By Penny Mintz Now that the primary elections are over, Progressive Action of Lower Manhattan (PALM), a chapter of the statewide New York Progressive Action Network (NYPAN), is once again focused on effecting grassroots change that matters to the residents of Lower Manhattan. On August 17th, PALM held a meeting in Jackson Square—the first live
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9/11 on 9/12/21 at Westbeth
By J. Taylor Basker To commemorate 9/11, there will be an event on 9/12 at Westbeth Artists Housing. A poem written by Griselda Steiner will open the event. After that there will be a digital presentation of photos from 9/11 by Westbeth photographers (David Plakke, David Seccombe, Judy Lawne, and others) who spent months documenting
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9/11 Twenty Years
By George Capsis Everybody has a 9/11 story; here is mine… I was working as a consultant for the United States Council for International Business, and there was a going to be a conference way up on one of the higher floors of Building One of the World Trade Center. I toyed with the idea
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Paris or Shanty Town?
By George Capsis Just a few feet from where I am keying this at 69 Charles Street, a very young Sinclair Lewis and his roommate (brother of poet Stephen Vincent Benét) would walk to the exit door on many Sunday mornings on their way to the outdoor cafe at the famed historic Brevoort Hotel at
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City Planners Become Enemies of Historic Preservation
By Brian J Pape, AIA, LEED-AP Never before have we witnessed such a callous attitude about historic preservation exhibited by city officials and department heads. Mayor de Blasio’s Department of City Planning (DCP) is on the warpath against historic districts—proposing rezoning that strips the historic districts of protections, and substituting open development measures that are
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Homeless Encampments
By Alan Cohen Greenwich Village is experiencing an explosion of homelessness and homeless encampments that surpasses anything longtime residents can recall. It is part of the chaos that has descended on this neighborhood, which includes stabbings, muggings, a shooting, and closed streets that house nightly parties which cause strewn garbage. Residents face difficulties when trying
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Open Restaurants: Assault on Quality of Life
By Brian J Pape, AIA, LEED-AP Once upon a time, city residents worked with their city government to protect the quality of life for all: noise ordinances were developed to limit the volume and hours of loud crowds, loud music, and loud work sites; restaurants were required to limit sound pollution with closed windows and
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Fifth Year Commemoration of the Pulse Nightclub Shooting
By James Tigger! Ferguson Five years ago, an unspeakable massacre occurred at Pulse nightclub. We live in a country that worships guns—the power, the money, the violence and the hatred that guns represent. So it certainly wasn’t the first massacre, nor would it be the last. And though it was the deadliest shooting in this
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A Great Victory—Beth Israel to Stay Open
By Penny Mintz In a closed Zoom meeting on Tuesday morning, June 15, 2021, representatives from Mount Sinai informed Community Board #3 that Beth Israel Hospital will remain open. I was not invited to attend. Nor were most of the community health activists involved in the struggle to keep Beth Israel open. But I learned
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A Tribute to Detective Stanley Dash
By Lisa Smith Dear Detective Dash, or may I call you Stanley? You’re gone now, having died from COVID on May 29th, so you won’t be reading this, but I want the world to know: you were one of the good guys that helped put me back together. You know my entire story, as you
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Charles Street Association News
Dear neighbors, Thank you for coming out and helping restore Charles Street to its natural beauty! Already, these flowers are putting a smile to all the faces when strolling down the street. To maintain our flowers throughout the summer, these tree-beds will need plenty of water. Please kindly remind your super or building manager to
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WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES
SATURDAY, JUNE 26 SUNDAY, JUNE 27 WHAT A DIFFERENCE A DAY MAKES: A large crowd of young people danced to live music at Washington Square Park (left) as NYPD officers kept watch over the crowd (center) during the last Saturday evening in June. Just a day later, the crowd would explode again, pitting NYPD
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International Stretto Piano Festival
From the West Village Across the Global Stage, a Virtual World Premier Narrow Keys…Broad Minds…No Boundaries By Heidi E. Russell Long time West Village resident Hannah Reimann joins forces with fellow pianists Carol Leone of Texas and Rhonda Boyle of Australia, bringing together a talented roster of pianists from around the globe to celebrate and
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Ray Johnson, Pop-Culture Collagist, Master of ‘The Happening’ and the Mysterious World of Zen Emptiness
By Robert Heide A new fantastic exhibition of Ray Johnson artworks, collages and memorabilia at David Zwirner Gallery, 525 West 19th Street will be on view until May 22. The exhibit curated by Jarrett Earnest is called ‘Ray Johnson: What A Dump.’ The presentation offers many never-before-exhibited collages and drawings from the 1950s through the
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Police and Public Wield the Same (Anti-Graffiti) Brush
By Brian J Pape, AIA It was a perfect day for street activities, cloudy but mild with temperatures in the 60’s. Just like dozens, perhaps hundreds, of others in precincts throughout the city’s five boroughs, we saw the opening round in the next chapter of the on-going fight against urban blight and graffiti. The Police
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An Interview With Mayoral Candidate Ray McGuire
By Frank Quinn and Bob Cooley Ray McGuire and his two brothers didn’t have much growing up. “I never knew my father. He never acknowledged me, a sorrow I share with far too many.” His mother worked as a social worker, his grandfather in a factory during the week and as a janitor on
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The Great Race: Vaccines vs Mutants
The Great Race: Vaccines vs Mutants By Alec Pruchnicki, MD It is hard to predict the future, but with COVID it is even more difficult. There is a race going on between the factors that will improve our situation and other factors that can make it a lot worse, and right now it’s a toss-up
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The End of Graffiti?
By George Capsis I hate graffiti and perhaps that is why WestView News has done several front page articles on the subject. With the pandemic and the closing of offices we now have an ever-ready young crowd that poured into Washington Square during the Black Lives Matter demonstrations and then marched down Broadway, spray cans
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A Mayoral Candidate With Significant New York City Experience
By Frank Quinn From 2014 to 2020 Kathryn Garcia was the 43rd Commissioner of the largest sanitation department in the world. Before that she was Chief Operating Officer of the NYC Department of Environmental Protection, and an interim Chair of the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA). She grew up in Brooklyn as an adopted
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WestView News Interviews District 3 City Council Candidates
By Frank Quinn and Bob Cooley The New York City Democratic Primary is June 22, 2021. Six candidates will compete for the District 3 city council office currently held by Corey Johnson who is term-limited. WestView News interviewed all six candidates and our short-form videos can be viewed below. We asked the candidates for succinct
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Corey Johnson Bounces Back
By George Capsis Oh wow, it was only just a short while ago I read with despair that Corey Johnson was dropping out of the race for mayor because of an extended bout of depression, and then, bang, on February 18th I read in the Times that he is thinking very seriously about running for
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The Architecture of Outdoor Dining: Restaurants Get Design Corps Help
By Brian J. Pape, AIA It seemed like the city began to change overnight, evoking comparisons to Paris or Rome, with so many sidewalk cafes opening up in response to the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. NYC was one of the first cities to severely limit gatherings to restrict virus spreading, harkening back to previous pandemics
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COVID Vaccines—Where is the Leadership?
By Arthur Schwartz On January 14, at 2:30 a.m., I got a needle full of the Moderna vaccine stuck into my arm. It wasn’t easy to get that done. As soon as I heard that Governor Cuomo had opened the vaccine to people over 65, I got on the internet trying to make an appointment.
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Lenox Health Greenwich Village to Ramp Up Local Vaccinations
By Bob Cooley “Tomorrow, I will lay out our vaccination plan to correct course and meet our goal of 100 million shots at the end of my first 100 days as president,” stated President-Elect Joe Biden in his January 14 address. Lenox Health Greenwich Village is racing to finish a new vaccination unit that will significantly aid in
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NYC COVID-19 Vaccine Finder
The City of New York has published a COVID-19 Vaccine Finder here. The Finder does not work with Internet Explorer, so you’ll need to use a different web browser. Wear Your Mask You will not be admitted to the site without one. Do I need to take precautions even after I’m vaccinated? Yes! Even after you
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City Winery Opens on Pier 57 Amidst Shutdown
By Brian J Pape, AIA The new flagship location for City Winery, designed by Brooklyn-based Christopher Warnick Architecture, has opened on Pier 57 near West 15th Street. Unfortunately, the pandemic shutdown of indoor dining means it is mostly off-limits to the public, except for the main entry with a wine shop and the winery itself.
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Working to Save West Village Restaurants
By Maggie Berkvist Back in early December, a number of us signed a petition to Senators Schumer and Maloney at saverestaurants.com/take-action/ However, it was pretty clear, even before the stimulus package was passed, that it was not going to begin to cover the financial needs of our area’s bars and restaurants. Which is why—since they
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2020—The Return of the Depression?
By George Capsis If you go online right now you can find half a dozen articles on the precipitous drop in the New York City real-estate market brought about by the pandemic. In reading them I encounter terms that are very familiar to me, which I discovered when apartment-hunting with my mother during the depths
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The Day the Village Stood Still: “Gimme Shelter”
By Roger Paradiso “It becomes a choice of risking your life or your business. In most cases people are risking their lives to keep their businesses from failing.” —Vittorio, La Lanterna di Vittorio on MacDougal Street “Ooh, a storm is threatening My very life today If I don’t get some shelter Oh yeah, I’m gonna
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Candidates Debate for Corey Johnson’s Seat
By Penny Mintz “All politics is local,” Tip O’Neill once said. That was one thing he got right. The impact of government on our daily life—police, sanitation, education, fire protection, the licensing of businesses, safety regulations, mass transit—is determined almost entirely at the city and state levels. Local government could not be more important. So,
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Graffiti in the ‘Hood: An Interview With the NYPD 6th Precinct
By Brian Pape AIA Graffiti is nothing new to New York City, or other cities around the world. But we wanted to know more about the recent activity in the West Village that we reported last month. WestView News followed up by asking the 6th Precinct of the New York Police Department to help us
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The Legend of Holly Claus by Brittney Ryan: The Making of a Classic
In the Author’s Own Words “My intent was to write a story that would become a true legend, so it was important for me to present Holly Claus’s story as a legend, a fantasy that would become part of the culture…a tradition…a classic…I want Holly’s story to endure for generations.” -Brittney Ryan, storyteller-author. There
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Obscene Graffiti Scars Village
By George Capsis In 1917 the City ruthlessly cut through the handsome historic townhouses of the Village to run the 7th Avenue subway through it and left ugly towering blackened backyard raw brick walls. A few months ago, after the Black Lives Matter incident, huge crude nonsensical graffiti messages appeared like “MAGIC TRICK” with the
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Village Voters Show Enthusiasm, Patience, Hope in First Day of Early Voting
By Bob Cooley In what leaders and many citizens have called “a fight for the soul of our nation,”West Villagers and New Yorkers turned out in massive numbers during the initial day of first-ever early presidential voting in the state. 1,211 West Village residents turned out to cast their early vote at the community space
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Crowdfunding Campaign Update
Dear readers, neighbors, friends, and supporters, We asked you to help because our beloved local newspaper is in danger of folding forever. You answered with a surge of donations, messages, and even ad requests! George and the folks at WestView News are overwhelmed by your love and support for the paper. You donated over $17,000
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Deborah Glick Hasn’t Debated Her Opponent
By Frank Quinn As we reported last month, WestView News invited both candidates for the District 66 State Assembly seat to debate the issues with us. The challenger, Tamara Lashchyk, accepted our invitation but the incumbent, Deborah Glick, did not. As a result, instead of a debate we are providing an interview with Tamara Lashchyk.
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New York Spirit! Villagers Are Saving WestView News
Dear readers, neighbors, friends, and supporters, We asked you to help because our beloved local newspaper is in danger of folding forever. You answered with a surge of donations, messages, and even ad requests! George and the folks at WestView News are overwhelmed by your love and support for the paper. We’ve raised almost $15,000
