By Hadassa Kalatizadeh

Barneys New York, once an esteemed department store that vendors fought to be displayed in, is still severely underwater. Despite being purchased by Authentic Brands Group for $271 million last month, the department store chain is still “massively” insolvent, angry vendors divulged in court papers filed this month. As reported by the NY Post, court documents show that Barneys still suffers from cash flow luxury goods that it is currently selling at deep discounts at its closing sales.

The woeful vendors include top-notch names like Prada, Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Celine and Balenciaga. The luxury suppliers will probably get back nothing at all for the goods that Barneys had in its stores right before it filed for bankruptcy on Aug. 6, according to court documents. The vendors expect to get back just 40 cents on the dollar for goods sent to the NYC-based chain after it filed for bankruptcy. “The vendors won’t get anything back on the merchandise that was in the stores on the day they filed,” explained Adam Stein-Sapir, an expert on distressed debt.

“People who are shopping at Barneys now are helping the liquidators and not the vendors who supplied Barneys, many of whom will suffer a meaningful haircut as the company winds down,” added Bradford Sandler of Pachulski Stang Ziehl & Jones LLP, who is representing the creditor’s committee.

Yves Saint Laurent and Balenciaga are poised to lose $2.2 million each. Another $1.8 million is owed to Gucci, and $1.6 million to Prada, court papers show. Vendors are not even the only ones ailing. Fedex, the delivery giant, is owed over $1 million since the bankruptcy filing, and over $2.3 million in pre-bankruptcy claims. Barneys “became deeply administratively insolvent in a short period of time,” said lawyers for FedEx, which may be forced to take a complete loss on the pre-filing debt.

Vexed vendors are now opposing Barneys’ plan to wind down its business and exit bankruptcy, claiming there isn’t enough money to pay them what’s due under bankruptcy law. Most of the $244 million in financing that Barneys received to continue operations, will go to paying off big name lawyers and financial advisers, who charge more than $1000 per hour.

Kirkland & Ellis, the law firm representing Barneys, did not respond to requests for comment from The Post.

“It’s unfortunate that a marquee brand worth almost $1 billion in sales wasn’t able to pay anything to the vendors who made Barneys the brand that it was,” Stein-Sapir said.

By: David Katzenberg

Later this month, the NYS Public Service Commission is expected to vote on whether to approve a proposed rate increase by Con Edison which would go into effect in the coming year.

Brooklyn Assemblyman Simcha Eichenstein, denounced Con Edison’s request declaring that: “Perhaps Con Edison should first demonstrate that its capable of upgrading its services before we consider their proposed rate increase which hard working New Yorkers cannot afford right now.”

In a letter penned by Assemblyman Eichenstein (who represents the 48th assembly district in Brooklyn) and sent to John B. Rhodes, Chairman of the New York State Public Service Commission, Mr. Eichenstein said: “I know firsthand how my constituents are struggling to pay their utility bills, which are already the highest in the country. Most New Yorkers are low to middle income city residents who pay their utility bills with great difficulty. My office receives countless calls from constituents that are barely making their payments and are reaching out to us for help. Adding this unjustified and costly increase in delivery rates would be a disaster for them, I cannot imagine how they will survive it.”

According to a December 9th article on NY1.com, it indicated that ConEd has proposed rate hikes starting January 1, with additional increases in 2021 and 2022. On average, electric rates will go up by 13 and a half percent in that time. Electric bills will increase 4.2 percent this coming year, then 4.7 percent the following year and another four percent in 2022.

Gas rate hikes will be even larger with a 7.5 percent bump in 2020, then 8.8 and 7.2 percent in the two years after.

That’s a 25 percent increase in total.

The NY Daily News reported in early December that exactly how much one pays Con Ed on a monthly basis depends on how much electricity they use. Under the proposal, someone living in a New York City apartment who uses 300 kilowatt hours per month will see their bill rise 3.9% next year, to $76.43. A 300 kilowatt hour bill would jump 4.5% in 2021 to $79.83, and 3.8% to $82.86 in 2022.

NY1.com reported that groups like AARP are voicing strong opposition for these changes and are urging the governor and public service commission to reject them.

The question is how the increases will affect low and middle-income customers.

“I think it’s very hard for middle class people to live in New York City. You can’t find apartments, you can’t find space, food is more expensive,” said one New Yorker.

It’s awful. We need pay raises in order to pay for these high prices of electricity,” said another New Yorker.

Ten percent of Con Ed customers are already roughly 60 days behind on paying their bills.

By: Mike Mustiglione

Governor Andrew Cuomo has vetoed a bill that would have allowed electric bike and scooter rentals statewide.

The reason: a lack of safety measures such as a helmet requirement, according to Cuomo’s office.

“Failure to include these basic measures renders this legislation fatally flawed,” he said. “There is no need for us to choose between legalizing e-bikes and safety, and I will propose a bill that does both on January 8,” he added in a Twitter message.

“E-bikes and e-scooters carry the potential to be a useful tool in changing the way we travel and reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” Cuomo wrote in explaining the veto. “They do, however, carry significant safety concerns. A number of recent accidents, including the tragic death of a 16-year-old boy in Elizabeth, N.J., demonstrate clearly that e-bikes and e-scooters must be carefully and responsibly regulated. As such, I am constrained to veto this bill.”

“Lawmakers may try to pass a bill with more safety measures next year. Cuomo said electric bikes and scooters must be regulated to protect public safety and said he looks forward to working with lawmakers on the issue in 2020,” reported Crain’s New York Business. “Cuomo had publicly expressed concerns about protecting pedestrians from e-bikes earlier this year. His veto message cites a 16-year-old boy who died in November after being hit by a tow truck while riding an e-scooter.”

Cuomo’s veto was “a blow to several constituencies: scooter companies that operate in dozens of cities in the United States and abroad and see New York as a lucrative, untapped market; delivery workers who rely on an illegal form of transportation to earn a living; and those pressing for ways to ease congestion on New York City’s traffic-choked streets,” reported The New York Times. “In rejecting the legislation, Mr. Cuomo cited safety measures he said that he had sought in his proposed 2019 budget but that had been “inexplicably omitted” from the bill that cleared both houses of the State Legislature by overwhelming margins.”

There is no shortage of disappointment in the wake of the decision. The bill “drew strong interest across the state but also uncertainty over what Cuomo would do as the industry has been eager to enter New York, particularly millions of new customers in the New York City market,” according to USA Today. “In fact, e-scooter companies – including Lime, Bird, Bolt, Jump, Spin and Skip – were spending more than $145,000 a month to lobbyists in Albany and Manhattan to get a bill into law, the USA TODAY Network New York found in April.”

By: Richard Melouse

When a borough president in New York City goes on a rant, it’s news – and usually portends some major action.

Eric Adams, the Brooklyn Borough President, had lots to say when speaking at the launch of a new senior center for poor and LGBT residents. The facility sits on land that belongs to the New York City Housing Authority.

“I can’t celebrate a building that is not going to be inclusive. That is not who I am. Those who know me, they know who I am. And I’m unapologetic about who I am,” Adams said, according to the New York Post. “Because if you have a body of people over there that feels as though this place here is not for them — we’re going to have incidents in this community that will be disruptive. And I don’t want that to happen. I didn’t put on a vest for 22 years to protect the children and families of this city to watch us be divided.”

“It’s not clear exactly what the 2021 mayoral hopeful meant when he claimed the new Stonewall House building at Fort Greene’s Ingersoll Houses is not inclusive,” the Post noted (see the full story at https://nypost.com/2019/12/25/brooklyn-borough-president-eric-adams-goes-on-bizarre-rant-at-affordable-housing-opening/). More than three-quarters — 77 percent — of the new residents are African American, Latino or Asian. Each tenant in the new building is at least 62 years old and makes less than $40,000 a year. More than a third of the building’s new apartments will be filled by NYCHA tenants — a quarter of its 145 units are reserved for once-homeless New Yorkers.”

Grace Bonilla, who heads the city’s Human Resources Administration, said this after Adams spoke, reported the Post’s Nolan Hicks: “I can’t follow the Borough President without addressing what he had to say. Our hope is that every single client has a place like this to live in, to actually talk to the people that are going to get a key and say ‘you no longer have to be homeless… So, I echo what the Borough President said, we do have more to do, but I do want to celebrate today because today is an accomplishment.”

According to GayCityNews.com, Adams also said,

“I don’t want to see beautiful floors like this and lead paint over there. I don’t want to see rodents over there and comfort here.”

“The borough president segued from his comments about diversity into a discussion about slavery,” the web site added. “I think about Frederick Douglass and the conversation about fighting for the independence of America,” Adams said. “He said ‘the arrogance of that those want me to fight for independence when I’m still a slave.’ I can’t celebrate a building that is not inclusive.”

By: Jason Murooney

Ever think Walt Whitman would be the source of controversy in the 21st century?

The question of whether or not to give his house landmark status has, surprisingly, raised some people’s ire.

Preservationists want to designate Whitman’s Clinton Hill, Brooklyn home – he resided there in the 1850s – a landmark.

Karen Karbiener, a professor at New York University, “said that there was a sense of urgency around protecting the building in question, 99 Ryerson Street, especially since Clinton Hill has gentrified and is drawing the attention of developers,” according to the New York Times. “But the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission does not think the house warrants designation. Nor does the building’s current occupant, who is unhappy about the attention to his home is getting. And then there is the matter of whether Whitman, whose verse in “Leaves of Grass” has for so long been seen as radically inclusive, was actually a racist later in life who does not deserve to be celebrated in a neighborhood as diverse as Clinton Hill.”

Whitman, largely unknown to today’s public school students, was an American poet, essayist, and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. His work was controversial in its time, particularly his poetry collection Leaves of Grass, which was described as obscene for its overt sensuality. Whitman’s own life came under scrutiny for his presumed homosexuality.

Born in Huntington on Long Island, Whitman worked as a journalist, a teacher, and a government clerk, according to Wikipedia. “At age 11, he left formal schooling to go to work. As a child and through much of his career he resided in Brooklyn. Whitman’s major work, Leaves of Grass, was first published in 1855 with his own money. The work was an attempt at reaching out to the common person with an American epic. He continued expanding and revising it until his death in 1892. During the American Civil War, he went to Washington, D.C. and worked in hospitals caring for the wounded. His poetry often focused on both loss and healing. Two of his well known poems, “O Captain! My Captain!” and “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d”, were written on the death of Abraham Lincoln. After a stroke towards the end of his life, Whitman moved to Camden, New Jersey, where his health further declined. When he died at age 72, his funeral was a public event.”

By Hellen Zaboulani

For the first time since 2016, New York City’s annual homicide total has surpassed 300. The spike in violence has been propelled by gang violence, two quadruple killings, and an oddly high number of bookkeeping readjustments.

Through Dec. 22, the city counted 311 homicides, compared with 290 through the same time period last year. This is the second straight year of higher homicides, following NYC’s attained modern-era low of 292 homicides in 2017. However, this year’s total is partially skewed by an irregular number of deaths left over from years past and accounted for only now.

As reported by VIN News, this year’s figures include 27 deaths from before 2019, which were not classified as homicides by the city’s medical examiner until this year. The police department said that those case need to be counted in the statistics for the year the death certificate is issued. In last year’s statistics there were less than half as many reclassifications.

Through the end of November, New York City tallied 272 homicides involving people killed this year, Deputy Chief Lori Pollock said. At the same time last year, there were 275. “We don’t like to talk about it because it’s fairly consistent through the years, but this one happens to be — it hasn’t happened since 2006 where you had this many classifications over the year before,” Pollock said.

Criminologist David Kennedy said this year’s increase in New York’s homicide total shouldn’t be cause for alarm, rather it is a regular fluctuation. “Most of that change itself can be accounted for by a couple of standout incidents,” said Kennedy, a professor of criminal justice at John Jay College. “This is well within the absolutely expected fluctuation of what happens with violent crime rates.”

New York finished last year with 295 homicides, down from 335 in 2016. The tallies for recent years indicate a major victory for NYC and are drastically lower than they were in the early 1990s, when the city averaged a chilling 2,000 killings annually.

New York, the largest city in the country, with roughly 8.6 million residents, now has a homicide rate of about 3.6 per 100,000. Statistically, it means the Big Apple is impressively less deadly than some other big cities. Philadelphia for instance, which has approximately 1.6 million residents, had 351 homicides as of Friday, for a rate of about 22 per 100,000 residents. Chicago, which has about 2.7 million residents, had 482 killings this year, for a rate of about 17.8 per 100,000.

Halfway into this year, New York was set for its lowest annual homicide total since 1951, however in the second half of the year a series of killings raised the total. In October, a homeless man allegedly fatally beat four men with a metal pipe as they slept on the Manhattan streets. Days later, four people were killed at a Brooklyn gambling den.

The city’s homicide spike can be attributed to just a few neighborhoods, as per VIN News. In the Crown Heights precinct, where the gambling den was located, there have been 14 killings this year up from just two a year ago. Those included at least six other fatal shootings and several deadly assaults. In Queens, a precinct covering parts of Jamaica, St. Albans and Hollis has seen a three-times increase in homicides over last year, where killings jumped from five to 15. The Brooklyn precinct covering Coney Island and Brighton Beach had six killings this year after posting none last year. A precinct in the Bronx neighborhood, east of Yankee Stadium, doubled its year-over-year tally from six to 12. “We continue to see a high percentage committed by gangs and gang involvement,” police commissioner Dermot Shea said at a crime briefing this month.

Across NYC, other non-fatal crime categories, such as shootings, robberies and felony assaults, have also trended slightly higher this year. Some fear that the upward tick will escalate, as the bail reform keeping criminals out of jail will begin on Jan. 1st.

By Hadassa Kalatizadeh

NYC seems to have entwined holiday spirit with shopping sprees, and it’s been good for business.

New York City consumers are set to break records purchasing gifts, goods and holiday entertainment, according to the NY Post. Forecasts and local merchants say this Christmas shopping season is the best we have seen in a long time.

“New Yorkers are a bit more excited about the holiday season this year,” said Don Levy, director at the Siena College Research Institute (SCRI). “Holiday gift budgets have risen slightly and New Yorkers’ collective view of their personal finances is up compared to a year ago.”

The volume of deliveries and pickups, which is regularly used as a benchmark, has picked up dramatically. DHL Express US told the NY Post that it expects its delivery of packages in New York City from Thanksgiving through New Year’s Day to increase by 11 percent year-over-year, and pickups to jump by 19 percent. DHL says that overall its forecasts the NYC volume to spike by 13 percent this holiday season over last year.

“E-commerce is contributing significantly to our growth momentum, especially around the holidays,” said Ryan Hunter, VP, global customers, for DHL Express Americas.

WalletHub, the personal finance Web site, predicts that the average NYC resident will have spent $753 this year from November through Dec. 25. That compares well with Silicon Valley’s Palo Alto, home of startups and millennial millionaires, where America’s heaviest holiday spenders spent an average of $3,160 for the same time period.

The retail holiday boom in NYC echoes a broader national trend. The National Retail Federation predicts US holiday retail sales in November and December will hit a new record, and leap by 3.8 percent to 4.2 percent over last year.

Nationally, online sales peaked this year, accounting for 14.6 percent of all holiday retail, and growing 18.8 percent over last year, as per Mastercard’s Spending Pulse report. “E-commerce sales hit a record high this year with more people doing their holiday shopping online,” said Steve Sadove, a Mastercard senior adviser and former Saks CEO. “Due to a later than usual Thanksgiving holiday, we saw retailers offering omnichannel sales earlier in the season, meeting consumers’ demand for the best deals across all channels and devices.”

As per the Post, last-minute Christmas shoppers, empowered by rising wages, spent $34.4 billion on the last Saturday before Christmas on gifts, breaking records to make it the biggest shopping day in history. The total amount spent online and in stores on that Saturday was more than 8 percent above last year, and also topped Black Friday spending by 10 percent, according to Customer Growth Partners, a retail research and consulting firm. Popular items sold included Disney’s “Frozen II” toys, the Nintendo Switch, and Apple’s Air Pod Pro, the iPhone 11 and Series 5 watch.

By: Cherlene J. Williams

As 2019 winds down, let’s take a peek at the year’s best movies. Despite fierce competition with Netflix and televised performances, 2019 saw a comeback for the cinema. As reported by the NY Post, this past year was the best year for movies in the past decade. The improvement can be attributed to popular streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime becoming major producers of hailed original films, in a new ‘if you can’t beat them, join them’ Hollywood mentality. The traditional Hollywood studio system corrected its course, tapping into streaming services to give people what they want to see in the big screens.

Here is the line up for the top ten movies of the year, as compiled by the NY Post.

The best movie of the year was “1917”, in a personal tale of two British soldiers on a crucial mission in a World War I epic. The film was praised for editing that made it seem like a continuous shot, which gave viewers an intimate feel. Director Sam Mendes has been nominated for the best director, at the AACTA international Award ceremony, which will take place on January 3rd.

Next on the list was “Blinded By The Light”. Released in August, this story about a Pakistani teen who finds his own voice after struggling with intolerance and stubborn views. Set to the music of Bruce Springsteen, the film sold $17.6 million at the box office.

The third best movie was “The Irishman”, a movie about organized crime in the 1950s, starring Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Al Pacino. The movie has been nominated for six AACTA awards including best actor, best supporting actor, best direction, best screen play, and best film.

“Parasite” was next on the top movie list. Directed and co-written by Bong Joon Ho, this psychological comedy-drama-thriller was original and shocking. The Korean movie raked in $126.3 million at the box office.

Rounding off the top five, was “Honey Boy”, written by and starring Shia LaBeouf. The sad semi-autobiographical storyline about an abusive, alcoholic father was a Sundance premiere, which highlighted LaBeouf’s +raw talent.

“Little Women” made it to sixth place on the list. The classic novel-based story directed by Greta Gerwig was a holiday treat with a modern twist.

“The Farewell”, written and directed by Lulu Wang, was next on the list. From the Sundance Film Festival this uplifting heart-warmer is based on Wang’s own true story, and stars best actress nominee Awkwafina.

“Booksmart”, the teen comedy about coming-of-age by new director Olivia Wilde, was ranked eighth best.

“Uncut Gems” was next on the list, with a crime mystery about a jeweler. Adam Sandler, Julia Fox and Kevin Garnett starred in this box-office thriller released last week.

The last movie for 2019 to make the top ten list according to the Post’s ranking was “Child’s Play”. The frightful Chucky reboot, released in June, sold $44.9 million at the box office with a budget of $10 million.

Entering the year 2020 also affords the opportunity to pick the best movie of the decade. The Post gave this honor to “The Social Network”, released in 2010. Director David Fincher and screenwriter Aaron Sorkin delivered a prophetic film that familiarized us with Mark Zuckerberg, a headstrong young genius who would consider a run for president, and exercise immeasurable control over all of our lives.

By: Tessa Mae Jones

Who better than the 168-year-old New York Times to help put New York City’s transformations into perspective.

Writer Ginia Bellafante wrote yesterday that the Big Apple’s changes over the past decade have been “profound. Not everything was so predictable, although predicting a Mike Bloomberg presidential campaign would have probably been a safe bet.”

Bellafante put together a list of nine ways New York has changed, and it is instructive for all those who live and do business there to ponder them. The list includes:

* The retail landscape was so thoroughly eviscerated that you actually mourned the loss of places you used to hate. “Between 2007 and 2017, vacant retail space in New York City increased by 5.2 million square feet. During that time, retail rents rose by 22 percent on average,” Bellafante noted. “So, much of what you used to love — diners, bike shops, tailors, hat stores, delicatessens, art-supply stores, bistros — disappeared.”

It was, the piece continued, “all so dispiriting that, over the past few years, you found yourself feeling wistful when you heard that, say, Barnes & Noble was closing some stores — even though you couldn’t stand Barnes & Noble when it started replacing independent book shops. You were undone when you heard that the Coffee Shop on Union Square was shutting down, forgetting how snobby and exclusive it was when it opened, and how it didn’t want you anyway.”

* A hip-hop musical about the nation’s first treasury secretary reignited Broadway. “When “Hamilton” debuted on Broadway in 2015, it not only brought heaps of money to a stagnant industry, it also attracted a new kind of audience member: a younger one,” Bellafanta wrote. “By the 2017-18 theater season, the average age of the Broadway audience was 40, the lowest it had been in nearly two decades. Dick Cheney loved “Hamilton,” but so did teenagers, first graders, their babysitters and so on.

* A devastating natural disaster couldn’t sedate the obsession with waterfront development. “In 2012, Hurricane Sandy tore through the city, killing 44 people and leaving billions of dollars of damage. The recovery effort was slow going — five years out, many houses were still in shambles.

The storm, the Times recalls, “was meant to be a reckoning about the city’s environmental fragility, but the shoreline continued to sprout high-rises. There would be few solutions, and mostly workarounds, like mechanicals put on top of buildings, or in the middle of them, instead of on the ground floor. In Manhattan, this need for rearrangement has been exploited by developers who claim they require more floors for mechanicals than they do.

By Ted Brooks

The Annex Markets in Chelsea is going belly up, yet another victim of gentrification.

The 40-plus year old Chelsea Flea Market reportedly lost its lease and closed up shop for good yesterday.

Nostalgia hung heavy in the air on the final day. As recounted in the New York Times, “Andy Warhol would arrive at the flea markets on the West Side of Manhattan before noon on Sundays in an old Dodge convertible. It was the 1980s, and on weekends, the parking lots near West 25th Street and Sixth Avenue were filled with vendors selling tchotchkes, collectibles and fine antiques.

“A friend told him you need to go to the flea market to get new and great ideas,” said Alan Boss, who opened the first space in 1976 and said he would often shoo away autograph-seeking fans as Warhol shopped,” the Times piece continued. “Mr. Boss watched Warhol build collections: “He bought vintage watches. He bought cookie jars. Nobody cared about cookie jars until he started collecting them.”

Annex Markets started in 1976 as a penny-jar investment on an estranged corner lot in Chelsea by native New Yorker Boss. “Having marshaled 11 vendors for the market’s first weekend, Boss shaped Annex into an outdoor shopping Mecca featuring 100s of vendors and known to treasure hunters worldwide,” it relates on its web site. “Annex Markets continued to evolve. Its venerable Chelsea Flea Market location remained a destination location for celebrities, prop masters, set designers, fashion designers, artists, antique-lovers, decorators, architects, and others. It was featured countless times in global print media and was the backdrop for movies and commercials.”

In 2006, after almost 30 years of outdoor commerce-delight and top-notch haggling, most of the original Annex locations along Sixth Avenue in the West 20s were displaced by high-rise residential buildings. Years later, in June 2014 and in its 20th year of operation, “The Garage closed—a casualty of real estate development—and its vendors merged with Boss’s outdoor market on the uptown side of West 25th Street between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, Chelsea Flea Market (#chelseaflea),” the group added.

In January 2019 Hell’s Kitchen Flea Market consolidated with Chelsea Flea Market after nearly 16 years on West 39th Street.

“Once New York City’s largest flea market, that included seven separate lots over the years, the spaces were known for their fine antiques that occasionally landed in museum collections,” the Times added in its farewell salute. “It was the city’s version of famous bazaars like Portobello Road Market in London and the Marche aux Puces in Paris. The lots, which drew the city’s creative community, also helped to shape Chelsea into an arts district.”

By: Millicent Zakowski

An op-ed piece that raised a stir has been tweaked by the New York Times.

The by now infamous Bret Stephens’ column “The Secrets of Jewish Genius,” reportedly cited an academic paper that had been co-authored by someone accused of being a white nationalist.

“A reference to the 2005 study was scrapped from after the author and his editors “learned that one of the paper’s authors … promoted racist views,” an editor’s note now reads on the op-ed,” the New York Post reported. “In his article published Friday, Stephens wrote that Jews “are, or tend to be, smart” and “might have a marginal advantage over their gentile peers when it comes to thinking better.” He cited the paper “Natural History of Ashkenazi Intelligence,” which compared Ashkenazi Jews to other ethnic groups and determined that they have the highest average IQ. The study “traffics in centuries-old anti-Semitic tropes,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks extremism.”

Notably, said businessinsider.com, the article “referenced a 2005 paper measuring IQ which was scientifically questioned and written by a professor with ties to white nationalist groups, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. Backlash to the article argued that the assertion also promoted a school of thought called eugenics, which suggests that the human race can be improved by encouraging the reproduction of people with “desirable traits.” This same ideology has been used to justify atrocities like slavery and the Holocaust.

According to Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, the column “crossed a very important line and for no reason other than to be provocative.”

“How is it that a people who never amounted even to one-third of 1 percent of the world’s population contributed so seminally to so many of its most pathbreaking ideas and innovations?” Stephens asked. “Aside from perennial nature-or-nurture questions, there is the more difficult question of why that intelligence was so often matched by such bracing originality and high-minded purpose.”

Stephens joined the Times in 2017 and during his relatively brief tenure he has attracted controversy, according to motherjones.com. “Before he became a columnist, in the Wall Street Journal, he had described climate change as a “mass hysteria phenomenon” made up of mostly “discredited” science. And then there his recent overreaction during the bed bug incident at the paper, when he viciously went after a George Washington University professor for a tweet comparing him to a bedbug.”

By: Letrice Titelli

Composer-lyricist Jerry Herman has died at the age of 88.

Herman is best known for works like ‘Hello, Dolly!’ as well as a host of other Broadway favorites. His melodies also graced such plays as “Mame” Dear World, Mack & Mabel, The Grand Tour, Milk & Honey and “La Cage aux Folles.”

“Mr. Herman wrote music that left the nation singing — rich melodies with powerful lyrics that stopped shows, dazzled critics, kept audiences returning for more and paved Broadway with gold for producers and performers,” was how the New York Times summed up his career. “To millions, he was the postwar theater’s clearest successor to Irving Berlin, a throwback to an era of songwriters who touched the heart with sophisticated simplicity, bringing audiences to their feet at the curtain calls and sending them home humming the unforgettable tune: “Hell-oh, Doll-ee!”

Herman was born July 10, 1931, in New York City. “He was raised in Jersey City, where his parents, who worked summers as musicians in hotels and camps in the Catskills, encouraged him to pursue music,” according to playbill.com. “He learned to play piano at an early age. Young Jerry spent all his young summers at Stissing Lake Camp in the Berkshires, where he eventually directed the camp’s theatrical productions and began writing music. His musical hero was another straight-shooting crowd-pleaser, Irving Berlin, whose Annie Get Your Gun he had seen when he was 11.”

At age 17, Herman was introduced to Frank Loesser who, after hearing material he had written, urged him to continue composing, according to broadwayworld.com. “He left the Parsons School of Design to attend the University of Miami. While an undergraduate student at the University of Miami Herman produced, wrote and directed a college musical called Sketchbook. It was scheduled to run for three performances, but the show created an instant patron demand and ran for an additional 17 performances.”

In 1960, the theater publication continued, Herman “made his Broadway debut with the revue From A to Z, which featured contributions from newcomers Woody Allen and Fred Ebb as well. That same year producer Gerard Oestreicher approached him after seeing a performance of “Parade”, and asked if he would be interested in composing the score for a show about the founding of the state of Israel. The result was his first full-fledged Broadway musical, Milk and Honey in 1961. The show, about American tourists in Israel, starred Robert Weede, Mimi Benzil and Molly Picon.”

By: Mike Mustiglione

Enjoy skiing? Head to the mall.

Big Snow has officially debuted. The 180,000-square-foot area, which features four rideable acres located within East Rutherford’s massive new American Dream mall, is reportedly the first indoor ski and snowboard area in North America.

Dress warm: the ambient temperature is kept at a brisk 28 degrees year round.

As its mall’s web site boasts, “Welcome to Big SNOW American Dream, North America’s first and only indoor, year-round, real-snow ski and snowboard resort. Big because it’s a big place and it’s big fun for everyone. I mean how can anyone not have fun at a place that is Winter, all year round? And SNOW because, well, we have lots of it. Even when there’s none outside. Enough snow for you to slide down forwards, sideways or backwards, skiing or snowboarding all day long. And when you factor in that every day here is picture perfect with freshly groomed snow, which makes it the best place to learn to ski or snowboard, in an indoor, temperature-controlled mountain, well … you’ve got yourself a recipe for awesome my friend. Big Snow. Two perfect words that equal one heck of a good time. Big Snow. Every day is a snow day.

“While the steel-trussed backdrop and still-unfinished faux-lodge facade fail to live up to the LED-powered hype of its winter fantasy-land renderings, the slope itself is ideal, said Anthony Melchiorri, a 54-year-old Travel Channel host and one of the first guests,” noted NorthJersey.com. “The slope is two escalator rides up from a parking lot. Wristband scanners are used to usher guests through the locker rooms, onto the slope and to the ski lift.”

Guest experiences at the 16 story, climate-controlled ski slope will include opportunities for skiing, snowboarding, introductory lessons, private coaching, children’s programs, snow play, corporate team building, private events and more, according to a release.

“Big SNOW American Dream, operated by New Jersey-based SNOW Operating, is the first facility of its kind within the United States and Canada. It offers a 160-foot vertical drop, a graduated degree of pitch ranging from 0% at the base to 26% at its steepest point and 1,000 feet of length for skiers of all ages and skill levels to take advantage of all serviced by 4 surface and aerial lifts. The center’s slopes will be filled with more than 5,500 tons of snow and shaped to an average snow depth of 2 feet throughout. Specially designed radiant cooling in the floor and snow melt systems will both maintain a perfect snow texture and reduce environmental impact at the center.

“We could not be more excited to be bringing Big SNOW to the public this December,” said Hugh Reynolds, vice president of marketing and sales, SNOW Operating. “Big SNOW is a game changer for skiing and snowboarding in the United States. The unprecedented access to year-round snow combined with the center’s unrivaled location and the overall appeal of American Dream will allow us to provide opportunities never before seen, and to move the needle on growing the sports in a big way. Our goal is to introduce more than a quarter million new skiers and snowboarders to the sports in the next year. It’s going to be truly amazing.”

By Andy B. Mayfair

The Wilpon family knows real estate (some would say better than they know baseball). And so the family that owns and is reportedly trying to sell their majority stake in major league baseball’s New York Mets wants to share its knowledge.

Chief Operating Officer Jeff Wilpon “has been quietly building a business that will keep him in sports for years to come,” according to therealdeal.com. “For a decade, the 58-year-old has been running a separate company that develops stadiums, complexes, and other related real estate for a fee from sports teams and leagues, according to Bloomberg.”

“Sterling Project Development, an offshoot of the family real estate business Sterling Equities, is working the Green Bay Packers and the New York Islanders to develop their respective mixed-use stadium complexes. SPD is also consulting with Major League Soccer to develop stadiums and has made deals to develop new headquarters for the National Hockey League and Major League Baseball in Manhattan,” therealdeal.com added. “The firm, which Wilpon runs with his childhood friend Richard Browne, is also working on traditional real estate projects — investment firm Square Mile Capital has hired SPD to advise on a 75-story skyscraper in Chicago and a warehouse project in the Bronx.”

The Wilpons should be Big Apple royalty, but for some reason that honor has eluded them. “The legacy of this New York real estate family’s stewardship of its beloved team, the New York Mets, ended up reflecting many aspects of the family itself. There were periods of success, but also dysfunction, intense rivalries among relatives and a financial crisis that, for a time, threatened much of what the family had built,” wrote David Waldstein, Kevin Draper and James Wagner in the pages of the New York Times.

“At their best, the Wilpons, self-made multimillionaires from the city’s outer boroughs, shined as generous philanthropists who occasionally broke the bank for a star player,” the trio continued. “At their worst, they were a squabbling, disorganized clan with a baseball team that fans saw as inept and thrifty, and functioning as a vanity play for the family scion, Fred Wilpon, and his eldest son, Jeff, who has overseen a team with mostly disappointing results since 2002.”

Indeed, Sports Illustrated seemed to capture the family’s aura recently when it noted, “Financial problems always seem to find the Wilpons. Even after reportedly recovering from the Bernie Madoff Scandal are now linked to losing $120M over the last two seasons. Surprised? I didn’t think so.”

Will Rogers famously advised anyone who would listen to “buy real estate – they ain’t makin’ any more.”

But people still lose money on real estate, as the New York Post recently pointed out.

Jennifer Gould Keil, who follows the real estate market for the Post, brought 2019 to a close by chronicling what she called “the biggest losers in New York real estate.”

As she points out, “buildings like One Beacon Court, One57 and Trump Park Avenue contained units that sold for millions of dollars below their initial asking prices in 2019.”

Among the Big Apple homes that sold for the greatest discounts, Keil said, were these:

* Trump Park Avenue (Percent off: 36). “A home inside Trump Park Avenue, at 502 Park Ave., is 2019’s biggest loser. A 19th-floor unit asking as much as $10.5 million closed for $6.72 million in June,” the Post noted. “That’s a 36 percent discount off the original asking price — and far less than the $9.41 million that it sold for in 2015, according to city property records. The three-bedroom, 3,211-square-foot pad at 59th Street and Park Avenue was last repped by Michael Balanevsky, David Florentin and Arthur Fruman, of Accent Holdings, LLC.”

* One Beacon Court (Percent off: 31.7). The building, located at 151 E. 58th St. near the old Le Cirque location and Bloomingdale’s, “is also turning out to be a stinker,” according to Keil. “There, a 46th-floor combination unit sold for $17 million in May — far from its most recent $24.9 million asking price. That’s a 31.7 percent discount. The Tony Ingrao-designed spread is 5,782 square feet and comes with four bedrooms. The listing broker was Corcoran’s Deborah Grubman.”

Actually, she added, the building “is no stranger to prominent discounts, as it’s home to hedge-funder and new Mets owner Steven Cohen’s long-suffering penthouse. In 2013, he put the home on the market for $115 million. The 9,000-square-foot behemoth is now asking $34 million, meaning a whopping $81 million (more than 70 percent!) off the original price.”

* 42 Crosby St. (Percent off: 23.6). According to Keil, the Soho penthouse “finally sold for $19.1 million after it first listed for $25 million. The unit, at 42 Crosby St., most recently asked $24.99 million in March, meaning it sold for a 23.6 percent discount. The 5,852-square-foot spread has four bedrooms and five bathrooms, and floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors with panoramic city views. The building was designed by respected modern architect Annabelle Selldorf.”

By: David MacGuire

A New York Post expose had led to action by New York City’s Department of Buildings.

Thanks to the Post’s reporting, the department has given a summons to the owners of 1627 Amsterdam Ave. In addition, a trio of other buildings that the Post had also reported on are said to be due for new inspections.

“In the wake of architect Erica Tishman’s death last Tuesday, when she was struck by a chunk from a crumbling facade, The Post launched a review of city records and found that thousands of buildings have been cited for unsafe exteriors, including some with open violations more than a decade old,” Post reporters Joseph Konig, Kevin Sheehan and Jorge Fitz-Gibbon noted (https://nypost.com/2019/12/23/nyc-hits-unsafe-building-with-summons-after-post-expose/).

“One, a seven-story mixed-use building on Amsterdam Avenue, already had a summons slapped on its window Monday morning — fewer than 24 hours after The Post published its story. Department officials said three other properties — 254 Seaman Ave. and 201 W. 145th St. in Manhattan, and 14-20 Boerum Street in Brooklyn — are scheduled for visits before the end of the week.”

“Another structure identified, a five-story Bronx building next to a daycare center on East 150th Street, was cited in 2008 for a collapsed rear retaining wall that blocked a rear entrance for years,” the Post reported. “Building owner Earl Bailey claimed Monday that the wall had been fixed but that paperwork confirming the repair had not yet been filed with the DOB. “The retaining wall has been fixed,” he told the Post. “There is a structural wall in the back. Before it was stone. We paid a lot of money to have it built.”

The greater than usual sense of urgency is no doubt the result of the tragic death of architect Erica L. Tishman, 60, who was struck by a piece of debris from a 17-story building near Seventh Avenue and 49th Street.

“By the time emergency responders arrived, minutes after being called at about 10:45 a.m., she was dead, the police said,” according to the New York Times. “While the authorities have not said what hit her, an inspection by the Department of Buildings after the accident found cracks in the building’s facade and terra cotta pieces missing.”