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Checks totalling $33 million have so far been sent to 13,000
households. (Checks are sent around the third week of each
month to everyone approved through the end of the previous
month, so there is a lag of three to seven weeks between approval
and the time residents receives their first checks.)
But more than 100 Downtown buildings had violations that
were preventing residents from receiving money. In buildings
with what the LMDC calls Level 1 violations, which include
Fire Department citations for hazardous conditions, no resident
can get a grant until the owner proves the problem was corrected,
Peterson said. In buildings with Level 2 violations, considered
less serious, anyone who moved in after Nov. 1, 2002, is barred
from receiving the LMDC grant until the violation is cleared.
The LMDC declined to immediately release the full list of
buildings where violations were blocking grants, saying that
the list changes as buildings clear up old violations or get
new ones.
In some cases, residents were not even aware that their
applications were on hold. Walter Usiatynski, a tenant at
144 Chambers St., who had heard nothing from the LMDC since
submitting his application in early October, was surprised
to hear from a Trib reporter last month that his building
was among several identified by the LMDC as carrying violations.
Robert Krauss, a 16-year Tribeca resident who lives with
his wife and nine-year-old daughter at 41 Murray St., was
similarly surprised. When he checked with the LMDC in December,
two months after submitting his application, he said, he found
out he needed to provide more documents (his full 100-page
lease instead of key pages, and a letter from his daughter’s
school instead of just a report card). He brought the material
to an LMDC office and was told it would take another month
to process.
“They said nothing about a building violation,”
he said with irritation after learning that the LMDC had identified
his building as a violator. “That would aggravate me.”
When asked why residents were not automatically alerted
about the violations, Peterson said, “We didn’t
want to go through the process of sending out letters when
we knew that building owners were working to get things cleared
up.”
The owners of all buildings with violations serious enough
to hold up grants were notified either in August or October,
she said, and the LMDC was working with owners and city agencies
to clear as many buildings as possible, as quickly as possible.
“The Department of Buildings and the Fire Department
have set up somewhat expedited processes to provide information
and deal with these problems,” she said.
But Eugene Andrews, president of Andrews Building Corp.,
which manages more than 50 Downtown buildings, most of them
co-ops and condominiums, including several where grants have
been withheld, sounded skeptical.
“The LMDC has never contacted us, that I’m aware
of,” he said. “Our name is on all city records for
buildings we manage.”
Instead, the management company found out about grant delays
from residents, and Andrews said that when his company contacted
the LMDC, the agency had trouble finding the violation numbers
or details.
In the case of 275 Greenwich Street, Andrews said, “it
took us at least four weeks and three meetings with representatives
of the LMDC, at their office, to find out what the violation
was.” He claimed the violation had been cured last August.
At 1 Hudson St., also an Andrews building, Celia Hartmann
got the violation number from the LMDC last month—after
first being given an incorrect number—and passed it on
to the management company. The violation, issued last August,
was for failure to perform a pressure test on the sprinkler
system, though Bob Brander, who handles compliance issues
for Andrews, said the test had been performed. He said he
was trying to schedule another one, and hoped to have the
violation cleared this month.
David Pian, an assistant vice president at Rockrose Properties
and building manager at 99 John St., said the LMDC did tell
him that there was a violation, but that “it took weeks
to figure out what the violation was.” After first telling
him that there were no citations, the Fire Department found
that a permit for an air conditioning unit installed in 1999
had been filed incorrectly.
Late last month, while Rockrose began filing new papers,
a process Pian said would take four to six weeks, the LMDC
suddenly removed the hold on the building’s grants.
Some residents questioned the LMDC’s policy, saying
they were being punished for things out of their control.
“Why should an incentive program be tied to the relationship
my building has with Buildings Department or Fire Department?”
asked Hartmann.
But Peterson said it was a matter of public safety. “We
don’t want to encourage people to move into buildings
that are unsafe,” she said. While the LMDC has come under
criticism for calling some “minor” code infractions
unsafe, Peterson said the Fire and Buildings Departments made
those judgements. In addition, she said, there were many violations
for which the LMDC did not hold up grants.
Despite his own experience, Peter Lynn said residents should
cut the LMDC some slack.
“They’re dealing with 30,000 applications and it’s
not their fault that they had faulty information,” he
said. “It’s frustrating that the city’s records
are in that kind of shape, but you have to kind of take that
in stride.”
Information on the grant program and applications are available
on the LMDC’s website, www.renewnyc.com. The agency can
be visited at 68 Reade St. and 225 Park Row, or called at
866-736-3969.
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