The stakes
City says no dice, will evict E. Harlem dry cleaner
A DAY AFTER the mayor’s office said it was “working closely” with an East Harlem entrepreneur whose family business is in the way of new development, the city signaled its intent to forcibly evict him.
Fancy Cleaners co-owner Damon Bae — whose family recently lost their dry cleaning business and two other plots of land in East Harlem to eminent domain — got the news Monday through a Manhattan Supreme Court filing.
The papers, dated last Friday, are from the city’s Law Department to Justice Shlomo Hagler. The city said it plans to submit “a writ of assistance . . . in order to gain possession of the property being operated by the dry cleaners.”
The Law Department cited Bae’s refusal to allow developers inside his family’s Fancy Cleaners business at 126th St. and Third Ave.
The Daily News reported Sunday on the plight of Fancy Cleaners.
The filing said the developer — who will raze Bae’s family business to put up a massive, twoblock commercial and residential complex — needs access to conduct some environmental tests and to set a time line for the owner to vacate and begin demolition.
According to the city, Bae initially agreed to grant access — and then reneged.
Bae is still fighting what he says is the city’s lowball compensation offer for his family land and dry cleaning business.
“The city has no choice but to move ahead,” the Law Department said in its filing. “We hope this matter can be heard Jan. 16, as time is of the essence.”
Bae, 42, the second-generation co-owner of a chain of dry cleaners his Korean immigrant parents built up over decades, said the push to evict was just one more kick in the gut from the city.
“Ever since yesterday’s statement from the mayor’s office that they are working closely with us, I thought, ‘OK, they haven’t yet, but maybe now they will,’ ” said Bae.
“Instead I get an email from my attorney this morning letting me know this is what the city filed on Friday. It’s very disheartening,” he said.
Bae and his family have fought the city’s eminent domain land grab — started under Mayor Michael Bloomberg — for more than a decade.
The family lost in March and the city took over the deeds for two vacant lots and the lot that houses Fancy Cleaners. All three properties are owned by Bae’s father and mother.
Bae says the city’s offer was about 30 cents on the dollar for the land.
For the 6,000-square-foot lot holding Fancy Cleaners, the city offered him $3.5 million — yet a comparable, 5,000-square-foot lot nearby that the city has urged him to buy is going for $11 million, he said.
The city has also stated it doesn’t have to compensate the family for its business fixtures at Fancy Cleaners, which is owned by Bae and his father.
The mayor’s office and the Law Department didn’t immediately respond to calls for comment.