Families of Auxiliary Cops Slain in West Village Rampage Denied Federal Benefits [Gothamist]
The Justice Department is denying federal benefits to the families of Yevgeniy Marshalik and Nicholas Pekearo who were brutally killed by a marauding gunman in the West Village last year. Both families had applied for $300,000 in benefits as part of the 2003 “Hometown Heroes” Congressional bill for families of first-responders killed in the line of duty, but “didn’t qualify” because the NYC’s “auxillary police are not recognized as police officers and do not have the power of arrest beyond that of a private citizen”. This comes a couple of weeks after BAMRA held a candle light on the anniversary of the incident.

Bovis Construction does it again… [The Real Deal]
A crane collapsed at a Miami high-rise construction site that resulted in 2 deaths. The contractor was no other than Bovis Construction who is also part of the the Trump SoHo, the same construction site that has been shut down twice for numerous violations and endangering its workers as well as the neighborhood.  They can also add the Deutsche Bank building to their extensive resume of deadly work incidents.

Subway Car Cleanliness Improved Slightly [Release]
A report was released today by the NYPIG’s Straphanger’s Campaign that rated the cleanliness of NYC Subways. According to the survey, Manhattan train’s cleanliness fell dramatically with some lines like the 4 going from 94%-38% in just two years, while other interbourogh lines like the L train saw significant improvement. [more] [Table]

City Hall to vote on tenant income discrimination bill [Gotham Gazette]
Landlords will now find it harder to reject low-income tenants who possess public housing authority section 8 vouchers if new legislature is passed by City Hall. This comes after Mayor Mike Bloomberg vetoed the bill that was passed by City Hall earlier.

Developer blocked in bid to build unaffiliated dorm [NY Sun]
The New York State Court of Appeals has ruled that the city can legally deny permits for dormitories if there is no school in line to lease the space. This ruling comes from a case where developer Gregg Singer tried to build a dormitory on the former home of P.S. 64 in alphabet city which he purchased from the city in 1998. The 19 story proposed dorm was widely opposed by the community. This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Bannana Republic Leaves the Village [Racked]
The nation-wide clothing store on Bleeker Street and Sixth Avenue is moving according to a brochure released by real estate company Staubach.

NYU’s razzle dazzle accused of being nazi [Curbed.com]
Curbed looks at the coverage of March 13th’s meeting where NYU presented their preliminary plans on NYU in 2031.

New Openings
Two new local eateries were featured in NY Magazine’s Grubb St.: Hakata Ippudo, a japanese ramen chain and Bowery Electric, a rock n’ roll bar. [Hakata Ippudo | Bowery Electric]

Speaker Quinn’s office is offering an invitation to all the women in the Greenwich Village area for a Self defense class.

This is a time sensitive matter and requires an RSVP to reserve a spot. Space may be limited.

The class is being sponsored by Speaker Christine Quinn and co-sponsored by Safe Horizon and the Center for Anti-Violence Education.

Date: Tuesday, March 25th, 2008
Time: 6:30PM to 8:30PM
Location: The basement of Our Lady of Pompeii Church
located at the intersection of Carmine and Bleecker
Streets in the West Village
Program:
6:30PM to 7:00PM Amy Edelstein from Safe Horizon
will discuss safety awareness and general resources
for survivors of sexual assault
7:00PM to 8:30PM Susan Moesker from the Center for
Anti-Violence Education will lead a self-defense class

What to Bring:
• Comfortable clothes, sneakers, a bottle of water, a
pad of paper and a writing utensil to take notes.
• We will provide exercise mats.

You may want to let your neighbors and friends know
about this opportunity.
Feel free to print the flyer and post it in your
building.

If want to attend, please respond directly to Grey
Elam.

Grey Elam
Legislative Aide
District Office of Speaker Christine C. Quinn
Phone: 212-564-7757
Email: Grey.Elam@council.nyc.ny.us

West Village Sex Fiend is Collard [NY Post]
The teenage sex offender who viciously attacked two women in the West Village two weeks ago has now been captured. He was a 19 year old who was picked up on Friday and is being charged with rape, sexual abuse and attempted assault.

CBGB’s Gallery to become The Morrison Hotel Gallery [Stupefaction]
The old CBGB’s Gallery is being turned into a gallery featuring “the best in visual music art curated by the staff of our gallery and created by the talented photographers and artists”. The first exhibit is opening Thursday evening, March 27th at 7pm.

NYU bids on CUNY Campus in Kips Bay [NY Observer]
NYU is bidding on the 4.2-acre city block of Hunter College’s Brookdale campus on the west side by 25th St. This continues their plan of expanding the school’s medical campus that is already in the area.

Webster Hall becomes Hall of Fame [NY Post]
“The Jewel of Greenwich Village” is now officially a historic landmark.

One and Two Bedroom Rents down in Manhattan during March [Real Deal]
Rents in one and two bedroom apartments went fell by 2% in Manhattan while prices for studios remained the same.

Is NYC construction like a 19th century coal mine? [curbed.com]
Curbed posts some good analysis of how dangerous construction has become with the great NYC development Gold Rush relating to the midtown crane crash and the Trump’s SoHo Chain incident fresh in mind. Queencrap also alerts its readers about an upcoming City Council hearing on construction site safety in April.

Mixed use stories [Villager]
The Villager brings us the latest news on Hudson Square, Trump Soho, Webster Hall, and Stuy Town

Discontinued: Magic Shoes Disappearing
Magic Shoes, the shoe store on 178 Bleeker St., is offering 80% off sales as they near the end of their lease.  The vintage shoe store is vanishing into thin air after being around since 1979.  Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York looks into the history of the store.

Webster Hall is Officially ‘Culturally Significant’
Landmarks Preservation Commission has recommended Webster Hall (119 East 11th Street) for historic preservation.  There still needs to be a public hearing with a vote.

Destructoporn: 30 Great Jones Going
The old screw factory at 30 Great Jones Street began its demolition.  There is very little on what will replace it.

Reader Rant: ‘Commie Boards’ & Bow Ties Ruining City [Curbed.com]
Curbed posts an email rant (this does not reflect the opinions of the fine staff of curbed.com in any way) about how community boards are made up of old “commie” geezers who are above the age of 80, retired and only like wearing cruise-ship blazers and bow-ties. Besides having to resort to name calling, makes the argument that Community Boards are made up of a minority of people with nothing better to do than protect their communities and demand an equal voice in how their neighborhoods are being developed.

197-a plans are a method for communities to formally establish development guides for city agencies that address the needs of the community. Creating a 197-a plan often requires a lengthy process of endorsements that has resulted in only ten plans being adopted since 1992 (when the law was enabled). Even when plans are passed, they cannot be enforced properly. An example was Columbia’s expansion being passed by City Council even though it directly violates the neighborhood’s 197-a. The new legislation that is being lobbied by The Community-Based Planning Task Force intends on changing the planning process to a bottom to top process.

However, the Bloomberg administration has created a road bump for seeing the effectiveness of bottom to top planning. A few months ago the city told Community Boards that they would be getting a $5,000 budget cuts. However, that was not the case, instead the city is now nearly tripling their budget cut to $16,000, or 8%, for Community Boards as part of its effort to tighten it’s belt. The problem with this is that the Community Board’s annual budget has always been $200,000 even during the good times. Cutting their budget is going to reduce the effectiveness of local government because Community Boards will now have to choose between operation costs and hiring experts for projects like 197-a plans.

Print media has also been raising concerns about the power of Community Boards. The New York Sun ran an article that questions the power Community Boards have by being able to reject liquor licenses to restaurants, even going far enough to insinuate that board members may be abusing their power for their own agendas.

What the Blogter is seeing is a struggle over the the philosophy of top to bottom vs. bottom to top governing in the works. The system we’ve seen, by example of the Atlantic Yards project, has been a series of city and developer decisions without any real input from the community. Now that is being threatened by recent legislature changes, so those benefiting from the current system are being threatened. Their answer to this is to weaken Community Boards even more, closing one door of citizens to get involved with their government.

If the budget changes are enacted, it is of the up-most importance that the local communities find volunteers to assist the boards so that we do not lose this opportunity to have real input into our neighborhoods futures. It is also the responsibility for Community Boards to also listen to its communities and adopt new ways of communicating and operating that reduces their spending.

Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer has stated his opposition to the cuts.

The Campaign for Community-Based Planning has drafted a letter to Mark Page, Director of the NYC Office of Management and Budget. In this letter they call for Boards to be able to receive more funding to enable them to undertake effective planning processes.

This news comes after recent legislation has been looked at to increase the power of community boards in development

[Letter]

Here is the full petition.

Dear Mr. Page:

We are writing to urge that you reconsider the proposed cuts to the city’s 59 community boards. The future ability of community boards to perform their charter-mandated responsibilities will be thrown into serious jeopardy if these cuts are allowed to go forward.

We are the Community-Based Planning Task Force—a coalition of community boards, citywide civic groups, grass roots neighborhood organizations, academics, and environmental justice activists that advocates for a more open, transparent, inclusive, and participatory planning process. Community boards are New Yorkers’ gateway to participation in the planning and development decisions that directly impact their neighborhoods, and we have consistently recommended increasing the boards’ resources so that they can plan more effectively for their districts.

The average community district has a population of over 130,000 people, making it comparable in size to Elizabeth, New Jersey and Albany, New York. All board responsibilities are carried out by a skeleton staff, and any extra personnel, such as planners, must be paid from funds raised beyond the board’s approximately $200,000 annual budget—which also pays for all salaries, office supplies, equipment, printing, and mailing. In comparison, Albany’s Division of Planning has an annual budget of $370,000 and employs six full-time staff. While the New York City Charter specifies that the boards are authorized to hire planners, it is the exception rather than the rule that they do so—they are forced to choose between planning expertise and basic operating costs.

The city is poised to add one million new residents; some districts have already grown by nearly 15 percent over the last census period. Community boards will be expected to make service delivery and planning decisions for this new surge of population—meaning additional siting of city facilities; more land use applications to consider; more variance applications to review; more people to inform and engage—critical work that keeps the city operating smoothly—with even less money. We urge that you enable the boards to perform their duties effectively—at the very least, by keeping their budgets intact.

Sincerely,

Cc:

Honorable Michael Bloomberg

Honorable Christine Quinn

Honorable Scott Stringer

Honorable Marty Markowitz

Honorable Adolfo Carrion, Jr.

Honorable Helen M. Marshall

Honorable James P. Molinaro

Ms. Nazli Parvizi, Commissioner, Mayor’s Community Assistance Unit

[more]

Joe Bruno to Assume Powes of a Lt. Governor; Gets Key Vote in Albany [Daily News]
Now that Spitzer is gone and David Paterson is assuming the role as Governor, Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno will take over the post of Lt. Gov, giving him the power to vote twice in the instance of a tie (which is likely since the Senate is nearly split between democrats and republicans.)

Buyers Wait To Saddle Up Converted Stable in SoHo [NY Sun]
Two Florida developers have changed a 19th century stable and carriage house at 11 Spring St. into three high end apartments ($17.95 million for a triplex penthouse with a private elevator). The problem is that they aren’t selling… Oh, the building is owned by the Murdochs of News Corp fame.

Thats all for now.