The Times has an article up on Masjid Aqusa on FDB and 116th Street which has been trying to fight off eviction. As most in the neighborhood know, 116th Street has a large West African population of which the majority worship at this local mosque. When the building was leased 16 years ago, the neighborhood had vacant lots instead of condos and the street were overrun by drug dealers. Now the new landlord of the building has increased the price of the rent from $10,000 to $18,000 a month and the mosque now faces eviction. A lawyer has since been hired by the house of worship for further negotiation but rising rents appear to be a continual problem for long term leasers in the area:
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I cannot understand why this doesn't become a win-win. It is a hideous building and a woefully underutilized space at a prime intersection. Tear it down, put up a glossy tall building with market-rate condos on the upper floors, and hold the ground floor for the mosque at something like current rent, in exchange for some sort of tax abatement.
ReplyDeleteThis is a damn shame and senseless, the reason this is is because they are aggressively changing the face of harlem , and the powers to be know how to do damage, hit it where it hurts our pockets, so let us do the reverse, hit them in their pockets.
ReplyDeleteCoopster that is much too sensible.
ReplyDeleteI agree 100% with Coopster. Why does the mosque need to stay in the current building. The landlord should sell the building to a developer with a provision for the ground floor. If more buildings went this way, Harlem would vastly improve.
ReplyDeleteI live around the corner from this mosque and its loss but be a huge one for the area. All those small African-owned businesses on FDB and 116th rely on the foot & taxi traffic that the mosque bring to the area. Without the mosque, the Muslim African community will not remain in the area long and their presence has been a big gain for the area.
ReplyDeleteI would be quite happy to hear of the mosque obtaining a ground-floor space in a new building but the disruption during construction could prove catastrophic to the area if an affordable nearby alternative could not be located in the short-term.
The problem for a developer making room for market-rate condos or apartments over a mosque is, sadly, that I think having a mosque that is active all day long (unlike churches which tend to see less mid-day activity) might keep prices lower than they might otherwise be. And the informal street market out front would definitely see its last days.
ReplyDeleteThere is something called PROPERTY RIGHTS in the USA. Why would the owner of this building do anything but seek the highest and best use of HIS or HER asset? The mosque should have bought the building, if try didn't want the rent to index to the market.
ReplyDeleteWhat if someone told you that you needed to sell your house with the stipulation that the first floor would be a homeless shelter? Your house would be worth a lot less. In the US that type of thing is not supposed to happen. You should all move to Venezuela, where the government can nationalize the assets of others to support the pet projects of "the people".
They only mentioned at the end that years ago they attempted to buy two townhouses on manhattan avenue but could not raise the money. The owner of the building has every right to do as he pleases in terms of getting market rent. i also agree that at some point it will be torn down for the next new development.
ReplyDeleteMissing here is the issue of that this space actually is not even big enough for the congregation and during any large holiday they take up the entire sidewalk. I am not against pray, however this is not right for the residents of the area either.
Also it states the congregation is about 1200 members. I am not sure of the mix, however if you chop in half and each member family came up with part of the rent we are talking about less than $400 per year, forgetting whatever else they have to cover. I pay more than that to my house of worship.
unfortunately for them, owning a rental building is a business and whatever the market rate rent is what they should be charged. i believe the area is at around $50 or more psf. There argument of rent stabilization is incorrect as already pointed out in the article.
It is sad as no one wants someone pushed out, however when restaurants, mom and pop stores, etc get pushed out by higher rent, this is nothing new or unexpected.
I believe though that the Owner of the building is going to slowly push out all so that he is able to knock down and build something new.
I agree with Michael and Paul as well.If you can't afford it you have to move somewhere else. There is no rent control on Commercial Properties. The person who bought this space couple of years back bought the space with certain plans as I am sure they have paid a premium owning this property in a highly desirable location. If the commercial tenant has no lease or their lease has expired then they have no right occupying the space. If they wanted it so much they should have bought it couple of years back.
ReplyDeleteahhh... yes, capitalism at it's best. Let's continue to dismantle the existing community, so that we can have more glossy, bland buildings, with it's new glossy, bland tenants.
ReplyDeleteNo need to respect religious diversity or a well established immigrant hub. It can now become a hub for upper income, granola munching, yoga loving yuppies. Ahh Harlem, you've come a long way.