Politicians took up the cause of rent stabilized tenants locked out of a new gym on the ground floor of their building on West 97th street, calling it “segregation” and even comparing it to “apartheid.”
Stonehenge’s policies barred rent-stabilized tenants from using the new 1,000-square-foot gym, which the real estate company reportedly spent $5 million to build after converting a former storage room. Stonehenge considers the amenity a draw for its market-rate tenants, but doesn’t think rent-regulated tenants — who make up about 60% of tenants — should have access.
At a press conference in front of the building at 120-160 West 97th street, Public Advocate Letitia James said she would file a complaint with the Commission on Human Rights alleging discrimination. She and Councilman Mark Levine said the policy is illegal, a charge that Stonehenge disputes. “(The gym) is aimed specifically at new and prospective tenants who expect certain amenities and incentives that are commonly available to market rate renters,” company spokeswoman Marcia Horowitz told the Daily News.
James is apparently relying on a 2008 law in stating that the arrangement is illegal. “A 2008 city law prohibited discrimination in housing based on tenants’ income, James’ spokeswoman said. The law was written to protect tenants in the Section 8 voucher program, but the spokeswoman noted it may apply to other instances, as well.”
A lawyer for the tenants in the building declined to comment, although Tenants Association President Jean Dorsey says she’ll take management to court.
Borough President Gale Brewer and State Senator Bil Perkins also spoke out against the policy, with Perkins calling it a “form of apartheid.” Councilman Mark Levine also compared it to a civil rights struggle. His spokesman sent us this statement: “No one should have to feel like a second-class citizen in their own home. This move by Stonehenge Management deliberately divides residents of a mixed-income building along lines of class. It sets a dangerous precedent at a time when such mixed-income buildings are becoming more and more common. We call on Stonehenge Management to immediately reverse this policy so that all residents can live as equals in their home.”
These tenants will not be pushed out bc the real estate industry has begun to covet this land. pic.twitter.com/dyCkWIXMZm
— Mark D. Levine (@MarkLevineNYC) February 25, 2014
More enabling for the Entitled Class! It would be nice if these politicians spent the same energy on cleaning up the homeless mess that the West 90’s became under Gale Brewer’s watch than on this nonsense.
PRL: i am willing to meet you any time of the day or night and walk you down W. 95th from Bway to RSD. you can then point out to me the “homeless mess” on those blocks… which, of course, doesn’t exist.
And I’m willing to trade apartments with you so you can hear what actually goes on at 3 in the morning, and enjoy the view of the garbage-filled courtyard! I’ve made the offer before, but you haven’t taken me up on it. My lease is up in August, if you’d like to take it over. I’ll be leaving.
I’m willing to take you up on your offer. But if the West 90s were “a homeless mess”, me and my neighbors would certainkly notice from the street.
I’m sure your apartment will be rented very quickly at a high rent.
This is totally awesome! How big is your apartment? Actually, who cares about the size — is it reasonably free of people screaming and breaking glass at 3 am? When can we do the trade?! Do not even begin to think I won’t take you up on this.
FYI, my apartment is at market rate for the building. I’m not getting a special rate, and the landlords will not get more when I move out, as you seem to be implying. Unless of course, you’d like to give it to them as the new tenant. It will certainly be rented again — but that’s largely because the vacancy rate is so low right now, and the lower priced options on the UWS are few. I’m here because (a) it’s what I can afford, and (b) because I moved in years before the homeless shelter mess did. And for what it’s worth, a LOT of apartments in this building, particularly on my side of it, have turned over since the shelter moved in. I make a point of telling prospective new tenants in the building that it’s there — the real estate agents and landlords do not, and it’s come as a grim surprise to a couple of people.
I’ve offered to trade with someone on the opposite side of the building (which doesn’t face the shelter), but no success so far.
re: the West 90s becoming a “homeless mess” under Gale Brewer’s watch:
this is simply a myth repeated over and over again by some. I live on W. 95th, down the block from the homeless shelter. there is no difference at all in re: conditions on the block. no more crime. property values in my condo building have gone up probably 20% since the shelters came in… not a sign of a “homeless mess.”
Bruce, you’ve run away every time I bring this up, but I live NEXT to the shelter, and my windows face it (on an inner courtyard). And you are simply dead wrong.
The tenants scream and fight all the time, day and night. I call the shelter and/or 911 (depending on whether I hear something scary or not) on a daily basis about this. Not to mention that they blast loud music all the time and I’m always hearing breaking glass. Two people are having a screaming fight right now that I can hear through closed windows and over a fan (which I turn on for white noise — I have one on in each room now 24/7 so I can get work done and sleep). Actually, the current fight sounds pretty bad. Time for me to call the shelter again!
Many of the residents throw their garbage out the window. (Like the rodent problem on the upper west wasn’t bad enough before.) I’ve had to call 311 about this more than once. Would you like to see a picture of the courtyard ankle deep in trash? I’ve got a couple, if Avi wants to post them. You can’t see it from the street. Someone even hurled a TV out the front window. You’ve seen that picture right here on the west side rag (I notice you didn’t comment on that article).
I guess the increased police, fire truck, and ambulance presence on my block has escaped you. I’ve noticed it because I have no choice.
You live around the corner. The extent of your contact is when you walk by the building. Just because nothing happens during the ten seconds while you happen to be passing doesn’t mean nothing happens.
G,
Is there a way for you to post the pictures? I think it’s high time that the rumor-mongering stops and we can actually **see** what some of the folks on 95th St are claiming.
“A picture is worth 1,000 words.”
(Maybe you can post pix to Picassa, if Avi can’t host the photos?)
FYI, I’ve sent a photo to Avi, and it’s up to him as to whether it’s worth posting or not! (I don’t want to get your hopes up, but he’s indicated that he thinks it is!) In fairness, I must note that earlier this week, the city made the shelter clean up the courtyard in response to my February 4 complaint (though it was a couple weeks later, after I sent a follow up email with a picture attached, and sent a copy to Aaron Biller of Neighborhood in the Nineties, who forwarded it to some city officials).
But FYI, two days later, there is already some garbage in the courtyard. And also FYI, the courtyard is usually a huge mess. They seem to let it accumulate until someone complains and they’re forced to clean it up. And the cycle starts again. I’m tempted to take a picture every day and do one of those time-lapse things.
Finally, I must note that the garbage is not the result of a garbage can being knocked over, etc. (They don’t have any garbage cans in the courtyard). And it’s not blowing in from elsewhere (it is an enclosed courtyard). It is entirely the result of residents throwing trash out their windows. In other words, it’s a chronic problem, not a one-time fluke.
We are not going to parade up and down the street a couple of times — that would prove nothing. Would walking up and down a dangerous street at 3 am prove that it was safe and crime-free, just because you didn’t happen to get mugged that night? FYI, the front (which is what you walk by) is where the security people are. Therefore, that’s not generally where the trouble is. The security people are pretty oblivious to what goes on in the rest of the building, which is what I face. That’s why I have to keep calling them (and 311, and 911). If you want a laugh, they didn’t even know how to get to the garbage-strewn courtyard. They’d never been there. And it’s a big one, not a narrow alley.
No. The deal is, we’re trading apartments, you and I. You will live next to the garbage strewn courtyard and listen to the noise at 3 a.m. That’s the only way you’re going to appreciate this.
But as a warning, you won’t get your apartment back. I really don’t have as much interest in proving this to you as I do in getting out of this apartment.
@fjl618 — In theory, I really love your idea. But after a year’s experience living next to the building, I know exactly what would happen. It would be like living next door to a particularly rowdy 24/7 nightclub.
The noise coming from some of the residents’ rooms is often noisy enough to travel across the courtyard (of course, many of them keep their windows open, all the time, which doesn’t help), penetrate my closed windows, and be heard over the noise of a fan, my television or sometimes both. I sleep with a fan on and foam earplugs, and sometimes it still wakes me up. Some of them turn their televisions and music up unbelievably loud. A few of them are always fighting. An inordinate amount of glass seems always to be breaking.
If they were doing that down in the courtyard, it would echo off the walls and make all the apartments bordering it unlivable. (Eh. I have some experience of this already. Some of them communicate Honeymooner style — by bellowing out the windows across the courtyard rather than walking down the hall. Trust me — it’s LOUD!)
Also, unless it were supervised pretty much all the time, it would be a mess. People who throw garbage out the window aren’t likely to care about throwing garbage on the ground. And it could turn into a place for fighting, drug use, etc.
Yeah. It’s very nice to imagine happy people enjoying a peaceful picnic down there. The truth is, unfortunately, that’s not what would happen.
By the way, I know that not all of the tenants are loud, scary, messy, inconsiderate trouble-makers. But I can tell you I feel very, very bad for those who aren’t. Once, when a couple of people were screaming and fighting, and I was looking out the window trying to figure out which floor it was coming from so I could call 911 and give them some direction, a woman in the shelter threw open her window and yelled “You people SHUT UP RIGHT NOW!” I laughed and gave her a thumbs up, and she gave me a smile and a return thumbs up. That woman wants a peaceful place to live. It’s a shame the shelter is so ill-run she can’t have it. I wish her luck getting the heck out of there ASAP.
When I receive free digs, such as at a friend’s vacation home, I try to reciprocate by making myself useful. I have helped plant rosebushes, taken out the garbage, gone to the supermarket, etc. Is there any reason why the recipients of the city’s largesse can’t be bothered todo the same? With supervision, they could utilize their idle time and clean up the courtyard. In return, maybe the city could put some picnic tables and chairs there so that the courtyard will have a purpose and won’t be used as a landfill.
I don’t live “around the corner”. I live ACROSS THE STREET. yes, I have noticed nothing ON THE STREET. Most police precense on 95th street is because of the “speed trap” on the exit from Henry Hudson Parkway.
I walk up and down the block 2 times every day, 10 times on weekends. Sorry that the increased ambulence presence bothers you so much. What a shame!!
i have noticed no increaded fire truck presence.
by the way, your trashing of rent stabilized tenants on this site puts your other claism into question.
I’m willing to walk up and down the block with you — twice, four times, as many times as you would like — go inside the shelter, inspect the alley, and so forth. By the way, some trash in an alley does not make W. 95th “a homeless mess.”
Let’s do the walk together and see what we see.
by the way, I’ve heard (from friends of mine who live in the shelter) that the building next to G. Gomez (316) is worse than the other one (330) in terms of the homeless tenants.
Yes, I have friends who have been in the shelter for a year. I met them in the park. I would be more 5than happy to introduce you. they are wonderful people… and in one case even stopped a robbery in the park. things you don’t usually hear.
By the way — I’ve been in the shelter. Several times. Have you? I also notice that you have asserted the owners provide services to the residents in return for the $3700 — but when I’ve asked you to articulate what those services are, you have not answered. I’ve actually spoken to a couple of residents, and they don’t seem to think they’re getting services. Maybe you’ve spoken to some who are? What services are they getting (not promised — GETTING)?
I very much think we need to do something to help our homeless population. But what we’re doing (and not doing) is a huge disservice both to them and the neighborhood. We are simply warehousing people without regard to whether some of them have serious drug, mental, and behavioral problems. The only one benefiting are the building owners. And when people like you defend them, and insist that everything is just hunky-dory, you are helping maintain this completely unacceptable status quo.
If for $3700 per month of taxpayer money they kept things clean and orderly (like any other building must do), and provided real services to get these people on their feet, I wouldn’t be fighting it. That is not what is happening. Can you really, seriously argue that it is?
But if you are willing to attest to the cleanliness of a courtyard you have never seen (in the face of someone who has an actual photograph, no less), I doubt we’ll get you to admit there are any other problems.
I am on the corner of 95th and RSD. entrance on 95th.
Cmon, I’ve taken up your challenge… i am away this weekend but the weekend of 3/8… or any other time. show me this disaster area!! because i can’t see it from walking up and down the street every day.
“Some trash in an alley” OMG. Seriously, I have a picture. It’s not “some trash” and it’s not “an alley”. It’s a courtyard. On the other side of a wall, people in my building have patios with picnic tables. Theirs literally was ankle deep in trash — covering the pavement. After my 311 complaint they just cleaned it on Monday. There is already more trash there because the residents throw it out the window. (I’ll need to call 311 again in a month or so at most to get it cleaned up.) And garbage is caught on the wall all the way down. I have seen it — I have PHOTOS — you do not.
And in a previous comment on this issue, you described your apartment as being around the corner on Riverside Drive. Besides which, across the street is NOT the same thing as next door. You’ll find this out after we trade apartments.
I’m not trying to be the bad guy here, but this is not income discrimination. For many rent stabilized apartments, there is no ongoing income requirement, you simply had to live there or qualify at the time of the initial lease, not ongoing. Also the protection of the rights under the lease are for the apartment itself, not the entire building, other than basic necessities (eg trash pickup, extermination, etc). If the management company wants to build and operate a private health club on site and offer a membership as part of new leases in order to entice new tenants, I don’t see why they should not be able to do so.
That’s right. According to the 2011 law, if the stabilized rent is under $2,500, the residents’ income does not affect the rent stabilized status of the apartment.
The income limit of $200,000 only kicks in once the rent goes above $2500/month.
NY politicians are without a doubt the most deplorable people on the planet.
Re: State Senator Perkins claim that “This move by Stonehenge Management deliberately divides residents of a mixed-income building along lines of class.”
Au contraire, I would say it is Perkins and especially our resident socialist, Public Advocate Letitcia James, who are doing the class warfare thing by using a minor issue to get their faces on television.
As most of the commentators to the original story noted, the “members only” policy strikes many as fair.
But of course James needs the attention because, following the lead of the previous public advocate and now Mayor, she hopes to someday become NYC’s first female-African American-Race-Baiting-Socialist Mayor.
Don’cha just love polticians?
“Don’cha just love polticians?”
more than i love hate-mongerers.
Bruce, you always complain that people on this site make ad hominem attacks (and while sometimes you’re right, most of the time, all they’re doing is making a passionate argument in opposition to yours). In fact, you make ad hominem attacks All. The. Time. E.g., calling someone a “hate monger.”
you don’t agree that the inflammatory statement about Tish James directly above is hate-mongering? Sorry… I call ’em as I see ’em.
Oh, it’s going to be a fun-filled four years. Seat belts on, everyone!
This is ridiculous. Why can’t a landlord offer a perq to someone who pays a higher rent? That is like saying that everyone gets to use the balcony of the person in the penthouse – and everyone gets to use the in-apartment washer and dryer in the big apartment – and everyone gets to use the whirlpool bathtub in the renovated apartment. This is more liberal envy craziness. You get what you pay for……and if you don’t pay, you don’t get….
If the perk exists within the PRIVATE leased or owned perimeters of the property ( I.e., an apartment, penthouse, etc.) that is one thing, but a perk that is constructed within the PUBLIC, COMMON AREAS of a residential building, is another entirely. Different laws and regulations apply to common areas and rights of all tenants of that building.
Remember the “poor door” “controversy”? The building owners planned to split the building in two, and have separate entrance for the market rate tenants and the stabilized tenants. Under this arrangement, it would have been possible to have separate facilities for each part of the building, and keep the gym in the market rate section. However, since that was also decried as equivalent to Apartheid, that’s not possible. Building owners are pressured to have a single entrance and a single shared building, and then are told that because it’s a single shared building with one entrance, everything in the building must be shared with everyone.
By the way, what if this were a parking garage with a limited number of spaces? If you have a market rate apartment at $3500/mo, you get a free parking space with your apartment. If you pay $1000 for your 2 bedroom terrace apartment, you don’t get a space and have to park your car (if you have one) in the garage down the street. Is that also like Apartheid?
Of course, this particular building was already in existence. Their only choice was to build a gym in the space they had (a not very big former storage area). They had no option to have separate facilities, or for that matter, to build a larger facility. They could either build a small gym in the basement or not. But my “poor door” point is this — if a separate entrance and separate “common areas” are not an acceptable option for buildings like this, a building owner has no choice but to have a gym in a “common area.”
The upshot is going to be that no one gets a gym. And the upshot of that is that the market rate apartments will be less attractive to market-rate tenants.
The landlord should certainly be allowed to offer a perk to a market rate tenants. However, the perk should be that the fee for the gym is waived / included in the rent. If the rent stabilized tenants want in, they can pay a gym membership fee (as their original leases did not include free membership to a gym in the building). At this point, they are not even permitted to pay a fee to use the shared space within their own building, and that is segregation.
Please tell me what law is being broken? I mean what segregation or discrimination law, not NY City Tenant Law, which are a joke because they exist purely to deprive landlords of flexibility, discretion and income. This is ridiculous. The gym is meant to increase the value (and hence the price) or the market rate apartments. By definition you cannot improve the price of the price controlled apartments. Therefore, access to the gym does not apply to them. Why is that such a tough concept? Why can’t the landlord have an incentive to improve the building?
I couldn’t agree more. “Membership” as a perk implies exclusion, in this case, to those who belong to a class of tenants whose rent is regulated under the DHCR. Isn’t this parallel to the newly minted Arizona state law legitimizing exclusion of LGBT consumers ( and how do you prove that?) to services offered commercially on the public market?
Either way, it’s discrimination, pure and simple.
excellent point.
“a perk for someone who pays a higher rent”
But that is not what it is. The landlord is not saying, “everyoen with rent over $2,000 gets to use the gym.” there probably are rent stabilized tenants in the building who pay higher rent than market rate tenants (albeit for larger apartments).
what the landlord IS doing is discriminating against everyone who has been there a while… since the RS tenants will almost all be holdovers, and the market-rate folks newbies.
is the landlord allowed to give a perk for “signing new leases”? sure… on the first lease! but that is not what the landlord is doing here, either. he is discriminating against an entire class of tenants.
ScooterStan,CE and PanderingFools you are right on the money here.
“Apartheid” and “Civil Rights struggle” are race-baiting analogies. The policy is for market-rate tenants vs. rent-stabilized tenants. Is that uniquely a black/white issue?
I need to get out of NY ASAP. I LOVE it here but 4-8 years of Mayor Castro will be more than I can take.
you apparently don’t love NYC enough to respect the choice of 73% of the voters as to who we want for Mayor.
Yeah Bruce, 73% of the RECORD low turnout of 24% of eligible voters. Don’t let facts get in the way of your liberal rants.
De Blasio got one of the highest RAW VOTE totals in history… and had a huge margin both in percentage and raw vote. His voter mandate is much more than Giuliani and/or Bloomberg ever had. And Bloomberg of course would spend obscene amounts each election… $100 million plus.
and the landlord is allowed to discriminate against rent stabilized tenants because… ?
Don’t you see, the poor, shall i say the people that sit home collecting Ssi, welfare, food stamps……are entitled. While we break our asses, and actually are “paying” for our perk, they feel they are entitled. I am sick of it!
(1) Not allowing someone to live in an apartment because they are hispanic: discrimination. Not allowing someone to live in a building because they won’t/can’t pay the rent for that apartment: not discrimination (even if that person happens to be hispanic).
(2) Declining to hire women, even though they are well qualified, solely because they are women: discrimination. Declining to hire someone who is not qualified for a position: not discrimination (even if that person happens to be a woman).
(3) Refusing to allow blacks into your restaurant: discrimination. Refusing to allow a person into your restaurant because they won’t or can’t pay, because they’re rowdy and disturbing other customers, or because they don’t comply with your retaurant’s dress code: not discrimination, (even if the person you are turning away happens to be black).
(4) Running an accommodation that is open to the general public, but excluding certain classes of people due to their race, religion, or gender — discrimination. Running a private country club that is open only to its paying members: totally fine.
This gym is private, not public — open only to people paying full market rate for apartments in the building. Not everyone is allowed to go to it — they wouldn’t let me in, either. (And I dare say they won’t let the doormen or other staff use it.) Nor are they excluding people on the basis of any legally protected category like race or gender. They’re merely opening it only to those who are paying through the nose for their apartments.
This happens all the time. I once had a (market rate) apartment in a building that had one general laundry room in the basement for those of us on the lower, cheaper floors. The fancier apartments on floors above me had a laundry room on each floor. And the really super expensive apartments had laundry in their apartments. It never once occurred to me to bitch that I wasn’t allowed access to the (nicer, less busy) laundry room on the floor just above me. If I were willing/able to pay $1000 more in rent, I could have used it, plus I would have had nice granite countertops instead of formica. Oh, and the nicer apartments came with free storage space in the basement, and mine didn’t. But guess what? That’s not discrimination. Even if those lucky stiffs on the upper floors got free parking in the garage (and maybe they did for all I know), I have no grounds for complaint. I got what I paid for.
When I go to the airport with my coach ticket, I don’t get to use the nice lounges for first class passengers. And when I’m on the plane, I don’t get to use the first class restroom, even if it’s empty and fourteen people are waiting to use the coach toilet. I don’t get to use the “members only” restaurant in the Metropolitan Museum if I don’t buy a membership. If I pay more money, I get a better seat at the opera. If I buy a fancy package on a cruise ship, I’ll get a better cabin and more amenities. Nothing unjust about any of that.
If we’re going to define being excluded from desirable luxuries as discrimination — hey, I’m not getting a 2 bedroom doorman apartment with terrace for $1000 a month. I’m stuck paying more than double that for a little box next to a homeless shelter. Help, help! I’m being oppressed!
Excellent job in summing up the reality here.
Here here! Well said. These people have no idea how much they are getting for how little they pay.
Comparing it to apartheid…they should be ashamed of themselves.
If your rich uncle offers to treat you to a five-star dinner at Daniel, don’t complain about the wine he’s selected.
Bruce, I have lived in the neighborhood since 1995. The mess – yes, mess – that I am referring to is the stretch of Broadway from the low ’90’s to the low ‘100’s. Perhaps you don’t walk on those blocks, but I do, and I know what I see and experience. I also know what I hear from shopkeepers, neighbors, and even surprised visitors. The number of panhandlers, loiterers, and those who appear to be homeless has increased dramatically in the last three years, and they are getting more aggressive. It is anything but a myth, it is a fact repeated by MANY, not SOME as you state. Why you are blind and deaf to it is beyond me. And is it just dumb luck that this mess – yes, mess! – coincides with the 2012 opening of the controversial homeless shelters on your block, and Gale Brewer’s stupid legislation outlawing the renting of SRO rooms to tourists? I think not.
Incidentally, the increase in value of your condo (or mine) doesn’t mean anything as we are simply riding a citywide increase. My prediction? The minute there is a citywide downturn, property values in our immediate neighborhood will be one of the first to suffer if it is not cleaned up. But that’s an argument for another day.
Boradway has more homeless THROUGHOUT… including in the 50s, 70s. etc. This is because of the increase in homeless in NYC… not because of the shelter. the people on Bway are NOT shelter residents. Ask them if you dare.
If there IS something that attracts homeless to the stretch of Bway you are talking about, it is the soup kitchen at the church on W 94 and Bway (93rd?). dio you want to chase that out of the neighborhood?
Bruce, I know where you are going with this, and against my better judgement I will respond even though you will twist it around to suit your arguments, in which you position yourself as the Champion Of The Poor and Disposessed.
I myself have given thousands of dollars and many hours of volunteering to charity. I do what I can in the spirit of tzuduka. However, I don’t care whether it’s a soup kitchen, homeless shelter, or fancy wine bar – if the entity in question is attracting folks who are aggressively panhandling, breaking into cars, spitting at people (yes I have experienced all these things in the last year alone) and otherwise making my neighborhood less safe for my 3-year old and 11-month old daughters, it is my unquestionable right as a tax-paying citizen to want to “chase it out.”
It is Broadway United Church of Christ on Bway and W. 94th Street. they have a free sandwich line for all who wish to partake almost every weekday.
https://broadwayucc.org/
I would love to see you go over there and try to “shut that down” or “chase it out.” Can i come wathc? I promise I won’t say anything… just videotape your efforts, and put them on youtube! I’m sure it would go viral…
Oh, gee, did I say that that was what I was going to do? No, what I said was that’s how I felt about any entity that was causing the problems that I pointed out in the first place. And I didn’t point out the church – YOU did. Not that you would ever give anyone on this blog the consideration of actually reading their posts before you replied with one of your canned rants.
Why is this apatheid. You get what you pay for. If you book a premium hotel room or a first class airline ticket, it comes with more perks than if you get a cheap room or a coach class ticket. Is that apartheid? I think not.
@Westsiderag: you’re going to document G Gomez and Bruce Bernstein’s apartment swap experiment, right? Your readers have a right to know!
Ha! I’m all for it! Look, as long as I get his apartment and he’s stuck with mine, I’m good. You guys are all witnesses to this agreement, right?
I’m going out to get some boxes and hire movers. (I like my stuff and Bruce isn’t getting that with the bargain.) But I’ll throw in some glue traps free of charge.
fyi, G. Gomez: I’m a condo owner. Hence you would be my tenant.
Well, I hope you’re a better landlord than my current (your future) landlord. He’s not all that responsive. But you’ll see after you move in.
Will you be able to use his gym?
I’d better get to use his gym. Because otherwise this is EXACTLY like Apartheid.
Not just document it. We should start a reality TV show! Avi
Using the word Apartheid for something so ridiculous is so uneducated.
People need to understand life is not fair. It’s not fair they are paying so little while others pay trouble their rent. If they don’t like it they can move, plain and simple. They are not held there.
Yes, they pay or ethereal are entitle to more, if you don’t like it move, it’s a free country.
advice to Stonehenge: I lived in the Sheffield on 57th btw 8/9 from 96-03 when it was all rentals. It included a fair amount of rent stabilized. They had a decent gym on the top floor (50th), with killer views (I’m sure it’s a private residence now that its condo). They charged $50 a month for all building residents – which is a steal (Esp. now that I am paying over $220 at Reebok). Just charge $100 a month and move on. Otherwise next time you need a permit to build or buy another property, the a-hole politicians comparing you to hitler and de Klerq will show you the Heisman.
I do not agree with this conclusion by the public advocate – rent control is intended to provide safe and affordable housing to people who can’t afford market rates. It does not require means testing below a certain rent level, because requiring it would be too complex and burdensome, but nonetheless, it is not intended to provide amenities that are not necessary for safe and affordable housing.
There is no reason that a building owner can’t offer amenities to free market tenants that are not offered to rent-controlled tenants, and in fact, the structure of the rent control rules makes it very disadvantageous to a landlord to extend amenities to rent-controlled tenants. This is because once you have given a rent-controlled tenant an amenity, you cannot take it away – but for a market-rate tenant, you can (for example, if this gym proves to be too expensive or not popular enough, the landlord can close it, as long as it hasn’t signed leases with market-rate tenants requiring it – but if it is extended to rent-controlled tenants, the landlord will be compelled to continue to provide it). I think the public advocate is just wrong on the law here – though clearly she is getting a good sound bite over this!
“Discrimination” on the basis of race, sexual orientation, gender, etc., is illegal and wrong. Giving a higher level of service to people who pay more is not.
There seems to be a feeling in NYC and elsewhere these days that everyone should receive the same no matter what they pay. Personally, I think that’s right in some core areas, like healthcare. But the idea that there is a basic right to get all the amenities in the building without paying for them, and that somehow all these amenities are going to exist if people get them without paying for them, is foolish.
This is also happening at The Windermere (West 92nd Street and West End Avenue). In fact this issue is included in a pathetic agreement that only benefits the landlord here. The Tenants’ Assn. is not even attempting to fight this issue and many others just as dreadful at The Windermere. It’s a sad day for the middle class in New York City.
Avi, instead of simply covering the one-sided view of the homeless issue that we get from our upscale commeters, why not include “the other side”? Why not try to interview the pastor and/or activists at the United Church of Christ? they are atually in touch with the homeless. it seems like they would have some insights.
And why not try to get the viewpoints of the people in the 95th St. Shelter, or at least some of them?
Bruce,
We’ve spoken to several people in the shelter, several of whom think the city is getting ripped off and using them for money. Did you attend the public meeting on the shelter? Several shelter residents spoke there. In addition, we spoke to a shelter resident about the time the building suddenly had no heat and politicians had to scramble frantically to get it turned back on.
We have attempted to speak with Aguila and DHS so many times it’s not worth counting. DHS has even blocked reporters from speaking with shelter residents on shelter grounds.
Please don’t accuse us of failing to cover a story that we broke, exhaustively covering the no-bid contract given to the most powerful and connected people in the city, a judge’s ruling against the city’s “black ops” shelter contracting procedures, and the reports of almost unbelievable conditions inside some of these local facilities.
Have you read the New York magazine article, every word in it?
https://nymag.com/news/features/podolsky-homeless-shelters-2013-12/
Please read the article. If you can still defend this program, after realizing who benefits from the system and who is left behind, then I’d love to hear your arguments for why it’s an effective method to alleviate suffering and poverty.
Avi
Here, here, Avi! I’ve been impressed by the West Side Rag’s efforts to obtain and present both sides of stories. Sadly, that’s all too rare these days.
Bruce, your accusation that you thought Avi was “neutral” on the shelter issue (rather than having an opinion) is actually a huge compliment to him. Of course Avi has opinions — we ALL have opinions! We’re human beings! — but he’s gone to some effort to make his reporting fair, and by your own showing, he’s been successful.
G. Gomez:
have you attempted to bring your issues to the attention of the shelter mgmt? it seems like there are simple solutions. for example, have a “hotline” to security when people are screaming / fighting so you don’t have to call 311. put an end to throwing garbage out the window (police it). don’t put the more volatile tenants on rooms so close to other buildings. and so on.
…And actually, I’ve mentioned more than once in this very thread that I’m constantly calling the shelter to report things. Do you read other people’s comments, or just start blasting back?
Indeed I do have a number, Bruce — It’s 212 222 9191, and I know it by heart because I call it so regularly. That’s the front security desk.
… by “hotline” i mean a direct phone # that they pick up… even their cell #s…
Avi,
why can’t i BOTH think these shelters were a rotten deal by Bloomberg and DHS and are (possibly) owned by the corrupt Podolskies… while at the same time think that the vast majority of the people within these two shelters are decent New Yorkers with real needs, some real problems, and that their mere presence in our commmunity has not singlehandedly destroyed our quality of life? and that they are members of our community every bit as much as the penthouse condo dweller.
Avi,
yes, I have read the New York magazine article. And by the way — the VICTIMS in the New York magazine article, or at least the large portion of them, were the rent stabilized tenants who are being so harangued on these comments as “entitled”, etc.
I thought you were NEUTRAL and simply reporting on the shelter. I didn’t realize you were an advocate…
I haven’t defended the “program”. I think the contract was an insider deal, which i oppose. Further, i think, as Gale Brewer has stated, that the process was a bad one — Bloomberg pulled a fast one on the process. I also think maybe 2 buldings is too much for the block.
Here is perhaps why you think i am “defending the program”:
1) the claim that the W. 90s has become a “homeless mess” is incredibly exagerated. There has been no increase in crime, no visible drugs, etc. on West 95th. I believe that a good deal of opposition to the shelters is based on NIMBY and no investigation.
Yes, the former residents IN THE BUILDING are suffering, and perhaps some people like G. Gomez, who apparently lives across an airshaft from the shelter. But note that even he wants to MOVE TO THE OTHER SIDE OF THE BUILDING or perhaps down the block. Would he do it if the neighborhood was a truly “homeless mess”?
2) I don’t think the voices of the homeless have been suffiently included in your reporting. You (very briefly) reported on a homeless woman who spoke at the hearing. And you state that DHS will not let you into the shelter to speak to the homeless. A valid reason, in part.
But have you used other methods to try to get the other viewpoint? What about homeless advocates? what do they think?
I specifically recommended speaking to the people running the sandwich line at Broadway UCC Church. A commenter above said he wanted to chase THAT out of the neighborhood. What about seeing the other side? What IS the homeless situation in the community?
The homeless residents of the shelter I have spoken to think that this shelter is better than some alternatives they face. It is actually a SAFER neighborhood for them.
I think it is a complex issue… but it is not resolved through hate and screaming. And I think everything has to be done to hear the voices of the homeless and near homeless. I think West Side rag could do a better job of presenting them. They are residents of the Upper West Side.
Why not a report on the Broadway UCC efforts? Certainly that is at least as important as yet another fancy restauranrt opening or closing.
By the way, Avi, the Community Free Democrats are having two leaders from the WestGate Tenants Association (protesting again discrimination against rent stabilized tenants — the issue covered above) speaking tonight thursday, 7:30, Goddard Riverside COmmunity Center.
Thankfully the Public Advocate is not in charge of anything important. I am totally on board with subsidizing housing for low-income, working people. I am not, however, the least bit interested in subsidizing their gym memberships.
Wow. This is how our Public Advocate is spending her time? Crusading for free gym access for tenants already getting an incredible deal on their rent? How many truly disadvantaged people are being ignored while she wastes energy on this?
Two leaders of the Westgate Tenants Association spoke at Community Free Democrats (CFD) last night. the tenants association went into the meeting with the landlords fully expecting to negotiate regarding the fee they would pay for access to the gym. They were stunned when the owners announced that they were BARRED from the gym, no negotiations.
So yes, that IS discrimination. And that (the denial of fee entrance) seems like an important point that should be reported.
It is a former Mitchell-Lama development of three buildings. Many of the rent-stabilized tenants are seniors who have been in the building as long as 40 years.
Incidentally, according to the tenants association president, many of the “market rate” tenants in the building are ashamed of the owner’s attitude… and ashamed of the sign on the door of the gym that urges them to basically slam the door on their neighbors if the neighbors are rent stabilized.
It is “discrimination”, in teh sense of treating one person differently from another – but the question is whether WRONGFUL discrimination. I do not think so, any more than I think it is not wrong to say that someone who bought a ticket for a train ride is not allowed to board the train.
I do think the landlord has the law on their side here, so there is no reason that they have to negotiate. People negotiate when both sides have rights that must be reconiciled; the tenants do not have a legal right to access this gym.
It is easy to give away someone else’s property. As you insist that landlords must give access to this gym and similar amenities, consider how comfortable you woudl be with the position that, because you have more house than a homeless person, you must share it with them. This really isn’t all that different, except that it’s someone else’s gym, not yours.
Here, here! If we’re talking about being treated “equally”, one has to wonder why the folks paying $1000 a month are getting an infinitely better apartment than people in NYC with six-figure jobs can afford — while most other low income folks don’t get anything approaching the same deal. E.g., they’re getting a 2-bedroom doorman apartment with terrace on the UWS for $1000, when the people in single room occupancy boxes pay something like $800 (that’s the rent I’ve heard mentioned — correct me if I’m wrong on it) for an 8×12 room without kitchen or bathroom! And still others who can’t afford a decent market rate apartment are forced to live somewhere cheap a long commute away, or in a total rat hole in a terrible neighborhood?
It would be interesting to ask someone paying to live in a ramshackle SRO or struggling to pay rent on a tiny box in the Bronx what they think about these tenants’ griping about not getting a free gym with their fancy cheap apartments. Ya know what? I bet they wouldn’t be all that sympathetic.
It’s remarkably reminiscent of the “Gym Crow” policy of Columbia University that played a large part in the ’68 student occupation and strike.
Every prewar building that has built a gym has taken that
space from some other amenity in the building , whether it
be a storage room, bike room, or any other space that was
used to benefit the whole building. The building can charge for using the gym, but cannot refuse any tenant who
who wants to join the gym based on when they moved in or
what type of lease they have. Bruce and Gomez, how about
lunch at a local diner…I’ll referee.
That’s actually not true – often these are spaces that were unused and off limits before being turned into gyms.
Unless it’s a lunch to organize a time and place for my move, I’ll pass. I don’t think I’d enjoy it, and I doubt Bruce would. I love a good debate, but I dislike having people rant at me while ignoring any arguments I make that they can’t answer and calling me an elitist, etc. And I don’t see that conversation going any other way.
Can you cite a law/regulation/anything for your assertion that the building “can’t” do this? I see a lot of people on this thread throwing around legal assertions about discrimination, real estate law, etc., but I haven’t seen anyone claiming to be a lawyer. (And before anyone says that I’ve thrown out a couple of legal assertions too, FYI — I am a lawyer.) I’d be extremely surprised if the building didn’t consult a lawyer before taking the position they have.
Webot is a lawyer and knows Landlord Tenant in New York City.
However, I too am weary of the fights with Bruce. I don’t even know how to reply here because he will say I am attacking him personally, which ironically he does with abandon.
Also, He appears to have free reign on this site while my comments are always “waiting for the moderator” and sometimes never published.
I am not a lawyer, but I have great respect for the profession.
The lawyers that worked for my company were diligent,
knowledgable and tireless in their per suite of information.
I can tell you that I witnessed a rent controlled lease stop
a landlord from making changes to service offered to the
tenancy. If controlled or stabilized tenants want to object to
change in service they should hire a lawyer to look for answers in their leases or in the laws regulating NYreal estate
in those leases.