On Tuesday afternoon, City Councilman Dan Garodnick called on Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village landlord Tishman Speyer to pay the legal fees of tenants who are proven to be legitimately occupying rent-stabilized apartments in the complex after contesting non-lease renewal notices from the landlord.

Under the proposal, which was endorsed by Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer and State Senator Tom Duane at a press conference, Tishman would also agree to a set of ground rules for attempting to evict tenants for allegedly breaking rent-stabilization rules.

“Over the last two years, we have seen an aggressive pursuit of tenants by Tishman Speyer, claiming that people are not using their apartments as their primary residence,” Mr.  read more »

New York City Councilman and Peter Cooper Village resident Dan Garodnick helped Stuy Town (square) dance its way toward landmark designation on Saturday night, as tenants of the 110-building, World War II-era housing complex officially (re)launched their landmarks campaign.

We stopped by the party after 6 before any real dancing had begun, but the Gramercy Park church hall was already packed with mainly elderly residents decked out in denim, flannel, and other Western regalia, fuelling up on dinner before the main event.

Gaining protective status for Stuy Town is not a new idea. The Historic Districts Council first endorsed the proposal seven years ago and five years later told the Tenants Association that the complex was eligible for honorary state landmark status.

But the square dance was the first push to get the landmarking process off the ground since Tishman Speyer paid $5.4 billion for the planned community in 2006, though the tenants we spoke to Saturday night insisted the campaign is not related to their new landlord.  read more »

Developer Sheldon Solow received a key vote from a City Council subcommittee this morning, clearing the path, seven years after he agreed to buy the land, for him to build a $4 billion set of towers just south of the United Nations.

Mr. Solow’s plan, modified some in an agreement with local Councilman Daniel Garodnick, will bring seven towers to the 9.2-acre former Con Edison site, a site that is perhaps Manhattan’s largest single privately owned tract of undeveloped land.  read more »

Sheldon Solow has made a lot of concessions to get the City Council to green-light his massive mixed-use development covering almost 10 acres along the East River, but it looks like he will have to overcome a few more hurdles before the plans are approved.

At a public hearing before a City Council zoning subcommittee this afternooon in City Hall, Mr. Solow's representatives defended their application to build six residential buildings and a commercial office tower, while public officials stressed repeatedly that the project had yet to be approved. (Mr. Solow did not attend the hearing.)

Nonetheless, Mr. Solow's revised proposal seemed to address some, if not all, of the Murray Hill residents' concerns. He has offered to scale back the sizes of some of the buildings, and he has tried to allay fears that the towers would overshadow the United Nations Secretariat to the north. His representatives displayed renderings that showed the buildings not interfering with the UN building.  read more »

If the city does not get behind a proposal to build a public park on the Murray Hill segment of the East River esplanade now when a trio of high-profile construction projects are in various stages of development, the five-year-old plan to build a green space in the area may never be realized.

With the public review process for Sheldon Solow’s 6.5 million-square-foot mixed-use development from 36th to 41st streets on First Avenue wrapping up—the plans are in the last stage of the approval process with City Council—and a hearing about the neighborhood’s rezoning approaching on Monday, a host of community groups and local politicos politely reminded city and state officials just how much they want a park.  read more »

With the City Council preparing a vote in coming weeks on Sheldon Solow’s plans for the Con Edison site; the UN expanding its campus into the nearby Marcus Garvey Park; and the reconstruction of the midtown portions of the FDR Drive set to kick off, Murray Hill residents are reminding city and state officials to prioritize the development of a waterside park in the area.  read more »

On the far East Side site of the former Con Edison plant, patience appears to be a virtue for Sheldon Solow, the billionaire developer and owner of the land. For the seven-plus years since he agreed to buy the 9.2-acre site, Mr. Solow has slowly planned for a mostly residential development defined by seven modernist, skinny, Skidmore Owings & Merrill-designed towers to rise along the East River, just south of the United Nations, on the border of Turtle Bay and Murray Hill.

Now, five months into the city’s review and approval process, the clash over Manhattan’s largest privately owned development site is finally reaching a crescendo, as Mr. Solow’s plans for the $4 billion project will soon fall into the hands of the City Council, a body that seems poised to greet the proposal coolly, at least as currently presented.  read more »

Staten Island City Council candidate Manny Innamaorato has a fund-raiser at the Beekman Pub, near City Hall, with Christine Quinn and several others featured on his invite.

And Ben returns to the local scene to moderate a forum of City Council candidates running in Brooklyn a weird coffee shop.

Great Kills, kills great

• What kind of real estate power does the average New Yorker wield? Over in Brooklyn, citizen groups have banded together to "create room for negotiation" with Forest City Ratner. (FCR has already responded well to their "reasonable middle ground" position.) Then over in Stuy Town, the young Councilman Dan Garodnick and his 25,000 neighbors are fighting against multinational conglomerates. Who will win?! Tune in next week. (The New York Times)
• How does Mayor Mike make New York the foremost environmentally sustainable American city? By meeting with Governor Schwarzenegger in Sunnyvale, figuring out "a bold plan to use our land in the smartest way possible," enlisting the help of hotshot architects, politicos and execs, then painting his government "green." (See the post below for more.) (StreetsBlog)
• Give a warm 'hello' to the latest monster real estate investment trust. It's called Archstone-Smith, and it's hungry: the fancy Key West Building on Columbus Avenue has been bought by the group for $110m, and their new Avalon Bowery apartments will be finished in early 2007. Avalon is sure to succeed, because kids on the Bowery love their "cardio theatres". (Crain's)
• To everything there is a season, and therefore Staten Island will one day enjoy its place in the sun of outer borough hipness. For now, though, it's only a "hot spot" of unexpected and dangerous radioactivity, according to the Government Accountability Office. Great Kills Park needs a cleaning, and a new name. (AP via NY Daily News)
- Max Abelson]]> http://www.observer.com/node/35147#comments Real Estate Brooklyn Daniel Garodnick Forest City Ratner Companies The New York Times Company Fri, 22 Sep 2006 04:30:41 -0400 Observer Staff 35147 at http://www.observer.com http://www.observer.com/node/29658 A garbage masterplan is at hand.

Matt Schuerman just called in from City Hall to say that a key opponent of a plan to re-open a garbage transfer station on East 91st Street has finally conceded.

"The sites in Manhattan are all part of the plan," Dan Garodnick told Matt a few minutes ago, as members of the Council's Sanitation Committee began to emerge from an extended closed-door meeting with administration officials. "I don't think anybody was willing to budge on them."

Garodnick, who represents a relatively wealthy district in Manhattan, said he still intends to vote against the city's final plan.

-- Josh Benson]]> http://www.observer.com/node/29658#comments Politics Council's Sanitation Committee Daniel Garodnick Manhattan Matt Schuerman Wed, 19 Jul 2006 11:46:32 -0400 Observer Staff 29658 at http://www.observer.com