Tag: New York

How New York City Mayoral Candidates Propose to Address the Housing Crisis
Seize deteriorating apartment buildings run by negligent landlords. Stop spending on new homeless shelters. Build apartments on church campuses and golf courses and on top of libraries.
In the race to be New York City’s next mayor, few issues have generated proposals as ambitious and sprawling as the housing crisis, a top concern for a growing number of voters.
The share of available apartments is at its lowest point in nearly 60 years, rents continue to climb and high rates of homelessness remain a persistent part of city life. There aren’t enough homes being built to satisfy the demand to live here, many housing experts say, while the Trump administration’s plan cut to federal housing aid could upend the city’s ability to help its most vulnerable residents.
Mayoral candidates across the political spectrum — those running in the June 24 Democratic primary and in November’s general election — agree that the situation is a threat to the city. In ways big and small, though, they differ on the best solutions.
Many of their proposals would be difficult to carry out. Several would require the skillful balancing of adverse political interests, including labor unions, real estate companies and pro-tenant groups. Some would be possible only with help from influential state or federal politicians who may resist development.
Most candidates do not say how they would pay for their plans, which carry price tags stretching into the many billions of dollars.
Still, candidates said it was better to be ambitious when it came to housing.
“It’s the No. 1 issue,” said Zellnor Myrie, a state senator from Brooklyn who is running in the Democratic primary.
He said that people needed to want to live in New York — and be able to afford to do so — in order for the city to generate the tax revenue it needs to survive.
“If we do not solve this crisis, if we do not build more and build rapidly and bring down the cost of rent, we’re going to suffer in many other ways,” he said.
Build More Homes. But How Many and Where?
Candidates agree that the city needs to encourage lots of development. Many are trying to outdo each other with eye-popping figures.
Two Democratic candidates, Adrienne Adams, the City Council speaker, and Brad Lander, the city comptroller, have each thrown out a 500,000 home target; Ms. Adams is eyeing a racetrack in Queens as a development site while Mr. Lander wants to build neighborhoods on municipal golf courses. Michael Blake, a former Democratic state assemblyman, wants 600,000 homes built across the city.
Outdoing them all, Mr. Myrie said he wanted one million homes to be built or preserved over the next decade, in part by creating new neighborhoods and developments in places like Midtown Manhattan and the Brooklyn Marine Terminal.
Many candidates talk about building on underused city land, like in parking lots or on top of libraries and schools. Jim Walden, a lawyer and former prosecutor who is running as an independent, said the city should develop apartments on abandoned public properties like Bartow Station in the Bronx and the Neponsit Health Care Center in Queens. More than one-third of any new homes, he says, could be made affordable to lower-income New Yorkers.
These types of changes would require approval by the City Council or the State Legislature, which may not be forthcoming, and would involve months of public hearings and studies.
Several candidates want to build mixed-income housing on public housing campuses, where parking lots and lawns make enticing development sites. That would have the added benefit of generating money for the struggling New York City Housing Authority, which is essentially controlled by the mayor, who appoints its board members.
Former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, who leads in Democratic primary polls, said in his housing plan that adding 500,000 units over 10 years “will be necessary to meet demand.” But unlike his rivals, he has expressed reluctance toward developing in low-density neighborhoods, saying that those neighborhoods need to first absorb “the impact of recent rezoning efforts” that may already be encouraging development there. He says he would prefer to focus on denser parts of the city.
What About Affordable Housing?
The candidates acknowledge that the city needs to spend on affordable housing if it wants to push down costs for lower-income renters.
“I also want to make sure that as we are thinking about 500,000 or one million units, that we also have a road map to not just building housing for housing’s sake, but building housing for the people who need it the most,” said Scott Stringer, a former city comptroller running in the Democratic primary.
Zohran Mamdani, a state assemblyman from Queens who is polling in second place in the primary, wants to build 200,000 subsidized homes, including some for families earning less than $70,000 a year.
He says his plan would cost $100 billion over the next decade, a price tag that dwarfs the costs of the other candidates’ plans. Mr. Lander, for example, wants the city to spend $20 billion over the next decade on building and preserving homes.
Mr. Cuomo’s plan calls for an additional $2.5 billion in city and state funds to be spent on affordable housing and public housing over the next five years.
Curtis Sliwa, a Republican, said he would make sure that in subsidized housing, the city sets rents at levels low enough to “account for the real financial burdens New Yorkers face — high energy bills, student loans, medical expenses and other nonnegotiable costs.”
The next mayor will most likely have significant influence over the rent-stabilization system, because mayors appoint members of the Rent Guidelines Board, which decides if and how much rents in stabilized apartments can go up each year. Roughly half of all city apartments are rent-stabilized.
Mr. Mamdani, Mr. Myrie, Ms. Adams, Mr. Lander, Mr. Stringer, Mr. Blake and Jessica Ramos, a Democratic state senator, have said that if elected, they would lobby the board to halt increases, even though landlords are increasingly saying they are not making enough to keep units in rentable condition.
Under Mayor Eric Adams, who is running as an independent, the board has allowed increases each year. Mr. Cuomo said he would want to create a subsidy program for landlords who need money to bring rent-stabilized units back online.
What Kind of Experience Matters?
The candidates’ proposals offer a sense of their priorities. But many of them say they are distinguished by their track records on housing.
Mr. Lander and Mr. Stringer both emphasize their policy work and experience in city government. Mr. Stringer highlighted how, when he served as Manhattan borough president, he helped craft development plans for West Harlem and other neighborhoods, while Mr. Lander pushed through a contentious development plan in Gowanus in Brooklyn.
“This has been my whole career,” Mr. Lander said in an interview about his plan.
Ms. Adams points to how she helped cajole other members of the City Council to accept development plans in their districts, despite opposition from neighborhood activists. She also successfully pushed for more affordable housing investment from the city and state.
Mr. Adams, who is not related to Ms. Adams, has made an ambitious citywide development plan, known as City of Yes, one of the milestone accomplishments of his first term. The plan, which was passed last year, is expected to make way for some 80,000 new homes to be built over the next decade.
The mayor said in a statement that the plan represented “bold, forward-looking action that meets the needs of New Yorkers, today and for generations to come.”
Mr. Cuomo served as housing secretary during the Clinton administration. And as governor, he spent many years negotiating with the real estate lobby and with left-leaning lawmakers supporting tenants. He helped pass sweeping pro-tenant legislation, while also pushing much-debated tax breaks for developers that he said he wants to bring back.
A spokeswoman for his campaign, Esther Jensen, said Mr. Cuomo would bring “strong political leadership and intensely focused operational execution” to address the housing crisis.
June 1, 2025
NYPD Assists Federal Agents in Migrant Investigations — But Should It?
In March, a federal investigator asked the New York Police Department for information about a woman who had been arrested during a pro-Palestinian protest at Columbia University and was now detained for overstaying her visa.
The woman, Leqaa Kordia, 32, was being investigated for money laundering, the investigator said, and the Department of Homeland Security needed help. The police handed over her birth date, address and the name of a possible associate. An officer also provided the woman’s sealed arrest report.
But a month later, during an immigration court hearing, the only evidence of money laundering that federal prosecutors presented was a $1,000 MoneyGram transfer that Ms. Kordia had sent to relatives in Gaza.
The judge, Tara Naselow-Nahas, was unimpressed.
“Based on the evidence, I do not find that the respondent poses a danger to the United States,” she said and ordered that Ms. Kordia be released on a $20,000 bond. Ms. Kordia remains at the Prairieland Detention Facility in Texas as prosecutors seek a reversal of the decision.
But the judge’s ruling and questions about the federal government’s credibility have civil libertarians asking whether the Police Department should reconsider its cooperation with the Trump administration.
The city’s sanctuary laws forbid the department from divulging information in immigration cases, which are civil matters, but the police often cooperate with federal authorities on criminal cases, usually in joint investigations into crimes like sex trafficking, drug and gun dealing, and terrorism.
Ms. Kordia’s case is the rarer instance in which federal agents have asked about a criminal inquiry that does not involve a joint investigation. In those cases, the department also expects officers to cooperate, vetting requests through superiors and maintaining a record of information released. But the department has no written guidelines or procedures for assessing such requests beyond a brief description.
Commissioner Jessica S. Tisch said Thursday that the police were watching closely to ensure that federal officials were truthful, but that cooperation with agencies like Homeland Security Investigations and the F.B.I. was crucial to keeping New Yorkers safe from terrorism, trafficking and transnational crime.
Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch said that smooth cooperation with federal authorities was crucial to keeping New Yorkers safe. (Angelina Katsanis/The New York Times)
“Some have asked whether we should reconsider our cooperation with federal agencies on criminal investigations in light of their work with ICE,” she said during a budget hearing before the City Council, referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. “The short, straight answer to this is no.”
“The only way these investigations are successful is by N.Y.P.D. detectives working seamlessly with federal agents on a daily basis,” she added.
But some say the department must ask more and harder questions. They contend that a long-established trust has been breached because federal authorities, struggling to meet President Trump’s demands to deport as many immigrants as possible, are misleading — even lying — to local law enforcement officers and judges.
“The N.Y.P.D. should think through its own systems and its own processes,” said Anne Venhuizen, senior staff attorney for the Bronx Defenders, which represents the indigent in court. “They are potentially violating sanctuary laws by not having a more fulsome practice of verifying that the information they’re getting is accurate.”
Local police officers in other states, predominantly in the South, have cooperated for years as ICE has apprehended people accused of immigration violations. Now, other states are falling in line with Mr. Trump’s demands. On May 22, Gov. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire signed two bills requiring police departments to help ICE.
New York and other cities with sanctuary laws, such as Boston and Chicago, have a trickier path, cooperating on criminal matters but not civil immigration. And events in recent months have cast a shadow on the actions of federal law enforcement.
In March, a judge approved a warrant for ICE agents to search for Yunseo Chung, a Columbia junior who had participated in pro-Palestinian demonstrations. The decision was based on an agent’s sworn statement that the university was breaking a federal law that prohibited the harboring of “removable aliens.” But Ms. Chung is a permanent resident, and her lawyers accused ICE of lying to the judge.
In April, the federal government sued the City of Rochester, in New York, after its Police Department ordered more training for officers who had helped ICE agents handcuff immigrants. City officials have said that immigration officers lied when they called the police on March 24 and said they needed help with an emergency stop on a city road.
In January, police officers in Millcreek, Utah, suspected that ICE agents were lying when they said they had stopped an American man because he had tried to hit them with his car. In fact, the man said, he had honked while the agents were detaining a woman and they pulled him over and pointed a gun at him.
ICE did not respond to a request for comment on the cases.
“This federal government has completely blurred the lines between valid criminal enforcement and immigration enforcement,” said Meghna Philip, director of special litigation at the Legal Aid Society in New York City. “In our present reality, if anything, there should be a presumption of noncooperation with immigration authorities.”
The New York police said that the federal agent who had asked about Ms. Kordia had provided contact information, as well as a name, shield number and case number, and they believed that was sufficient. Commissioner Tisch said Thursday that she had put federal agencies on notice.
“I am nobody’s fool,” she said. “If we were to find that a federal agency had not been honest with us, if we were told that a records request was for a criminal investigation, but in fact that was not true, then that would be a tremendous breach of our trust. And we would need to reconsider how we do business with that federal agency. I have been very upfront about that with all our federal partners.”
Homeland Security Investigations did not return repeated requests for comment.
Pushing back on federal requests would harm cooperation that flourished after the Sept. 11 attacks, said Christopher Mercado, a retired New York police lieutenant who now teaches at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
But, he said, “I’m going to be honest with you: The feds may not always be transparent with the P.D.”
Federal investigators may fear that giving too much information could compromise an investigation or a confidential informant, he said. Historically, local police officers have accepted that.
“Those relationships are always going to be important and we don’t want to burn them,” Mr. Mercado said.
Ms. Kordia, a waitress from Paterson, N.J., who came to the United States from the West Bank in 2016 and lived with her mother, an American citizen, has not been charged with any crimes and is accused only of overstaying her visa.
She went to the demonstration in New York on April 30, 2024. She was accused of blocking a gate and arrested with dozens of other protesters, according to a police report that also said she had no record of criminal complaints or investigations. The report was sealed after her case was dismissed.
Leqaa Kordia was arrested during a protest at Columbia University last year. Even though the charges were dropped, the police still provided information to the federal government.(Amir Hamja/The New York Times)
Court records filed by Ms. Kordia’s lawyers suggest that agents with Homeland Security Investigations did not start looking into her until March, almost a year after her arrest.
From March 5 until March 13, the day she was detained, federal agents interviewed people who knew her, including her mother and uncle.
They set up a trace on her WhatsApp account and subpoenaed records from MoneyGram, according to court documents. She had sent the $1,000 to her aunt on behalf of her mother, who could not figure out how to send the funds through MoneyGram, according to her family and lawyers.
After Ms. Kordia learned that ICE wanted to question her, she hired a lawyer and they went to the agency’s Newark field office to explain. But her lawyer was barred from the meeting and Ms. Kordia was immediately detained and put on a plane to Texas.
The following day, Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, accused Ms. Kordia of taking part in “pro-Hamas protests,” and the federal investigator asked the New York Police Department about the supposed money laundering investigation.
An officer who works at the police’s Real Time Crime Center, a hub that provides detectives with data, gave an agent from Homeland Security Investigations the sealed arrest report, which state law forbids. The Police Department has said it is investigating the officer’s actions.
In court papers, Ms. Kordia’s lawyers have said that she has been kept in miserable conditions at Prairieland, where cockroaches skitter across the floor and guards have refused to honor her requests for halal meals.
Hamzah Abushaban, a cousin who came to visit her in Texas soon after her arrest, said he was shocked. She had lost 50 pounds, had dark circles under her eyes and seemed confused about why she was there.
“I’ve never seen her look like that,” said Mr. Abushaban. “She looked like death.”
Ms. Kordia’s future in the United States remains uncertain. Prosecutors have said that federal investigators are still investigating her for financial transactions overseas.
Before her arrest, Ms. Kordia had been trying to start a business selling candles and balloons. She had found a small space about five minutes from her mother’s house in Paterson that she planned to rent.
During the immigration court hearing in April, the judge asked Ms. Kordia about the space. Was she still renting it?
Ms. Kordia replied simply, expressing little emotion.
“I had it for one night,” she said. “That’s it. Then I came here.”
June 1, 2025
The Business Backers Funding Andrew Cuomo’s Campaign for Mayor
A quarter-million dollars came from the head of Suffolk Construction, a Boston-based builder betting big on a New York City expansion.
Another $150,000 arrived from the chairman of Vornado Realty Trust, who is searching for a way to revive a stalled Midtown Manhattan redevelopment so important that he once called it his “promised land.”
DoorDash, the food delivery service lobbying City Hall on regulations that could disrupt its business model, chipped in a staggering $1 million.
The donations make up just a fraction of the checks from New York business leaders, billionaires and special interest groups pouring into a super PAC boosting Andrew M. Cuomo, the favorite in the Democratic primary for mayor on June 24.
With $10 million raised so far, the super PAC, Fix the City, is already the single largest outside spending force in New York City’s political history, surpassing a record set in 2021. It has spent multiples more on ads than any campaign in the race, blanketing New Yorkers’ screens in paeans to the former governor.
The next biggest candidate super PAC, set up to back Assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, a democratic socialist who is second in recent polls, has 1/50th of the funds.
Many of Fix the City’s donors are longtime Cuomo supporters who share his moderate policy views, or fear what Mr. Mamdani’s tax-the-rich policies would do. Among them are Barry Diller, the media mogul ($250,000); Billy Joel, the musician ($50,000); Bill Ackman, the investor ($250,000); and Kenneth Langone, the Home Depot founder ($50,000).
But millions of dollars more have arrived from labor unions, tech companies, real estate developers and landlords who have a direct financial stake in the election’s outcome — grand gestures that, while legal, raise pressing ethical questions about the motivations behind their generosity.
The potential conflicts can be seen in the donations from real estate, a multibillion industry that relies on City Hall to approve land use agreements and zoning variances that can make or break a project. Many of the city’s largest developers and landlords, or their executives, have donated five- or six-figure sums, including Related Companies, the Durst Organization, Two Trees Management Company, RXR and Vornado, whose Midtown development plan Mr. Cuomo supported as governor.
PENN 2 in 2024. (Vornado Realty Trust)
Many of the donations came after Mr. Cuomo made a rare appearance at the Real Estate Board of New York, where Politico reported that he expressed regret for signing rent reforms as governor that landlords bitterly opposed.
Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, was adamant that “no contribution of any amount will have any influence on a government decision of any kind.”
Liz Benjamin, a spokeswoman for the super PAC, said the group had made no assurances to donors. “Donors have supported Fix the City because they know that Andrew Cuomo has the right experience and the right plans for New York City,” she said.
But New York has a long history of pay-to-play behavior, in which individuals and businesses shower politicians with large campaign donations in hopes of gaining access and preferential treatment.
The issue is hardly abstract for New Yorkers deciding whether to replace Mayor Eric Adams. The incumbent was indicted last fall on federal corruption charges that accused him of providing political favors for campaign donors. The Trump administration later dropped the charges, but only after prosecutors handling the case accused their superiors of striking a corrupt bargain with the mayor.
Government watchdog groups and other Democrats in the race have sounded alarms that some donors now at least appear to be seeking favor with Mr. Cuomo, a notorious micromanager whose fund-raising practices drew near constant scrutiny as governor.
“This is about tithing to the king and giving the king his share in case you need to call on him for help or protection,” said John Kaehny, executive director of Reinvent Albany, a leading watchdog group.
“There’s not necessarily a glaring quid pro quo,” he added. “It’s insurance and access.”
The city instituted a campaign matching funds program decades ago to try to limit the influence of big donors. In exchange for agreeing to strict limits on how much they can raise directly — $2,100 from most individuals; $400 from people with city contracts — well-backed candidates like Mr. Cuomo can tap into millions of dollars in public matching funds.
But the rise of super PACs has reinvigorated New York’s transactional culture. Since the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision, the groups are allowed to raise and spend unlimited sums, so long as they operate independently from the campaigns they support.
In Mr. Cuomo’s case, though, Fix the City can be hard to distinguish from his official campaign. It is run by Steven M. Cohen, a member of Mr. Cuomo’s inner circle for decades, and its messaging closely mirrors that of the official campaign.
A New York City Campaign Finance Board investigation determined that because the campaign’s messaging was so similar to the super PAC’s, they were most likely colluding. The board penalized Mr. Cuomo by withholding $1.3 million — equal to the cost of one of the PAC’s commercials — from the amount of public matching funds Mr. Cuomo was expecting. The candidate is appealing.
As of last week, Fix the City had collected 38 contributions of $100,000 or more, including from individuals and companies who contract with the city. The group was expected to report another $250,000 contribution on Monday from Mark Gorton, the founder of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential super PAC, according to a person familiar with the plans. Mr. Gorton has said “that 9/11 was orchestrated by the U.S. government.”
At least 16 donations can be tied to individuals Forbes magazine identified as billionaires (that does not include four donations from Rockefellers).
Some are motivated by Mr. Cuomo’s tough-on-crime approach or support for Israel. Many executives, even those who clashed with him when he was governor, say Mr. Cuomo is the most business-friendly candidate in the race. Several have also donated to President Trump.
“Folks are looking for somebody with strong leadership and a perceived sense of getting things done,” said Carlo Scissura, president of the New York Building Congress, a trade organization. “He’s a known entity to this world.”
But privately, business leaders and political operatives also keep mental lists of which companies, unions and executives want what from the mayor, who oversees a $115 billion annual budget and can help broker labor agreements.
Fix the City received $250,000 from Halmar International, a public works company that has had contracts with the city and state, and has a pending proposal to redevelop Penn Station.
The New York City carpenters’ union donated $100,000. A consortium of smaller building trade unions gave $250,000.
In addition to the donation from Suffolk Construction’s chairman, its executive vice president, Nick Dhimitri, serves on Fix the City’s board. He did not respond to a request for comment about the company’s giving. James L. Nederlander, a Broadway theater owner and producer, contributed $125,000.
DoorDash, which gave $1 million to Fix the City, has an active lobbying effort to sway several bills in its favor. (Bloomberg)
Lyft, the ride-sharing platform that has a stake in how the city regulates for-hire vehicles, chipped in $15,000.
DoorDash, Fix the City’s single largest donor, has a clearer wish list from City Hall. It is lobbying around legislation to allow it to charge restaurants higher fees, as well as bills related to tipping rules and minimum wage requirements.
John Horton, DoorDash’s head of public policy for North America, told Politico that it believed Mr. Cuomo would be the best candidate to “prioritize practical, pro-local economy solutions.”
The contribution is one of two that have drawn extra scrutiny. The other is a $100,000 contribution from Fisher Brothers Management Company, a real estate firm that a decade ago became a poster case for the risks of money in politics.
At the time, Mr. Cuomo, then the governor, had set up a high-profile commission to root out corruption in state politics. When that Moreland Commission panel began investigating whether his own real estate donors, including Fisher Brothers, received special tax treatment from the state, Mr. Cuomo disbanded it. Publicly, he credited an agreement by the Legislature to adopt new ethics rules, but the fallout was the biggest scandal of his first term.
June 1, 2025
Police Investigate Detectives Involved at Home Linked to Crypto Torture Case
The New York Police Department is investigating two detectives who provided security at a luxurious Manhattan townhouse where two cryptocurrency investors are accused of torturing a man for three weeks, according to two city officials with knowledge of the matter.
One of the detectives, Roberto Cordero, who has also served for years on Mayor Eric Adams’s security detail, picked up the victim from the airport on May 6 and brought him back to the townhouse, where he was held captive until his escape last week, the officials said.
Detective Cordero and the other detective, Raymond J. Low, who investigates narcotics cases in Manhattan, were placed on modified duty on Wednesday, according to an internal document and the officials, who were not authorized to speak because of the sensitivity of the investigation.
It is unclear whether the detectives were employed directly or whether they had been working for a private security company. Officers are not permitted to work for security firms without Police Department approval, according to the department’s patrol guide. It was also unclear whether the men were present during the crime prosecutors say occurred there.
In a statement, the Police Department confirmed that two officers had been placed on modified duty, which generally restricts a person to desk work, and that the matter was under internal review.
Neither Detective Cordero nor any legal representatives could immediately be reached for comment. When reached by phone, Detective Low declined to comment.
A 20-year veteran, Detective Cordero has served on the Executive Protection Unit, the mayor’s security detail, since December 2021, according to records from the police and the Civilian Complaint Review Board, an independent oversight agency.
The house where they worked is at 38 Prince Street in the NoLIta neighborhood. On May 23, an Italian man, Michael Valentino Teofrasto Carturan, escaped from the home, where he said he had been tortured for weeks.
The Manhattan district attorney has charged the two cryptocurrency investors — John Woeltz, 37, and William Duplessie, 33 — with kidnapping and torturing him. Mr. Woeltz has been indicted by a grand jury, though the indictment will remain sealed until he is arraigned on June 11, the Manhattan district attorney’s office said on Thursday.
When Mr. Carturan arrived at the townhouse on May 6, he was captured and held by Mr. Woeltz and a 24-year-old woman, according to prosecutors and an internal police report. They wanted the password to a Bitcoin wallet worth millions, the report said.
The woman, Beatrice Folchi, was initially charged by the police with kidnapping and unlawful imprisonment, but she was released and her prosecution was deferred, a law enforcement official said.
Detective Cordero joined the Police Department in January 2005 and has served in the 46th Precinct in the Bronx and on a narcotics team in Manhattan, according to police and Complaint Board records.
He has been the subject of several complaints accusing him of abusing his authority and using physical force. In one complaint from 2014, a man accused Detective Cordero and seven other officers of beating him, strip-searching him and taking his money. The case was settled in 2016.
Detective Low joined the Police Department on the same day as Detective Cordero, according to police records.
Detective Low was elevated to his rank in 2013. He has been named in nine complaints dating back to 2008, including one that accuses him of making a false official statement and using a chokehold, according to Complaint Board records.
May 29, 2025
Hobby Lobby to Open First Store in Manhattan — But It’s Stirring Controversy.
In the Lower Manhattan neighborhood of TriBeCa, known for its liberal politics and sky-high rents, a new retailer, known for its conservative Christian convictions, rock-bottom prices and steadfast customers in rural America, is moving in.
Now the question is, can this retailer, Hobby Lobby, make it in Manhattan?
The retailer, which is expected to open this spring and is taking over 75,000 square feet that used to be a Bed Bath & Beyond and Barnes & Noble for its first Manhattan store, should have prompted an enthusiastic response given the surge of Americans who picked up crafts hobbies during the pandemic.
Instead, the reaction has been mixed, with some residents feeling affronted that Hobby Lobby is opening in their neighborhood. Local groups and forums that are protesting the company’s arrival in TriBeCa point to Hobby Lobby’s work with organizations that oppose gay and transgender rights. They haven’t forgotten the private company’s lawsuit in 2014 to fight against having to provide insurance coverage for contraception for employees.
Over a decade later, it remains to be seen whether low prices and a staggering selection of products are enough to make residents in an area that has long been a liberal stronghold look past the company’s conservative bent. The neighborhood, known for cobblestone streets and converted loft buildings that are now home to affluent families and A-list celebrities, is solidly Democratic, but, like much of New York, it shifted to the right during the 2024 election.
Heide Fasnacht, an artist who has lived and worked in TriBeCa for five decades, said she felt “angry” about the arrival of a company that promotes the evangelical Protestant convictions of its founder.
“I moved to New York to get away from things like that,” said Ms. Fasnacht, who was calling for a boycott of the store.
“There are probably a lot of people here who do crafts, I’m sure,” says Heide Fasnacht, an artist who lives in TriBeCa. While she appreciates increased access to materials, she strongly opposes the new store.Credit…Oliver Farshi for The New York Times
Madeline Lanciani, the owner of Duane Park Patisserie, a couple of blocks from Hobby Lobby’s location in TriBeCa, also considers herself part of the resistance. “I will gladly go out of my way to shop somewhere else,” she said.
Hobby Lobby is no stranger to protests against its business. Its owners, David and Barbara Green, are outspoken about their Christian faith, which has infused the culture of the retailer. The company has said its guiding principle is “honoring the Lord in all we do by operating the company in a manner consistent with biblical principles.” The stores remain closed on Sunday and sell Christian-themed goods.
Despite backlash from residents like Ms. Fasnacht and Ms. Lanciani, Hobby Lobby is making inroads in New York at what appears to be an opportune time: One of its main competitors, Joann, which sold fabrics and crafts supplies for over 80 years, said in February that it was going out of business and closing all of its roughly 800 stores, including 30 in New York. Another competitor, Michaels, went through a leveraged buyout in 2021.
Hobby Lobby, by contrast, has been the model of stability. The company, which has about 1,040 stores across the country, including 28 in New York State, brought in $8 billion in revenue and opened 37 new stores last year.
Visits to its stores increased nearly 17 percent from 2019 to 2024, according to an analysis of foot traffic by Placer.ai, a data provider, while Michaels had a decline of over 9 percent and Joann a loss of over 5 percent.
Hobby Lobby opened its first store in New York City last year, in Staten Island, the most suburban and conservative-leaning of the city’s boroughs, and is eyeing possible locations in other neighborhoods.
As for the TriBeCa location, just blocks from the World Trade Center site, which attracts millions of visitors annually, Neil Saunders, managing director at GlobalData, a research and consulting firm, said, “There will be some people who boycott it and some who adore it and people in the middle who just want a ball of yarn.”
Lidia Curto, a Staten Island resident who was indeed loading blue yarn in her car after shopping at the store there on a recent afternoon, said Hobby Lobby’s low prices were why she shopped there.
Hobby Lobby did not respond to requests for comment for this article.
The reaction to the retailer’s coming to TriBeCa harks back to Chick-fil-A’s arrival in Lower Manhattan in 2018 on Fulton Street, not far from Hobby Lobby’s new space. The purveyor of fried-chicken sandwiches — with an ethos that has also been colored by its Christian founder, who has publicly maligned same-sex marriage — had caused its own uproar.
Protesters greeted Chick-fil-A when it opened there, but were soon replaced by long lines of customers who seem to have since put aside their political concerns for a crispy, well-seasoned chicken sandwich.
Chick-fil-A did not respond to requests for sales figures for the Fulton Street store, but the chain’s non-mall locations generated average revenues of $9.3 million in 2023, according to the company’s 2024 franchise disclosure document, an 8.1 percent increase over 2022. Chick-fil-A has 26 stores in New York City, according to its website.
Chick-fil-A, which opened on Fulton Street in 2018 near the new Hobby Lobby, similarly embeds its founder’s Christian faith into aspects of its corporate identity.Credit…Oliver Farshi for The New York Times
Jonnie Weeden called the food he had just bought at the Fulton Street restaurant on a recent afternoon “a guilty pleasure.” He said he was aware of what he called the founder’s “homophobic views,” which he said didn’t align with his own, but pointed out that “many other companies have flawed world views, and people turn a blind eye.”
Founded in 1972, Hobby Lobby started as a 300-square-foot space in Oklahoma City, an outgrowth of a miniature picture frame business that the Greens had started in their home. They later added crafts supplies, home goods and seasonal decorations to their offerings.
Mr. Green, 83, is still Hobby Lobby’s chief executive. One of his sons is president of the retailer, and another started an affiliate company that sells Christian books and church supplies.
Today, Hobby Lobby stores are as big as 90,000 square feet and filled with tens of thousands of items.
At Hobby Lobby’s Staten Island location, shoppers can browse a wide selection of crosses. Credit…Oliver Farshi for The New York Times
The retailer’s Christian principles may seem like an odd fit for Manhattan, let alone TriBeCa. Hobby Lobby, like Joann and Michaels, has typically favored suburban and rural areas.
But Steven Soutendijk, an executive managing director and retail specialist at the real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield, said he thought Hobby Lobby’s lease in TriBeCa had less to do with the neighborhood than with the space itself, a rarity in Manhattan.
“There are very few superlarge-format big boxes that actually even physically exist” in the borough, he said.
An executive at the real estate firm Cushman & Wakefield said he thought Hobby Lobby’s lease in TriBeCa had less to do with the neighborhood than with the space itself.Credit…Oliver Farshi for The New York Times
The company’s real estate strategy involves leasing big-box facilities previously occupied by another retailer, avoiding the high costs of new construction. Its 42,000-square-foot space in Staten Island was a former Babies “R” Us. It also typically funds its own renovations, unlike many other retailers that rely on their landlords to help cover those costs and are thus locked into higher rents, said Daniel Taub, the national director of retail at Marcus & Millichap, a commercial real estate brokerage.
As to what extent Hobby Lobby’s politics might affect how well the store performs, James Cook, the senior director of Americas retail research for JLL, a real estate services company, said, “At the end of the day, I don’t think it matters.”
Chris Panayiotou, the owner of the Gee Whiz Diner in TriBeCa just across from the Hobby Lobby building on Greenwich Street, said he was hoping to benefit from the foot traffic the retailer would bring.Credit…Oliver Farshi for The New York Times
Chris Panayiotou, the owner of the Gee Whiz Diner, a TriBeCa mainstay just across from the Hobby Lobby building on Greenwich Street, said he was hoping to benefit from the foot traffic the retailer would bring and possibly make up for the customers he lost when Bed Bath & Beyond and Barnes & Noble closed.
“People, once they’re done shopping, they’re going to be tired,” Mr. Panayiotou said. “Once they pop out and see us on the corner, they might want a cup of coffee or something to eat.”
April 10, 2025