The dangerous conditions this week at the construction site at 235 East 42nd Street that led to numerous buildings being evacuated, blocks cordoned off, and fear of a disastrous collapse sadly but perhaps predictably had a precursor in Greenwich Village. The private inspection company that oversaw structural work being done on the Midtown project reportedly is the same firm that oversaw work at 14 Gay Street, the landmarked 1827 house that had to be demolished in 2022 after dangerous work performed there made the building structurally unsound, endangering other nearby properties. Over our protests, no one was held meaningfully responsible for that disaster at the time, in spite of the enormous consequences of the failures in this case. 

Village Preservation had been loudly calling for reform to the system that allows disasters like this to occur time and again. On day one of Mayor Mamdani’s term in office, we wrote to him calling for him to address this issue (as well as several others) that his predecessors failed to fix. We also called upon newly appointed Landmarks Preservation Commission Chair Lisa Kersavage to finally confront this ongoing problem of bad actors in construction and construction oversight getting no more than a slap on the wrist at most for actions that destroy property, lives, and our city’s history. 

It’s time for our leaders to finally fix this problem, which has led to too many disasters, big and small, in our city. 

TO HELP: