Your chance to talk up at the the Office of Nightlife listening tour

Tomorrow evening, the Office of Nightlife (night mayor!) is hosting the fifth stop — the Manhattan leg — of a five-borough listening tour "to hear comments, concerns, and ideas for strengthening New York’s distinctive nightlife."

It takes place at the Town Hall on West 43rd Street from 5:30 to 8 p.m. (RSVP at this link.)

Here's more from a press advisory via the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment yesterday morning:

Established earlier this year within the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, the Office of Nightlife serves as a central point of contact between City agencies, nightlife business owners, residents, employees, and patrons, promoting a safe and vibrant nightlife scene beneficial to businesses and communities across the five boroughs.

Led by the Office of Nightlife’s senior executive director Ariel Palitz, this listening session is designed to inform the Office of Nightlife as it pursues policy recommendations and long-term solutions to ensure the vitality of New York’s nightlife. The Office of Nightlife welcomes all New Yorkers to share feedback on topics such as quality of life, safety, regulations, enforcement, and the role nightlife plays in fostering creativity and social cohesion.

Aside from Palitz, attendees will include Julie Menin, commissioner of the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, Gale Brewer, Manhattan Borough President, and other local elected officials.

Neighborhoods United, a coalition of citywide block associations, is helping spread the word about the session. Nora Breen, a rep for the group, says that to date, there hasn't been adequate advance notice about the listening sessions, especially within Community Board 3, where there are multiple quality-of-life issues related to nightlife and liquor-license saturation. (CB3's district manager, Susan Stetzer, is also one of the 14 members of NYC's first-ever Nightlife Advisory Board, appointed back in July by the mayor.)

"The Nightlife Mayor's Listening Tours in Bronx, Queens, Staten Island and Brooklyn have been poorly publicized and stocked with nightlife industry insiders," Breen said. "So far, the voices overwhelmingly weighing in are from developers, bar/hotel/club operators, lobbyists, liquor lawyers and nightlife insiders."

In its coverage of the Brooklyn stop last month, Bedford & Bowery reported that Palitz was "truly surprised" how few "residents" came out to speak.

And leading up to tomorrow night's event, Neighborhoods United distributed these flyers...





The Town Hall is at 123 W. 43rd St. between Sixth Avenue and Broadway.

Previously

The messenger

New York's first-ever "night mayor" wants to get the city's residents and nightlife business owners to learn to coexist https://t.co/enpQFzDvQk

— Grub Street (@grubstreet) May 31, 2018

Grub Street files an interview with East Village resident Ariel Palitz, the senior executive director of the Office of Nightlife at the Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment ... aka the recently appointed night mayor.

Here's an excerpt:

Her history with complaining neighbors has made Palitz a target for accusations of impartiality. One resident even called in to WNYC during Mayor de Blasio’s weekly appearance to tell the politician that Palitz was “very far from being a neutral, unbiased party.” De Blasio defended his pick, describing her as a “person who can find a fair approach.”

His commitment to making the role work, though, is as vague as that answer. Despite the “night mayor” title, Palitz cannot introduce bills or sign any legislation. Her role is purely advisory. “This is really intended to be an educated opinion that informs the administration about the issues for all the stakeholders and to be an advocate for the industry as well as the community in a way that has not existed before,” she says. “I’m a messenger.”

Read the full piece here.

Previously

The Post looks at the Night Mayor's fines as an East Village bar owner

In case you haven't had your fill of Night Mayor articles (apparently the Post hasn't), the tabloid reports today that Ariel Palitz paid nearly $30,000 in fines when she owned the Sutra Lounge for 10 years on First Avenue between First Street and Second Street.

Per the Post:

“She racked up a number of violations, for sure,” said Liquor Authority Spokesman William Crowley.

Palitz was slapped with 24 violations in the 10 years she ran the club that was dubbed the noisiest in the city.

The majority of complaints against her watering hole were for noise but the bar was also cited for serving underage patrons, selling booze past the 4 a.m. cutoff, and allowing dancing and a DJ without a license.

Investigators also cited the bar for various problems with signage, exits and rearranging the layout for the DJ and dancing.

In an interview with The Lo-Down from 2012, she blamed a single neighbor for the multiple 311 calls.

According to the Post: "Her bar was forced to shut down for a week in July of 2011 and she paid a total of $28,250 in fines."

Palitz, an East Village resident, was recently appointed senior executive director of the Office of Nightlife (aka Night Mayor). In her role, she'll serve as a point of contact among city agencies, communities and the city's nightlight industry.

The 'Night Mayor's' challenge close to home

For the @villagevoice, I wrote about the newly-appointed Nightlife Mayor's home turf, the East Village and Lower East Side, and the inherent difficulty of balancing dueling nightlife concerns in such a bar-heavy area https://t.co/ZxmJy69utO

— Allegra Hobbs (@AllegraEHobbs) April 2, 2018

Over at the Voice, Allegra Hobbs explores the challenges that Ariel Palitz, newly appointed senior executive director of the Office of Nightlife (aka Night Mayor), faces in her own neighborhood.

Palitz, an East Village resident, owned Sutra Lounge on First Avenue from 2004 to 2014. She also served on CB3's State Liquor Authority subcommittee from 2007 to 2014.

Hobbs speaks with residents and Block Association leaders who believe Palitz's appointment was a mistake.

Members of the Dwellers, North Avenue A, and the Orchard Street Block Associations all say that during her time on the community board, Palitz voted overwhelmingly in favor of new liquor license applications and brushed aside residents’ concerns in public meetings. (Community Board 3 declined to comment for this article and was unable to provide Palitz’s voting record.)

“They really couldn’t have made a worse choice, in my opinion,” says Pamela Yeh of the Orchard Street Block Association, which covers a swath of blocks below Delancey Street and between Allen and Clinton streets. “She voted in favor of just about passing every [liquor license] application that came through the SLA committee.”

Meanwhile, some of her former CB3 colleagues are more positive about the work that Palitz will do for the city.

“I am extremely happy that she got appointed — I think she is the perfect person for this job,” enthuses former board chair Anne Johnson, who says Palitz’s experience as a bar owner should allow her to effectively tackle the issues facing the Lower East Side and East Village. “I always found her to be reasonable and willing to listen to all sides and not just blanketly support one side or the other.”

Former community board member Chad Marlow, who has been a staunch supporter of limiting liquor licenses in the community, recalls Palitz as a voice of reason, attempting to bring “uniformity and clarity” to the process of supporting or denying liquor license applicants on the subcommittee. “I think [for] Ariel, her challenge is going to be to try and find a way to promote the interests of the industry while at the same time protecting the interests of the community, and I have no doubt she’s going to labor very hard to strike that balance,” he says.

Palitz declined requests for an interview with the Voice.

'Night mayor' Ariel Palitz holds her 1st public meeting

"We have a lot of talking to do": The city's first-ever nightlife mayor, @ArielPalitz, heard concerns from bar and club owners at a public meeting last night https://t.co/EI85t4qOzE pic.twitter.com/ndeXAKNhCC

— amNewYork (@amNewYork) March 27, 2018

Ariel Palitz, the East Village resident recently appointed senior executive director of the Office of Nightlife (aka Night Mayor), held her first public meeting last night... in front of a reported 100 club owners, artists and community members at Secret Project Robot in Bushwick.

There was plenty of media coverage, including at amNewYork:

The subject of rents and regulations for DIY clubs and concert halls was the biggest point of emphasis Monday night. Clubs and bars in the outer boroughs, such as Bar Sepia in Prospect Heights, have struggled to keep up with rising costs and threats of development. Owners urged Palitz to push for rent control.

“I want [you] to work to preserve our neighborhoods. Without our businesses and cultural institutions, we are nothing,” Delissa Reynolds, Bar Sepia’s former owner, said.

Rachel Nelson, the co-founder of Secret Project Robot, asked the nightlife mayor to make the city’s inspection and club regulatory process more transparent. Too many times, she said, a club will be temporarily closed because of issues found during inspections by the NYPD Multi-Agency Response to Community Hotspots, or MARCH, initiative. Some club owners said they’ve had MARCH inspections take place without warning in the middle of the night during their busy hours.

And via Bushwick Daily...

Palitz, who owned a night club in the East Village for 10 years and worked on a community board for six, said she sympathized with nightlife venue owners and the issues they face.

“I understand, I live it, I breath it and I am here to really work with you from this moment forward to do what we can to preserve, protect, enliven and make sure it's safe, make sure we’re good neighbors, make sure we’re legal, make sure we’re all playing by the rules,” Palitz told the crowd.

And the Observer...

She said there will be smaller talks and roundtables and noted the Office of Nightlife is not a “complaint line” but will have umbrella policies for different types of complaints.

“We can listen and we can be a voice when it makes sense and just to have that cornerstone, I think, is really important,” Palitz continued. “To be the voice and to be the ears and to have a place that really advocates and speaks for in a non-judgmental, non-punishing way.”

You can read more from the meeting at Fox 5 ... and BKLYNER ...

Report: Ariel Palitz named NYC's first Night Mayor

The newly established NYC Office of Nightlife has named its first director (aka Night Mayor) — Ariel Palitz.

Palitz is well-known in the East Village/Lower East Side as a bar owner (the former Sutra Lounge on First Avenue) and as a member of Community Board 3's Liquor Authority & Department of Consumer Affairs Licensing committee.

As The Lo-Down noted: "Her clashes with local residents fighting new liquor licenses were fairly legendary."

In recently years she has helmed Venue Advisors, "a full-service hospitality consulting company with integrated licensed real estate services."

Mayor de Blasio is to officially make her announcement official later today. Her official title is senior executive director of the Office of Nightlife.

Meanwhile, the Times has a very Times-ian feature with the news.

Since September, when Mayor Bill de Blasio announced he was forming an Office of Nightlife to promote the industry and soothe the strained relations between the city’s night spots and the neighborhoods that complain about their merriment, the local demimonde has been wondering who might nab the glamorous position. Would Mr. de Blasio appoint a modern-day Tex Guinan, someone who would quaff champagne in the small hours of the morning under the trapezes of the erotic circus scene?

In her first interview since accepting the post, Ms. Palitz suggested that her stint as the Nightlife Mayor would be slightly more sober and focus less on carousing than on conflict mediation. In today’s New York, gentrification has pitted partygoers against the settled residents of neighborhoods like the Lower East Side of Manhattan and Williamsburg in Brooklyn. In her first official act, Ms. Palitz promised to hold a series of listening tours and entertain the gripes of those who are bothered by the vomit on their streets or the noise at 3 a.m.

The article notes that Palitz is a fifth-generation New Yorker who has lived in the East Village since 1996.

And more from the Times...

Now in charge of a mayoral office with a 12-person advisory board, a $300,000 budget and a salary of $130,000 a year, Ms. Palitz seems to have realized that even a doyenne of New York night life must make a few concessions when joining city government. On her Tuesday evening drink, she was accompanied, for instance, by a minder from City Hall. While she admits that there were times in her career when she personified “what the no-bar movement rejected,” she also claimed that she has always tried “to find solutions that work for everyone.”

Previously on EV Grieve:
Ariel Palitz responds to Daily News article, 'ripe for picking' comment

ICYMI — Mayor forms Office of Nightlife

Sutra has closed; big sports bar on the way

Sutra Lounge closed for good after last night ... the club at 16 First Ave. went out with a VIP bash...



Sutra, owned by Community Board 3 member Ariel Palitz (who is also a member of CB3's Liquor Authority & Department of Consumer Affairs Licensing committee) put up signs explaining the closure last month or so...





Coming next here between East First Street and East Second Street — a big sports bar from the owners of Murray Hill's Mercury Bar and Tonic East. Expect at least 12 TVs, as BoweryBoogie reported in July, when CB3 approved the new license.

Palitz first put Sutra up for sale in November 2011, as we first reported. She is now rumored to be part of the new quinoa bowls and juice bar and club combo that is the Mars Bar reboot.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Envisioning a new-look First Avenue nightlife scene

Ariel Palitz responds to Daily News article, 'ripe for picking' comment

Ariel Palitz responds to Daily News article, 'ripe for picking' comment

As you may recall, the Daily News reported last Thursday that the East Village — specifically East Houston and southern parts of First Avenue — were destined to become some kind of MePaSoho Deluxe Hybrid that would blow up the nightlife world as we knew it.

Or something.

The article included a quote from Ariel Palitz, who is currently trying to sell her club, the Sutra Lounge on First Avenue ... she is also a member of the Community Board 3's Liquor Authority & Department of Consumer Affairs Licensing committee.

Here's the quote that riled up some readers in the comments:

"The East Village is ripe for the picking right now. There's an opportunity to change the culture and the makeup of the neighborhood from the underground nightlife experience to a high-end clientele."

Yesterday, Palitz responded in the comments:

I know that many of my adversaries will find this impossible to believe but I was grossly misquoted and misinterpreted in the Daily News piece. Anyone who knows me and my mission knows that for over 15 years I have been devoted to New York preservation and have fought to keep the integrity of the Nightlife scene. I would NEVER say that East Village is ripe for the picking for an elite meatpacking scene, even though that scenario it is plausible that it will happen, it is not my mission. What I DID say was that because of the widespread closing of venues in the East Village that it was time for a Renaissance, an end of an era for many venues that have been open for many years and that it would inevitably change the existing culture here. I don't know how or why my words were twisted, and I do know that anything I say will always be used against me due to my pro nightlife stance. I usually don't defend myself against such things but this is way out of bounds from my beliefs and from what I said and I felt clarification was in order. Believe it or not.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Envisioning a new-look First Avenue nightlife scene

[Photo of Palitz via Blackbook]

CB3 member Ariel Palitz puts Sutra on the market

Sutra Lounge, the club owned by Community Board 3 member Ariel Palitz, is on the market. A listing for Sutra at 16 First Avenue (near First Street) showed up on Streeteasy on Friday.

Per the listing:

Bi-Level Lounge For Sale
• Exterior and Interior entrances for Lower Level
• Original Mosaic Mirror staircase and other detail
• 10+ Year lease
• $15,000 per year base rent
• Optional Office/Apartment above lounge

We reached out to Palitz via email for a comment. This is her response:

"This month is Sutra Lounge's 7 year anniversary and it continues to thrive against all odds in industry. At this time we have opted to put Sutra on the market to explore its value and interest but continue to operate as if there is no tomorrow. As entrepreneurs we intend on developing new ventures and look forward to the future."