Going for a walk today in Tompkins Square Park…
Photo by Bobby Williams
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
'Misinformation' cited as DOB issues Stop Work Order at the former PS 64; community meeting set for Sunday afternoon
[EVG file photo]
Developer Gregg Singer's plan to turn the former PS 64 and CHARAS/El Bohio community center into a dorm are on hold once again.
Here's the information we just received from Rosie Mendez's office...
Councilwoman Rosie Mendez will be joined by colleagues and community residents to celebrate a major step in trying to reclaim the historic landmarked building The Former P.S. 64 that once housed CHARAS/El Bohio Cultural Community Center.
On Sept. 22, the Department of Buildings (DOB) issued a Stop Work Order to halt any construction that may have begun under a Partial Work Permit that was issued based on misinformation to the Department.
Gregg Singer, the owner of 9th & 10th Street LLC, entered into separate lease agreements with Cooper Union and the Joffrey Ballet Center Concert Group Program (CGP) to convert the building into a student dormitory. On July 25, 2014, the Department of Buildings (DOB) approved Singer's application to have the CGP considered a not-for-profit with housing accommodations as opposed to a dormitory and issued a partial work permit in August to convert the ground and 1st floor into dormitory rooms for CGP.
After reviewing the objections raised by Councilwoman Rosie Mendez in a letter dated September 3, 2014, DOB determined that the lease agreements in which Singer and the two parties entered into did not meet the agency's criteria for a lease with an educational institution.
Moreover, DOB determined that CGP could not be considered a not-for-profit with housing accommodations since the application contained misinformation that disqualifies CGP for this status.
The Councilwoman surrounded by community residents will be presenting DOB’s findings in the latest of that this long standing battle to reclaim the building for community use.
The presentation is Sunday afternoon at 1 outside 605 E. Ninth St. between Avenue B and Avenue C.
Singer bought the building from the city in 1998.
Previously on EV Grieve:
Rebranded P.S. 64 up for grabs: Please welcome University House at Tompkins Square Park to the neighborhood
Deed for 'community facility use only' at the former P.S. 64 now on the market
Efforts continue to fight the dorm planned for the former PS 64 on East 9th Street
Testimony Of Councilmember Rosie Mendez regarding the former PS 64
[Updated] At the 'Save Our Community Center MARCH AND RALLY'
Landmarks Preservation Commission asks to see modified plans for former PS 64
The Landmarks Preservation Commission approves application for modifications at PS 64
City approves dorm conversion plans for the former PS 64 on East 9th Street
Report: 50,000 square feet of condos coming to the former 2nd Avenue BP station
The BP station on Second Avenue and East First Street closed in early July.
And now The Deal Deal hears what's next: 50,000 square feet of condominiums and 7,000 square feet of retail.
AORE Capital, which purchased the site for $32 million, will take charge of the site’s development. There are no details yet on how tall the building will stand, how many residential units it will include or the prices of those units.
As a comparison of what is in store here ... the newish Jupiter 21 across the Avenue at the site of the former Mars Bar is 57,658 square feet.
[EVG file photo]
There's nothing yet on file with the DOB about the new development.
Previously on EV Grieve:
RUMOR: Gas station going, boutique hotel coming on Second Avenue? (31 comments)
BP station on 2nd Avenue closes this month
The 2nd Avenue BP station has closed
Post discovers that cyclists often run the light at 1st Avenue and St. Mark's Place
From the Post today:
For New York cyclists, red lights means go almost 80 percent of the time — despite an NYPD crackdown and the recent deaths of two pedestrians hit by bikes, The Post has found.
From 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday, reporters at three busy intersections observed 1,006 cyclists encounter a red signal — often with pedestrians in the crosswalks — and a staggering 796 of them passed through before it turned green.
As your can see from the graphic, First Avenue and St. Mark's Place was one of the intersections where a Post reporter hung out for 8 hours watching.
Out and About in the East Village, Part 1
In this weekly feature, East Village-based photographer James Maher provides us with a quick snapshot of someone who lives and/or works in the East Village.
By James Maher
Next week: Mikey Cole on starting the business from home. "We’d be at my house for hours filling up the freezer with ice cream until my mom was like, ‘You gotta get that shit out of here.’
James Maher is a fine art and studio photographer based in the East Village. Find his website here.
By James Maher
Name: Michael “Mikey” Cole
Occupation: Owner and Head Chef, Mikey Likes It Ice Cream
Location: 199 Avenue A (Between 12th and 13th)
Time: 1:30 pm on Wednesday, Sept. 17
Thirty-Five years ago, born and raised on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. I grew up in Stuyvesant Town, across the way. My parents are from Sierra Leone, West Africa. [They came here] when they were around their late 20s or 30, I think.
They tried to teach me lessons that I didn’t really know. They tried to be very rigid when I was a child, which kind of also makes you want to venture off and see the crazy side of the world. My mom was a nurse. My dad worked at the supermarket and then he worked for the City of New York. He carried like two, three jobs and my mom had two jobs, so sometimes they wouldn’t see each other for two or three days. I see my parents work hard and that’s what instilled the value of working hard myself. They tried to get me what I needed. I wanted them Jordans, ‘You’re getting the Avias.’ Damn. But they’re sneakers, so, you know? I’m glad that they instilled a hardworking value in myself.
As a child the neighborhood was cool. You had to stay out of trouble. You went anywhere around here and there was trouble up and down. I remember Friday the 13th or Rookie Day, that’s what we used to call it. It was real. I would get out of school at PS 19 and would go outside and be like, ‘Man, this is some fake bullying holiday.’ There were like 60 kids waiting outside to pummel you. You were like, ‘Damn, I’m gonna have to pull the Barry Sanders off to get home.’ But it was definitely fun growing up.
From Avenue B, 14th and Avenue B, the Campos projects there, they always had problems with the kids from Avenue D, which was two blocks from there, so when you came down to this area people didn’t want to venture off past Avenue B. Even Avenue A was tough. You would get off the train and just stay on First Avenue until you’d find your street and then you’d turn left or right. People rarely wanted to come into these areas. On 14th and First, there was drug dealing going on and clashes between people. In the 80s, even the 90s, you’d come outside and there was always something going on. You’d walk outside and walk down 13th Street and there was a bunch of people hanging outside and drinking on the stoop.
What was cool was the competitiveness. Kips Bay, up on 28th Street, these guys played basketball. Then you’d get the kids from Campos, Avenue D, 12th Street, 6th Street, who would play basketball. So all of us would roam around with our own teams of five. You’d roll five deep. After you’d lose, ‘Okay lets pack it up, let’s go over here.’ That’s what the weekends were like. You’d get to know other kids because we were all playing basketball. We all did the same damn thing anyway. You might not know their names but you’d say what’s up walking by. I can’t really walk down the street without someone saying, ‘Hey Mikey, how you doing?’ Now I have the store but way before that it was like that.
I got into ice cream because of my aunt. [Yesterday] was her birthday. When I was younger she would take me to school in the morning. Her name was Luciana but I called her Lucy. She was on my mother’s side. My grandfather was a chef on cruise ships, so my aunt came over and all she wanted to do was learn to cook just like her father.
So when I was in the third, fourth, fifth grade, since my parents weren’t home, I would sign up for Boys Club and go there a couple days a week. But my parents still didn’t want me out, so I was forced to go to cooking school with my aunt. I was the kid in the corner who would sit at the table with a whipping bowl or something smaller. Because of that, I was intrigued with cooking at a young age.
When my parents left me at home, my mom would leave like five dollars. ‘Get some pizza for you and your sister,’ and I’d be like, ‘Let’s not get pizza today, lets go to the supermarket, see what we can get for five bucks and make something.’ I made some nasty tasting ramen noodle experiments. But one day I was like, ‘I’m not eating like this anymore, I’m going to eat good tasting food’ and I just sort of learned cooking. Growing up, I became the kid that, showing up at any barbeque, and people were like, ‘Pass Mikey the tongs!’ I would be anywhere. I would be like, ‘Hey guys, I’m hanging out today,’ and it would automatically become, ‘Yo, Mikey’s cooking burgers.’ Everybody’s running to the grill.
I went to high school in Rhode Island, and then I ended up going to Johnson and Wales culinary course out there when I was in high school. I wanted to cook all the time. My mom would leave and my dad would be like, ‘I’m glad she’s gone, you’re cooking tonight.’ Then my aunt Lucy passed away. When she passed away my parents sent me to her apartment to clean. So I’m cleaning up the apartment and I saw four or five cookbooks up in the shelf. I’m short and I tried to reach for it and all the books fell and one of them opened up to an ice cream recipe and she actually was writing one herself. The school would make her write menus and stuff.
So then I came home, went to the supermarket, bought all the stuff and tried making the ice cream. I didn’t have an ice cream maker, I didn’t have nothing, I just did it in a freezer with a bowl and would stir it every half an hour. The texture came out disgusting, but the taste was kind of old school. It was like Julia Childs type stuff, but it needed to get some Mikey [influence]. So I sat there and started researching.
That recipe from my aunt is actually the base of ice cream that I use to make all these ice creams. The flavor is me giving it flavor on the top.
Next week: Mikey Cole on starting the business from home. "We’d be at my house for hours filling up the freezer with ice cream until my mom was like, ‘You gotta get that shit out of here.’
James Maher is a fine art and studio photographer based in the East Village. Find his website here.
Let's talk about rats
The 6th Street A - B Block Association is co-hosting a talk on rat prevention with the NYC Department of Health tomorrow night at 7 at the 6th & B Community Garden. Details are on the flyer below…
An organizer says that the area has been inundated with rats of late … in part because of the demolition of 98-100 Avenue A between East Sixth Street and East Seventh Street.
Meanwhile, in Tompkins Square Park, some people think the rat population is near the levels of the TSP Ratstravaganza during the summer of 2011.
And, despite the signs, people never stop feeding the birds and squirrels ... ultimately helping supply the rat colonies ...
Bottom photos this week via Scuba Diva
... and this morning in the Park...
Gut renovations enter 16th month at 338 E. Sixth St., where 1 tenant remains
[Photo from yesterday via EVG reader Michael Hirsch]
Three flatbed trucks with sheetrock arrived here yesterday on East Sixth Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue ... where Rory Denis remains the only tenant in the building at 338 E. Sixth St.
He has lived in a rent-stabilized apartment here since 1979.
As DNAinfo reported last October, Denis stayed in his apartment despite the best efforts of landlord Nurjahan Ahmed.
Denis reportedly took Ahmed to housing court last year after she switched off the electricity and water. Denis won the case in June 2013, which forced Ahmed to restore the services.
Word here now is that workers have installed the new electrical wiring and plumbing. (DNAinfo reported that the gut renovations began in May 2013.)
Meanwhile, according to city records, a Stop Work Order exists on the address. Per the DOB's ALL-CAP STYLE: "CONSTRUCTION SITE UNSAFE - WORKER CONDITIONS UNSAFE."
The city issued the Stop Work Order last Thursday. Despite this, construction work continues.
[Early last evening]
Previously.
Former St. Mark's Bookshop for lease
Signs went up yesterday at 31 Third Ave. We didn't spot the listing online just yet.
Before moving this past summer to a new storefront on East Third Street, St. Mark's Bookshop had been paying $23,500 a month, according to the Times. (The store's new rent is $6,000.)
Anyway, took a little longer for the "for lease" signs to arrive here. Workers gutted the space back in early July.
The lack of rent signage made it seem as if a new
New laundromat now open at site of former laundromat
Capital Laundry & Dry Cleaners opened this week at 44 Avenue B between East Third Street and East Fourth Street. (Thirty percent off on drop-off and pick-up service!)
Back in January, the previous laundromat here relocated to Clinton Street.
As we've noted, this is the third time in recent memory where a laundromat closed … only to be replaced by another laundromat. (Here and here.)
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Sammy’s Roumanian Steakhouse: Still got it?
[Via Trip Advisor]
At the Times, Pete Wells files a review on Sammy's Roumanian Steakhouse 157 Chrystie St. near Delancey.
All is well!
He calls Sammy's "the most wonderful terrible restaurant in New York."
Woot.
And!
The rest of the Lower East Side can obsess over filament light bulbs and salvaged barn beams; Sammy’s, virtually unchanged since opening in 1975, will be ready when fluorescents and drop ceilings make their triumphant return to fashion. Inside the dining room, lighted like a bail bondsman’s office in Detroit, are hundreds of faded business cards, yellowed newspaper clippings and curled snapshots taped and tacked to every surface. Outside on Chrystie Street, scaffolding obscures the faded red and yellow painted signs in front of the building, which looks as if it has been marked for demolition. Like a Mississippi juke joint, Sammy’s seems to have been put together under the theory that nobody is likely to stay sober long enough to inspect the décor. (Known for selling vodka bottles encased in ice, Sammy’s is New York’s original bottle-service restaurant, and still the only tolerable one.)
Read the whole review here.
Noted
Outside the McDonald's on Third Avenue at St. Mark's Place this afternoon. Eat a Big Mac. Do some planks.
Jimmy McMillan wants to wear his karate uniform for an upcoming gubernatorial debate
[Photo from February 2013 by James Maher]
Catching up to this piece in The Wall Street Journal Saturday on St. Mark's Place resident Jimmy McMillan of the Rent is 2 Damn High Party.
He plans on running for governor again, though it hasn't been easy.
It's not clear whether Mr. McMillan will be on the ballot come November. His petitions have been challenged by Mike Welch, a Schenectady science teacher who alleges Mr. McMillan photocopied signatures to meet the 15,000 required for a spot on the ballot. Mr. McMillan says Mr. Welch didn't follow proper procedures filing his objection. The Board of Elections is expected to rule [this] week.
And!
He's already selected an outfit if he is included in a coming debate — his karate uniform. And he sees no need to go out campaigning.
His most convincing campaign literature, he tells people, is their rent receipt: "If you can't see that your rent is too damn high, don't pay me no mind."
You can read the Journal article here. (Subscription may be necessary.)
Going Mobil
The former Mobil station is now all snug behind plywood on Avenue C and East Houston (luckily, workers left blogger portals in the plywood!).
Meanwhile, Mobil management put up a sign showing the nearest convenient locations for another Mobil station…
The station, the last one left in the East Village, abruptly closed on Sept. 2.
Back in March, Hakimian Property filed plans (still waiting for approval) to erect a 9-story mixed-use building on the site. Plans call for 45 residential units and 4,550 square feet of commercial space.
This aerial shot, via www.anitam.com, gives you a good idea of the shape of the lot and what the developers have to work with…
Previously on EV Grieve:
You have a little longer to get gas on Avenue C
Plans filed for new 9-story building at site of Mobil station on East Houston and Avenue C
RUMOR: Gas station going, boutique hotel coming on Second Avenue? (31 comments)
BP station on 2nd Avenue closes this month
State seizes Mobil station on Avenue C and Houston for nonpayment of taxes
[Photo by Michael Sean Edwards from last fall. Click to enlarge.]
Headline H/T
Full reveal at 154 Second Ave.
Workers yesterday removed the plywood from the ground-floor space at 154 Second Ave. … now finally providing a full view of the former Sigmund Schwartz Gramercy Park Chapel.
Icon Realty and architect Ramy Isaac added three extra floors here for luxury rentals… with ground-floor retail that's still on the market (the rate is negotiable, according to the Icon website)…
The demolition work here started back in April 2012.
As we've posted before, here's how the building looked in the summer of 2011…
Here's what the address looked like in the 1940s, via Vanishing New York...
And here is the rendering …
Sill no word yet on pricing for the units.
Previously on EV Grieve:
Former funeral home looks to double in size with help from 'the controversial penthouse king of the East Village'
Redeveloped funeral home looking for a few live retail tenants
The walls come tumbling down at 154 Second Avenue
'Go Lightly' with Ellen Turrietta
[Photo from August by James Maher]
Back on Aug. 27, we featured Ellen Turrietta in our weekly Out and About in the East Village feature.
At that time, she had been camped outside a building on East Seventh Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue for several weeks. She had set up a fake barber shop. And a leather shop, among other things. There was a surprisingly intense debate among readers about all this. Was it some kind of performance art? Or was she out there where the trains don't run?
Since then several readers told us about the existence of "Go Lightly," described on YouTube (and uploaded in June) as a "psychologically intense portrait of a former fashion model living in New York. This film explores themes of masochism and exploitation."
We asked Brooklyn-based writer-filmmaker Forrest McCuller a few questions about his "Go Lightly."
How did you meet Ellen?
I met Ellen while I was working at a coffee shop. I think it was in May.
I am usually guarded when I am working in food service. I am a writer. I do not have any small talk.
But Ellen is good at engaging people. She can slice through introversion. I found her to be an interesting and challenging person. She can express her inner world and make it vivid. She has a lot of insight.
That is a good word for it: insight. She looks inward to understand the outside world. It is a strategy with a limited applicability contingent on the breadth of the mind in question. Ellen has come a long way on her wits. It is egotism, but if you think that it is not practical I'd challenge you to go stand outside in the street for a month and see how you fare.
I am not saying that she is self-made. Few people pass that test. But the opportunities that she gets, at least as long as I've known her — and I think since she left home in her teens — she has gotten because she impresses people. She is sharp and straightforward. One thing I've learned watching her: you get a lot more out of people if you tell them what you want right away than by any underhanded plot. She lives off of that idea.
At what point did you know that you wanted to film her?
The first time I hung around with Ellen outside my job she told me about her life, and I told her about my filmmaking. I like to make documentaries with characters who seem unreliable. That way you get a notion of the person without the false sense of certainty that a lot of documentaries sell.
I described "The Fortune Tellers," a music documentary I made that does not attempt to sell music. Instead, it is a dark comedy. She liked the sound of what I was doing, and she mentioned wanting a film about her own life. Knowing what I knew about her life then, it seemed to me like any biographical portrait would be an exploitation film. I decided to make an anti-exploitation film.
I wanted to demonstrate Ellen rather than packaging her personality and selling it. The film is neither for or against her.
Did you give her any guidelines, or did she just start going?
I didn't give Ellen much direction while we were filming. I just talked to her. I wanted it to be as much like our previous conversations as possible.
It would not have been appropriate for me to give her too much direction. I would have been like a photographer demanding a model to strike postures. My intention was the opposite. I didn't want a model. I wanted to show Ellen.
Our feature on her generated 80 comments. What is your assessment of her?
She seems much healthier today than she was when I met her. She found a way to build a community around herself. I think that is helping her.
I understand people calling Ellen an anachronism in the East Village. Her performances aren't made to sell, and I suppose everyone is supposed to be scrambling for money right now (I won't speculate about her financial situation.)
But the problem with calling her behavior old-fashioned is that I don't know of any time when withdrawal from social etiquette has been broadly well-received. Ellen's ideals line up with her practices, and that happens to be a recipe for ostracism.
What are your plans for the film?
My plan for the film is to put it in front of a lot of eyes.
It's not an informational doc. It relates a tacit experience. For people to understand it at all they have to watch it.
Here's a preview.
You can find the 30-minute film here. (It's $5.)
Exciting new business opens on University Place
At East 11th Street … formerly home to Jack Bistro, which closed last fall.
Now neighbors to the European Wax Center, which opened in the space last held by the Cedar Tavern.
Photo by @Zipperfilm
Monday, September 22, 2014
Avenue A and East Houston intersection shaping up, pretty much
[Photo of Houston and A from July by Maggie Wrigley]
After nearly four
See — less confusion and chaos. You can see the streets! And new curbs!
An aside, does anyone know how to get to the hospital… oh, forget it!
Anyway …
And via Twitter, EVG reader Mike Brown reminded us of the new Greenstreets and street configurations on these corners…
[Click on images to enlarge]
No sign of a cab stand in these designs.
The East Houston Reconstruction Project is now scheduled (PDF!) to be completed by mid-2016, according to the latest city estimates.
Previously on EV Grieve:
Coming soon to East Houston: Construction, hell, rodent control stations
Long-threatened East Houston reconstruction starting this month
How you can help Punjabi Grocery & Deli stay in business
Taking a pit stop at 98-100 Avenue A
As we pointed out on Friday, there isn't much, if anything, left of the former theater-turned-grocery at 98-100 Avenue A between East Seventh Street and East Sixth Street.
And what's it looking like from the top?
An EVG reader shared these photos...
Developer Ben Shaoul is putting in a 6-floor residential building with 29 apartments and ground-floor retail here.
Previously on EV Grieve:
A little bit of Hollywood on Avenue A
Inside the abandoned theater at East Village Farms on Avenue A
Workers back demolishing what's left of 98-100 Avenue A
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