19 hours ago
3
The party-loving bigiwgs at the Park Avenue Armory are suing the state for “unlawfully depriving” them of a small basement room in the building where a child cadet group meets once a week after school.
Last week, The Post reported on allegations that the bosses at the Upper East Side nonprofit, the Seventh Regiment Armory Conservancy, turned the national landmark into their “own personal country club,” using it to host exclusive affairs like fashion shows and celeb-filled after-parties — even wedding celebrations for its staff on the nonprofit’s dime.
Now, they’re trying to overturn a bill signed last year by Gov. Hochul that prohibited them from kicking out the Knickerbocker Greys, calling it “a clear abuse of legislative power.”
The child cadets’ use of the room will interfere with their “carefully laid” $73 million renovation plan for the basement, according to the court filing.
“Unless this court intervenes, the conservancy’s planned construction and restoration work — years in the making — will be derailed,” the federal lawsuit filed Sept. 5 in Manhattan federal court claimed.
The conservancy secured a 99-year lease from the state for the valuable property — a giant 150-year-old building that spans an entire city block — by promising in 2006 to restore it to its historical significance.
But critics told The Post the nonprofit had only renovated a handful of rooms over two decades.
“The conservancy has undertaken extraordinary efforts to rescue the Armory from neglect and to create from scratch a thriving new cultural institution,” the filing countered.
A spokesperson for Hochul said they could not comment on pending litigation.
English (US)