By Brian J. Pape, AIA In the Two Bridges area of the Lower East Side, a collection of five new residential towers are planned to include over 3,000 apartments, with retail stores at the base of each project, with 700 affordable units in the mix. However, in December 2018, City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, Manhattan
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Congestion Pricing & Access-a-Ride: Tech Breakthroughs
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, LEED-AP Have you adjusted to the “Sharing Economy” yet? In NYC, the Taxi & Limousine Commission (TLC) is supposed to control the ride-hail world, but what has happened? Well, this has been a year, or decade, of turmoil in the ride-hail/ride-share world. The TLC oversaw 143,674 for-hire vehicles in 2015,
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Why I Am Supporting Bernie—Again
By Arthur Z. Schwartz On a cold Saturday, the first weekend in March, I trekked out to Brooklyn College to attend Bernie Sanders’ announcement that he was running for President in 2020. I had been Bernie’s NY State Counsel in 2016 and had attended the Democratic Convention as a Sanders’ pledged delegate, but I wondered
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Do Not Legalize Sex Work!
By Carol Yost Two op eds about the current state of affairs in the field of sex work appeared recently, a week apart, in the Daily News. The one published March 1, 2019, by Melanie Thompson, a sex trafficking survivor, was given the title “Hell no to legal prostitution.” On March 8, 2019, the op
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Rage, Rage Against Croman
By Cynthia Chaffee and Mary Ann Miller Whenever a New York restaurant closes, look under the nearest rock and you’ll usually find Steve Croman, the notorious landlord who just spent several months in jail—not at Rikers where he was supposed to go, but at the Manhattan correctional center, a.k.a. “The Tombs.” Add to the mix Eytan
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Death By Architecture
By Ananth Sampathkumar Partner NDNY Architecture + Design New York is going through an architectural renaissance right now. The most famous architects from around the world are designing bespoke buildings and infrastructure for the city. The new designs range from museums to skyscrapers and even waterfront piers. The West Village has benefited from the signature
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Eviction by Property Tax
DEATH AND TAXES—A cry of pain from George Capsis Neither can be avoided but one can offer considerable and protracted pain. So when I received a very well written plea for help from a neighbor who was facing an impossible-to- pay jump in real estate taxes to almost $51,000, I sent an e-mail to Chief
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A Sad Farewell to Beloved Cornelia Street Café
by Karen Rempel On January 1, 2019, hundreds of patrons and performers from every decade of the Cornelia Street Café’s 41 years of creative explosion gathered for a final burst of celebration and communion. Many took the stage on the final evening, including the luminary award-winning recording artist Suzanne Vega. She sang “Tom’s Diner,” which
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L Train—14th Street Project Update and Aftermath
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, LEED-AP After months of valiant and sustained efforts to save their neighborhoods from an ill-advised MTA/DOT scheme for an L Train shutdown planned to start April 2019, local citizens persuaded Governor Cuomo to seek a 3rd opinion from engineers. Engineers recommended alternate plans, which do not require full shut-downs. Since
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Elizabeth Street Gardens: A Classic Double-Cross?
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, LEED-AP Neighbors of the Elizabeth Street Garden (ESG), in the NOHO and Special Little Italy District (SLID), have expressed their concern that years of promises and being ignored have brought about a fiasco of controversy. CB2 joined in recapping the disingenuous way the city has mistreated this district at its
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Mayor de Blasio Waves His Baton Over New York City
By J. Taylor Basker At Symphony Space, punctuated by cadences of applause, our Mayor revealed his new orchestration of the citizens of NYC. In his sixth State of the City speech, Bill de Blasio promised New Yorkers a better life. NYC should be a model for the rest of the country that is descending into
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Can Words Repair a Broken City?
By George Capsis Attorney Arthur Schwartz sent me an e-mail offering an interview with Jumaane Williams who is running, along with 22 others, for the post of Public Advocate. With election day fast approaching (Tuesday February 26th), I ask Arthur “does he have a chance,” and Arthur replied back “sure, he is number one.” Public Advocate is a
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What You Need to Know About Emergency Rooms and Urgent Care Facilities
By Joy Pape Many people have some confusion about the difference between an emergency room and an urgent care facility. Even I, a health care provider, wanted to clear up some confusion. So once again, I reached out to Dr. Warren Licht, Vice President of Ambulatory Operations for the Western Region of Northwell Health and
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The Nicest Jewel Thief Drops In…
By George Capsis Carol Yost sent an article from the Post about an international jewel thief who lived, until he was arrested on October 24th, in a “$10 million dollar townhouse on West 4th Street.” Wait—West 4th is just up the corner from 69 Charles; so I e-mail our photographer, Joel, to take a picture
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Paving the West Village: A Historical Primer
By Tom Lamia Something odd is happening in the West Village and other long-neglected areas of our city. New life is coming into throwback street paving and its importance to economic development. After decades of neglect for the old technologies, urban street paving is becoming a hot topic among politicians and urban planners. Historic New
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Somebody Just Shot My Neighbor!
By George Capsis I got a call from one of my readers who has now become a friend, to say a murder had just taken place on Bedford Street and I had met the man who had been murdered. I had been sitting out last summer at a small table near the kitchen of a
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Gourmet Garage Dies as Rent Hits One Million
By George Capsis A couple of people called me to say Gourmet Garage was closing—wow! Sure, I, who grew up in the Depression, found the prices larcenous, but the breads were good and if you didn’t want to travel up to Trader Joe’s—that was about it… And bang—when you read this they will be closed.
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Doctors and Diagnosis—Short an Operating Room
By Siggy Raible What follows is one reader’s very accurate portrait of a typical emergency situation. What seems to be left out in talking about the logistics of getting a patient from 13th Street to Lenox Hill is the pain and anxiety of the patient. I know because I had an identical experience. I had
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Jerusalem: No Winners
TAGS: POLITICS, NEWS, OPINION By J. Taylor Basker I have lived and worked in the Middle East since 2007, teaching at an American university in Amman, Jordan. I’ve made frequent trips across the River Jordan to visit Jerusalem, relatives in Israel and friends in Palestine. The first time I entered Israel I was shocked to
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Movie Review: THE LOST VILLAGE
By Bennett Kremen The Lost Village is an alarming documentary that uses engaging interviews and strong visuals to show us the slow death of that unique treasure called Greenwich Village. You’d have to be deaf and blind not to notice that dismayed Villagers everywhere are profoundly baffled by a cancerous disease known as hyper-gentrification. The film is not a nostalgic historic rendering of the Village
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Northwell Returns Doctors to St. Vincent Site
By Joy Pape I’ll never forget the day I started work for Lenox Hill Hospital when I attended my first day of orientation in a lovely venue in Long Island. It had recently been merged with the North Shore Long Island Jewish (NSLIJ) Health System, now known as Northwell Health. It was the time of
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Bureaucracy Rewards Doctor’s Dedication With a Penny
To The Editor: I was deeply impressed and moved by Dr. Gary Kohl’s story, “Duty to Warn: How Big Business Runs the Healthcare Industry,” in the October 2018 issue of Westview News. My father was an internist from Germany who lived in the USA for 54 years, had an office in New Jersey as a
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Duty to Warn, Part II: How Big Business Runs the Healthcare Industry
By Gary G. Kohls, MD In this two-part series, Dr. Kohls explores how the intersection of big business and the pharmaceutical, vaccine and medical device corporations have come to rule the healthcare industry. Part one of the series appeared in the October issue of Westview. The Big Pharma propaganda campaigns are much more potent today
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Hospital Board Members Reap Sure Rewards by Serving on the Boards of Pharmaceutical Companies They Buy From
By George Capsis Oh wow—I was surprised when I heard Northwell’s CEO Michael Dowling, with his thatched hut Irish brogue, boasting about Northwell’s purchase of a successful chain of storefront doctor’s offices, with one right on 8th Street just a couple blocks from the massive “overbite” building on 7th Avenue and 12th Street. I realized
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Duty to Warn: How Big Business Runs the Healthcare Industry
By Gary G. Kohls, MD PART ONE—In this two-part series, Dr. Kohls explores how the intersection of big business and the pharmaceutical, vaccine and medical device corporations have come to rule the healthcare industry. Part two of the series will appear in the November issue of WestView. “Corporations should not be involved in any aspect
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The Price of Immortality
“OK, give me a business plan,” Steve Witkoff ordered, as he finished agreeing with Sarah Jessica Parker that St. Veronica should offer something for everybody, not only seniors, but young people and even kids. When I sat down to write the “Business Plan” I was stuck. How do you write a business plan to create
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Cynthia Nixon Comes to 69 Charles Street!
By George Capsis Arthur Schwartz, who besides being a prolific political contributor to WestView, is currently the lawyer for Cynthia Nixon’s campaign to become the next Governor of New York. As such, he kept e-mailing me he was going to get Cynthia to come to 69 Charles Street for an interview. And bang! The day
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City Awards WestView $5000
Erik Botcher, the Chief of Staff for City Council Speaker, Corey Johnson, called George Capsis, the publisher of WestView News, to say the City had awarded the paper an unprecedented grant of $5000 to support its enormously popular Free Concerts for Seniors program. “You ought to let people know the City supports you,” offered a
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News Staff Truncated
By George Capsis Oh, wow. The Daily News sacked half of their reporters in just ten minutes— bang, just like that. Sure, the villain is digital media. While I’m watching the CBS six o’clock news, Dusty is watching the alternate media on her iphone. The Times is almost bereft of ads. They do full page
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Battle on Barrow Street—A Victory for Organized Villagers
By Jane Heil Usyk Well! It has been quite a week; several meetings, two demonstrations, petition signing, and who knows what next week. Here is how it played out: on Monday, July 9th, I went to the senior center, Greenwich House, at 27 Barrow Street to see “The Big Knife,” one of the many excellent
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If You Can’t Fix It, Lie – NYCHA gives a course in lying and even has a textbook
By George Capsis I clicked on the TV to find Mayor de Blasio, in front of a gaggle of terribly young City Council members, competently running down the council’s achievements as the session apparently came to an end. With only the slightest change in tone he slid into what was happening to the New York
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Maison Kayser Closes
They are picking them off higher on the vine by George Capsis Oh, wow. I got a call from Peruvian born, Nelly Godfrey, who lost her restaurant on the corner of Christopher and Bedford in a years’ long struggle with our very own king of evil landlords, Steve Croman. By the way, Croman has just
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If You Can’t Fix It, Lie
NYCHA gives a course in lying and even has a textbook By George Capsis I clicked on the TV to find Mayor de Blasio, in front of a gaggle of terribly young City Council members, competently running down the council’s achievements as the session apparently came to an end. With only the slightest change in
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14th Street Fight Moves Forward
By Arthur Z. Schwartz Elevators coming to 14th Street and 6th Avenue On June 18, the 14th Street Coalition and Disabled in Action announced a big win in their joint lawsuit versus the MTA, NYC Transit, and the NYC Department of Transportation: Within the next four years, four elevators will be installed on the corners
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Larcenous Landlords Use the Law to Oust Tenants
By George Capsis Oh wow. On March 22nd the Times did a massive article (like 4 pages) on the emerging breed of amoral landlords that use rent regulations and an indifferent overworked bureaucracy to oust rent regulated tenants. Most tenants get hooked by failing to pay their rent but a new breed of heartless, larcenous
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New Models for Senior Share Living in the Village
By The Compassionate Caregiver What if we all could have the opportunity to live the last years of our lives in peace, comfort and tranquility, and to die surrounded by loved ones in a safe and familiar place? Soon there will be more seniors on the planet than there ever have ever been in history.
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Sounds of the Great Religions
By George Capsis The dramatic, almost theatrical interior space of St. Veronica invites imaginative uses and we came up with The Sounds of the Great Religions, a survey of great musical moments from the world’s great religions. Having been exposed to the Greek Orthodox church (my father was Greek, my mother a Lutheran German), I
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Two Takes on Cynthia
Vanity, Thy Name is Nixon By Alec Pruchnicki “The road to hell is paved with good intentions.” Cynthia Nixon has as much experience in government as President Trump did when he entered the White House. She has less experience in setting educational policy than Betsy DeVos did when she became Secretary of Education. Success, even
