BY EMILY DAVENPORT
The Greenwich Village Society for
Historic Preservation is calling on
the city to recognize African-American
& LGBT civil rights and women’s suffrage
sites for landmark designation.
According to the organization, the city
has been refusing to designate the nation’s
oldest and largest African American and
LGBT civil rights groups began anti-lynching
and anti-discrimination campaigns, and
where New York’s women suffrage movement
was headquartered.
“At a time when we are seeking to recognize
the value and contributions of African
Americans, women, and the LGBT community,
it is puzzling and frustrating that Mayor
de Blasio, the city’s Landmarks Preservation
Commission, and Councilmember Rivera
won’t support honoring and protecting these
sites which are so crucial to the history of
these groups and their struggles for equality.
For two years we have been waging this
campaign and are yet to see progress from
these city offi cials. As we contemplate our
country’s past and future during the July 4th
holiday, it’s high time to honor and recognize
these sites with landmark designation,” said
Village Preservation Executive Director
Andrew Berman.
Among the buildings that the Greenwich
Village Society for Historic Preservation
is seeking landmark designation includes:
70 Fifth Avenue (13th Street), where the
NAACP began anti-lynching campaigns,
began fl ying their “A Man Was Lynched Yesterday”
fl ag, and began campaigns against
Village Society seeks historic
recognition for city civil rights sites
discrimination against and segregation of
African Americans, as well as defamatory
portrayals in the media like the fi lm ‘Birth
of A Nation.’ It was also here that the related
The Crisis magazine began, the fi rst
magazine ever published for a black readership,
and was a hub of left-wing progressive
activity and housed organizations dedicated
to stopping the Armenian Genocide and
leading the Women’s Peace Movement.
80 Fifth Avenue (14th Street), which
was the original headquarters of the National
Gay Task Force (now the National
LGBTQ Task Force), the fi rst and oldest
national LGBT rights organizations, from
PHOTO COURTESY OF THE GREENWICH VILLAGE SOCIETY FOR HISTORIC PRESERVATION
its founding in 1973 until 1985. The building
also housed from 1930 to 1954 the
headquarters of the International Workers
Order (IWO), a mutual benefi t fraternal
organization which led trailblazing fi ghts
against Jim Crow and discrimination
against Jews and immigrants, fi ghting for
integration in professional sports and the
workplace.
55 Fifth Avenue (12th Street), which is
where producer and civil rights activist
John Hammond created the fi rst integrated
musical recordings. Artists such as Billie
Holiday and Bessie Smith recorded here,
and the building also housed The Feminine
Mystique.
10 East 14th Street, which served as the
headquarters of the New York City Woman
Suffrage League in 1894.
17 East 13th Street (Fifth Avenue/University
Place), which housed the personal
printing press of seminal revolutionary
feminist writer Anais Nin, who personally
supervised and designed the printing of
her works here, which were transformative
works of art as well as literature in the
1940s.
For more information, see www.gvshp.
org/research and www.villagepreservation.
org/campaign/south-of-union-square.
BY MARK HALLUM
Workers servicing the PATH
train are calling for the Port
Authority to come to the table
and renegotiate a nine-year-old contract
that upholds the healthcare coverage that
members of the Transport Workers Union
Local 2001 say they are entitled to.
Claiming that they face poor working
conditions in tunnels with bad air quality,
the union says that not only has PATH attempted
to take away employee’s vacation
days during the height of the pandemic, but
that the new healthcare plan on offer will
cost the members who are mostly pump,
station, structural and track maintainers
thousands per year.
“Our members have sat by patiently
through years of contract delays because
of PATH. Now that PATH is fi nally willing
to even offer a contract, they have a
‘take it or else attitude,’” TWU Local 2001
President Patrick Howard said. “Normally
I would say ‘take it or leave it,’ but they are
now threatening my members with punitive
action if they don’t sign their pre-negotiated
contract that they had with the Port Authority.
Well, my members don’t work for
PATH workers call on Port Authority
to renegotiate nine-year-old contract
the Port Authority; they are railroad workers
and deserve to have the opportunity
to actually negotiate their own contract.
PATH is looking to force my members
into an inferior healthcare plan that could
potentially cost these workers thousands of
dollars a year. This is not acceptable to the
rank and fi le, and PATH is well aware that
they need to come off their position if we
can try to come to terms.”
TWU Local 2001 Vice President Kevin
Campopiano said that over the course of
the past nine years, their members have
battled some of the worst nature has had
on offer for them, from major snowstorms
to Superstorm Sandy. All this has been
weathered without a contract, Campopiano
claims
But the pandemic would prove to be
another hurdle, Campopiano claims.
“During the current pandemic, PATH
instituted a more restrictive quarantine
policy with a retroactive date that looked
to take back compensation from members
for previous paid time off by attempting
to take away vacation days,” Campopiano
said. “PATH later reversed the retroactive
date after an outcry by the various unions.
Since July 1, they also instituted a more
restrictive sick policy, forcing members
to jump through more hoops to use their
contracted sick leave.”
Port Authority of New York and New
Jersey did not respond to a request for comment
from amNewYork Metro; this story
will be updated once a response is received.
4 July 9, 2020 Schneps Media
/www.gvshp
/www.villagepreservation
/www.gvshp
/www.villagepreservation
