By George Capsis In the more than five years that WestView News fought to save St. Vincent’s Hospital, one voice emerged as the spokesperson for the doctors, nurses, and hundreds of staffers that had spent years of their careers in the that massive collection of buildings that traced its history back to a small Catholic orphanage
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Jason Bander of Lifethyme Health Market’s Dharma: Service, Quality & Valu
By Hannah Reimann Lifethyme Health Market 410 Sixth Ave between 8th and 9th Streets Deepak Chopra says, “the highest expression of the law of Dharma is expressing your gifts and service to others.” When I asked Jason Bander, who opened Lifethyme Health Market with his dad, Stuart Bander, to describe his long-time workers and what
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Cuomo’s Veto Betrays Independent Pharmacies and Patients
By John Kaliabakos Hundreds of community pharmacists and patient advocates from across New York protested at Governor Cuomo’s State of the State address in Albany. The protest was in response to Cuomo’s recent veto of legislation that would have kept rising prescription drug prices in check, protected doctors’ freedom to prescribe medications that are best for
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The Intellectual Savior in a Time of Nazi Darkness
By Bruce Poli My mentor and advisor at Bard College, Justus Rosenberg, a Polish Jew who speaks a dozen languages, turned 99 on January 23rd. He studied at the Sorbonne, taught Brecht in China, and socialism, revolution, theater, French poetry, languages, and general cultural classes including one of his favorites, “Ten Plays That Shook the
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Plan Early for Your Obit
By George Capsis A month or two before Jonas Mekas died, he and his son Sebastian came to my kitchen table at 69 Charles Street to talk about raising money to fix up the Film Forum on Second Avenue and East 2nd Street. Jonas pulled from his briefcase a transcript of our first meeting 60 years
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14 Key Questions about 9/11: 3,000 Architects & Engineers Ask
By Richard Gage, AIA, Architect When obtaining licensure, architects and engineers commit themselves to upholding their respective profession’s code of ethics. More than 3,000 architects and engineers are meeting this ethical obligation regarding 9/11. They are questioning the official reports of the collapse of World Trade Center Buildings 1, 2 and 7. These reports, published
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Your immediate action is needed to save Beth Israel
I have written to you in the past about PHHPC, the state board that advises the Department of Health on plans to enlarge or diminish hospitals. Well, the state board is meeting this Thursday, January 23rd, to consider Mount Sinai’s plans for closing the current Beth Israel and replacing it with a much smaller, new
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Bird of the Year 2019
By Keith Michael We are standing under the canopy of a cloudy winter sky on the corner where the 14th traditional presentation of the Annual West Village Bird of the Year Awards, “The Millies,” is held. This tourist-confounding intersection of West 4th and West 12th Streets is where a rosy-hued House Finch was heard and
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Make 2020 the Year to Cure AIDS
By Kambiz Shekdar, Ph.D., and Drew Davis Thank you to all those who joined Research Foundation to Cure AIDS (RFTCA) at the Free From AIDS Gala on World AIDS Day 2019. We put forward an unforgettable night for supporters of a cure and we’d be honored if you, too, would team up with us. If
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“ACT UP! Fight Back! Fight AIDS!”
By Stanley Wlodyka Last month marked the 30th anniversary of an unprecedented event, one that saw worlds collide. Organized by AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), approximately 4,500 people gathered outside St. Patrick’s Cathedral on 5th Avenue one Sunday in December of 1989. They were there to protest the Catholic Church’s response to the
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Mount Sinai’s ER Is a War Zone
By Penny Mintz Not too long ago, a nurse came into the emergency room of Beth Israel Hospital as a patient seeking emergency care. This nurse is employed in the ER of the main Mount Sinai hospital on East 98th Street. When asked why she had not gone to the Mount Sinai ER she said,
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Crooked Lawyer Encounters Lawyer Victim
I got an anxious call from Gretel Ramirez, the very nice lady who, with her brother, operates the friendly Sandwich Shoppe on Greenwich Avenue, saying that she had been subjected to what seemed to be some kind of fraud and would I come by and talk to her. She showed me a sheaf of very legal-looking
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AIDS Memorial May See AIDS Cure
By Kambiz Shekdar Thirty-forty years ago, thousands of gay men were abandoned and left to die of AIDS in New York City’s St. Vincent’s Hospital. On the occasion of World AIDS Day, Research Foundation to Cure AIDS (RFTCA) announced plans to build its AIDS cure incubator at the former site of the St. Vincent’s AIDS
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Northwell May Host Lab to Cure AIDS
THOUSANDS MARCH TO A SINGLE MESSAGE – CURE AIDS: The 2019 Gay Pride Parade marchers advance toward what had been St. Vincent’s Hospital’s main building (on the right), where thousands died, and the Northwell Medical complex (across the street on the left) which may house a laboratory to cure AIDS. Photo by Ismael Ramirez. By George Capsis
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Hi, Mr. G. Capsis: This is Lily. I am in third grade at PS340.
Hi, Mr. G. Capsis: This is Lily. I am in third grade at PS340. Today, I met a photographer from your newspaper who wanted a photo of me and my new puppy, George. She told us that her boss was also named George. We named him George because he first lived in the country, so
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A Public Housing Primer
The Housing Act of 1937 was intended to improve living conditions in cities and create quality public housing for low- and middle-income families. But after several iterations of the bill, two critical pieces were inserted. First, the Act passed with coverage for only the lowest income residents, due in part to fear that middle-income housing
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NYC Helped Block President Trump’s Proposed Public Charge Rule & Allocated $30 Million to Prevent the Spread of Fear
By Karen Rempel Since 2017, when President Trump took office and began trying to change US immigration policy, 78,000 New Yorkers who are eligible to receive food stamps or SNAP benefits left the program or didn’t enroll. A draft of a new “Public Charge” rule was leaked in February of 2018, and even though the
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Presidential Candidates Pledge to Cure AIDS
By Kambiz Shekdar, Ph.D. In a crowded 2020 presidential race, taking the lead on curing AIDS may offer candidates an opportunity to differentiate themselves and resonate with voters across multiple key demographics. More than 1.1 million LGBT, African-American, Latino and female Americans are living with HIV/AIDS today. Where does each candidate stand on curing AIDS?
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Conquering AIDS in the LGBT Presidential Town Hall: Top 10 Questions Regarding Curing AIDS
By Kambiz Shekdar, Ph.D. The upcoming town hall among U.S. presidential candidates on October 10th will focus on LGBT issues. The choice to address AIDS in this debate could surprise and disrupt the current HIV/AIDS landscape. It’s remarkable that during the last presidential election, a coalition of AIDS activists adopted the following (invalid) consensus position:
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Chelsea’s Fulton Houses Get Gentrified
By George Capsis Any historic review of public housing in cities like Chicago or St. Louis offers images of massive controlled demolitions when the sprawling public projects, which have run out of money to make even essential repairs, have turned into leaking, rodent-infested, crumbling prisons for the poor. When it is clearly apparent that the money to fix them
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WestView Needs to Cry “Stop Thief”
We need to go online! By George Capsis Dusty got a call from an anxious landlord that offered that a retail shop tenant of hers had received a very legal looking “Summons and Complaint” document that offered that because the shop did not have a proper handicapped ramped entry they were being sued by a
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Cornelia Street Café Returns from Exile
With a star-studded performance on September 15 in the Meatpacking District. Cornelia Street Café comes home to the village! Come join in for the fun and music: September 15, 3-7 PM Gansevoort Plaza, Gansevoort Street & Little West 12th Street
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“Wild West” Ad Culture on Facebook Targets Youth
IMAGES ON SOCIAL MEDIA POSTED BY THE SAN DIEGO LGBT COMMUNITY CENTER, @mxdavidmx and @darrow81. In a first of its kind, Facebook has been co-opted to advertise a pharmaceutical drug. Like Russian influence on the U.S. election, the use of social media targeted at vulnerable populations raises important questions. By Kambiz Shekdar, Ph.D.
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Senior Shares for the Village
By Hannah Reimann According to the Institute on Aging, the number of seniors across the country will grow by more than 40 million, doubling between 2015 and 2050 and the population older than 85 will come close to tripling. By 2030, more than 28 states will witness a fifth of their populations being older than
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Enraged Stalker Makes the News
By George Capsis Late in the evening of Wednesday, August 14, we received an email from a 53-year-old woman who had been punched in the face by a bare-chested African American man, at approximately 8.40 p.m. while walking her dog on 14th Street, between 7th and 8th Avenues. Her complaint was that the six officers
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Landmark Preservation Today
By Brian J. Pape, AIA, Architecture Editor The loss of the original NYC Penn Station caused citizens here to focus on the importance of our monumental buildings and special historic homes being lost. But the movement to preserve special places grew. Economic and population pressures continued to threaten our historic fabric, from Plymouth Rock to
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The Legendary Caffe Cino Designated a NYC Landmark
By Robert Heide In 2015 the Stonewall Inn was granted landmark status by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission. On June 18th of this year, six historic sites important to the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and trans people movement were also designated historic landmarks. They are the LGBT Community Center on 13th Street, the former
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WestView Instagrams the Issues of the Day
By Karen Rempel Last month we reported that WestView News has begun a video interview series in which George Capsis speaks with prominent cognoscenti about newsworthy subjects. We discovered that George is a natural TV maven, delivering compelling stories and coaxing his subjects to tell all. This month, WestView is pleased to announce we continue
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Tenant Protection and Drastic Rent Drop Came Too Late for Cornelia Street Café
By Karen Rempel The New York State Senate Bill S6458, the “Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019,” came a few months too late to save the Cornelia Street Café. But at least the Café’s former landlord and its managing agent, the terrible duo Mark Scharfman and Mitchell Rothken, are hoist on their own
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A Celebration of Pride: WorldPride NYC 2019 in the Village
By Karen Rempel Marchers and spectators from around the world brought a rainbow of color and sparkle to New York City on June 30 to celebrate and support each other at the 2019 LGBTQIA+ Pride March. NYC Pride was the official host of WorldPride NYC 2019 and Stonewall 50. These events meant unprecedented millions of people
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A Race for the Cure: The Research Foundation to Cure AIDS
By Karen Rempel Dozens of Pride Parade spectators stopped by for a photo op at the Research Foundation to Cure Aids (RFTCA) display on Seventh Avenue, near the 9/11 Memorial Tiles display. All genders and no-genders were welcomed to wear the crown and carry the torch for the cure to AIDS. RFTCA President and Founder
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Whither the Village?
By Senior Minister at Judson Church The Village can’t be what it used to be any more. Been there, done that. It may be that the times have changed. Since 9-11, most people are more concerned about safety than we are about freedom. We even say good-bye with the words “Be Safe,” as though safe
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Use It or Lose It
By Maggie Berkvist So, dear readers, despite posters that started to appear around the neighborhood in May, and my Open Letter to Corey Johnson in our June issue, the fate/future of our vital 14A is still in jeopardy. On June 10th a Daily News story, headed Cars To Be Banned From Most of 14th Street In Manhattan
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Big Victory for All Tenants
By Arthur Z. Schwartz The plight of renters, both rent-regulated and non-regulated ones, has long been part of New York City lore—steep rent hikes, shoddy maintenance, fear of being blacklisted and evicted, and a general sense of powerlessness against a landlord who doesn’t care. The State Senate and Assembly’s landmark deal on New York’s rent
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Mermaid Parade Splashes Up Coney Island’s Surf Avenue
By Karen Rempel Summer began with a splash on Saturday, June 22 with Coney Island’s 37th annual Mermaid Parade. Mermaids, Neptunes, merkids, and merdogs paraded in sea-deep splendor to a crowd of over 840,000 people. The parade ended with Coney Island-born King Neptune, Arlo Guthrie, and Queen Mermaid, Nora Guthrie, together with the self-designated mayor
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A School for Creative Innovators
Our encounter with The New School began with an invitation to a reception at the residence of the University President, David Van Zandt. A bronchial illness prevented me from attending so I wrote out my questions which he graciously responded too. —George Capsis Q: What was President Van Zandt’s image of The New School when he first
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Parsons School of Design Runway Show Ornamented Fifth Avenue
By Karen Rempel | Fashion Editor As part of the New School’s graduation festivities at the end of May, the Parsons School of Design held the first-ever street runway show in Parsons history. The event on 5th Avenue and 13th Street featured more than 250 unique looks by Parsons fashion grads. It was a spell-binding
