Shuttered Sixth Ave. Barnes and Noble to Become Bank

The retail space that housed a Barnes & Noble store until January 2013 will reopen as a TD Bank in 2015, a spokeswoman for the bank said.

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DNAinfo/Andrea Swalec

GREENWICH VILLAGE This space is going from books to bank slips.

The Sixth Avenue and West Eighth Street Barnes & Noble location that closed earlier this year will become a TD Bank branch, the bank confirmed Monday.

The 396 Sixth Ave. bookstore shuttered in January, when signs reading "Closed Forever" were posted in the windows. They were later removed.

Rumors about the new bank circulated in the Village last week, including on Washington Square Park Blog.

The bank will open in 2015, a TD Bank spokeswoman said. The company is planning on opening additional locations in early 2014, at 451 Lexington Ave. at East 45th Street and 885 Sixth Ave. at West 32nd Street.

Friedland Properties, which marketed the retail space, did not respond to an inquiry about the terms of the lease.

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Alleged Stolen Phone Seller Busted at 6th Avenue Tattoo Shop

A worker at Crazy Fantasy Tattoo was arrested Feb. 1, 2013 for alleged criminal posession of stolen property, police said Feb. 27, 2013.

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DNAinfo/Andrea Swalec

GREENWICH VILLAGE With electronics thefts on the rise in the Village and Meatpacking District, 6th Precinct police say they recently caught one phone re-seller in an undercover sting just steps from the West Fourth Street subway station.

Solomon Born, 20, who worked at Crazy Fantasy Tattoo at 333 Sixth Ave. agreed to buy a snatched phone from an undercover officer, police said at a community meeting Wednesday night.

"A cop came in and said, 'I just stole this. Can I sell it?' and he said yes," the precinct's commanding officer, Deputy Inspector Brandon del Pozo said.

The 6th Precinct received a warrant to search the tattoo shop for stolen goods, found two allegedly snatched cell phones in a Feb. 1 raid and arrested Born, 20, police said.

Police charged Born, a Brooklyn resident, with criminal possession of stolen property.

Crazy Fantasy Tattoo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The precinct is investigating other stores in the area suspected of buying and re-sell stolen electronics, del Pozo said.

On the supply side of the electronics theft equation, police are warning people to guard their valuables, especially at Meatpacking District clubs.

"[The thefts] are happening pretty much to females who were intoxicated at the time," del Pozo said, adding that officers had passed out 3,500 fliers at bars and clubs in the last two weeks urging people to watch their belongings.

Sixth Precinct police are also patrolling in and around clubs to catch thieves and are watching club surveillance videos to identify criminals after they have pounced.

The grand larceny rate, which covers the theft of goods worth at least $1,000, has risen nearly 39 percent in the precinct this year through Feb. 17 with 172 reported incidents compared to 124 last year within the same period, NYPD statistics show.

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Chefs on Reality Show 'The Taste' Cook NoLita Pop-Up Dinners

MANHATTAN The boyfriend-girlfriend chef duo featured on the ABC reality show "The Taste" are whipping up dinner this weekend on the Bowery.

Le Bernadin alumni Gregg Drusinsky and industry newcomer Sarah Ashley Schiear are hosting a five-course pop-up dinner series through Saturday night at the Old Bowery Station on the Bowery at Kenmare Street.

Schiear, a 28-year-old NoHo resident, said diners can expect top-notch food in a relaxed environment.

"People feel like they're coming to our home for dinner, only this is way cooler than our home," she said.

With 24-person seatings at 7 p.m. and 9:15 p.m. each night, the chefs will start the evening with a surprise amuse bouche not listed on the menu. The dishes that make up the meal, which runs $85 per person, all have "bright" tastes that draw from multiple regional cuisines, Schiear said.

The menu includes a roasted shiitake salad with miso and smoked eel, cumin lamb with yogurt and green olive, and the curry lobster bisque Drusinsky, 31, cooked in his audition for "The Taste."

"It's a lot of things that we like to cook at home for our friends," Schiear said.

Old Bowery Station, a small cafe built out of a former subway entrance, is run by Openhouse Gallery, which operates multiple Downtown pop-up spaces.

Only two more episodes are left in the first season of "The Taste" which stars Anthony Bourdain and Nigella Lawson but Schiear wouldn't even hint at who takes home top honors.

She said appearing on the show that filmed in September had been fun, but stressful.

"You're kind of living in a different world," she said. "It's not reality. It's a unique experience."

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Back Fence Bar Shut Down by Health Department Days Before Closing for Good

GREENWICH VILLAGE After 68 years, the owner of the Bleecker Street bar and music venue The Back Fence was planning to close the business for good on Saturday with a final concert but the city Health Department beat him to it.

The popular 155 Bleecker St. bar was shut down Sept. 18 after inspectors hit the establishment with 55 violation points for evidence of mice, "filth flies" and improper sanitation practices, city records show.

The Health Department also found workers were using their bare hands on food that would not be heated, and that plumbing was improperly maintained, according to public records.

Owner Ernie Scinto who told DNAinfo New York in July that the concert spot would close because of a rent increase called the Health Department shutdown, which came just 10 days before the bar's final closure, "ridiculous."

"We were closing already," he said Tuesday. "We told them that and they closed us anyway."

Health Department inspectors are required to inspect restaurants that are open, a spokesman said, adding the agency had no information about the permanent closure when the inspection was assigned.

Scinto, 83, said workers inside The Back Fence, which has yellow closure notices posted on its doors, are trying to resolve the sanitation issues in time for the scheduled farewell show on Saturday. Singer Greg Aulden and "many past performers" will play, according to the bar's website.

The bar, with a small stage and red-and-white checkered tablecloths, was previously closed by the Health Department in December 2011 after being cited for roaches, evidence of mice and filth flies.

The Health Department immediately shutters restaurants and bars with "conditions that may be hazardous to public health," according to its website.

The Back Fence's four-story building at the northwest corner of Bleecker and Thompson streets was bought for $6.85 million in May 2012 by the Midtown-based property firm Trevi Retail, property records show.

Company executive Johnny McCarthy previously said the space would be available later this year at "market rate," declining to discuss the terms of The Back Fence's proposed lease renewal.

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Spotlight On: CFDA Awards 2015

Tory at the 2015 CFDA Awards, photographed by Taylor Hill/GettyImages

Last night was a big night for the fashion industry it was the CFDA Awards, our version of the Oscars, Emmys, Tonys and Grammys, all rolled into one. Designer of the Year winners included Tabitha Simmons, Tom Ford and The Rows Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen, with honors for emerging talent going to Rosie Assoulin, Hood by Airs Shayne Oliver and Rachel Mansur and Floriana Gavriel of Mansur Gavriel. Betsey Johnson snapped up the Geoffrey Beene Lifetime Achievement Award and, at a spry 72, performed her signature cartwheel-and-split acrobatics on stage while Kanye West introed the Fashion Icon Award winner, Pharrell Williams. Williams, for his part, gave shout-outs to a medley of inspirations: Zaha Hadid, Alber Elbaz, Marc Jacobs, Ralph Lauren, among others. A little app called Instagram won The Media Award. And Chelsea Clinton gave a beautiful speech in tribute to Oscar de la Renta, recounting her first conversation with the designer, when she was 17 or 18, in which he encouraged her to come out of her shell.

And the fashion? It was fun and fabulous, of course from the vibrantly colorful (Tory, left) to the coolly fringed (Liya Kebede) to the sexy and sheer (Hanne Gaby Odiele). Meanwhile, the award for unexpected accessory of the evening has to go Josh Ostrovsky, a.k.a. Instagram star The Fat Jew, who merged merriment with marketing savvy and carried a bottle of his own White Girl Rosé (available this summer!) down the red carpet.

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Would-Be Thief Hid Under Subway Seat to Steal Phone, Cops Say

A man sleeping on a Downtown E train awoke Sept. 22, 2013 to find a woman lying under his seat, trying to steal his phone, police said.

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MANHATTAN Look out below!

A man sleeping on the subway early Sunday morning awoke to find a woman hiding under his seat and trying to snatch his cellphone, police said.

The Hudson Heights resident was snoozing on a Downtown E train about 5 a.m. Sunday when he felt motion in the right front pocket of his hoodie, according to the police report.

When he opened his eyes near the Spring Street C/E station, he found a woman lying under his seat trying to yank his phone out of his pocket using the cord attached to his headphones, he told police.

Transit police conducted a canvas and arrested Kristen Mundo, who had not succeeded in snatching the phone, police said.

Mundo, 28, pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of attempted grand larceny and was sentenced to 10 days in jail, according to the Manhattan District Attorney's office.

She was being held on Rikers Island as of Tuesday, Department of Correction records show.

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Pier 40 Development Forum Stirs Park Space Passions

HUDSON SQUARE A developer and an alliance of community sports groups presented two competing plans for the redevelopment of crumbling and cash-poor Pier 40 Thursday night, attracting more than 200 athletes and locals who said they want to preserve west side recreation space no matter what redevelopment option city officials pursue.

Douglas Durst and representatives of the Durst Organization, one of the city's largest developers, detailed a plan that would fund the Hudson River Park by creating new office and retail space on the three-story, 15-acre pier located on the Hudson River at West Houston Street and re-situate the sports fields.

The rival plan by the coalition of local youth athletic leagues called Pier 40 Champions would expand recreation space and generate income by building two 22-story residential towers on what is now a parking lot.

An "adaptive reuse" confined to the current structure of the pier would attract creative and technology companies that are already flocking to Hudson Square and bring in much-needed funds, Durst said.

"You can develop Pier 40 while developing the revenue of the park," he told a standing-room-only crowd dotted with "Save Pier 40" buttons advocating the Champions plan.

Tobi Bergman, part of the Champions group, told forum attendees that his group's designs to connect the pier to the rest of the park would at once bring in money and create additional recreation space as the Downtown population rises.

"The same amount of field space is not going to be enough," he said.

Alexander Berscheid, founder and player on the Downtown soccer team Zum Schneider FC, said he and many of his uniformed teammates attended the forum to back the Champions plan.

"We wanted to show how important it is to the local community that the plan have more ballfields, not commercial offices," he said.

Charlie Sewell, coach of a baseball team at the Lab Middle School in Chelsea, said he supported the Champions option because it seemed to be best for young athletes.

"The development should minimize the impact on the kids," he said.

The Hudson River Park Trust, which manages Pier 40, will ask the state legislature to change laws prohibiting residential use on the pier, president and CEO Madelyn Wils said.

"We are proponents of opening up the Act to as many uses as possible," she said.

A study commissioned by the Trust which faces a projected $80 million deficit over the next 10 years shows the Durst plan could have more financial risk than the Champions plan, the Villager and the Wall Street Journal reported about documents the community paper was first to obtain.

According to the Journal, Newmark Grubb Knight Frank analyzed the two proposals and found the Durst plan would generate about 25 percent less than Durst had predicted for office space and 50 percent less than the projected for retail.

A spokesman for the Durst Organization disputed the Newmark report, arguing it was commissioned to refute the Durst proposal. 

"With nearly 100 years in New York City real estate, we stand by our assumptions," the spokesman said. "What should be questioned is the math in the [Champions'] housing proposal, which is overly optimistic."

The Durst plan would give $10 million in rent to the Trust in the complex's first year open, according to the group's presentation.

The Champions option, the Villager reported, would also pay $10 million to the Trust annually.

Assemblyman Richard Gottfried, Assemblywoman Deborah Glick, State Senator Brad Hoylman and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer attended the forum and promised locals their concerns would be heard.

Hoylman, the former chair of Community Board 2, drew cheers when he said he will refuse to support any plan with high-end housing.

"Public space for luxury housing? I'm just not going to do it," he said.

Glick also cautioned locals to think through the pluses and minuses of both plans.

"Two 22-story buildings will have your kids playing in shadows," she said.

Regardless of which development option is adopted, elected officials and locals need to move fast to repair Pier 40, which has seen 30 years of debates about redevelopment, Village resident Wayne Kimbell said.

"The pier is going to fall in the river and we're going to say 'Why didn't we do something?'"

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