Q&A with Andrew Berman

Nothing happens in Greenwich Village that escapes Andrew Berman's eyes.

The executive director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, Berman is a notorious critic of NYU's plans to expand into Greenwich Village. The following is an interview with Berman about his relationship with the university.

WSN: NYU is one of the biggest property owners in New York. Is this good for the city?

AB: It depends on what they do with their properties. NYU has been an integral part of the development, history and character of the Village. The danger, as we see it, is that the university, in the last decade or two, has been really aggressively expanding and seeking to broaden its share of the neighborhood. It has the potential to turn the neighborhood into a company town.

WSN: Isn't it better that an educational institution like NYU is buying up the property than someone like Donald Trump?

AB: Donald Trump would be pretty bad. But it's not an either/or situation, though the university administration tries to pretend sometimes that it is. The university is able to access certain loopholes in the zoning code that allow it to build much bigger than a private developer would. For instance, if the Kimmel Center had been built by a private developer, it would have been about half the size.

WSN: How will the new Center for Academic and Spiritual Life, that will be constructed next to the Kimmel Center, be detrimental to the community?

AB: Compared to other NYU projects, we have fewer issues with the Spiritual Center specifically. But as part of their 2031 plan, NYU has said they intend to add about three million square feet of space to this neighborhood.* It's an overwhelming amount and to do that, they have to get zoning variances, which is what they are asking for in the case of the Spiritual Center. They claim the exemptions they are seeking are absolutely necessary to meet programmatic needs. We disagree completely. While we may not mind what they are asking for, we are worried about the argument they are using. If they win, they can then apply it to getting those three million square feet.

WSN: Do you feel NYU has been dishonest?

AB: They are, unfortunately, dishonest a huge amount of the time. It's very hard to deal with them when there is really no evidence they are going to negotiate in good faith. The Provincetown Playhouse is an example. First of all, NYU kept trying to say they were preserving the building, which they demolished. After an enormous public outcry, they conceded they would preserve the four interior walls of the old theater. They started demolition work and built construction walls so no one could see what was going on but neighbors sent us pictures showing that they were demolishing the four walls. We exposed this and when we held a demonstration, we actually had a lot of NYU students and faculty come and join us.

Kyle Leighton is a contributing writer.