The Men Who Would Be King of New York Bedbug Blight Abates
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20120102-NEWS--0001-NAT-CCI-CN_-- 12/30/2011 1:45 PM Page 1 INSIDE Help the TOP STORIES Haves NYU vies for feel good runner-up prize in —Michael Gross offers a modest campus contest ® proposal PAGE 4 Page 2 VOL. XXVIII, NO. 1 WWW.CRAINSNEWYORK.COM JANUARY 2-8, 2012 PRICE: $3.00 ECONOMIC OUTLOOK The men who would Real estate scion STUCKINNEUTRAL burnishes a family be king of legacy of service PAGE 2 Say goodbye to New York’s recovery, New York NBC, ABC hail at least until Wall St. bounces back taxi TV advertising Clashing styles and in expansion plans BY DANIEL MASSEY impeded by uncertainty in the city’s egos mar relationship PAGE 2 bedrock financial services industry, which between Bloomberg The New York success story is over. lost $3 billion in the third quarter of 2011. Duane Reade: The city’s economy, which suffered less Unease over U.S. regulatory reform and and Cuomo and recovered faster from the recession the European debt crisis are taking their The new hot spot than the nation did, hit a snag in the sec- toll on a sector that typically leads the city BY JEREMY SMERD for power lunch ond half of 2011. Job growth slowed to a out of recessions. PAGE 3 crawl, and the unemployment rate, Recent tax filings indicate Wall Street One is a big-picture mayor who prefers did not bounce back as quickly as orig- policy to politics. He delegates to sub- after declining steadily for ordinates and does his best work when months, started ticking up, inally thought. More important, he can make decisions on the merits, BUSINESS LIVES finishing the year at 8.9%. substantial layoffs are on the not the machinations. As the calendar horizon, judging by notices The other is a governor who sees turns, the recovery here filed by several major industry the world as a political chessboard. He will be sluggish, its path See OUTLOOK on Page 14 is a tactical wizard who picks his bat- tles, but once he does, he rolls up his sleeves to get a deal done. Michael Bloomberg and Andrew Cuomo are a study in contrasts and,for much of the past year,in conflict.Some of it comes with the territory: New York City mayors have historically butted heads with governors because GOTHAM GIGS See CUOMO on Page 20 Performing the perfect massage ● ANNE FISHER How to start a business online Bedbug in 54 hours P. 21 ● MOVERS & SHAKERS A bubbly market for blight wine auctions P. 22 ● GAEL GREENE Noshing abates at Kutsher’s Tribeca P. 23 Violations drop as INDEX city stamps down on insect scourge IN THE MARKETS _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _4 REAL ESTATE DEALS PLUS _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _5 SMALL BUSINESS _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _7 BY LISA FICKENSCHER THE INSIDER _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _8 New Yorkers have one more reason to NEIGHBORHOOD JOURNAL _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _9 celebrate the new year: Bedbugs are FOR THE RECORD _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _16 john kuczalajohn losing their bite. CLASSIFIEDS / _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _18 The panic that gripped the city in EXECUTIVE MOVES _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _21 2010, when the nasty critters invaded THE WEEK AHEAD _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _23 every corner of the five boroughs— istockphoto from people’s homes and workplaces to trendy clothing shops like Victoria’s Secret—is subsiding. City agencies REPORT OUTLOOK FOR 2012 that track the bloodsuckers and the ex- terminators who stamp them out are Greg David takes stock of the Wall Street effect, reporting fewer cases. Even ordinary ELECTRONIC EDITION plus construction’s unhappy New Year, Brooklyn’s New Yorkers are feeling less edgy P. 11 about the scourge. renaissance and the foreign retail invasion. In fiscal 2011, bedbug violations in NEWSPAPER See BEDBUGS on Page 20 20120102-NEWS--0002,0003-NAT-CCI-CN_-- 12/30/2011 3:08 PM Page 1 COMMENTARY A family’s legacy o A modest Fisher Brothers’ free housing disposal builds on longtime dedication to vets and active-duty forces ack in 1729,responding to Irish impov- erishment, which he deemed “a de- BY THERESA AGOVINO plorable condition,” Jonathan Swift wrote a satirical essay. You probably re- There were some touch-and-go moments for Matthew Zajac as he lay in a member it from junior high:“A Modest hospital bed,his back badly burned,one arm mangled and both legs shattered by a bomb that tore through the Humvee he was driving in Iraq in 2007. BProposal,”in which poor families were urged to solve “I promised him I’d stay with him until he got better,” said his father, Mike their money problems by selling their children as Zajac, who conceded he had no idea how he’d actually fulfill that pledge, since livestock to the rich. Swift even suggested recipes: he lived an 11-hour drive from his son’s San Antonio hospital and had no mon- ey for a hotel.“I figured I’d pitch a tent in front of the hospital if I had to,”he said. That wasn’t necessary. He ended up spending 14 months in a home built “Seasoned with a them but reward to offer free lodging to loved ones visiting hospitalized retired and active mil- little pepper or them when they itary personnel. That home in Texas is one of 56 around the country built by salt [they] will do. Let’s lower the Fisher House Foundation, a nonprofit founded by be very good their taxes, but in a member of one of New York’s most influential real SOLID FOUNDATION: Ken Fisher, shown boiled.” direct proportion estate families.Their company,Fisher Brothers, owns aboard the Intrepid, Today,we face to spending that 6 million square feet of Manhattan office space, in- led the effort to build an equally in- directly benefits cluding the 50-story Alliance Capital tower on Sixth 12 houses last year tractable prob- the economy. Avenue and a big construction firm. for families visiting lem—the world’s Continue the Since 1980, the family has put its for-profit skills hospitalized veterans. wealth gap—and Bush tax cuts? honed over 97 years in real estate to great effect build- whoever finds a Fine. Just make ing homes near veterans’ and military hospitals that are then given for free to solution to it MICHAEL sure you drop the government to run. Along the way, the Fisher House Foundation has would deserve a GROSS what you save on achieved an outstanding level of efficiency,devoting 95 cents out of every dol- statue erected in things like lar raised to fulfilling its mission of building housing. In recognition, Charity their honor in $18,000 gold- Navigator,which monitors nonprofits’performance,recently ranked the foun- Zuccotti Park. I’ll pass on the embroidered full-skin croco- dation as the country’s “best social-service agency.” statue, but I do have an idea. dile cowboy boots and the The family’s dedication to the military stems from the late Zachary Fish- Instead of imposing punitive Bullpen Suite at Texas er, one of the three brothers who founded the family firm. He led the charge “millionaire taxes” on the 1%, Rangers games. in the 1970s to save the U.S.S. Intrepid aircraft carrier and turn it into a mu- let’s cut the rich even more Thinking local? For 15 seum. A decade later, he started Fisher House with a $20 million donation, slack and slash their taxes. years now,New York state has after hearing about relatives forced to sleep in their cars when visiting their Only with strings attached. offered tax breaks on inex- loved ones in military hospitals. I got this idea when a very pensive clothing for the 99%. Today,his nephew Ken Fisher chairs an organization that has a $7 million wealthy friend invited me New York City waives sales budget,a staff of 16 and a growing war-fed demand for what it does.Last year, aboard his Gulfstream G550.