The Finger Building's Date in Supreme Court
Buried in a story replete with depressing statistics about building safety in this town (e.g. 98 construction workers killed since 2001 and many others believed unreported because they involved immigrants) were some juicy details about the state of the Finger building in Williamsburg. Turns out there’s been a Stop Work Order on the North 8th…
Buried in a story replete with depressing statistics about building safety in this town (e.g. 98 construction workers killed since 2001 and many others believed unreported because they involved immigrants) were some juicy details about the state of the Finger building in Williamsburg. Turns out there’s been a Stop Work Order on the North 8th Street building for a few weeks because of a lawsuit by a neighboring landlord named Scott Spector. Interesting! We remember meeting Spector back in 1999 or 2000. At that point he owned a ton of properties in Williamsburg, including the one that runs through the block from North 7th to North 8th between Bedford and Berry whose airspace the Finger Building stands accused of invading. We were surprised to hear Spector’s name in the case because we remember hearing rumors at the time that he was in the process of selling his portfolio of buildings to an Orthodox developer. Anyway, Finger Building developers Mendel Brach and Moshe Oknin have filed for summary judgment to allow them to build 16 stories despite their infractions. (The building is currently stalled out at the tenth floor.) They will get to argue their case in Brooklyn Supreme Court next Monday.
Construction Zone Nghtmare [NY Daily News]
Judge to Give Finger to the Finger [Curbed]
Photo by TrespassersWill
What in the world are you talking about? Again, I ask you, when was the last time you were in Hasidic Williamsburg south of the bridge? That neighborhood has seen an enormous building boom over the last several years, as increasingly has the rest of Williamsburg and surrounding areas. What percentage of this new building do you think has been undertaken by Hasidic Orthodox developers? I’m certain that the number is a whole lot higher than 5%. In south Williamsburg I would bet that it’s close to 100%.
What’s happening in Willaimsburg and surrounding areas begs some serious questions. Like why are most of these buldings so ugly and being built with such cheap materials and non-union illegal immigrant labor? Why are so few safeguards being taken for worker safety and the structural integrity of the surrounding occupied buildings? How and why are so many of these buildings still going up in Williamsburg and Greenpoint north of the bridge despite significant local opposition? Why were several of these projects granted easy exemptions and waivers from zoning laws, and why is construction continuing on some of them without apparent penalty despite stop work orders from the Buildings Dept.?
The major objection is not to the ethnicity or religion of the builders, but to the awful buildings that they build and their horrible, dangerous, and unlawful practices in doing so. I don’t like talking or thinking about it in these terms, and neither do most people in the neighborhood, but as someone stated above it’s an unavoidable fact that most of these projects are being developed by folks who have something in common. Part of the answers to the questions I asked above could possibly be found in that fact. However, the argument in the end is with the developers themselves, and not the Hasidic community as a whole, and certainly not with Jews or Judaism. But the current trends in development in the area is why it’s notable, as in the story under discussion, that the buildings in question were thought have been purchased by Orthodox developers. To say that these developers have “done nothing” to anyone is laughble and I suggest that you ask the familes of injured and dead workers or the people forced out of their homes without compensation because their foundations were undercut and broken just how they feel about it.
“Warsaw ghetto”, wow, you fuckhead, you know well, that maybe, maybe, 5% of any building in the whole Williamsburg, was build by a Hasid, but that still doesn’t stop you from throwing up your vicious hate and shit on some people who have done you nothing, expect that they live in peace with no crime or drugs etc., and you just jump out of your pig skin when seeing this.
I am happy to see I am mentioned in such glorious company. The fact of the matter is that all people who build should be sent away to some far off country to build there and leave Brooklyn to the true people who should have it the Dutch.
I’m sorry if I offend anyone but IMHO Williamsburg is by far the ugliest nabe in all of Brooklyn. It absolutely disgusts me. It has no redeeming qualities to speak of. I find it dreary and depressing. The streets are dark and cold. Half of the neighborhood is an industrial heap and the other half looks like a Warsaw ghetto. The best thing about Williamsburg is the waterfront and the Nimby fools are trying to keep it underdeveloped for God knows what reason! I’m not being anti-Semitic. I’m just pointing out an obvious fact – Orthodox developers are turning Williamsburg into an eastern European ghetto and should their recklessness and tastelessness go unchecked then the nabe will permanently remain the armpit of Brooklyn. Ever wonder why Landmarks is about to make “Crown Heights North” New York’s largest historic district? Look no further than CH’s large Hasidic population and what’s become of Williamsburg.
Sorry for the inadvertent double post. Damn the lack of a delete/edit function!
When was the last time you were there? Those older brownstones and the low rise industry that once made up that neighborhood are very quickly being replaced these days by much higher density apartment buildings. And these buildings and the highly questionable building practices involved in their constructionbuilding are spreading quite quickly southwards to Flushing Ave. and beyond. If it was just old brownstones and public housing I wouldn’t have brought it up.
When was the last time you were there? Those older brownstones and the surrounding low rise industry are very quickly being replaced these days by much higher density apartment buildings, and these buildings and building practices are spreading quite quickly southwards to Flushing Ave. and beyond. If it was just old brownstones and public housing I wouldn’t have brought it up.
I wont go into details here now at the moment, as I am a bit busy now, but to show the true colors of those “concerned citizens”, look at the comment of anon 1:14.
“A quick drive or walk around Williamsburg south of the bridge should be enough to raise anyone’s architectural and building safety concerns.”
Anyone who ever went south of the bridge knows, that 99% of the buildings there are Brownstones that are years old, some of them even hundreds of years old, and the rest are mostly NYC public housing etc. never built by those “ugly Hasid’s”.
But, to cover an hatred with leis and deception, why not put another lie in there?
shame on you.
No – Scarrano isn’t a Jew but the fact of the matter (and this is indisputable) the majority of the worst, most dangerous, most illegal, and ugliest sites in the borough are run by people of Jewish affiliation. Including many of Scarranno’s Business Partners. In fact Scarrano was only doing what Radufsky (a Jew) had been doing for many years, before.
It’s not anti-Semitic. It’s the facts.
If anyone is upset then they have only the Radufsky’s, Gutman’s, Boymelgreens, Katan’s and the rest of the upstanding people of the Jewish faith to thank.