The Village didn’t forget
To The Editor:
Re “Officer slain in ’47 honored with street co-naming” (news article, March 22):
On behalf of my brothers, Jim Gargan and John Gargan, and the entire Gargan family and their friends, I thank The Villager for their wonderful help in covering the ceremony in honor of my father on March 21, 2006, at the dedication of Patrolman Thomas J. Gargan Way in the Sixth Precinct.
The great honor bestowed on him almost 60 years after he was killed in the line of duty truly shows that the Village, the city and the N.Y.P.D. forget not their own.
A special thanks to Lincoln Anderson, Colin Gregory and Jefferson Siegel of The Villager and to Deputy Inspector Theresa J. Shortell and Detective Mike Singer of the Sixth Precinct, whose tireless efforts made for such a wonderful memorial.
William H. Gargan
Finale of Third Ave. overture
To The Editor:
Re “N.Y.U. may be looking to add to Third Ave. dormitory row” (news article, March 22):
By now, most people have heard that contrary to the Villager’s front-page article, New York University is not pursuing any real estate opportunity on 10th St. and Third Ave.
We have always been very consistent and careful about making public statements on any real estate negotiations. At the point when the ultimate fate of a site is clear, we can and do alert the community. But it cannot be the expectation that we alert the community to any and all overtures that come to the university. In reality, it’s simply not feasible. The university receives a number of offers every week, the vast majority of which do not result in any agreement or engender any interest on our part. Indeed, the five-year track record would show that out of hundreds of overtures made to N.Y.U., the university acquired only three sites.
Such false interpretations and speculations made by The Villager and the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation only do a great disservice to the community by fueling unnecessary anxiety and mistrust.
Alicia D. Hurley
Hurley is associate vice president, N.Y.U. Government and Community Affairs
N.Y.U. was caught red-handed
To The Editor:
Re: “N.Y.U. calls off negotiations for Third Ave. dormitory site” (news article, March 29):
Caught secretly attempting to acquire yet another development site in our neighborhoods while failing to fulfill a four-year-old pledge to have a meaningful public dialogue about their long-term development plans, N.Y.U. is trying to focus attention on anything other than their lack of forthrightness and failure to maintain their public commitments. But a simple review of the facts shows that:
1) When questioned by Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation and other community leaders about whether or not N.Y.U. was negotiating for this site, N.Y.U. refused to answer.
2) Only since the negotiations were publicly exposed in The Villager has N.Y.U. publicly admitted that they were negotiating for the site.
3) A representative of the owner of the Third Ave. and 10th St. site has confirmed to G.V.S.H.P. that while N.Y.U. was refusing to give an answer to G.V.S.H.P., other community leaders and The Villager about their involvement, they were in fact negotiating for the site.
Now, under the glare of the public spotlight, negotiations between N.Y.U. and the owner for the site have been dropped.
This is not the way it should be. N.Y.U. must have an honest dialogue with the public about both its designs upon particular sites and its long-range plans. And they must recognize that their ongoing expansion creates a perpetual conflict with the surrounding community, which will only be resolved when they start to look at alternatives for their future growth, such as siting a secondary campus outside of the Village.
Obfuscation isn’t going to work here. N.Y.U. has to deal with the issues at hand.
Andrew Berman
Berman is executive director, Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation
So should N.Y.U. just leave?
To The Editor:
Re “N.Y.U. may be looking to add to Third Ave. dormitory row” (news article, March 22):
It seems to me that you are doing a lot of complaining about an institution whose student body, faculty, administration and staff must contribute a heck of a lot of cash to the Greenwich Village business community. Perhaps they should do the one thing that would allow their student body to grow exponentially: pull up stakes and found a campus in the countryside. I wonder where the Village would be then, with the real estate developers circling like vultures.
Joan M. Connelly
University’s big unit problem
To The Editor:
I am also a tenant at 300 Mercer St. The unit that disturbs me is on the top of 18 Waverly Pl. I went through at least two years of testing with N.Y.U.’s engineers and a meter. Eventually they put some aluminum bags around the A/C unit to lower the noise level. However, this past year the bags have fallen off and now the noise is evident again in my apartment.
The original A/C unit was not designed for a residential neighborhood and is not enclosed as it should be according to the manufacturer. I was dealing with a fellow named Jim Sugaste but I am not sure he is still around.
I am going to send a scathing letter as I am faced with six months of very annoying noise levels in my apartment coming from the units. I especially can’t open my windows and it wakes me up in the mornings around 5:30 a.m.
They used to turn them off on Sundays and I would call to remind Jim if they went on during the weekend. But now they are on night and day if I don’t constantly call to complain.
Roy Spectorman
Dad did some Waverly work
To The Editor:
Re “Lancelot the ocelot and the story of Ye Waverly Inn” (news article, March 1):
I was Googling my dad, Stanley Watkins, and found your newspaper with the article about the Waverly Inn and the Piels. Lovely to read it. You might like to know that Dad laid the flagstones in the courtyard, now covered up. I would love to get in touch with Mark Piel, quoted in your article. I had a teenage crush on him when the Piels visited us in London (probably when your photo was taken) and we took the ferry across the Thames to the Greenwich Maritime Museum. I am now happily married in Albuquerque, N.M.
Barbara Witemeyer
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