CB1 OKs License for a W. Bway Corner

By Carl Glassman
POSTED DEC.4, 2006

The corner bar at West Broadway and White Street has sat empty for more than two years. Its presence is a reminder of the Liquor Store Bar’s noisy 10-year run there; its silence a relief to the neighbors. One hopeful bar owner tried to move in last year, but neighbors won their fight against his liquor license, and he abandoned his gleaming, $250,000 renovation of the place. Last month that space, at 235 West Broadway, was again the focus of opposition by nearby residents. David Ethan, 39, wanted Community Board 1’s advisory approval for a beer and wine license for a new coffee shop, a spin-off of his popular Grey Dog’s Coffee, at 33 Carmine St. in Greenwich Village. Opponents envisioned a return of crowds and noise on the corner. And, they said, the area is already saturated with food and drinking establishments. The board sided with Grey Dog. “If we turn down this application I think it’s shameful,” CB1 member Andy Neal said before the board voted, overwhelmingly, in Ethan’s favor. “This applicant has made such an effort to placate the community to get his license.” In fact, Ethan won with an effort that few license applicants have matched.

He gathered hand-printed testimonials from children who frequent the Grey Dog (“I think that building another Grey Dog is a great idea. That way other families who live somewhere else will be able to enjoy Grey Dog”) and he gave an accounting of every one of his wholesale beer orders in 2006 (weekly average: $294.76).

More importantly, Ethan sat through community board meetings, month after month, to see what he would face.

“There are a lot of amazing personalities in that room,” Ethan said of the board members. “When they’d get up to go to the bathroom I’d follow them out, stop them in the hallway and say, ‘Hey, I’m Dave and I’m thinking of opening up a place there. How do I meet some people on this board? How do I get my point across? Some took the time to really talk to me.” Ethan learned that he could face a wall of resistance from the neighbors, who in the past had fought liquor and outdoor seating licenses—new or renewed—for other bars and restaurants on West Broadway. Trying to ease their concerns, he met with Peter Townsend, who with his wife Janna, lives across the street at 1 White Street. He failed.

But speaking before the Tribeca Committee, he appealed to the members to see that the new Grey Dog would be much like his Village institution. “Right now we are the top rated food for a coffee house in Zagat,” he noted. “So you’d be adding something that’s quality.” Ethan said he would not proceed “out of respect” if the community board, which is advisory, turned him down.

But he also made it clear that this very visible corner location, in a landmarked 1807 home, was worth fighting for.

“Why do I want this place so bad? Because this puts me on the map. It puts me above every other coffee shop in New York and the nation.”

Opponents in the room were not moved.

“Regardless of who the operator is,” responded Townsend, “we didn’t want a licensed establishment on that corner.”

Townsend said it was unanimous among his neighbors, and that residents who had opposed the Liquor Store Bar were against the Grey Dog, too. One of them, Matthew Geller, who lives next door, said he feared “30 people sitting outside talking and screaming.” Others said that the neighborhood does not need another place to eat and drink.

“At some point,” said Jean Grillo,  “there has to be a suggestion to people who want to come into Tribeca that as much as you may be a great restaurant, we could use some small retail.”

“Unfortunately, you’re blaming the wrong culprit here,” said board member Peter Braus. “If this landlord wants to get what she wants to get, then the only way she’s going to do that is with an establishment like this. And this establishment really is best in show.”

Eileen Hecht, who owns the building and lives with her husband above the storefront, told the Trib that “99.9 percent” of the inquires about the space are for restaurants and bars. “Everyone who walks by sees a bar. They say, ‘I’m calling about the bar, I’m calling about the restaurant. I haven’t done any marketing research. I just don’t see anything here but restaurants. How would another kind of business do here?”

Neither Hecht nor Ethan would disclose the asking rent for the 1,000 square foot space. But the former prospective tenant said the price for him was  $13,000 a month.

As of late last month, Ethan had yet to sign a lease, and notices plastered on the windows still said the space was for rent. But Hecht said she liked the Grey Dog when she visited it, and thought it would be a “great addition” to the neighborhood.

“He seemed like he had a good business,” the owner said, “and he’d be able to pay the rent.”