CITYWIDE

East Side Complex Gets Landmarks Protection

The city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission voted yesterday to designate as landmarks two unprotected buildings in the City and Suburban Homes complex, which takes up an entire block between York and First Avenues and 64th and 65th streets. Most of the complex’s buildings were designated as landmarks in 1990. In what the local city council member Jessica Lappin called a “favor” to the building owners, two lots were excluded from the designation by the Board of Estimate. Neighbors feared the two buildings would be razed to make way for a pair of 28-story towers. The property owner, Stahl Real Estate, said that development was at least five years away, and it protested the landmark designation on the grounds that it had a deal with the city to develop those sites. Completed in 1915, City and Suburban Homes were built by prominent philanthropists who placed limits on their profits to build model tenements with abundant light, air, and running water.

— Staff Reporter of the Sun

Municipal Art Society Suing To Save Dock

The Municipal Art Society is suing the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to force a review of historic resources at a site in Red Hook, Brooklyn where Ikea is building its first New York City store. The Corps is permitting Ikea to pave over a Civil War-era graving dock to make way for a giant parking lot. The graving dock, a 710-foot ship repair facility, is one of only two docks in New York Harbor that can accommodate large, tall ships, according to a statement by the Municipal Art Society. Filling it would rob the area of its rich maritime history and diminish the region’s maritime capacity, the non-profit organization says. The President of the Municipal Art Society, Kent Barwick, said in a statement, “For nearly two years, the Corps has said that civic groups and others would be allowed input and comment on demolition and construction plans at Red Hook. That time never came and we are left with no alternative but legal action.”

— Staff Reporter of the Sun

IN THE COURTS

Discrimation Case Thrown Out of Court

The New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division yesterday threw out a discrimination case filed against nine board members of a Park Avenue condominium, and the building’s tenants association. A resident of 77 Park Ave., Dean Pelton, who suffers from Muscular Dystrophy, alleges that the building had failed to make adequate accommodations to help him navigate the steps at the building’s entrance, and in the lobby. He sought compensatory and punitive damages totaling $23.5 million — not only from the condominium association, but also from each member of its governing board. The court ruled that the individual board members were not personally liable, and dismissed the case altogether. “The board members are unpaid volunteers, and the defendant has to show that each individual did something wrong above and beyond what the board did,” the president of the Council of New York Cooperatives and Condominiums, Marc Luxemburg, said. “The ruling is significant, particularly in the context of a discrimination claim.”

–Staff Reporter of the Sun