Academy on Second Avenue and Second Street. These buildings were the only ones never landmarked and developers salivated at the opportunity to build another hideous 12-story, luxury apartment complex.

The site was sold to the highest bidder, despite organized and passionate disapproval from the neighborhood, and now every residential building around it is in jeopardy of irreparable structural damage from the developers’ attempts to pile drive 10 feet from our foundations. We were shaken awake six days a week for months during demolition. The engineers are shameless in their flouting of agreements and promises. It is costly and soul crushing.

Holly Critchlow

Part of the plan?

To The Editor:

Re “Breaking — literally: 5th Ave. work causes evacuation” (news article, March):

I am guessing that the developers want to get 10 Fifth Ave. and 12 Fifth Ave. out of the way so they can incorporate the property into the structure of 14-16 Fifth Ave. Just a hunch.

Patricia McKee

‘Everyone’s against this!’

To The Editor:

Re “G shock: Link5G towers rollout roils West Village” (news article, March):

They are totally underestimating the opposition in the West Village and Meatpacking District! I have lived here for 25 years. I have a kid in a public school here and a dog I walk. I go to every community meeting and as many events as possible. Everyone is against this!

Rose Arce

Profit — not equity

To The Editor:

Re “G shock: Link5G towers rollout roils West Village” (news article, March):

The push for these towers in the Far West Village and Meatpacking is fueled entirely by the profit motive, not by “equity” or any other acceptable motives. There clearly are underserved communities elsewhere in NYC but we aren’t one of them. NO ONE WHO LIVES HERE NEEDS THEM OR WANTS THEM. The Office of Technology and Innovation failed to ask for community input — and then when they got it and didn’t like what they heard, they started trying to refute it and may well eventually ignore it entirely. We will not accept that result.

Jonathan Bell

The Village Sun welcomes readers’ letters of up to 250 words. Letters are subject to editing for length, clarity, grammar and factual accuracy. Anonymous letters will not be run in the print edition. Send letters to news@thevillagesun.com.

Photo by Roger Bultot

A different vision for West Side flood protection

TALKING POINT

BY TOM FOX

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers recently released a preliminary flood control plan for Manhattan’s West Side waterfront in Hudson River Park between Battery Park City and W. 34th Street. Their simplistic approach to resiliency is to build a 12-foot-high concrete wall along 3 miles of the waterfront — in the Hudson River Park.

The proposed wall would displace the busiest bike path in America, diminish public use and enjoyment of a $1 billion public park visited by 17 million people a year, impede public access to the river, increase air and noise pollution and block views of the river. It would significantly impact the desirability of the park, undermine the quality of life in adjacent neighborhoods, and erode the value of adjacent real estate and the city ’s tax base.

Let’s recall another West Side waterfront project. In 1985, after an 11-year legal battle forced the withdrawal of a U.S. Army Corps Westway permit for an interstate highway buried under 236 acres of landfill in the Hudson River, the governor and mayor established a unique city/state task force. That body brought together agency commissioners and local elected officials, along with community, environmental, business and civic stakeholders to craft a new vision for the West Side waterfront.

Their recommendations were visionary — build a surface-level boulevard and turn the waterfront into a world-class maritime park. The Hudson River Park transformed a dangerous and deteriorating waterfront, preserved the priceless Hudson estuary, made adjacent neighborhoods more livable, increased tourism, created jobs and enhanced the city’s tax base. That progress, and the continued vitality of adjacent West Side neighborhoods, will be undermined by the Army Corps’ current proposal.

In response, the Hudson River Park Advisory Council voted unanimously, on Feb. 13, to request that the governor and mayor establish a new city/ state task force to coordinate public infrastructure investments in order to prevent coastal flooding, protect the Hudson River Park, and redesign Route 9A to meet changing transportation needs without impacting traffic congestion.

The opportunity is unique because three public infrastructure projects could be critical to the future of the park, the estuary and adjacent West Side communities. There has been billions of dollars in public and private investment in the park and in adjacent communities. Coordinating the planning and implementation of major public infrastructure improvements is critical to protecting the benefits that the Hudson River Park has created.

West Side resiliency should include both in-water and shore-based measures. Given that 70 percent of the Hudson River Park is water, mitigating the impact of tidal surges should start in the park’s estuarine sanctuary. Existing natural systems must be preserved as we initiate

innovative environmental interventions, such as expanding the current oyster restoration initiative, ecological enhancement of near-shore environments, and wrapping pier piles and surfacing the bulkhead with materials that encourage and support the growth of marine and terrestrial flora and fauna.

The Army Corps regulates all construction in the waterway while the state Department of Environmental Conservation oversees the estuarine sanctuary. In 2018, the governor supported a $135 million estuarine research, restoration and protection plan recommended by the Hudson River Foundation. Roughly $35 million is being spent for new shoreline habitat at

ipal water treatment facilities, so stormwater and untreated household waste is discharged directly into the Hudson during periods of heavy rainfall. These discharges wreak havoc on the park’s marine and bird life and create unsanitary conditions for boaters and other park visitors.

A stormwater holding system, like the one installed at Brooklyn’s Paerdegat Basin, could provide a model. There, a city Department of Environmental Protection 48-inch sewer line captures and stores stormwater to prevent its discharge into Jamaica Bay. The sewage is then slowly routed to a wastewater treatment plant after the rainfall.

micro-mobility would support the current and future use of electric bicycles and scooters, food delivery and small, last-mile package delivery vehicles. That would also enhance pedal bicycle and pedestrian safety in the park. Thankfully, the new $1.2 trillion federal Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act included $110 billion to improve the nation’s transportation infrastructure and provide the opportunity to meet that need.

Hudson River Park has created tremendous benefits for the environment, adjacent communities, the city and the region’s economy. Redesigning Route 9A could create an opportunity to expand the park, as well. If the roadway can be narrowed, the park and its bicycle path can be expanded, increasing the opportunity for more creative, and natural, shore-based flood-control measures.

As a West Side Task Force member, I participated in the planning of Route 9A, which was designed to accommodate 1980s traffic levels. The tree-lined, 19-foot-wide median was designed to facilitate pedestrian safety and mitigate air and noise pollution from traffic. Now, the anticipated 20 percent reduction in traffic from congestion pricing argues for a narrower roadway, while new vehicles are trending toward electric propulsion, which is quiet and has no exhaust emissions.

Gansevoort Peninsula off of the Meatpacking District, ecological improvements at Tribeca’s Pier 26, oyster restoration and the design of an estuarium, also in Tribeca.

Last November, New Yorkers passed a

Almost 40 years ago, following the demise of the Westway project, the West Side Task Force recommended a surface boulevard to accommodate north-south traffic flow along the West Side corridor and enhance waterfront access for adjacent communities.

W ith less traffic, one vehicle lane and the median might be removed from the roadway. That would add 30 feet of width to the Hudson River Park. Except perhaps in the section from 14th to 23rd Streets, where the park is extremely narrow, expanding the park would provide room for creative, shore-based measures, such as 12-foot-high, reinforced landscaped berms to increase park elevations. If the new stormwater interceptor sewer can be integrated in the overall design, city Department of Environmental Protection bond funding could contribute toward shore-based measures and complement federal flood control funding secured by the U.S. Army Corps.

$4.2 billion environmental bond act that can help fund the restoration and protection of the park’s estuarine sanctuary and match any federal funding secured by the Army Corps for coastal protection. However, in-water environmental enhancements won’t succeed without substantially improving water quality. That requires stopping the routine discharge from 33 combined sewer outfalls that dump untreated waste directly into the Hudson River.

New York City’s combined sewer system mixes raw sewage with stormwater from local streets. Normally, that waste is routed to municipal wastewater treatment plants for processing. But too much water would overwhelm munic-

But few then envisioned the dramatic transformation of the Meatpacking District and Hudson Yards, redevelopment of Hudson Square, popular new attractions like the High Line and Little Island, or commercial offices at Pier 57. Back then, the state Department of Transportation’s primary concern was moving traffic along the West Side corridor, and they chose the least expensive roadway alternative. Fast-forward to today and development on both sides of the roadway has matured, both conventional biking and electric-powered micro-mobility have increased exponentially, and congestion pricing is expected to reduce Manhattan vehicular traffic below 60th Street by about 20 percent.

The roadway is fast approaching its planned 50-year lifespan. Meanwhile, local community boards, the Hudson River Park Advisory Council and the Manhattan Borough president have requested that one lane of Route 9A be dedicated for electric vehicles used to transport people or goods.

Repurposing Route 9A’s parking lane for

It’s premature to suggest specific designs for these public infrastructure improvements. The task force charged with this mission should be responsible for decision-making with the same meaningful, transparent community participation that created the Hudson River Park. Ultimately, all task force recommendations would need to be approved by the governor, mayor and other elected officials.

Taking a comprehensive approach to public infrastructure improvements on the West Side waterfront can prevent coastal flooding, enhance the public use and enjoyment of the Hudson River Park and redesign Route 9A to meet evolving traffic volumes and transportation needs.

Excelsior!

Fox was a Westway opponent and the first president of the Hudson River Park Conservancy, which completed the final plan and environmental approval of the park, and represents the City Club of New York on the Hudson River Park Advisory Council. His first-person history of the creation of the park will be published by Rutgers University Press in spring 2024.

A rendering by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers depicts a 12-foot-high floodwall in the Hudson River Park's Greenwich Village segment. U.S. Army Corps

Have a task force lead the process.

Comings & Goings: Robot sushi, birria & ‘updated Italian’

BY CAROLINE BENVENISTE

More casual Asian restaurants arrived this month, and more coffee shops appeared. Bleecker Street continues to be filled with women-owned businesses catering to women. A long-announced restaurant has finally opened, and a popular bar that closed a year ago has plans to return.

Top Openings:

MakiMaki Sushi – 350 Hudson St., between King and Charlton Streets

MakiMaki is a robotic sushi restaurant. The robots include one to measure and wash the rice, another to mix in the vinegar, a third to “print” the rice into the correct shape for rolls, and a final one to cut the rolls (although I did not see that one). The founder, Kevin Takarada, explained that he had been in finance, and before that he had worked as a mechanical engineer at Honda. As a child, he helped out in his parents’ restaurants in Miami. He had never wanted to work in the restaurant business because he felt the long hours were not conducive to a reasonable work/life balance. Yet, all his experience and training led him back to hospitality. He has brought in robots because they can make sushi much faster and more reliably than humans, and this helps to keep the price down. The Hudson Square location is the third in the city.

Pappas Taverna – 103 MacDougal St., between Bleecker Street and Minetta Lane

Stratis Morfogen has finally opened Pappas Taverna, in the large space that for years housed Panchito’s. It is named after a Greek restaurant that Stratis Morfogen’s grandfather and two great-uncles opened in 1910 on E. 14th Street. Pappas was initially slated to open in fall 2021, but the usual delays pushed it back a year and a half. The chef is Todd English, who used to have a number of restaurants in New York, including the Plaza Food Hall. That closed during the pandemic. English has some Italian ancestry on his mother’s side, but no discernable Greek connection, and the offerings are certainly not what one would expect from a traditional Greek restaurant. (Some oddities are lobster spanakopita and octopus souvlaki.) There is, however, a wood-burning oven, and on their Instagram page, Pappas explains, “Old style Greek Cooking started w our wood burning fire pits... We are bringing back that Greek culinary heritage to Pappas Taverna...” In addition to the regular menu there are $175 and $275 tasting menus, as well as the option to have any wine on the wine list served by the glass.

Bloom Chicken 162 W. Fourth St., at Cornelia Street

Bloom Chicken has a location in Hackensack, NJ, and has now come to the West Village. They offer Korean fried chicken with six different sauces (Soy Garlic, Sweet

& Spicy, S.O.S. Korean Spicy, Miso BBQ, Korean BBQ and Cheese Snow) and four different side sauces. There are a number of other menu options, like fried kimchi rice with bulgogi, burgers, spicy rice cakes and wasabi kimchi.

Also Open:

Food:

A reader writes to us about Mi Garba, a Tuscan restaurant that used to be in the Union Square area and has now reopened at 310 Bleecker St., between Grove and Bar-

Tacombi, on Bleecker Street, is now serving birria (meat stew) tacos with a dipping broth. Photos by Caroline

row Streets. She characterized the cuisine as “updated Italian,” and went on to say: “Food is excellent, staff is welcoming (Pier Boi, the manager/bartender), atmosphere is warm and relaxed, decor is simple but attractive, music (’40s jazz) is not quite too loud.” Matto Espresso (487 Sixth Ave., between 12th and 13th Streets) is a chain of coffee shops with more than two dozen locations in the city where all drinks and food are $2.50. The shop was giving out free coffee for the first two weeks after opening. Hercules Café (275 Bleecker St., between Morton and Jones Streets) is a different kind of coffee shop that serves bubble tea, waffles, iced coffee and smoothies. Pop-up Grocer (205 Bleecker St., at Sixth Avenue) is a strange store in that it is not actually a pop-up, and also because it sells a seemingly random assortment of products. The explanation could be that their “sourcing is guided by three core criteria: Is it new and interesting? Is it made responsibly? Does it look good?”

Retail:

Bag-All (353 Bleecker St., between West 10th and Charles Streets) is a women-run company that makes bags. Isalis (353 Bleecker St., between West 10th and Charles Streets) is also women-owned and sells clothing and home goods. Astr (345 Bleecker St., between Christopher and West 10th Streets)

also sells women’s clothing and features a wedding collection. Another store that sells wedding clothes is Sabyasachi Calcutta (160 Christopher St., between Greenwich and Washington Streets) but these are specifically for Indian weddings. The shop is gorgeous, as are the garments, with some prices in the five figures. This is noted Indian designer Sabyasachi Mukherjee’s first store outside of India.

Closed:

The Subway on Seventh Avenue at West 13th Street is gone, and a sign in the window promises that a Bagel Rx is coming soon. Rag & Bone has left 100 Christopher St., between Bleecker and Bedford Streets.

Coming Soon:

The owners of Silver Apricot are applying for a liquor license for a new project called Figure Eight. The location will be next door in the old Pearl Oyster Bar space (18 Cornelia St., between W. 4th and Bleecker Streets). Neighbors received an email from Silver Apricot asking them to sign a petition in favor of a liquor license. Raising Cane’s (10 Astor Place, at Lafayette Street) is a Baton Rouge, Louisiana-based spot that sells chicken fingers and crinkly fries. It is going in the space that was a Walgreens and, before that, the previous home of Astor Place Wines & Spirits. According to a liquor license application, L’Artusi Supper Club is planning to open at 105 Christopher St., between Bleecker and Bedford Streets, where I Sodi is now. In the application, the L'Artusi folks explain the expansion plans thus: “We have more demand that we can fulfill at L’Artusi and would like to create L’Artusi Supper Club that allows for the L’Artusi experience in a more intimate, communal, family style setting. Our intention is to offer

both classic and new L’Artusi dishes created by our long time chef, Joe Vigorito. We also plan to host winemaker dinners, guest chef dinners and also private events from time to time.” According to The New York Times, Angel’s Share, a popular cocktail bar that was located on the second floor of a Japanese restaurant on Stuyvesant Street, through a hidden door, will be reopening at 45 Grove St., at Bleecker Street. The bar was opened by Japanese restaurateur Tony Yoshida, who also opened many of the Japanese restaurants on E. Ninth Street, all of which have now closed. The new location will be owned by his daughter, Erina Yoshida. Talea Beer Co. has three locations in Brooklyn, and will be opening their next one at 102 Christopher St., between Bleecker and Bedford Streets. They claim to be NYC’s only female-founded brewery.

Moved/Other:

In 2019, a food truck called Birria-Landia appeared in Jackson Heights. This was the first time that most New Yorkers had been introduced to birria tacos, crispy corn tortillas filled with meat stew and served with a dipping broth. Now, birria tacos are widely available, and the most recent entry to the game is Tacombi, at 355 Bleecker St., at Cornelia Street. Their version is excellent and definitely worth a try, particularly during happy hour (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. on weekdays) when drink deals are also available. Joe’s Pizza has a number of locations in New York, but recently, while in Tel Aviv, I noticed a storefront with a Joe’s Pizza logo that looked like it was on the verge of opening.

Please let us know if you’ve noticed any activity. You can let us know at vsuncandg@ gmail.com. We are looking forward to hearing from you!

Korean fried chicken with tangy sauces at Bloom Chicken.

Benveniste

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

Jesse Malin and friends ‘Self Destruct’

BY EVERYNIGHT CHARLEY CRESPO

Jesse Malin, a singer-songwriter and revered mainstay in New York’s music scene, celebrated the 20th anniversary of his debut solo album, “The Fine Art of Self Destruction,” at a sold-out Webster Hall on March 25. Lucinda Williams, Butch Walker, Tommy Stinson of the Replacements, Adam Weiner of Low Cut Connie, Aaron Lee Tasjan, Cait O’Riordan of the Pogues, Catherine Popper of Puss n Boots and Diane Gentile of Diane & the Gentle Men were among the musicians who joined Malin on stage.

Fantastic Cat, comprised of four local singer-songwriters, Don DiLego, Anthony D’Amato, Brian Dunne and Mike Montali, opened the night with a half hour of folk-rock songs from the band’s 2022 debut album, “The Very Best of Fantastic Cat.” After an intermission, Malin’s band took the stage to bac k three of Malin’s musician friends, each of whom covered one of Malin’s songs. Cait O’Riordan, formerly of the Pogues, sang “Shane,” a song Malin wrote for the late Shane MacGowan of the Pogues. Catherine Popper of Puss n Boots sang “Swinging Man.” Aaron Lee Tasjan sang “Shining Down.”

After a second intermission, Malin performed a lengthy set, singing the songs from his debut album along with other songs. As always, Malin told numerous anecdotal stories between songs.

Tommy Stinson of the Replacements joined Malin on “State of the Art ” and “Meet Me at the End of the World Again.” Butch Walker sang on “Modern World.” Lucinda Williams sang on “Room 13” and “Jukebox.” All the guests returned to the stage for covers of Johnny Thunders’s “You Can’t Put ms Around a Memory” and The Clash’s “Rudie Can’t Fail.”

Malin, who is originally from Queens, first came to the East Village as a 12-year-old member of the band Heart Attack. He later relocated to the East Village and led two bands, D Generation and Jesse Malin & the Saint Marks Social. More recently, he has partnered with local entrepreneurs as part owner of several East Village bars, some of which feature live-music nights. Locals often call Malin the Mayor of the East Village music scene.

For more of Everynight Charley Crespo’s coverage of the city’s music scene, check out TheManhattanBeat.blogspot.com.

Jesse Malin with Butch Walker at Webster Hall on March 25.

Photos by Everynight Charley Crespo

Jesse Malin with Lucinda Williams.

Cait O'Riordan performing at Webster Hall.

CHARAS’s artistic spirit lives in new murals

ART

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Local artists, including former squatter documentarian Seth Tobocman, painted murals on the front side of the old P.S. 64, the former CHARAS El Bohio Community and Cultural Center, on E. Ninth Street east of Avenue B. Among the artworks was one of the late Armando Perez, CHARAS’s former artistic director, who vowed he would die before seeing the building taken away from the Puerto Rican-led

activist group.

The historic structure has sat in limbo for 25 years under the ownership of developer Gregg Singer, who bought it at a public auction in 1998, then went on to evict Perez’s group. A judge’s effort to force an auction of the property was recently foiled at the last minute when Singer declared Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization. Other murals depict women exercising and people playing music, just some of the activities that used to occur at the place and could again, if the building is reacquired as a community center, as activists and local politicians are urging.

Photos by Bonnie Rosenstock

Sound and vision at ‘Take Heed’ closing event

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Jennifer Elster’s exhibition “Take Heed,” at The Development Gallery, at 75 Leonard St. in Tribeca, has been described as “evoking urgent

To quote a Bowie song title, the closing reception for “Take Heed,” on March 16, was an evening of “sound and vision.” Dynamic performances played into the timeline of the art exhibited.

The evening began with Elster playing her recently deceased uncle’s chimes and making a spoken-word performance out of her artist’s statement. Chief Dwaine Perry of the Ramapough Lunaape Nation offered a blessing of peace on the space and a blessing for all in the gallery to be lifted into the light. Next came performances by classical pianist Nargiz Aliyarova playing a piece by Chopin and an Azerbaijani work, plus Heide Hatry and Jane LeCroy performing poetry, and Mike Handelman on electric guitar joining Elster for interactive poetry and songs to conclude the evening.

Chief Perry and Elster, who met through a mutual friend, have known each other for several years. He’s one of the subjects in her upcoming film series, “In the Woods (and Elsewhere).”

The exhibit, which will stay up through April 12, can be viewed by private appointment, Tuesday through Sunday, from noon to 7 p.m. E-mail AtachiAtTheDevelopment@ gmail.com or call 212-524-9281. Visit ChannelELSTER. com/art-gallery for more information about The Development Gallery’s next exhibition, program and virtual tours.

Artist Jennifer Elster with Chief Dwaine Perry of the Ramapough Lunaape Nation. Photos by Alex Korolkovas

Nargiz Aliyarova performed classical pieces. The artist played her late uncle’s chimes.

The crowd watched the performances.

Jennifer Elster with spoken-word artists Heide Hatry, left, and Jane LeCroy.

Robin Hirsch on the Cornelia Street Café and beyond

BY HANNAH REIMANN

The Cornelia Street Café, an artistic home to thousands of performers, artists, writers and many others for more than 41 years, a restaurant with great food, and a wine bar that was well before its time with more than 35 wines by the glass, was a mecca of artistic and culinary activity, creativity and good times. Suzanne Vega, Eve Ensler, Arturo O’Farrill, David Amram and Oliver Sacks are only a few of the many luminaries who cultivated their craft and benefited from the space and the spirit of Cornelia. I had the pleasure of reminiscing with my friend Robin Hirsch about many things, past and present.

HR: Tell our younger readers and others that don’t know in a nutshell about Cornelia Street Café and your experience there.

RH: Three of us who were all starving artists opened a little one-room cafe with a toaster oven shortly after The Mayflower (actually, 1977). Because we were artists and all kinds of other artists watched us clean out the Augean stables for more than two months, when we opened we realized that we might actually have a space where all kinds of artists could perform. Literally, from day one there were clown shows on the street outside, there were puppeteers inside, there were classical musicians, there were songwriters, there was every kind of performer doing stuff in a tiny, one-room cafe where every customer had to shut the f--- up. And out of that grew something which meant a lot to quite a lot of people, including me. It enabled me to come out of the closet as a writer and performer in New York.

We grew from one room to two rooms and to three rooms and then, eventually, quite famously, Senator Eugene McCarthy, who happened to be a poet, came to read his poetry there together with another poet, Siv Cedering.

We realized, even if we kept it to ourselves, that word would get out, so we went “Clean for Gene” and cleared out our basement. That poetry reading was the first thing we ever did down there.

HR: What came first, the food, the wine or the performances?

RH: The performances. I think it was two years before we had a wine license. And five years before we had a proper kitchen.

HR: What are your feelings and thoughts since the closing of Cornelia Street Café four years ago at this time?

RH: I’m overcome with waves of grief, nostalgia and gratitude.

HR: What have you been doing since it closed?

RH: Dreaming up things which can essentially continue the spirit of the cafe, even after the pandemic hit, which was 15 months later. The legendary David Amram,

as we were in the throes of closing, said, “I’m going to call you ‘Cornelia Street in Exile’ and I will follow you wherever you go.”

That’s what we have been since then. We did a whole slew of shows in Brooklyn. We did an outdoor music festival in the Meatpacking District. We did one of my little solo performances at the Integral Yoga Institute. We did a Purim Fest at The Bitter End, aptly named because it was the last show that we did before the pandemic closed everybody down three days later.

HR: If you could wave a magic wand, what would you create now?

RH: In a dream, it would be lovely to have another physical space where I was not responsible for the rent, for battling vile landlords, and where the sheer energy of New York’s extraordinary range of performers could flourish in a space that nurtured them.

One of the things I said on the last night from the stage was, first of all, to congratulate the audience and the performers for having collectively created with us a physical space where people got together in the flesh, something that no virtual space could possibly match.

HR: Tell us about your books. Where can they be found?

RH: My first book was a Holocaust-related memoir called “Last Dance at the Hotel Kempinski.” Every single word of that was written to be read at the cafe. It’s possibly the only Holocaust memoir to have been called “very funny” by The New York Times. My parents escaped from Hitler, from Berlin. Those of my family who survived (and quite a lot of them did not) were scattered across the globe. So, in some ways for me, actually planting a physical foot on the island of Manhattan 32 years after the war had ended, was an incredibly important psychological step.

Book number two was a riotous thing that I did with my kids when they were 7 and 10 at the time. We wrote a book of

poetry called “F E G: Stupid Poems for Intelligent Children,” which has very learned footnotes. It’s all about language and great fun. I just weirdly did a reading for pre-K kids in Manhattan of “F E G” a week ago. It was great fun to do.

Publishing being what it is, these books can occasionally be found on Amazon.

The upcoming third book is a collection of pieces with the working title, “The Whole World Passes Through: Stories from the Cornelia Street Cafè.” It’s been in the works for a very long time. Portions of it have been published in various journals and papers.

It’s essentially what happens to a wandering Jew, namely me, when he finally stands still and opens the doors. The whole world passed through those doors. The collection won an international literary award from the Café Royal Cultural Foundation. That has not brought me any nearer a publisher, however, so…one foot at a time.

HR: If anyone reading this knows of a publisher who might be interested in this volume, please reach out to us here at The Village Sun (news@thevillagesun.com).

HR: What can you tell me about a film that is being made about you?

RH: At least five years ago a filmmaker named Michael Jacobsohn, who has a similar background to mine, approached me about making a film. He is also Jewish and his family fled Hamburg for Palestine, even-

tually landing in the U.S. — also in New York. Michael wanted to address his own background by at least alluding to it through my story. He’s been interviewing me for years. While he was filming me, the cafe went through this excruciating business of closing, which, I have to say, in a weird way, had terrible ontological echoes of what happened to my parents, who lost everything. I mean, this is not a holocaust, etc., etc., but I think that Michael has realized that there are a lot of echoes. He has been filming and interviewing a lot of people about their relationship to the cafe and, perhaps, what it meant to them.

HR: What else would you like to share with our readers?

RH : I think what we built over a very long period — more than 41 years — grew organically. We had no idea that this would last for that long, that it would become a restaurant, bar, a performance space and so forth. I think there’s an enormous virtue in not knowing. So I can’t say I’ve advised my younger son, who has retired at the age of 30 from Google, what to do next. Maybe he can publish my book. I’ve never had a plan in my life. I put one foot in front of the other, trip, and then I go there. That has served me in very good stead, partly because I don’t like planning but partly — and more importantly — because it has allowed me to simply reap what was being sown completely unbeknownst to me.

A portrait of Robin Hirsch by the artist Lutka, who frequented the Cornelia Street Café in its heyday.

Robin Hirsch reading from his “Cafe Stories” at La Sala de Pepe in December 2022. Photo by Michael Jacobsohn

New York grit, magical realism mix in new novel

BOOKS

BY THE VILLAGE SUN

Awork of fiction that reads like a memoir, “Urban Folk Tales: Stories by Y. Rodriguez,” celebrates ordinary individuals living extraordinary lives in New York City. Mixed with magical and spiritual realism, each story is rich in content, yet told in an informal style that reminds readers of the ancient folklore tradition. Taking its cue from Gabriel Garcia Marquez and “The Brothers Karamazov,” “Urban Folk Tales” provides an escape from reality without sacrificing truthfulness or relevance in today’s cultural consciousness.

As a wor ld-builder, Y. Rodriguez has a passion for storytelling and an appreciation for life’s complexities and nuances. As she tells readers in her author’s note: “All of the stories in my book ‘Urban Folk Tales’ are based upon many of these encounters, some of which were so extraordinarily unbelievable that I had to use the fictitious components of magical and spiritual realism to understand and explain them.” While each story offers its own New York City microcosm, the overall thematic content reminds us that some moments in life — and all of its struggles — are

universal.

In “Laura and the Kickboxer,” a chance encounter on the N train changes the destiny of two people lucky enough to find each other. Laura and David long to be seen by the rest of the world and make small talk on the N train filled with second chances only found in New York. In later stories, reality dissolves into scenes of magical realism as we travel to the most sacred of all spaces, the neighborhood nail salon, in “The Manicurist.” Inez struggles with her clairvoyance as both a dangerous secret and an opportunity to help others. When a neighborhood tragedy severs the bonds of safety and community, Inez’s past reappears to complicate her present secret. In “The Man Who Dreamed Too Much,” the main character loses himself to his subconscious desires, leading to a battle between good and evil. Heartbroken Eddie prefers his dream world to his waking world, but doesn’t quite understand the sacrifice it entails.

As in the best fiction, there is an illustrative juxtaposition between joy and pain, desperation and faith, life and violence. Every character must participate in the nuances of tragedy, love and survival via the miraculous and the mundane scenes that play up

and down the avenues of New York City. For example, “The Manicurist,” while including the fantastical, is rooted in realism through its historical and social tragedies.

As Rodriguez explains, “Inez’s story is told both in the present day and with the use of flashbacks about her life in El Salvador, where her family faced political and religious persecution at the hands of an American-backed oligarchy during the 12-year war that sanctioned oppressive, sociopolitical institutions, such as the Catholic Church, as manifested in the story by the cruel Father Everett.”

The neighborhood tragedy at a nightclub, another premonition that Inez struggles to prevent from happening, is a historical reference to the Happy Land Fire, which killed 87 Hispanics. The fictional lives — and the real ones they are meant to honor — are safe and protected in Y. Rodriguez’s capable hands.

In a world filled with too much content and little substance, “Urban Folk Tales: Stories” is fiction for a better world. Its mission is to create memorable tales that inspire empathy for all people, especially those with few voices in mainstream media. Like all folklore, these stories are meant to be heard until they become part of the strata that is New York City.

Y. Rodriguez was born in Manhattan to Puerto Rican parents and has lived on the Lower East Side and other New York City neighborhoods. She is a published, produced and award-winning playwright and director who has had her plays produced in Off Broadway theater companies, such as Theater for the New City, The Public Theater and La MaMa. Rodriguez is also a published poet and a professional musician and songw riter who performs with her band, AYOKA, in venues throughout Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Karen’s Quirky Style: Riding the Fanelli carousel

FASHION

BY KAREN REMPEL

Adear friend from Jersey City took me to the beloved Fanelli Cafe on an early trip to New York. It was nighttime and glowing spots of candlelight lit the winter-dark cafe. Mike told me stories about the cafe, leaning close over the red-checked tablecloth. We naturally progressed to sharing stories of our own history, drinking Chianti and feeling part of the magic stretching back to 1847 when a grocery store opened in a wooden building at this location.

The original structure at 94 Prince St. was replaced with brick in 1857. There have been corner stores serving liquor, saloons, taverns and “porter houses”— so called because they served a style of beer called porter — on this spot continuously since 1847. In 1922, Michael Fanelli arriv ed and christened the cafe with his family name. Fanelli’s legitimately makes the claim that it’s the second-oldest watering hole in NYC.

The Fanel li family sold the business to Hans Noe after 60 years, and now Noe’s son Sasha operates it. Noe treasures New York history and retained the name and the red neo n sign that’s beckoned plenty of weary workers and hun -

gry artists in from the cold. Fanelli’s has a w el l-researched history that cites various city records and published narratives to establish its claim. In comparison, the Bridge Cafe opened in 1794, but closed in 2012 after being flooded by Hurricane Sandy. Pete's Tavern dates from 1864 and McSorley's Ale House from 1854. The Ear Inn is NYC’s oldest bar, continuously serving since 1817.

Fanel li’s operated as a speakeasy during Prohibition, and became a favorite of artists and Beat poets in the Sixties, when Paula Cooper had a gallery nearby. Fanelli’s was a popular place to hang out before and after performances at the gallery, though this was subject to Mike Fanel li's unpredictable whims regarding closing time. Bartender Bob Bozic was an attraction from 1990 until he retired in 2016.

“Fanelli’s is what people expect a bar in New York to be like,” Bozic said, “and I’m what they expect a bartender to be like.” According to The New York Times’s Alex Vadukul, Bob was often rude — refusing to make cocktails that required more than two ingredients — but he’d pour you a free drink for answering his trivia questions. Plus he’d hit on your girlfriend!

This romantic dress in shades of rosy orange creamsicle always evokes bliss for

me. When I wear it, I feel part of the whirling merry-go-round of life with all its flashing colors — the pleasure of

immersing fully into life that New York demands of us. The bustle of Soho on a Saturday is Immersion 101, with artists and artisans selling their wares on the sidewalk and the crowds strolling by, happy to have a day off to savor the scene. Here’s a guy sipping his beer at Fanelli’s primo outdoor table, with his stylin’ dog wearing a fine coat with a pocket and turned-up collar. The guys are catwalking their pricey hip-casual duds and superhot hairstyles. Life is a carousel, old chum. Jump on the carousel!

Rempel is a New-York based writer and artist. For her past columns and more Philip Maie r photos, see karenqs. nyc.

Style Notes

• Swirly orange creamsicle dress with rosy watercolor flowers and draped neckline. The Bay, Vancouver, British Columbia.

• Jimmy Choo silver platform sling-back sandals. Jimmy Choo sample sale, 123 W. 18th St.

• Pink pearl drop earrings with silver Art Deco detailing. Penny Whillans Designs, Victoria, BC.

• Silver bangle with double row of tiny rhinestones. Starlin New York, 206 E. Sixth St.

Y. Rodriguez.

West Village model Karen Rempel squirms with the sheer pleasure of summerlike bliss in a sea of winter men at Fanelli’s Cafe in Soho. Photo by Philip Maier

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Scooby Scoop

IN BRIEF

V.I.D. PRESIDENCY: There’s been a changing of the guard at the top of the storied Village Independent Democrats club. Jonathan Geballe is the club’s new president, succeeding the unique co-presidency of Mar Fitzgerald and Cameron Krause, who led the club for the past two years. Geballe, an evenkeeled attorney, is a former district leader and club president. Maybe not everyone knows, but he originally came to New York City to be a guitar player.

COMMUNITY BOARD (MUSICAL)

CHAIRS: After two years leading Greenwich Village’s Community Board 2, Jeannine Kiely is stepping down (per the board’s voluntary term limit) to be succeeded by Susan Kent, the first vice chairperson. Kent ran for office unopposed. David Gruber, a former C.B. 2 chairperson, praised Kiely as “a ball of energy” and Kent as having “the right temperament to be chair[person]. She’s fair, level-headed.” Former Councilmember Alan Gerson, a leader of the Save Our Supermarket (S.O.S.) effort to keep the Morton Williams store at Bleecker Street and LaGuardia Place and another former C.B. 2 chairperson, also called Kiely a “very impressive” board chairperson. Gruber said, though, that the all-volunteer body will suffer a big loss when Bob Ely, the longtime co-chairperson of its State Liquor Authority committee, as expected, steps down. “There will be a hole in the community when he leaves,” he said. “He has been doing this for 10 or 12 years and I think he wants to move on with his life.” We’ll never forget that epic committee meeting where the late Tom Connor accused Ely of badgering him over Connor’s support for an alcohol application — was it for Zero Bond? — but it actually turned out that Connor, due to his hearing loss and the echoey acoustics in the Our Lady of Pompeii Church basement, actually had just misheard a lot of what Ely said. C.B. 2 also has finally hired a new district manager (head staff member), Mark Diller, who succeeds the man, the legend Bob Gormley. He’s a lawyer and formerly chaired the Upper West Side’s C.B. 7. Meanwhile, over at the East Side’s Community Board 3, Michelle Kuppersmith has stepped down as the S.L.A. Committee chairperson, to anti-bar watchdogs’ rejoicing. Some say it was due to a disagreement with District Manager Susan Stetzer, but the latter told us, “There was no falling out and Michelle’s decisions had nothing to do with me.”

There has also been a shakeup at the top of the board, with Paul Rangel not only bailing as chairperson but ditching the board altogether.

The new chairperson is Tareake Dorill

‘WHAT’S GOIN’ ON?’ As if you haven’t read enough about Arthur Schwartz and the ongoing WestView News/Village View clash, the Greenwich Village district leader celebrated the big 7-Oh at Turkuaz restaurant on W. 53rd St. on Feb. 12. His young-

er, accountant brother Ray was there, along with their mother, 100, who was scrolling away on her cell phone in her wheelchair, and his daughters and son, plus a cousin, whom Schwartz remembered going to the Fillmore East with to see bands when they were young, “for $3!” he recalled incredulously. His wife, Kelly Craig, an actor-turned-real estate broker, was by his side. The group also included friends, neighbors and people from WBAI radio (Schwartz hosts a show and is the station’s attorney), staffers from his law office and writers from his new breakaway newspaper, like Brian Pape. Ray Cline of the Village Reform Democratic Club and Save Our Supermarket, also made the scene. He noted that more than 8,200 locals have now signed the petition to keep the Morton Williams supermarket at or near its current location at Bleecker and LaGuardia Place. Schwartz said, in a bit of exciting news for him, that the Village Independent Democrats, for once, have actually endorsed him for reelection as district leader. He noted he’s been forging a good relationship with his co-district leader, V.I.D.’er Jenn Hoppe. Meanwhile, negotiating the boundaries of his Part A with Part B, which is represented by District Leader Jeannine Kiely was a challenge, he said, noting, “Jeannine is a tough negotiator.” Schwartz’s bro Ray told us the story of how their mom once did Marvin Gaye’s toenails. The two lived in the same building in Santa Monica, CA, and during an elevator ride Gaye mentioned he was having issues with his nails. She gave him a pedicure and also abraded his heel calluses. At 100, she’s still a doctor of pediatric medicine (D.P.M.) in good standing. Also at the party was Miranda Ordonez, who was the youngest City Council candidate, at age 20, in 2021. Schwartz said she’s an up-and-comer in the mold of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Also in the house were W. 13th Street activist David Marcus and Lindsey Boylan, the former candidate for borough president and Congress who made the first sexual-misconduct accusation against Andrew Cuomo.

‘CORNELIA STREET’ CRASHES:

Well, we saw “Cornelia Street,” the new musical by Simon Stephens and Mark Eitzel, at the Atlantic Theater’s Stage 2 in Chelsea last month, and we can safely say it’s not that much of a “rip-off” of Robin Hirsch and his former Cornelia Street Café.

On the other hand, we didn’t really enjoy the show. Neither did the critics. In fact, we haven’t seen scathing reviews like this since “Spinal Tap.” In the observer.com, Brian Cote sniffed, “A talented cast is trapped by cringe material,” calling the show “aimless tedium” and “dreadful” and complaining there’s too much talking about “friggin’ balls.” Not surprisingly, after a short run, “Cornelia Street” closed March 5.

Only when cocaine dealing was thrown into the mix was there any momentum — at least some suspense and danger had been add-

ed. Some theater critics up from Philly sitting behind us just grumbled when asked their thoughts on the show.

To his credit as a Brit, Stephens at least picked the relevant theme of a small business struggling to stay afloat amid New York City’s hypergentrification (though wasn’t that the real cafe’s story, too?). And he tossed in some references to lesser-known local landmarks — like the former tow pound at Pier 76 — kind of neat. But, over all…nah.

The set, at least, did resemble the real Cornelia Street Café. There was the front door, with its three horizontal brass bars (though the gold-leaf lettering said Marty’s Cafe) and the awning with its red-and-white stripes. However, the lead character, Jacob (Norbert Leo Butz) was a rough-and-tumble chef from New Jersey, not at all like Hirsch, the cultured and witty, Oxford-educated artistic impresario and non-chef of the former Greenwich Village venue. And, unlike the real cafe, Marty’s didn’t feature a basement cabaret space with an array of entertainers. Like the real cafe, though, Marty’s was facing eviction due to rising rent. The landlord counseled Jacob: “The Village is gone. Maybe [try] Red Hook,” and that he should ditch food and “just do drinks.”

One character that rang true was Patti (Lena Pepe), a former flame of Jacob’s, who, older now and sporting a lush mane of white hair, formerly discoed fabulously at Studio 54. “This was the one place I feel needed,” she said. Hirsch and Stephens had a sit-down, for tea of course, at Tea & Sympathy, on Greenwich Avenue, before the show opened. Hirsch had felt left out of the loop upon learning over the summer that a musical named after his erstwhile establishment was about to hit the stage. As The Village Sun previously reported, Stephens hung out at Cornelia Street Café, soaking up the place’s atmosphere, during its swan song.

The upshot was that Hirsch read his “Cafe Stories” at one of the theater’s off nights. “Simon made a really gracious introduction [before the reading],” he said. “I think we really healed whatever rift had grown between us.”

As for what got Stephens onto the cafe in the first place, Hirsch said the playwright had met Kristen Abate, who grew up on the block and worked at the hotel where Stephens was staying, and who ushered at Cornelia Street Café during its final days.

V.I.D. transition: Jonathan Geballe and Mar Fitzgerald. Photo by The Village Sun

Maggie’s rescue and how to better protect your pets

us,” the neighbors who took her said.

I see Sheila in the neighborhood.

BY LYNN PACIFICO

This is a true story.

Years ago, George, a quiet professor, lived above me with his little beagle Maggie. They were devoted to each other, and it was a pleasure to encounter them since George always had something pleasant to say and Maggie was adorable.

George passed away in his apartment and since he left no instructions on who was to take Maggie, police took her to Manhattan Animal Care and Control. Poor Maggie’s beloved guardian had died. Alone and grieving, she stood by George until he was discovered. Then strangers took her away from her home and everything she knew. MACC is filled with the sights and smells of fear, illness and death and loud sounds, including the desperate wails of many dogs in distress. This would be terrifying for any dog, but especially for

Some information to include on an “In case of emergency” form is listed below. Keep a copy on your fridge, in your wallet, in your pet’s go bag, and if you can, on you when you are out, especially with your pet. Update as necessary and send updates to the vet, daycare, boarding and all emergency contacts.

coddled, little Maggie.

Neighbors, including Maggie’s dog walker, Sheila Sim (who had stopped by to feed a cat), stood in front of the building in shock at George’s sudden death. I noticed the determined look on Sheila’s face. First she called Maggie’s best friend’s owners, who had a car. Then she called Maggie’s vet, who wrote a letter stating that Sheila was Maggie’s “in case of emergency” person. This letter allowed them to rescue Maggie from the pound (MACC). On returning, Maggie tilted her head back and let out a long, hauntingly mournful wail. I will never forget it.

Maggie’s heart was broken, but she was home. Her dog walker was her hero. And the kind neighbors, who had helped with her rescue and who owned Maggie’s play buddy, took her in. Respect and appreciation to Sheila and people who adopt suddenly homeless canine neighbors. If that happens more, shelters might not be in such dire crisis.

I spoke with Evrim Can, the 6th Pre-

cinct’s head Community Affairs officer, about how the police handle a situation like Maggie’s. He told me that unless there are written “in case of emergency” instructions that give authority over a pet to someone, then, out of concern for the animal, the responding officers take the pet to the pound. He also said that if there is a will, then that, along with the pet’s information, should always be left in a visible place.

Maggie’s case is unusual since most pets in this situation, whose owners do not keep pet info organized and visible (on their fridge is good), and who do not have a dog walker as capable as Sheila, sadly end up in the pound. These pets are in shock after losing their person. They are confused, not sure why they are at the horrible place. They watch ceaselessly for a familiar face to come for them. They tremble, cry, refuse to eat, cower at the back of their cell/cage. It is traumatic at best and many dogs, and most cats, do not make it out alive. Maggie was a very lucky pup. Does your dog walker know who your dog’s vet is?

It is our duty, as loving pet guardians, to keep our pets out of the pound by providing a safety net in case of our incapacitation. There is peace of mind in knowing that if something happened to you, someone would move heaven and earth to see that your pets are safe and taken care of going forward. Maggie lived out her life

in the building where she had always lived, in a sweet little family, with her canine sister, Annie.

“We were so happy to have Maggie with

Things to include: Owner/guardian information (name, phone number, e-mail address, physical address); owner’s next of kin with contact info; emergency contact to take charge of pet with contact info; an emergency contact nearby for temporary help/care for pet; veterinarian (name, phone, e-mail, address); emergency contact alternatives; Pet #1 name; type of animal — describe (include recent photo), breed/mix, weight, birthday/age, preferred food/brand, feeding schedule, walk schedule, current vaccination/expiration date, dog license number, dog microchip number, estate planning (do you have a trust set up for your pet?); medications, dosage, timing; pet’s hiding place(s); certifications; behavioral issues; misc notes; location of pet’s go bag, crates, carriers, papers; location of pet’s walking gear: leashes and harness/collar, coats, etc.; Pet #2 name and info.

Pacifico is a fourth-generation Villager who loves dogs, nature and New York City.

Maggie, lower right, was adopted by a neighboring couple, above, after her owner died — but not before a harrowing trip to the pound. Unlike

dogs

weren’t so lucky, Maggie was saved from the pound.

Sheila Sim, Maggie’s dog walker, got a letter from the pooch’s vet that allowed the little beagle to be saved from Animal Care and Control.