Residents, politicians, activists envision impact of NYU’s long-term expansion plan

New York University scored a key victory last week as the City Council approved a slightly scaled back version of the school’s controversial 2031 expansion plan. While the project was pared down, it will still add close to 6 million square feet of academic space throughout the city. Nearly half of the expansion, equal to about the size of the Empire State Building, would be concentrated on two Washington Square-area superblocks located near the school’s main campus in Greenwich Village.

The NYU plan calls for four new buildings on the two large blocks bordered by LaGuardia Place and Mercer, West Houston and West 3rd streets. The buildings will be used for both academic and residential purposes.
The plan has generated an enormous amount of discussion and controversy both for and against since it was unveiled by NYU officials in 2010. Moreover, the Council’s approval comes at a time when residents uptown are waging a battle of their own against Columbia University’s mammoth, long-range plan in West Harlem that includes a 17-acre, $6.3 billion campus expansion.

Opponents of the NYU plan, including village residents, activists, NYU faculty members and others, have already vowed to continue the fight, including an expected legal challenge, to get the plan sent back to the drawing board and significantly revised. The plan has the support of the mayor and is unlikely to be vetoed.
But what if the current incarnation of the plan is upheld and remains largely unchanged? What will Greenwich Village look like in 2031? Will it be congested, overcrowded and largely unlivable, as many naysayers suggest, or will the plan usher in a new chapter of peaceful coexistence between NYU and its Village neighbors?

“When I ask myself what the Village will look like in 20 years, the first thing I see is large, concrete, functional-looking buildings casting long shadows over the neighborhood; absorbing all the light. The only outdoor space for people to congregate will be Washington Square Park, and you know how crowded that gets now!” said Janet Hayes, who lives in a high-rise co-op at 505 LaGuardia Place near Houston.

A longtime resident of the Village and a local Republican leader, Hayes predicted that NYU’s plan, if allowed to come to fruition, would greatly affect life in the Village and not in a good way.

“Take grocery shopping, using the dry cleaner or going out to dinner, for example—full-service restaurants will be replaced with beer halls, pizza places and other fast-food sources,” Hayes predicted.

She added that more stores would cater to NYU and transit would be a “nightmare”; subways and buses would be overcrowded all day long, and “forget catching a cab.”

In support of NYU’s plan, Borough President Scott Stringer, who most recently helped to broker concessions from the school, cited substantial economic benefits for New York City, which include the creation of 9,500 permanent jobs and as many as 18,200 construction jobs over the next 20 years.

Andrew Berman, executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, has been one of the plan’s most outspoken critics and has worked to help mobilize village residents, activists and like-minded politicians in opposition to a project he has called a “grandiose scheme of a private university’s super-rich board and its president.”

Immediately following last week’s Council vote, Berman said in a press release, “The NYU expansion plan will turn a residential neighborhood into a company town and subject it to 20 straight years of construction.”
Robert Yaro, president of the Regional Plan Association, a nonprofit planning organization that serves the tri-state area, however, said NYU’s expansion is important to the city for many reasons.

“NYU’s continued success is vital to the economy of New York. The university is among the city’s largest private employers,” Yaro noted. “NYU can continue to attract top students and scholars only if it is able to modernize and expand…By emphasizing density, the NYU plan will avoid harming any of the Village’s historic fabric.”

Asked about possible loss of open space and congestion resulting from NYU’s plan, Council Member Margaret Chin seemed confident the issue has been addressed. “Under this plan, the open space on the superblocks will be improved and it will be fully accessible by the public for the first time,” Chin said in an emailed statement.
“The padlocks and fences around the Sasaki Garden will finally come down, and this park—which few New Yorkers know about—will finally be open to the public. We will also gain a pedestrian walkway, or ‘greenstreet,’ behind the new Zipper Building, which will connect the Village with Soho,” she said.

The Council member added that the walkway would be lined with cafés and restaurants and would have an indoor atrium open to the public year-round.

A spokesperson for Chin also noted that the university would be “bound” by a 500-page restrictive declaration document that specifies what the school can and can’t do with regard to construction, building and other logistics related to the plan.

For example, the school has committed to limit construction to the hours between 8 a.m. and 4:30 p.m. and to limit weekend construction. In addition, the school has promised to assist with construction mitigation issues related to air quality and noise by equipping affected apartments with soundproofing materials.

“This plan is a way to start over. It is a pathway forward,” Chin said. “This plan integrates the Greenwich Village community and NYU in ways that have never been done before.”

Terri Cude, co-chair of Community Action Alliance against NYU 2031 and a member of Community Board 2 (CB2), isn’t so sure of the plan’s integration into the neighborhood.

“If NYU builds everything that is in the current plan, we will have a very dark neighborhood,” Cude said.
Asked about the various committees that were formed by NYU to address community concerns and incorporate residents’ needs into the plan, Cude said, “They attended all the meetings and listened to everything we had to say. The only thing they didn’t do is modify the plan at all based on the input.”

But the concessions brokered by Stringer in early April did in fact include a significant overall density reduction, preservation of public space as parkland, elimination of a temporary gymnasium on the site of two community playgrounds, elimination of proposed dormitories on the Bleecker Building and an affirmation of NYU’s commitment to provide space for a K-8 school.

Brad Hoylman, former chair of CB2 and candidate for state Senate in District 27, testified before the City Planning Commission back in the spring that the NYU plan would “forever alter the character of the neighborhood, bring in thousands of new people into the area [estimates suggest up to 12,000 people daily] and cause decades of construction disruption for local residents.”

Village residents and community garden members Marcia Lawther and Bob Hirschfeld moved to the neighborhood in the mid-1970s. “It’s invasive. It’s crowded enough as it is,” said Lawther when asked about the expansion.

“In the ’70s, things were much quieter, there was not much going on,” recalled Hirschfeld. “NYU was a separate world. It wasn’t elbowing its way into the community.”

However, signs of hope for the future of the project were evident on Tuesday as legislators lauded a new agreement between NYU and the residents of 505 LaGuardia Place in an effort to maintain long-term affordability at the Mitchell-Lama development.

“I am pleased a deal has been reached and much-needed affordable housing has been preserved in Greenwich Village,” said City Council Speaker Christine Quinn in a prepared statement.

“This agreement guarantees that 505 LaGuardia can maintain affordability and that the working-class families that currently reside there will be able to continue to live in a neighborhood they have long called home.”

Father Fagan Park in Soho. Photo by James Kelleher.

By Alissa Fleck and Paul Bisceglio

Public outcry has prompted the Department of Transportation (DOT) and CitiBank to decide against installing one of their forthcoming 600 Citi Bike rental stations in Father Fagan Park, a small public square at the corner of Prince Street and Sixth Avenue in Soho.

Citizens banded together with the SoHo Alliance and Community Board 2 to oppose the installation on the grounds that the neighborhood’s green space is already limited and that a commercial presence would disrespect the park’s status as a memorial. The park is named for Father Richard Fagan, a former member of nearby St. Anthony’s Church who gave his life in a rectory fire while rescuing two people. Three pear trees in the park commemorate three firefighters who died while extinguishing the 1994 blaze.

The DOT was at first reluctant to relocate the station. According to SoHo Alliance Director Sean Sweeney, two separate DOT officers made it clear to the Alliance in emails a few weeks ago that they had no intention of changing their plans. Later, the DOT said it would consider relocating the station after the park’s proposed $1.5 million reconstruction in two years.

The Soho community continued to pressure the DOT, however, and attracted media attention to the issue when Father Joe Lorenzo, a pastor at St. Anthony’s, spoke out against the installation, arguing that the rental station would cheapen the park’s meaning to the neighborhood.

Sweeney told Our Town Downtown, “It’s not just a park issue. It’s a matter of respect, of memorializing the community’s heroes.”
DOT representatives met with CB2 last Friday and, after discussion, agreed to find a different location for the bikes.
The new spot has yet to be announced, but CB2 suggested using a section of the alternate side parking on MacDougal Street or the sidewalk on Houston Street between MacDougal Street and Sixth Avenue.

“Soho is pleased that DOT has listened to our requests to preserve our park and respect our community members,” said the SoHo Alliance in a release.

This is not the first time a proposed Citi Bike placement has been met with vigorous opposition. Plans to install docking stations in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza across from the United Nations building were opposed because it would disrupt the atmosphere of the plaza and create unnecessary congestion.

Victoria Weil, president of Friends of Bogardus Garden, was also not happy about the station planned for the pedestrian plaza at Chambers and Reade streets that her group oversees. She told the Tribeca Trib she saw accidents on the horizon in the small, already cluttered space.

While the DOT spent months listening to community concerns, Kate Fillin-Yeh, director of the bike share program, told CB1 they were trying to install a station every 1,000 feet, which does not leave a lot of space for dissent.

It’s been nearly two months since State Sen. Tom Duane announced that he will not seek re-election this fall, and the race for his seat in the 27th District is taking shape.

Brad Hoylman, the solidly backed chair of Community Board 2, who before Duane’s announcement was seeking Christine Quinn’s City Council seat, will run opposed by two relative unknowns: Tom Greco, owner of the Ritz Bar and Lounge in the Times Square area, and Tanika Inlaw, a self-described educator, community outreach worker and mother of two who lives on the Upper West Side.
Earlier this year, Duane revealed that he would not seek an eighth term in the state Senate, a post he was first elected to in 1998. Duane reported that he would instead be embarking on a “new chapter” in his life.

As a politician, Duane was best known for helping “those who never before had a voice in the halls of government.” An openly gay, HIV-positive legislator, Duane championed causes close to the LGBT community, including the Marriage Equality Act, the Sexual Orientation Non-Discrimination Act, the Dignity for All Students Act, comprehensive hate crime legislation and the Family Health Care Decisions Act.

For his part, Hoylman, who is also out and is the parent of an 18-month-old girl, plans to continue Duane’s trademark LGBT activism by supporting, among other legislation, the Gender Equality Non-Discrimination Act.

“It’s incredible that even today, transgender people can be fired from jobs or kicked out of their houses or even denied service in a restaurant,” Hoylman said. He called gender equality one of the “last horizons of the LGBT community.”

Hoylman added that if elected, he would be the only LGBT person in the state Legislature.

“I don’t shy away from discussing being gay and I don’t mind if reporters mention it. It’s who I am,” he said in an interview.
Among other issues of concern to Hoylman are campaign finance reform, reducing class sizes and “changing the dynamic that currently exists where teachers are demonized in Albany.”

In a recent email to supporters, Hoylman touted his record of progressive results.

“I have helped secure two new public schools; won concessions from developers to scale back and mitigate inappropriate proposals; advanced landmarking and rezoning efforts that preserved historic buildings and neighborhoods; created an innovative legal defense fund for rent-stabilized tenants; and brokered a deal that allowed for the long-stalled renovation of Washington Square Park,” Hoylman wrote to supporters last month.

Amid the Democratic establishment, Hoylman’s support is very strong and includes, most notably, Duane’s endorsement, along with Reps. Jerrold Nadler, Nydia Velazquez and Carolyn Maloney.

Greco, while not a household name, believes he has much to offer the people of the 27th District as a state senator.

Starting with affordable housing, Greco pointed out successful housing programs that should be revisited in the city.

“I would like to bring a new program to New York State modeled after the Mitchell-Lama program, which to this day stands as one of the most successful housing programs ever established here,” Greco said. “In a similar model, we can work with developers to make it fiscally advantageous for them to build new affordable housing, while strictly regulating that they do so through tax incentives and legislation.”

Regarding the always vexing health care issue, Greco believes a true public option is needed to better care for city residents. “While I am a supporter of President Obama’s Affordable Care Act, I do not think it goes nearly far enough in addressing the country’s health care concerns and out-of-control costs,” he said. “It is my goal to bring a public option to New York similar to the successful program that has been instituted in San Francisco.”

Greco added that he, too, is concerned and involved with LGBT issues that affect the district.

Greco founded the Ritz bar and lounge in September of 2006, after working for several years at POSH, another LGBT establishment owned by his family. “It has allowed me to use my name, resources and time to help the LGBT community,” he explained. “Through the years I have had the privilege of using my business as a vehicle to help with LGBT causes, such as Heritage of Pride, AIDS Walk and Blades Against AIDS.”

Public school teacher Inlaw is an Upper West Sider who was born and raised in the city and previously worked in broadcast journalism on ABC’s daytime talk show The View, as well as for ABC News Radio.

Inlaw is also a former president of the Yonkers chapter of the NAACP, where she advocated to decrease overcrowded schools, increase home ownership opportunities, stabilize rents and increase the minimum wage.

Discussing her difficult decision to run for state Senate, Inlaw wrote, “The lack of resources would deter most potential candidates from running against him [Holylman] due to his backing from deep pockets and well-established political roots, but I believe I was called to serve the people and conserve our community’s right to a fair democracy.”

Issues that concern Inlaw include animal rights, affordable housing, affordable health care and marriage equality.

“What sets me apart from the other candidates is my intuitive ability to relate to peoples’ personal experiences. I am personally invested in our fight,” Inlaw wrote in a statement.

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; Broderick said NYU 2031 would “destroy the village” by hurting the “quirkiness and humanness” for which it’s known.

Council members largely agreed with Broderick, expressing concern over the plan, which would add 2 million square feet for academic and residential uses. One of the greatest sources of debate was how much community green space the plan would ultimately allow.

The hearing, the last expected before the City Council votes on the expansion proposal in July, incorporated presentations and testimony from opposition and proponents alike. Elected officials, NYU faculty members, community advocates and others came together to debate the highly contentious NYU 2031 plan also known as the “Sexton Plan.”

Two morning rallies proceeded the hearing outside City Hall, with plan opponents having a significantly larger turnout than supporters as people scrambled for space inside to attend a pre-hearing. Opponents held colorful banners that read “NYU 2031 is Wrong for NYC, Wrong for the Village and Wrong for NYU” and appeared to fill the majority of seats in the chambers. Security struggled to allow an even number from both camps to enter as people flooded into chambers.

The proposal, which was announced publicly in 2010, was approved by the City Planning Commission (CPC) on June 6 of this year after receiving feedback from Community Board 2 and Borough President Scott Stringer. The CPC passed the plan along to the City Council with several modifications, including the elimination of a hotel and commercial space.

The hearing opened with a presentation from supporters affiliated with NYU, including university President John Sexton, Tisch Dean Mary Schmidt Campbell, Senior Vice President Lynne Brown and Vice President Alicia Hurley. Council members then thoroughly questioned aspects of the NYU 2031 plan.

Councilwoman Margaret Chin, representing the area contained in the proposal, roused excitement from plan opponents by calling the expansion “unacceptable” and urging for greater balance.

“This plan tries to shoehorn too much into too small a space,” said Chin to wide applause and jazz hands.

The issue of scale was a hot topic. Councilwoman Jessica Lappin, representing parts of the Upper East Side and Roosevelt Island, agreed with Chin, calling the plan “too dense, too big, too tall and too much.” She added it could be made significantly more contextual with its surroundings, agreeing with many dissenters’ arguments against the plan. Lappin also pointed to the contradiction in the university’s choice to grow the undergraduate student population in the past and its current insistence on resource expansion to meet those needs.
Lappin said community members’ wariness about the plan was evident in the overwhelming contact she has received, even as a representative outside the relevant district.

Supporters affiliated with the university said there is a direct correlation between space and the ability to stay competitive with peer universities, while community supporters added that the plan will create jobs and benefit the local economy. NYU representatives have stated the plan will create 18,200 construction jobs and 2,600 opportunities for long-term employment.

Sexton, a lifelong New Yorker, said the university is desperately in need of space, which “translates into talent.” He pointed to the growth of new disciplines—the study of genomes, for instance—and the resulting need to attract the fields’ top researchers.

Currently, according to evidence the school put forth, NYU’s science facilities are outdated and not adequately sophisticated to keep pace with other top research institutes. Up-to-date science labs require additional space and flexibility over the average classroom. Without the necessary facilities, attracting top experts would be near impossible, said Sexton.

Sexton and other supporters continually reiterated that the school has no intention of growing the student body or viewing this as a real estate or corporate development project; it’s about academic necessity and meeting current needs and demands. The students themselves are “the loudest voices” calling for more space, explained Sexton.

Opponents of the plan granted that NYU may be in need of additional space, but encouraged the university to consider development elsewhere, like the Financial District, which would welcome the development, according to downtown District Leader Jenifer Rajkumar. Plan opponents overwhelmingly argued the proposal would change the character and ambiance of the Village, including decreasing green space, and some say it would force residents to live in a construction zone for at least 20 years.

It’s essential for facilities to be developed near the school’s core for many reasons, explained Brown, including efficiently delivering curriculum to undergraduates, creating community, decreasing university costs and not having to duplicate crucial facilities. Proposed changes, NYU claimed, will be built entirely on the school’s existing footprint or space currently owned by the institution.

Hurley responded to accusations against the school by providing a breakdown of space allocation, saying the university is dedicated to transforming current private space into public open space, including increasing open green space.

The debate over whether the plan will increase or decrease public green space is still highly contested on both sides. Council Member Robert Jackson put Sexton on the spot, asking whether he and his other representatives, were being as honest and forthcoming as they possibly could. Audience members’ hisses indicated their opinion as Sexton affirmed he was being truthful.

Some opponents believe the university is being deceptive about its motivations for the project. Many say the school is acting as a corporation rather than a university, with an eye toward taking over its “backyard.” Protesters pointed to a law firm hired by NYU to advocate for the plan, construction worker union members in the crowd who had little understanding of what the plan entailed and the many faculty members against the plan choosing who chose to remain anonymous as evidence of the school’s deceptive tactics.

NYU maintained it has tried to engage the community and remain transparent about the plan for the past five years. While the plan is projected to cost from $3 to $4 billion in total, Sexton asserted it would have no financial impact on NYU students. The City Council is expected to reach a decision by the end of July.

Traffic in NYC. Photo courtesy of Wiki Commons.

If there is anything that makes sane people act crazy, it’s traffic. In Manhattan, transportation congestion is a constant problem, causing safety risks, environmental issues and extensive time delays.

On Thursday, May 10, Community Board 2 and New York University hosted the panel discussion “Dealing with Downtown Bridge Traffic: Are Tolls the Answer?” The four members of the panel discussed the possibility of tolls for the East River bridges and the benefits of congestion pricing. Throughout the event, audience reaction was sometimes angry and always loud.

(By Courtney Holbrook for Our Town Downtown.)

“Traffic is just a pain,” said Shirley Secunda, chair of the Traffic and Transportation Board of CB2 and the panel moderator. “Traffic overruns our neighborhoods, blocks people from commuting, affects safety, causes air pollution and loud noises, threatens our vulnerable historic infrastructure and impedes the conduct of business.”

The four members of the panel were Kate Slevin, executive director of the Tri-State Transportation Campaign (TSTC); Paul Steely White, executive director of Transportation Alternatives; Hope Cohen, associate director of the Regional Plan Association’s Center for Urban Innovation; and Charles Komanoff, an energy policy activist and transport economist.

The members came to an agreement about the benefits of tolls on the East River bridges, which carry travelers from Brooklyn to Manhattan.

“Currently, on the isle of Manhattan, bridges and tunnels are operated under three different policies and price structures,” Cohen said. “For example, the Hudson River Tunnel is owned by the Port Authority. It charges tolls, and that bridge is in the best condition.”

New York State, however, controls the East River bridges; they are paid for through tax revenue rather than tolls. According to Cohen, the lack of tolls on the East River bridges creates “an uneven distribution of traffic patterns…if you were to install tolls, you would level out the pricing of the different crossings into Manhattan, and thus lead to a more evenly distributed traffic pattern.”

Komanoff acknowledged that the process of proving the benefits of such an action would require some political maneuvering.

“We don’t want to create a war on the car,” Komanoff said. “But we need to change the car from a sacred cow to a cash cow. If we want to improve our pollution and our traffic, we can’t ban cars—we must bill cars.”

The next question raised was where, besides on the East River bridges, tolls would be most effective. Cohen noted that the tolls could not be issued in isolation. In fact, some of the most-trafficked roads were not in Manhattan—the BQE, the Staten Island Expressway and the Long Island Expressway.

“If we don’t deal with those traffic issues elsewhere as well as those in Manhattan, we take the risk of creating a certain political argument,” Cohen said. “We play into the idea of Manhattan as this elite fortress wanting to keep everyone out. We must attend to other traffic problems as well.”

At this point, a specific cost for those tolls is unavailable, though the plan suggested by CB2 would make tolls comparable to those on the other tolled bridges.

Slevin insisted tolling would not render Manhattan a “fortress of elites,” keeping low-income households out. According to a study conducted by TSTC in 2007, Brooklyn households without vehicles earned an average yearly income of $32,000. Households with vehicles earned almost double that figure. The average yearly income of Bronx residents without a vehicle was $27,000; those with a vehicle earned a median yearly income of $60,000.

“The facts can show that only 2.5 percent of our lowest-income earners would be affected by the congestion charge,” Slevin said. “If we, in turn, took the money we earned from the tolls and directed it toward public transport—the transport those low-income workers use—we would be creating one of the most progressive pieces of legislation in years.”

The idea of donating funds generated from tolls to the MTA transport system was met with support from the rest of the panel. Currently, vehicles traveling the two tolled tunnels contribute more than $200 million per year. If the free East River bridges had tolls, the MTA could earn approximately $800 million per year in new revenue. These funds would offset transit service cuts, according to a statement issued by CB2 to Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo.

Slevin noted the funds would need extensive monitoring.

“We have to be able to give the funds directly to the MTA, not Albany,” Slevin said. “Once the funds go to Albany, they have to be allocated to an agency and then they can get tied up in other projects.”

In order to ensure the funds from tolls would go to cheaper, improved transit, transportation boards would have to “set up an entity within the MTA to protect revenues,” Slevin said.

Certain audience members protested they opposed congestion pricing because they had to drive for health or job reasons. Some opposed tolls and congestion pricing in general. But most agreed traffic was a problem that needed a solution. The panel encouraged audience members to contact their legislators and push for change.

White noted these ideas would help New York City take “control of its transit destiny and improve the city’s transportation efficiency.”

By Courtney M. Holbrook

A slim, pale woman puffs away on a cigarette. A cloud of smoke rises from perfect red lips beneath a sign—“Marlboro Menthols, $10.75.”

A bright window advertises candy, snack food and soda brands. Wrapped around the display in bright green foil, white block letters read “KOOLS, KOOLS, KOOLS.” In the corner, a mint-green box of KOOLS lies next to the Snickers bars.

A long white cigarette pops out against a black background. With a high-tech look and clean colors, it could pass as an advertisement for an Apple product. Beneath the cigarette, large block letters scream out the message “SMOKELESS CIGARETTES.”

These advertisements show up on bodegas across the street from a children’s playground on the Lower East Side. Head down the street, and a customer can walk past Emma Lazarus High School and MS 131.

Take a walk through Chinatown, and make an attempt to buy cigarettes. Although it may not apply to every bodega, it is still possible to purchase cigarettes without receiving an ID check from the man or woman behind the counter.

Despite the increasingly severe crackdown on smoking in New York City, anti-smoking activists are concerned that kids in Lower Manhattan neighborhoods are still lighting up and getting hooked.

“Young people want to fit in and feel cool,” said Adam Steiner, a SmokeFree Project counselor at the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual & Transgender Community Center in the West Village. “At a young age, kids are extremely vulnerable to the messages all over the place. And when it comes to smoking, they’re seeing these messages in stores right near their schools.”

According to Steiner, approximately 17,000 high school students in New York City smoke. Steiner says this high figure is due to the alliance between convenience stores and tobacco companies.

“Go to a Rite Aid or a bodega, and you’ll see the massive power walls of cigarettes,” Steiner said. “These power walls are displayed right in front of the candy bars. Why are they not under the counter? Kids shouldn’t see these products as normal things on sale.”

Such ads and displays are meant to be highly visible, but they are not illegal, however. As long as cigarettes are kept behind the counter, bodegas and convenience stores have every right to display them as they choose, according to the Department of Consumer Affairs.

“I am not doing anything illegal by selling my cigarettes to customers who are over 18,” said one bodega owner in the Lower East Side, who would only give his first name, Mohammad. “I ask for ID, I give them what they want. I don’t do anything illegal.”

The problem of legality may restrict customer complaints about tobacco advertising. If parents or other concerned community members have problems with the way bodegas are promoting their products, they can contact their community boards. These boards, in turn, contact the Department of Consumer Affairs or the District Attorney’s Office.

Community Board No. 2 encompasses Greenwich Village, NoHo, SoHo, Little Italy, Chinatown, Hudson Square and Gansevoort Market. Bob Gormley, the district manager for Community Board No. 2, said they would have a problem with any youth-targeted advertising— f they were receiving complaints.

“We have not had a single complaint from anyone about the tobacco products or the advertisements in bodegas in our area,” Gormley said. “Obviously, if we did, we could contact the appropriate agencies.”

Gormley said that although it is “clear that tobacco kills, we haven’t heard anything from families or teachers complaining about their kids being sold or pressured to buy tobacco products from convenience stores.”

Marie Myman, a 22-year-old barista at Momofuku Milk Bar, grew up on the Lower East Side and started smoking when she was 12. Myman does not see her old smoking habits as the result of advertisements at convenience stores.

“I started smoking because I wanted to fit in with my older friends,” Myman said. “I thought smoking was cool because the older kids were doing it. We definitely weren’t looking to the posters on bodegas for signs that it was OK.”

However, Danny McGoldrick, vice president of research for the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids, insists that the “unholy alliance” with convenience stores has allowed tobacco companies to continue targeting youth.

“Since tobacco advertising is banned in most major media outlets today, tobacco companies have stepped up their game in marketing through convenience stores,” McGoldrick said. “[Tobacco companies] spend almost $10 billion a year to push their products in convenience stores and other retail areas … that’s more than 90 percent of their budget.”

The alliance between convenience stores and tobacco companies comes together with printed advertisements and point-of-sale marketing. According to the 2012 Surgeon General’s report released by the federal government, children tend to be more price-sensitive than adults; through point-of-sale marketing, tobacco companies and convenience stores offer price discounts and coupons that may encourage new smokers. These incentives also tend to occur in lower-income areas, where prices may be more of a concern.

“We know point-of-sale is where the vast majority of tobacco advertisement occurs,” McGoldrick said. “By making tobacco more affordable and accessible, [tobacco companies] have made it normal.”

The sense of “normalcy” that surrounds tobacco advertisements in convenience stores is the primary risk for children. From the time “you can walk into a bodega, you’re exposed to cigarettes. They’re everyday, and that is insidious … you may not realize what’s driving a kid to try that first cigarette, because it’s just a part of everyday life,” Steiner noted.

According to McGoldrick and Steiner, tobacco companies use their money to pressure convenience stores to display cigarettes in an open, positive way. Concerned parents may not even notice these advertisements. When approached about this topic, most bodega owners refused to comment.

Right now, the way to fight back lies in two corner —politics and economics. In the same way children are drawn to cigarettes through discounts, various anti-smoking groups recommend even greater price increases for cigarettes in New York City. The Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids also recommends that steps be taken to force tobacco companies to advertise in black and white text; by taking away colorful images, they hope to reduce the appeal for children.

“On a statewide level, we need to invest more of our budget into anti-smoking programs in schools, where so many anti-smoking initiatives may stop after elementary school,” McGoldrick said. “Right now, tobacco companies outspend states. … If we can get states to dedicate 15 percent of their budget toward tobacco prevention, we could really see changes.”

Steiner noted the real fight must take place before children begin smoking. Once they have started, the difficulty moves beyond the first problem of addiction, and toward legal problems.

“It’s beyond the fact that quitting smoking is so difficult,” Steiner said. “As someone who helps people quit, I can’t work with those under 18. I can’t offer them nicotine replacements, because they’re under 18 and it’s illegal to smoke and illegal to use products with nicotine that help you quit. So, it becomes incredibly difficult to help.”

For now, the convenience stores of Lower Manhattan continue to plaster cigarette advertisements on glass walls and behind counters stacked with bright boxes of tobacco products. But those in the anti-smoking community hope that someday those power walls will cease to exist, and tobacco companies will lose their supply of new customers.

“Kids may want to be cool and, at that age, they also think they’re indestructible,” Steiner said. “For that reason, we need to spread the awareness of what is going on. People need to know that the advertisements they see in their local bodega can be extremely dangerous.”

“The memorial should enhance the park but not overshadow it,” said Tom Molner of the preservation group Protect the Village Historic District as he commented at the first of three public sessions sponsored by Community Board No. 2’s parks committee. The sessions are set up to gather input on the proposed triangle park and AIDS memorial across from the former St. Vincent’s Hospital site, the future site of a Rudin condo and medical facility development.

The public sessions, which include participation from Rudin Management and the AIDS Memorial Park Coalition, will look at designs for a 16,000-square-foot park, including a 1,600-square-foot memorial to the AIDS epidemic as well as the former hospital that many have described as “ground zero” for HIV patients.

Molner also pointed to Abingdon Square and Strawberry Fields as memorials that are well integrated into their surrounding areas.

Yet another village resident suggested that the names of those lost to the disease should be incorporated in some way into the memorial. “A memorial means something when you see the name of a person you lost,” the resident said.

One resident made the point that many people died from the disease alone or in secret. “It may be difficult to put the names of people on the memorial because many victims were unknown, largely due to the stigma of the disease,” he said.

Other residents agreed saying that there should be a “balance” between personal impact and the disease in general.

According to CB 2, Brooklyn-based design firm Studio a+I, the firm that submitted the winning concept in the AIDS Memorial Park Coalition design contest that was ultimately rejected by Rudin Management, will now design the AIDS Memorial and work with Rudin’s landscape architect Rick Parisi of MPFP to integrate the memorial into the park.

The construction of the triangle park, bordered by Greenwich Avenue, Seventh Avenue and West 12th Street, will be paid for by Rudin as part of the St. Vincent’s Redevelopment Project.

Kate Turley, principal of the City and Country School on 12th Street, pushed for an educational component for children as part of the memorial. “There should be a part of the memorial where kids can go and learn all about the epidemic and those who passed away,” she said.

A handout from CB 2 suggested that the memorial’s commemorative priorities should celebrate the community’s heroic response to the crisis; honor the thousands who died by celebrating life; recognize the ongoing nature of the epidemic and inspire additional learning about the crisis.

Meanwhile, community design priorities for the memorial should invite reflection with comfortable seating and a water feature; maximize landscaping; incorporate contemporary aesthetics respectful of the historic district and be physically integrated into the park.

Upcoming design meetings on the Triangle Park and AIDS Memorial will take place on May 30 and another on June 27.

CB 2’s Landmarks and Parks committees will examine designs from the three public sessions on July 9 and make a recommendation to the full board, which will vote on a final design on July 19.

It appeared that a majority of the attending public were against this rule, and many posited that Mayor Michael Bloomberg and the city were attempting to rid the city’s parks of performers in order to usher in more corporate operations in the vein of the holiday market currently open in Union Square.

William Castro, the Manhattan Borough commissioner for the Department of Parks and Recreation, attended the meeting and opened it with a few remarks. He maintained that the rules are misunderstood and said that the city isn’t attempting to ban performers. He noted that the city recognizes the importance of having performers in the park, but added that they hope to better regulate their activities to make parks vibrant and safe places for all. While some have argued that, due to the plethora of monuments in Washington Square Park, it is difficult—if not impossible—for a busker to find a legal spot to perform, Castro noted that there were many acceptable places, including the Garibaldi Stage.

Robert Lederman, president of Artists Response to Illegal State Tactics(ARTISTS), noted that he had visited the park with a tape measure and couldn’t find a spot that was 50 feet away from a monument. He believes the city hopes to make room for corporate vending.

“These rules seem to have come all of the sudden,” said Doris Diether, co-chair of CB2’s Landmarks and Public Aesthetics Committee. Deither, a longtime resident of the area, pointed out that musicians have been a fixture of the park since the 1950s.

Colin Huggins, known for playing a grand piano in the park, called himself “the big ticket winner” in terms of the amount he has been fined for performing. He noted that at minimum, he owed over $2,000, which he had to pay over a six-week period, but many generously donated to him to cover the costs.

Joe Mangrum, the artist responsible for the sand art pieces found in the park, said that when he first moved to New York City he was surprised by the freedom for self-expression and said that sense of freedom propels art in public spaces. “By killing this art, the park will be more vacant as a result,” he added.

Of course, a meeting involving themes of self-expression had to end on an artistic flourish with the opera singer Katie Kat, a masters student and adjunct professor of voice at New York University, belting out a musical piece in Italian. Kat, one half of the Opera Under the Arch duet, said she has been busking since she was a teenager and that for many artists in the park, public performance offers a chance for their talents to be discovered.

The Parks, Recreation and Open Space board is set to reconvene Jan. 14, 2012, at which point, noted board members, a resolution concerning these regulations will most likely be brought up. In the meantime, community members can send their comments to washingtonsquareparkspeakout@gmail.com.

Citizens Polled on Living Wage

According to a recent Quinnipiac University poll, 74 percent of New Yorkers are in favor of the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act, also known as the Living Wage bill. In a statement, Living Wage NYC said of the poll results, “This sentiment reaches across political lines, as a whopping 56 percent of Republicans and 83 percent of Democrats agree that the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act would benefit the city—results consistent with an earlier Baruch College living wage poll.”

1,242 registered voters were polled Dec. 7 through Dec. 12. The Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act would make the minimum hourly wage for workers hired by companies that receive more than $1 million in city subsidies $10 per hour plus benefits or $11.50 without benefits.