By Arthur Z. Schwartz On August 30, 2017, as promised, a lawsuit was filed to block the further closure of Beth Israel Hospital, and to restore the services already cut. The lawsuit, titled George Capsis et al v. Howard Zucker as Commissioner of the N.Y. State Department of Health, addresses the ruse pursuant to which
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Will We Get St. Veronica’s?
By George Capsis As I waited for a ham sandwich at an outside table at Eric’s Restaurant on Hudson Street, I became aware of a gray-haired (and as I confirmed later) Irish-American lady walking towards me, trying to figure out if I was indeed the ‘George of WestView’. “Are you George?” she asked, followed by,
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Elizabeth Street Garden Debate Continues
Dear Editors: I want to respond to Alec Pruchnicki’s “analysis” of the demographics of those who use the Elizabeth Street Garden. I visited the garden on Saturday, August 5th, a gorgeous day full of sunshine, which made everything look magnificent. I didn’t see any zombies there. What I did see were families, children playing, international
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Where Were You on 9/11?
By Dusty Berke “Juliana Valentine McCourt Age 4 VA flight 175 flew into God’s arms 9/11/2001” “Poppy was killed here” “This is for all the unsung heroes” “The silence of your absence is still hard to hear” These words are all inscriptions taken from Tiles for America, the makeshift community memorial that grew out of
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Kill the Zombie Park Already Part IV: Put the Garden on the Roof
By Alec Pruchnicki Yes, put it on the roof. This is a complicated but not impossible process if both sides work together. There are rooftop farms (e.g., Rosemary’s restaurant), rooftop gardens (e.g., P.S. 41), and extensive green roofs with potential public access proposed for Essex Crossing at Essex and Delancy Streets. These and many others
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The Last Newspaper
By George Capsis Newspapers are quite naturally interested in other newspapers so, when one of them makes news, they all report it. That was the case with the demise of the print version of the Village Voice. On August 22nd, the new (only two-year) publisher, Peter Barbey, announced that they would stop printing on paper
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Amazon Buys Whole Foods and Cuts Prices
By George Capsis Oh wow! Amazon’s Jeff Bezos bought Whole Foods for $13.7 billion and, in days, he cut prices. What does that mean for us here in the West Village? I mean, I went to Whole Foods on 14th Street only once and found the prices forbidding (a jar of asparagus juice with three
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The Riviera Cafe Dies but it is Not the Rent
By George Capsis “Oh no, not the Riviera,” was the reaction to the closing of this 47-year-old landmark defining the corner of West 4th Street and 7th Avenue, with its outdoor tables and the funny-leaning front door. So, Dusty and I went there to share a hamburger and asked the waiter to send over the
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GOTTLIEB ON CHARLES
The billion-dollar Gottlieb real estate empire, legally wrested by nephew Neil Bender, may see this seven-story condo block on Charles and Hudson Streets. In August, it was turned down by the NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission. In the rendering above, the building is shown with the new Charles Street Block Association planters but not with the
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UGLY INSPIRES BEAUTY
In an effort to prevent police officers from parking their private cars in front of the Bomb Squad on Charles Street, the New York Police Department offered large, ugly concrete blocks. This inspired WestView Publisher George Capsis to ask the paper’s Architecture Editor, Brian J. Pape, to design a planter cover, which was generously sponsored
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In and Out
Perhaps things will improve for retail in the Village: A bill in the New York City Council, which proposed raising the threshold for the Commercial Rent Tax (CRT) from $250,000 to $500,000, now has enough bipartisan supporters to override a mayoral veto. The law came into effect 54 years ago and requires commercial tenants below
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Market-less in the Village
By Robert Widmann My M14A bus pulled up to the light at 8th Avenue and—seated as I was, on the north-facing side—I found myself gazing into the darkened, empty frontage of the former Associated Supermarket. A quick twinge or two shot across my brow—guilt (two heavily laden bags of Trader Joe’s stuff sat beside me
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The West Village – Lookin’ Good on the Web
By W. Russell Neuman Have you ever wondered what the West Village looks like to the outside world? We know that the tourist buses stop at Carrie Bradshaw’s imagined home on Perry Street, at the very real Magnolia Bakery, and at the fictional ‘Friends’ apartment above the Little Owl on Bedford Street. But, if you
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Urban Myth: Landlords Save Money by Keeping Spaces Empty (Part One)
By Steve Wilson Passing by empty storefronts and restaurants, Villagers can often be heard uttering the widely accepted urban “truth”—They (landlords) make money by deducting the high rents which they no longer receive. Leading local commercial real estate broker Brian Kanarek insists that landlords don’t make money on empty storefronts: “Landlords cannot claim a deduction
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Italytime Brings Cultural Events to the Village
By Jane Heil Usyk The basement of Our Lady of Pompeii Church is a vast, cavernous space where the Senior Center meets. In the summer, there are talks on great painters of the past and classes on painting restoration. Local political clubs and community boards also meet there. Now, there is a new addition, with
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Alien Skills
This conscientious scavenger of Asian ancestry gathers deposit bounty by using a bamboo pole over her shoulder.
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We Get a Concert Hall
By George Capsis Oh wow! In the 15 years I have been producing WestView, we have never received such heartfelt support for an idea we proposed as we have for converting the now locked St. Veronica’s Church into a concert hall for classical music—including a plea from a locked-out parishioner. We sent an elaborate proposal
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14th Street Closing
Dear Editors: In order to see the draft concept plan released by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) and the New York City Department of Transportation (NYC DOT), visit mta.info, scroll down to ‘L Canarsie Tunnel Reconstruction,’ and click on ‘View community presentation.’ The impact, not only on 14th Street, will be significant when the L
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Continuing the Fight Against Illegal Fliers
Dear Mr. Capsis: On Saturday, July 15th, while removing one of the numerous ads defacing lamp posts at the four corners of 8th Avenue and 28th Street, I was approached by an individual claiming that I had no business preventing someone from advertising. This individual took my picture on his phone “to put it on
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Temporary Closing of Gourmet Garage
Gourmet Garage, located at 117 7th Avenue South (between West 10th and Christopher Streets), has announced a mid-August temporary closing. The building owner needs to install columns to reinforce the building in order to add additional floors for new residential apartments. (The accompanying rendering illustrates the design proposal by Cruzen Samton Architects.) The New York
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The Alumni of Caffe Cino
Every year on April 2nd, a group of people known as the ‘Cino Alumni’ gather at the Cornelia Street Café. The original Caffe Cino—the birthplace of ‘Off-Off-Broadway’—was located at 31 Cornelia Street from 1958 to 1968 (it later became Po Restaurant, which also recently closed). The Cino Alumni gather to commemorate the passing of founder
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Arthur Z. Schwartz Re-Elected as District Leader
With petitioning completed on July 13th, only one candidate filed for Male Democratic District Leader for Greenwich Village: Arthur Z. Schwartz, longtime WestView contributor, civil rights lawyer, and anti-establishment Democratic Party activist. Schwartz was first elected in 1995, and also served on the New York State Democratic Committee from 2006 to 2013. — WestView News
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A Stroll Around the Neighborhood: Construction and Development Sites
By Brian J. Pape, AIA You know that you are in a popular neighborhood when there seems to be construction on every block. This stroll covers one small area of the West Village. Let’s start along West Street, just south of the condo at 1 Morton Square. Ian Schrager and his development partners tapped Herzog+de
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Bleecker Street in the 1950s
By Naomi Sager You didn’t have to speak Italian but it helped. The open-cart Italian vendors had their fruits and vegetables (very fresh, picked early that morning, or the day before) on display in wooden crates stacked on pallets tilted toward the sidewalk. It was okay to just point, pack the produce in your bag,
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Stop the Closure of Beth Israel by August 11th OR WE WILL SUE
By Arthur Z. Schwartz The following is a copy of a letter sent to Howard Zucker, Commissioner of the New York State Department of Health, threatening suit over the closure of Beth Israel Hospital. (Note: The content of the letter has been slightly edited.) _________ Howard Zucker Commissioner New York State Department of Health Corning
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District 1 Council Contenders Wrangle on Development
By Nan Victoria Munger If politics is “war without bloodshed,” then the race for District 1 City Council is pure politics. Eight-year incumbent Margaret Chin is opposed in the Democratic primary by Aaron Foldenauer, Christopher Marte, and Dashia Imperiale, who suggest that she is too pro-development. (According to a Common Cause New York report, the
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Air Bird & Birth
By Mary Alice Kellogg The cooing of Mourning Doves was the sound of my childhood, spent in the desert Southwest. I called them ‘Morning Doves,’ as their sound was not mournful to me, but sweet music. Moving to New York four decades ago, I missed that. But, as I adjusted to the City symphony, I
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IN AND OUT
Summer is always a slow time for openings, with only three this month. A number of places closed or will close temporarily (or so we’ve been informed) and one scandalous closing has been in the news. Fortunately, a couple of ice cream pop-ups have opened for the summer, joining the growing list of established spots
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Why Destroy the Elizabeth Street Garden When a Vacant Lot Will Provide More Housing?
By Jeannine Kiely The City wants to destroy a park used by thousands of downtown residents and visitors in order to build a small number of affordable housing units. The Elizabeth Street Garden, which hosts hundreds of free community events, including movie nights, yoga, children’s crafts and story time, and an annual Harvest Festival, is
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Kill the Zombie Park Already Part III: The Hidden Problem
By Alec Pruchnicki When I started writing about the Elizabeth Street Garden last year, I made about a dozen trips there and to the surrounding parks, playgrounds, and gardens and became aware of an aspect of this controversy that has been unmentioned: race. This year, to confirm or refute my suspicions, I completed a very
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Vermeer Senior Chess Club: Promoting Health, Community, and Plenty of Fun
By Nina Leto Mayleas If it’s Wednesday at 4:00 p.m., the Vermeer Senior Chess Club is about to meet. Chessboards are lined up, and members take their seats for an interactive chess lecture and demonstration, followed by their own competitive games. Chess, the game of kings, is inspirational, fun, and a bright highlight of the
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Jim Fouratt’s HAVE YOU HEARD?
August 2017 Good news: Once again, the Village, like in old times, is ground zero in the NYC battle against the Trump administration and its attempt to repeal the Affordable Care Act. Rise and Resist (RAR), a grassroots, direct action political group, meets every Tuesday night at The Church of the Village (201 West 13th
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The Closure of Beth Israel Will Be Stopped
By Arthur Z. Schwartz June 11th marked a really sad day for those of us who live downtown. On that date, Beth Israel Hospital closed its Center for Labor and Birth. Life is funny. The Catheterization Lab doctors at Beth Israel saved my life in January, when I got wheeled in with a heart attack.
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The Times Reads WestView
By George Capsis Oh wow! The day after WestView’s June issue came out with the front-page article (“The Ego Fight for Diller Island”) about the now years-long ego clash between Wall Street tough guy Steve Novogratz and staid developer Douglas Durst to control and shape the Hudson River Park, Charles Bagli of the Times released
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Musical Resurrection of St. Veronica’s Church
By George Capsis On June 25th, the New York Catholic Archdiocese changed the locks and closed the 115-year-old St. Veronica’s Church on Christopher Street (just opposite the Archive Building) to the very few who still tried to attend the continually diminishing religious services. Another church has been lost to the ever- waning call of traditional
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Clarifying Statements in June’s “In and Out”
Dear Caroline: I read your “In and Out” column with interest, as usual, in the latest WestView issue. I always welcome your news. But two things you wrote puzzle me. You ended the section by saying that, “Perhaps the West Village is just not a favorable location for vegan restaurants.” What vegan restaurant? Certainly not
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West 12th Street Water Pipe Construction…
Dear Mr. Capsis: Firstly, many, many thanks for WestView News. It is a lifeline for West Villagers. I have lived in the townhouse my father bought, since 1946. He was a doctor, who needed to be near St. Vincent’s. Currently, West 12th Street is being victimized by the City’s construction to replace water pipes. The
