Landmarking in downtown neighborhoods has surprising opposition from local churches The city’s preservationists marched downtown last Tuesday to make their voices heard at a Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) hearing on the proposal to create an East Village and Lower East Side Historic District. Landowners, locals and political representatives flooded the ninth floor of City Hall 
President John Sexton defends plan to the community, and city council members By Alissa Fleck City Council members struggled to quell boos, hisses, applause and chants at a hearing on the NYU expansion on Friday, June 29. Even Greenwich Village resident and actor Matthew Broderick showed up to voice an opinion on the controversial proposal; 
Council Speaker Responds to the Supreme Court Ruling on Obama’s Health Care Bill The U.S. Supreme Court upheld President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act 5-4 last Thursday. The decision will reportedly insure up to 30 million Americans who are currently uninsured. Council Speaker Christine Quinn expressed her happiness with the ruling in a statement released 
By Paul Bisceglio St. Mark’s Bookshop seeks a new home. Established in 1977, the bookshop is a literary fixture in the East Village that has attracted cultural luminaries like William S. Burroughs, Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass and Susan Sontag. According to Crain’s, however, the store hopes to find a more affordable location when its rent increases 
Fight and thieves bringing negative reactions to the newly-renovated pool The newly reopened McCarren Park Pool is having a few problems more severe than the occasional toddler screaming. The park, amidst an array of criminal problems, was shut down for the second time since its $50 million opening last Thursday, The Huffington Postreports. After a 
It’s difficult to imagine that amid the coveted, prime real estate of downtown Manhattan, where rates often top $200 per square foot for commercial space, some buildings remain idle, abandoned, deteriorating or otherwise neglected. Although it’s unknown exactly how many abandoned, vacant or unused properties there are in the city, recent efforts to count such 
