222 WEST 23RD
Got Suite 211 Rubble? Thank one of these folks!
#1. A (smirking) Chelsea tenant wants you to think Suite 211's demo didn't happen...
Several contributors to a newly-published book promote the idea that interior gutting of Hotel Chelsea -- a hazard to all living things -- began in 2011 at the direction of real estate mogul Joseph Chetrit. But this is pure fiction. The destruction began three years earlier, in mid-2008. And it wasn't Chetrit who illegally sledgehammered the Hotel Chelsea homes of Bob Dylan (below, shot by a tenant), Bob Marley and others. Zoe Pappas and her husband did.
#2. Zoe's Dust was Blowin' in the Wind...
The fabled Chelsea Hotel was home to 120+ full-time Bohemians on the day of Owner-Manager Stanley Bard's dismissal in July 2007. Tenants were quickly mired in eviction proceedings. Nevertheless a savvy and opportunistic few interpreted the hotel's shakeup as an excuse to carry on like the Donner Party. Among them, tenant Zoe Pappas who became an 'architectural consultant' to the Corporate takeover, gutting historic suites including Suite 211 without any safeguards to protect residents.
#3. Don't cause no Rubble, won't be none...
In Fall 2008, Zoe Pappas' unsafe worksites are exposed through fellow tenants' candid photographs published in the NY press, which implicate her husband's falsified permit applications. Responding to complaints from Pappas' neighbors, inspectors impose hotel-wide Stop Work Orders that halt demolition for two full years. Pappas & Pappas? Out of a job. Now, fast forward to 2011. Zoe Pappas dubiously names herself a "tenant advocate", but who's she kidding? Her subcontractor, a fellow tenant, fell to cancer!
WHY RUBBLE?
WHY'S IT MATTER?
WHY'S IT MATTER?
Believe it or not, some folks prefer no one knew about the fate of historic Suite 211. Like "Tenant advocate" Zoe Pappas, who gutted it illegally in '08 yet claims hazards to tenants arrived later. Zoe can't promote how she 'saved' The Chelsea if she wrecked it!
WHY'S IT MATTER?
WHY'S IT MATTER?
WHY'S IT MATTER?
Truth matters! And if a conversation ignores that Pappas exposed 120+ fellow Chelsea tenants (including kids) to hazards like lead & asbestos contamination while she portrays herself as a 'tenant advocate'? Then truth matters more!
WHY NOW?
WHY'S IT MATTER?
WHY NOW?
Pushback against recent slander of late Chelsea owner Stanley Bard by those who foolishly rewrite a titanic chapter in his saga: when Bard loyalists led a charge to save the 'Old Chelsea', exposing a predatory few who profit from the landmark's strife.