Long Island | The New York Observer

Take That, Hamptons! North Fork Feels Home Price Bounce

Thu, 30 Oct 2008 12:53:37 -0400

As the Hamptons housing market tumbled mightily in the third quarter, the North Fork's saw a mild price bounce. The North Fork median sales price was $575,000 in the third quarter, up 10 percent from last year, according to the new Miller Samuel-Douglas Elliman report.

The North Fork, home to a cluster of well-respected wineries and other tourist attractions, lacks the sandy dunes and social cachet of its southern neighbor; but the...

Meanwhile, On Long Island...

Thu, 17 Jul 2008 14:02:32 -0400

As 2008 home sales tumbled in Brooklyn and Queens, Nassau and Suffolk counties' numbers increased, sometimes sharply.

The number of Nassau home sales jumped 60.1 percent from the first to the second quarter of 2008, according to the latest Miller Samuel-Douglas Elliman report. Annually, sales were up 5.3 percent.

In Suffolk (not including the North Fork and the Hamptons), sales increased 74.7 percent quarterly and 4.6 percent annually.

Not surprisingly, homes in the two Long...

Home Prices Up on Long Island

Tue, 16 Oct 2007 14:58:39 -0400

Long Island home prices increased on average during the third quarter, according to new numbers from appraiser Jonathan Miller.

The average price of a Nassau County home increased 5.7 percent from the second quarter through the third to $628,839. The average in Suffolk--not including the Hamptons or the North Fork--increased quarterly 3.8 percent to $469,331.

Sales, too, in both Long Island counties increased from the second through the third quarter. In Nassau, sales were up...

Campaigning Against Campaigns

Tue, 03 Apr 2007 09:19:12 -0400

Independent congressional candidate Bill Corrigan of Long Island wants to boost his name recognition in his bid against Republican Rep. Peter King. Which will be kind of hard, since, according to Corrigan's blog, "We are not taking donations - as removing influence is of paramount importance to the voting system model." So, without money, how do you run a campaign? Corrigan has the answer. Here are some pointers he posted today for people helping him...

draft-Winners and Losers: State Budget

Wed, 28 Mar 2007 07:29:43 -0400

The state budget isn't finalized, but agreements on key fronts were announced last night: $350 in health care spending was restored (coupled with federal matching funds will bring a few more million to the health care industry here). Eliot Spitzer still gets to claim $1 billion in Medicaid spending cuts, namely from health insurance and pharmaceutical companies (not hospitals and nursing homes). $500 million in additional education spending was added, which should make Long Island Republican senators...

ESDC Raids Newsday

Thu, 08 Mar 2007 11:02:11 -0500

Errol Cockfield has joined the Empire State Development Corporation as press secretary, the second Newsday staffer to defect to the state's economic development agency that is now run by a Long Islander. How did this happen? The ESDC's new senior vice president for communications, A.J. Carter, was the first hire. As Newsday's associate business editor and business columnist, he told The Real Estate that he knew Pat Foye, the downstate ESDC co-chairman, back when Mr. Foye...

Modern-Day Robert Moses

Sun, 18 Feb 2007 19:00:00 -0500

Location: The downside of a strong real-estate market is that people have been priced out of neighborhoods, old mom-and-pop shops closed. There was even a “Talk of the Town” piece in The New Yorker recently about how New Yorkers believe their city is changing too fast. Doctoroff: I honestly don’t hear that often. There are certainly concerns about gentrification and rapidly changing communities. As the Mayor says, “If you want to solve the problem...

Nassau Money

Mon, 29 Jan 2007 07:59:54 -0500

Here are some numbers from the state senate race on Long Island that has become an important proxy battle for the senate Republicans, Eliot Spitzer and the most politically powerful union in the state. Republican Maureen O'Connell raised a total of $800,585.99, of which her campaign spent $548,953.88. She has $268,514.06 left in the bank. Democrat Craig Johnson has raised $352,351.03, spent $415,814.98 and has $148,381.60 left in the bank. On the Republican side, a lot of...

Meet the Junebug Weddings Contest Winner!

Tue, 21 Nov 2006 10:08:14 -0500

SHALINI: I received an email informing me that I was a JUNEBUG WEDDINGS CONTEST WINNER ($500 gift certificate to Tulip, one of my favorite Seattle boutiques). This made up for my car getting towed last week and the $230 ticket/towing fee. It doesn't stop there. Junebug has another great contest on their website this month: Visit www.JunebugWeddings.com on or before Dec.15th and enter to win a luxurious spa package from Frenchy's Day Spa,...

The Rebirth of Mondello

Mon, 13 Nov 2006 09:48:47 -0500

There is some poetic justice in the ascension of Joseph Mondello, the Nassau County leader to the Republican Party's state chairman. Like the state party, critics have written off the Nassau County organization, which Mondello has led for more than 20 years. From the right: Former Long Island congressman and outspoken commentator John LeBoutillier wrote in 2005 that, "Mr. Mondello has presided over a recent series of political defeats that have reduced what was once...

Beneath Their Stations

Sun, 05 Nov 2006 19:00:00 -0500

During a recent and rainy rush hour at Penn Station, dripping umbrellas and dirt tracked in from squeaky sneakers and soggy loafers added to the standard feeling of despair among New Jersey Transit and Long Island Rail Road commuters trying to get home. The air was thick and humid with anxiety, and it smelled like a combination of wet hair, hot dogs and defeat. “There’s a low-ceiling alienation to the place,” said New York...

Peter King Calls the Republicans a Bunch of Wimps

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 19:00:00 -0500

Peter King is worried that his fellow Republicans are turning into wimps.

“I find it frustrating sometimes with the Republicans—you want to shake them and say ‘Let’s do this,’” said Mr. King, the pugnacious Long Island Republican who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee. “A lot of Republicans, when they get thrown off their game, they are scrambling to find a new message. To me, if you believe in what you are saying, you...

Peter King Calls the Republicans a Bunch of Wimps

Sun, 29 Oct 2006 19:00:00 -0500

Peter King is worried that his fellow Republicans are turning into wimps. “I find it frustrating sometimes with the Republicans—you want to shake them and say ‘Let’s do this,’” said Mr. King, the pugnacious Long Island Republican who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee. “A lot of Republicans, when they get thrown off their game, they are scrambling to find a new message. To me, if you believe in what you are saying, you...

Big Apple Grates; Plea From a Native: Get Me Outta Here

Sun, 15 Oct 2006 20:00:00 -0400

I’m sick of New York. There—I said it. The other day, I made a list of pros and cons about the city. I jotted down, rather quickly, 27 cons (cramped living, subways!!!, stressful, unfriendly people, terrorism???). On the pro side I wrote Cuban-Chinese food and then below that I wrote friends and family (but I can keep in touch). And then I was done. ‘ Have my ties to New York become so...

Elsewhere: Kerik, Spano, Kerry

Mon, 09 Oct 2006 14:04:43 -0400

Jeanine Pirro's campaign received an in-kind contribution from Bernie Kerik's lawyer days before their scandal broke. Senate Republicans sent more money to defend John Flanagan's seat on Long Island than to defend the Westchester seat Nick Spano won by 18 votes two years ago. John Faso misspelled the name of some guy headlining his fundraiser tomorrow. Dick Cheney hung up on Bob Woodward, who thinks the White House doesn't like people disagreeing with them. More good poll...

The Quietest Campaign of All

Sun, 08 Oct 2006 20:00:00 -0400

So Christopher Callaghan, the unknown, super-long-shot Republican candidate for State Comptroller, was driving along the Long Island Expressway a couple of weeks ago in his green Honda Civic when he spotted someone he knew: Alan Hevesi. Mr. Hevesi, the current comptroller, whose bid for re-election was made somewhat more complicated in recent days by the news that he had been using a state employee to chauffeur his wife, was in a black S.U.V. heading...

Countdown to Bliss

Sun, 01 Oct 2006 20:00:00 -0400

Jerry Neugebauer and Eunice Hong

Met: 1999 Engaged: Dec. 17, 2005 Projected Wedding Date: Sept. 30, 2006 Jerry Neugebauer, 28, a lawyer at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen & Hamilton L.L.P., plans to wed Eunice Hong, also 28, an interior designer for Mancini Duffy. The Reverend Allan Lokos and Susanna Weiss—married interfaith ministers—will preside over the ceremony at Banchet Flowers, a florist-cum-catering-space in the West Village. The couple’s first encounter was during freshman...

My Caterer's Insecurity: 'They Make Me Seem Like I'm Just a Clambake Guy!'

Thu, 08 Jun 2006 10:14:14 -0400

GABRIELLE: Earlier today I called my caterer to ask for sample menus and the following conversation ensued: "We don't do sample menus," Tony says in his Long Island accent, "check out our website." * "Your website, though great," (I fib here), "has a general menu. Can you at least email me a photo of how you serve your food?" I ask politely. "No," he says, and an edge creeps into his voice that...

Editorials

Sun, 28 May 2006 20:00:00 -0400

Pataki’s Legacy: Chaos and Disarray

New York’s Republican Party will gather on Long Island on May 31 for a state nominating convention. For the first time since 1990, George Elmer Pataki will not be the party’s nominee for Governor. After a dozen years, Mr. Pataki is bowing out—and none too soon. He and his administration ran out of energy and ideas about 11 years ago. The lethargy of the Pataki era will...

Video: Weld a Republican

Wed, 24 May 2006 11:44:42 -0400

Here's the latest Weld video, for those of you who have four minutes and fifteen seconds to burn. The message amounts to, "I'm a Republican -- Really!" The soft biographical piece has Weld talking about his upbringing on Long Island and upstate, making mention of the fact that his father was a local GOP official. The background music switches to something more up-tempo for the section of Weld-as-prosecutor, a segment that prominently features the names Reagan...

Sure, He Likes McCain Now...

Thu, 18 May 2006 08:08:48 -0400

The state Democrats are attacking "hypocritical" John Sweeney for campaigning with John McCain, a man he trashed on behalf of the Bush-Cheney campaign in 2000. It will be interesting to watch how often this theme resurfaces as other New York Republicans who supported Bush six years ago cozy up to McCain ahead of the 2008 election. But I'm not sure the hypocrite charge amounts to more than an annoyance. The Bush versus McCain stuff has...

Silver v. Spitzer on Rail Link

Fri, 05 May 2006 12:14:52 -0400

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, long a supporter of the Second Avenue Subway and resident of the Lower East Side, is now saying the J.F.K. Rail Link is more important, according to the new Downtown Express. This is a big deal, especially because Democratic Gubernatorial Candidate Eliot Spitzer just made fairly clear this morning that he has the opposite priorities. A number of civic groups like the Regional Plan Association think the airport rail link...

March 22, 2006: Toilets!

Tue, 21 Mar 2006 11:46:26 -0500

Tonight, Tuesday, NARAL will hold an event at Hofstra directed at the eight state senators in Long Island that voted against over the counter morning after pills. Tomorrow, NYC DOT reviews designs for--to the relief of Starbucks chains citywide--public toilets! Then, activists and community leaders from the tri-state area will gather at 32BJ headquarters to discuss the importance of renewing key provisions of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, just before the Department of Homeland Security...

Riverhead and Kelo

Mon, 06 Mar 2006 19:24:59 -0500

Riverhead, Long Island is looking to expand—shopping centers, businesses and esplanades—and is considering three proposals from private investors for apparently public use. Currently however, the land belongs to someone. And the town is taking careful steps to avoid using eminent domain to claim it. Yesterday, The Real Estate pointed at a New York Daily News editorial that discussed the modern uses of eminent domain for the construction of offices and factories, rather than...

Hillary's Roberts Problem: Private School?

Mon, 10 Oct 2005 05:23:00 -0400

Some Orthodox Jewish bloggers are buzzing over an article in the Five Towns Jewish Times, (no link available), which recounts a meeting between Hillary and a group of constituents at Long Island's Temple Beth Sholom: Lester Henner, a Lawrence resident and former president of Congregation Beth Sholom, asked Clinton why she voted against the appointment of John Roberts to the Supreme Court of the U.S. Clinton responded that while Roberts is a very intelligent man,...

At Fillip's, Peace and Quiet, And French From a Textbook

Sun, 18 Sep 2005 20:00:00 -0400

I had in mind the sort of casual place I used to frequent in the Village: doors folded back onto the street, a few tables under the awning, relaxed and quiet on a warm summer night, a place where you could linger over a bottle of wine. Fillip’s, a small French restaurant in Chelsea, sounded like just the thing.

The aroma of rosemary wafted from bushes that had been placed outside to create a small...

Get Rich Quick?

Mon, 29 Aug 2005 07:07:00 -0400

Despite all the bubble-talk, diving into real estate might not be the best move for would-be brokers,according to Slate. While New York Magazine warned a few weeks ago about broker glut, The Times reported this weekend about the phenomenon on Long Island where you can get certified in only a week (and without too strenuous requirements). "I don't understand what the teacher says," Ms. Franco said of the English-speaking real estate course instructor. "Nothing,...

The Goodyear Reprieve

Mon, 01 Aug 2005 11:14:00 -0400

While Tom Wolfe and his fellow 2 Columbus Circle advocates continue their fight with the landmarks commission, one of architect Edward Durell Stone's renowned buildings has been spared. In 1938, Mr. Stone designed the Long Island home for A. Conger Goodyear, the Museum of Modern Art's first president. Mr. Goodyear was already well aware of the architect's work, considering that Mr. Stone, along with Philip Goodwin, designed the MoMA's legendary 53rd Street building a year...

Bonds Away!

Mon, 11 Jul 2005 07:40:00 -0400

The Post reports that a state panel has failed for the second time to approve a bond proposal for the MTA that would include $1.45 billion for transportation projects you probably thought were already well-funded and underway, including the Second Avenue subway and a LIRR tunnel to Grand Central Terminal. What's at issue is how that billion and a half will be split up: the Rail Link from downtown to JFK and Long Island...

The Search For 2005's Hottest Disease

Mon, 11 Jul 2005 06:14:00 -0400

The always-popular Monday morning South Shore line of the Long Island Rail Road leisurely jets work-latecomers into Manhattan a bit shy of 10 a.m. It often reveals heady surprises. Recently, The Transom was aroused to be sitting across from gray-haired recent Survivor winner Tom Westman, the infamously manipulative Long Island-living NYC fireman. He spent most of the trip on his cellphone; apparently, he had a meeting later that day at NBC. When not chatting,...

Bottoms Up

Thu, 07 Jul 2005 10:39:00 -0400

Both the New York Post and the Daily News report today that Martin Heidgen, the wrong-way driver in Saturday's fatal head-on collision in Long Island, allegedly had a blood-alcohol level of 0.28, three-and-a-half times the legal limit. But the papers disagree on how to get that drunk. The Daily News says "Heidegen, 24, a former college frat boy, must have had at least 11 beers or 11 shots of hard liquor to be that drunk,...

Pataki Tunnel: Who Picks Up $6 Billion Toll?

Sun, 22 May 2005 20:00:00 -0400

Every few weeks, a couple of well-connected New Yorkers-maybe Carl Weisbrod, a board member of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, maybe Governor George Pataki's chief of staff, John Cahill-make a trip down to Washington, D.C., to lobby what at first looks like an obscure technical point: whether $2 billion in tax incentives can be converted into cash to fund a rail tunnel under the East River.

By all external indications, the reception's been cool, even...

April 20 - 27, 2005

Sun, 24 Apr 2005 20:00:00 -0400

Wednesday 20th

Sunny D! Sunshine has given our city a tongue bath, transforming the gray, sodden streets into a blossomy (and pollen-infused) Brigadoon … but we say: Stand up for your right to be depressed anyway and lie on the couch watching celebrity poker! If you do venture out (or " oot," as our Canadian neighbors say), look for plucky al fresco diners ignoring the chill and fumes, trying to throw themselves in the spirit...

The View From Pittsburgh

Tue, 12 Apr 2005 08:30:00 -0400

NYC got a property tax instead of a commuter tax because Mike didn't win (or even play) chicken with state lawmakers, according to the Mayor of Pittsburgh. According to a Pittsburgh newspaper, "...Bloomberg recently lost a bruising battle with the New York State Legislature about imposing a commuter tax in the city. As a result, Bloomberg was forced to raise property taxes 18 percent. Pittsburgh was able to avoid a similar fate when, after much...

Eliot's Black Problem

Mon, 14 Mar 2005 06:54:00 -0500

Back in 1998, when Eliot Spitzer was a little-known longshot candidate for Attorney General, Virginia Fields was one of the very few elected officials to back him early. But after we reported that Eliot was set to endorse Freddy Ferrer for mayor, and Eliot decided to make it official with a phone call to the Times, the Attorney General didn't bother giving Virginia a heads-up. And that slight seems to have crystallized a quiet disaffection...

Beyond the Buzz, Bistro du Vent Serves Middling French Cuisine

Sun, 06 Mar 2005 19:00:00 -0500

Bistro du Vent was packed with food people the other night. Hardly surprising, since the restaurant is the latest project of Mario Batali and Joseph Bastianich and their partner, David Pasternack, the chef at Esca. With a team like this, expectations were high.

While we waited for our dinner, the staff scurried around a nearby table, where a food writer had been recognized. As plates went back and forth next-door, we waited. And waited. Forty...

Painting the Clouds: Jane Wilson's Weather Lasts Beyond Forecast

Sun, 07 Nov 2004 19:00:00 -0500

To the places that, over the course of time, have come to be associated with the work of certain American painters-think of John Marin's Maine, Georgia O' Keeffe's Sante Fe, Jackson Pollock's studio in Springs and Morris Graves' in the Pacific Northwest-we may now add Jane Wilson's Long Island. Or perhaps we should say the weather on Jane Wilson's Long Island: The focus in her latest paintings-the subject of an enchanting exhibition at the...

Conventional Wisdom

Sun, 08 Aug 2004 20:00:00 -0400

If John Kerry and John Edwards thought their convention would give

them some much-needed momentum, they clearly were mistaken. The vapid proceedings in Boston did little to excite the public; in fact, the public, in its wisdom, pretty much ignored the goings-on at the Fleet Center. Television coverage reflected the voters' apathy-the broadcast networks devoted a mere three hours of coverage to the convention. Conventions once served a real purpose in American political life. It was where the parties nominated their...

Crime Blotter

Sun, 21 Mar 2004 19:00:00 -0500

Paintball Pinhead Tries

Target Practice at Mayor's Mansion Paintball has become an increasingly popular sport. Nevertheless, as one Upper East Side resident discovered on Feb. 28, it is probably unwise to conduct your target practice near what the police euphemistically describe as "sensitive locations"-such as Gracie Mansion-particularly in this jittery era. At around 4:55 p.m., the police received a call reporting a man with a gun in the vicinity of the Mayor's official residence at...

Four Corners

Sun, 15 Feb 2004 19:00:00 -0500

Up and West at 'Cesca,

Four Rich Guys Convene On the southeast corner of Amsterdam and 75th Street: 'Cesca: prosciutto and breadsticks, hockey on TV. On the next bar stool, a beige cashmere turtleneck said this to his date: "I say, pshaw ! Pshaw, I say!" The bartender slides me a tall O.J. I start to pay. "Don't worry about it," he flips his hand. A big round smile on a 5-o'clock-shadow face appears....

From King's Pen, A Novel of Terror

Sun, 10 Aug 2003 20:00:00 -0400

Early next year, Republican Congressman Pete King of Long Island will release his third novel, which may be something of a record for a public official not named Benjamin Disraeli. That's not to say that Mr. King's efforts measure up to the gouty old imperialist's canon, but then again Mr. King has been juggling his writing with the performance of his public duties, while Disraeli's best novels were finished before he moved into 10...

Post-McMansions: The Once And Future Hamptons

Sun, 06 Jul 2003 20:00:00 -0400

As we trundle off on this July Fourth weekend-either to escape from a certain kind of madness, or plunge headlong into it-let us muse, for a moment, about the history of summer resorts in America.

In particular, I'm thinking about a place that was, at one time, the very epicenter of American society. It was a place where impossible mansions lined the water; where the newly minted oligarchs-the movers, the celebrities, the tycoons of the...

Can Summer at N.Y.U. Turn Jenna Bush Into a New Yorker?

Sun, 22 Jun 2003 20:00:00 -0400

When I read that one of the Bush daughters was going to be spending this summer in the city taking courses at N.Y.U., it made me start thinking about my own first summer in the city, taking courses at N.Y.U. at night, pushing a hand truck in the garment center during the day. I hadn't read that Jenna Bush's plans include pushing a hand truck, but I know my experience-night school, that street job,...

I'm an Aging Armchair Soldier Looking for a Fight

Sun, 30 Mar 2003 19:00:00 -0500

The Army just rejected me.

I don't know why this should make me so upset. I do not want to go to war. I abhor violence and killing and have no overwhelming need to prove my manhood. I like guns, but the only things I shoot are targets or clay pigeons. And yet, I feel like I could cry at any moment. I know I shouldn't feel this way. After all, the Navy tried to...

I'm an Aging Armchair Soldier Looking for a Fight

Sun, 30 Mar 2003 19:00:00 -0500

Channel 11 Cameraman--Granddad Won Pulitzer--Captured Terrible Moment And Never Recovered

Sun, 15 Sep 2002 20:00:00 -0400

Then: A shadowy 767 barrels across the sky from the west, dips left and plunges into the south tower. A black and orange mushroom envelops the...

Channel 11 Cameraman-Granddad Won Pulitzer-Captured Terrible Moment And Never Recovered

Sun, 15 Sep 2002 20:00:00 -0400

He got the shot.

It only lasts a few seconds. It's taken from the window of a Ford Explorer rolling south on the F.D.R.; the lens bounces lightly. The Brooklyn Bridge looms on the lower left. Fixed in the center of the frame is the burning north tower of the World Trade Center. Then: A shadowy 767 barrels across the sky from the west, dips left and plunges into the south tower. A black and...

Clancy's Gotham Safe House

Sun, 19 May 2002 20:00:00 -0400

Tom Clancy said the September terrorist attacks were a doomsday scenario he couldn't have written himself. But he wasn't researching his next novel when he toured Ground Zero for the January/February issue of Book magazine; he was just taking note of the transformation the city had undergone in the wake of the attacks.

"I didn't think New Yorkers had this in them, and I was wrong about that," the Maryland native said, before getting his...

Reilly, Come Home! Puppy Ordered Back as Breeders Vanish

Sun, 25 Nov 2001 19:00:00 -0500

The Donaldson twins only had their puppy a few months, but already they were in a routine: They'd mope their way to the school bus in the morning, leaving a sad Reilly behind, and they'd rush back home in the afternoon, full of hugs and horseplay for the champagne-colored Wheaten terrier pup.

This fall was different. Reilly was gone, and Sean and Brian, the 9-year-old boys from Farmingdale, Long Island, had little hope of getting...

New York's Heart Knows No Boundaries

Sun, 21 Oct 2001 20:00:00 -0400

Is it possible to get through the portraits of grief in The New York Times every day and not weep? No, it is not. But through our tears we are learning a great deal about this city, and about the lives of those exotic strangers in our midst-the men and women we pass in the street, share elevators with or crowd up against in the subway.

First of all, many of the victims of...