Those who do not want the mental facility to be in their neighborhood have raised concerns that the way the facility is being restructured is illegal and has involved harassing current tenants. Additionally, they are concerned that there are a disproportionately high number of supportive housing units already in the Upper West Side.
On the other side of the case is the nonprofit Lantern Group, which apparently has received financial assistance from the city.
The legal battle has been underway since 2007, and the group intends to appeal the decision. “We expect that the appellate court will give it a long look and see that it’s a dangerous project—one that’s bad for New York, and more importantly one that has been illegal since its inception,” said local residents’ attorney Michael Hiller.
The building, called St. Louis Hall, is located at 319 West 94th Street by the Hudson River. It has the capacity to house 148 tenants in its single occupancy rooms, but only a third of the units are occupied because the developer has been denying upkeep to tenants to drive them out, according to Aaron Biller, president of the community group, Neighborhood in the Nineties, which represents residents on West 93th, 94th, and 95th Streets from Broadway to Riverside Drive.
The Lantern Group did not obtain a Certificate of Non-Harassment from the Department of Housing, Preservation and Development (HPD), according to Neighborhood in the Nineties. The HPD requires that owners of single room occupancy buildings in the city who wish to alter the number of rooms or transform rooms into apartments must obtain a Certificate of Non-Harassment from HPD. This certifies that tenants were not harassed in the process of vacating the property.
The building’s owner, the Lantern Group, is registered as a nonprofit in New York City. It is adding three floors to St. Louis Hall and undertaking major internal renovation. According to their plans, the reconstructed building will have 149 units, 60 of which will house “Department of Homeland Security-referred single adults, aged 50 and over, living with mental illness and capable of independent living in permanent housing.”
Neighborhood in the Nineties says the pending facility would bring dangerous people into the residential neighborhood, which already bears a disproportionate number of supportive housing units.
“The city charter stipulates that it must site facilities throughout the city,” said Biller. “But the Upper West Side has over 2,000 (supportive housing) units and the Upper East Side has fewer than 100.”
He worries that in the face of reduced police presence, residents will not be protected. “People might have breakdowns and attack,” Biller said.
In June of 2008, WCBS investigative reporter Don Dahler looked into the living conditions of tenants in housing run by the Lantern Group. His video report showed vermin, cockroaches, bed bugs and toxic black mold in the units.
Publicly available complaints on the HPD’s Web site show numerous counts of tenant complaints. They include rubbish accumulation in common areas, insufficient cold water, broken walls and floors, leaks, and missing smoke detectors.
When Dahler contacted the Lantern Group for comment, they declined. So did the HPD, which in 2005 awarded the developer $1,018,376 in tax credits for low-income housing. Dahler challenged the then-HPD Commissioner Shaun Donovan to explain its decisions. Donovan has since been promoted to Secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Barack Obama.
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