A millionaire New Yorker identified for moonlighting as a can collector uncared for one in every of her Manhattan properties for almost a decade, and now the town is about to demolish the landmark-protected townhouse, The Put up has discovered.
However critics say the proprietor is loopy like a fox — and set to make hundreds of thousands of dollars over the demolition.
Lisa Fiekowsky, 71, grew to become often known as a unusual bag woman who drove round her Brooklyn neighborhood in a graffiti-covered, trash-filled clunker — whereas secretly holding greater than $8 million in Manhattan actual property.
Metropolis officers not too long ago informed The Put up that Fiekowsky is now of their crosshairs for leaving one in every of her Harlem properties in such poor form that the 125-year-old constructing within the Sugar Hill Historic District is unsafe and should be demolished.
The location has racked up 1000's of dollars in fines, numerous violations and a metropolis lawsuit over a nine-year interval, prompting the Buildings Division to take issues into its personal palms and plan to stage the historic brick constructing at 451 Convent Ave.
Whereas the constructing has its landmark safety, the town has deemed it “a life-safety risk to the general public and neighboring occupied buildings.”
The deserted constructing — which is connected to 4 almost an identical rowhouses all in-built 1897 — has suffered from a big gap in its roof, partially collapsed inside flooring, extended water injury, lacking home windows, a rusted cornice and a raccoon infestation, based on constructing data and court docket filings.
It was damaged into by homeless individuals in search of refuge and has been used as a haven for drug use, based on complaints logged as not too long ago as final month.
Homeowners of landmarked buildings are required by legislation to take care of the properties in good situation, which the town says Fiekowsky has did not do time and time once more.
Fiekowsky, who resides in Brooklyn and bought the Harlem rowhouse in 2000, has largely ignored dozens of requests from the Landmarks Preservation Fee and Buildings Division — courting again to 2013 — to repair the injury or face demolition and fines.
Metropolis companies stated the eccentric landlord — who owns two extra landmarked Harlem properties — hasn’t paid a dime of the 1000's of dollars value of fines she’s racked up and has had zero precise work accomplished to restore the four-story constructing.
She has solely filed a couple of work permits throughout the 9 years the town has been begging her to make repairs to the landmarked rowhouse, data present. The work permits have been finally revoked every time for being incomplete.
The self-described “old school bohemian” blamed lack of constructing entry and a raccoon infestation as the reason why she’s stalled over time, court docket data present. She stated the damages stemmed from a fireplace that leveled the constructing subsequent door years in the past.
The Landmarks Preservation Fee sued Fiekowsky in 2019 over her failure to make any repairs and threatened fines of as much as $5,000 per day.
A choose finally sided with the fee a 12 months later, ruling that the Brooklyn resident owed the town damages.
“After a number of years of working to get the proprietor of 451 Convent Avenue to voluntarily make repairs, together with many violations and an order from the LPC Chair, LPC introduced a ‘demolition by neglect’ lawsuit in search of a court docket order to compel repairs and monetary penalties,” a LPC rep stated in an announcement to The Put up. “The choose in that case dominated towards the proprietor.”
However the court docket ruling didn’t push Fiekowsky to make repairs.
Now, two years later, the DOB made the decision to knock down the landmarked rowhouse, based on paperwork filed July 13 first reported by Patch.
A city-contracted crew stopped by the positioning earlier this month to disconnect the sewer and water strains to organize for demolition.
However neighbors on Convent Avenue are upset the the rowhouse can be torn down regardless of its landmarked safety — and by none aside from the town itself.
“If [the demolition] goes forward with out a gentle being proven on it, a cynical millionaire will make hundreds of thousands extra, and an irreplaceable metropolis gem can be misplaced perpetually,” stated Projjal Dutta, who lives subsequent to the decrepit constructing and is a prime MTA official.
“She principally needs this constructing gone as a result of I believe the land goes to be rather more profitable to her,” Dutta speculated. “It’s form of a cynical view of issues, however I believe that’s what’s occurring.”
Together with the 4 connected rowhouses, 451 Convent Ave. was given landmark designation in 2001 as a part of the Sugar Hill Historic District for its structure and historical past.
The Renaissance Revival-style constructing options ornamental brickwork and limestone trim and was deemed architecturally vital for the realm and time interval.
The Sugar Hill neighborhood gained prominence within the Nineteen Thirties and Nineteen Forties when “a major group of Black professionals, energetic in legislation, enterprise, literature, music and artwork,” lived there, based on Landmarks Preservation Fee paperwork.
Dutta, the MTA’s director of sustainability, stated he fell in love with the buildings and their historical past after studying in regards to the former proprietor of his personal landmarked house.
It belonged to a black political activist named Helen Taylor — who broke colour boundaries on the Brooklyn Navy Yard the place she labored as a draftsman. She lived within the house up till her demise in 2013 at age 91.
Taylor spent her last years combating to get the house owners of the buildings subsequent door to hers — together with Fiekowsky — to repair up the properties, based on her household.
“She was nonetheless making calls from her hospital mattress about getting her house on Convent Avenue fastened and attempting to get the builders who owned the neighboring properties to repair theirs,” Taylor’s niece, Marsha Saldanha, informed the Amsterdam Information after her demise. “She was combating the entire time. She simply didn’t wish to go.”
Dutta, a registered architect, stated two buildings within the connected row have been in worse situation than 451 Convent when he first moved into his house, which he renovated himself, in 2014.
Each of these buildings have been saved by the US Division of Housing and City Improvement by a partnership with the nonprofit Ecumenical Group Improvement Group. The Harlem-based group restored the buildings after which offered them to civil servants in 2020, based on Dutta and property data.
“Two buildings constructed by the identical developer as part of the identical block have been restored to good well being from worse situation … so it’s doable, and the proof of that's just some ft away,” Dutta stated.
Dutta believes the constructing at 451 remains to be structurally sound given its compact measurement and may and must be saved.
“I don’t assume that there's any [danger] of imminent collapse,” he stated.
If Fiekowsky received’t make repairs, the town ought to discover somebody who will, he added.
Dutta famous that personal house owners are prevented from demolishing buildings with landmark standing and that Fiekowsky stands to make a hefty sum have been she to promote the land 451 sits on, which is situated subsequent to an empty lot.
He stated the septuagenarian — who did stints as a advertising analyst at AT&T and briefly as a stockbroker — is smarter and extra financially savvy than her can-collecting, trash-hoarding, raveled persona.
“That aura that she has is, I believe, no less than in some half cultivated,” he stated, given her success within the New York Metropolis real-estate market.
Fiekowsky, who holds a grasp’s in enterprise administration from Chicago College, is the daughter of high-flying Washington, DC, economists. Her father was the chief of economics for the Treasury Division’s Workplace of Tax Evaluation, and her mom traveled the globe negotiating commerce offers for the Division of Labor.
Regardless of her well-off upbringing, Fiekowsky, who lives in a $1 million co-op adjoining to Prospect Park, is thought for can-collecting and hoarding trash in her properties and her 1993 Toyota Camry — angering neighbors each in Manhattan and Brooklyn.
Her two extra landmarked Harlem buildings — at 47 and 60 Hamilton Terrace — have additionally been sitting empty and are in various states of decay.
The townhouse at 47 Hamilton Terrace has an open Buildings violation from 2020 for cracks in its exterior partitions, and neighbors of the 2 brownstones have complained of rat infestations, foul odors and piles of rubbish and clothes on the properties for a number of years, DOB data present.
Regardless of the neglect, one of many buildings has an estimated market worth of greater than $4 million, based on a metropolis evaluation.
Fiekowsky claimed she deliberate on fixing up her dilapidated Harlem properties in a 2018 interview with The Put up, however no work has been accomplished.
“In New York, you’re at all times below renovation as a result of there’s at all times stuff the town is requiring you to do,” she stated on the time.
A 12 months later, she informed The Put up she’s been too busy to make the repairs.
Fiekowsky didn’t return current cellphone or electronic mail requests for remark from The Put up. A lawyer for her additionally didn't return messages.
The DOB stated there's not set demolition date but, however Dutta stated he noticed work crews at Fiekowsky’s property Aug. 10. A employee stated they have been there to disconnect sewer and water strains.
“I believe financially I’ll most likely be higher off with a brand new constructing [at the property] with a number of models that may promote or lease for some huge cash — that may most likely drive my property worth up,” Dutta stated of 451 Convent, which is on the finish of the row of houses and whose demolition might happen with out majorly impacting the opposite properties.
“However I do really feel, nonetheless, that it is a lovely, lovely block … and these may nicely be the final single-family houses in-built that pre-war mildew in Manhattan, and to see one in every of them be demolished is an actual pity.”
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