Park Slope neighborhood hates this building — but they’re fighting the city from tearing it down

A war veteran’s historic, but crumbling, Brooklyn brownstone could face the wrecking ball if city building officials get their way. But a group of preservationists are trying to save the property constructed the same year the Brooklyn Bridge opened.

Neighbors and members of the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission will ask a judge Thursday to save 44 Berkeley Place in Park Slope, where similar homes in better condition fetch millions of dollars in one of the city’s most coveted neighborhoods.

City building officials say the rat-infested, graffiti-strewn, dilapidated structure needs to come down as soon as possible. The cost of the demolition will be handed down to the owner, said Nicholas Paolucci, a city Law Department spokesman.

(That owner, 77-year-old Yves Calvin, could not be reached for comment. He served in the Vietnam War, according to New York State Department of Veterans’ Services records.)

“The city is carefully balancing public safety needs with efforts to save this historic building,” said Paolucci. “An absent estate administrator has neglected this property for decades, and the city has taken both enforcement action to keep people safe and at the same time has initiated a court process to try to have someone take control of the building before demolition occurs. While we will continue with that court process, the Department of Buildings will take all necessary actions to ensure New Yorkers remain safe.”

Last fall, the Department of Buildings issued an emergency demolition order that could be carried out at any moment due to “significant deterioration,” an email from the city’s building department details. The roof has partially collapsed, floor joists have rotted and the third floor has detached in places from the exterior load-bearing walls. Interior walls inside the rowhouse have collapsed, the inside staircase is structurally unstable and the masonry facade exhibits signs of severe disrepair.

Building inspectors began visiting the property in 2001, when it became vacant, after receiving complaints about the building’s condition, issuing multiple violations to the owner and more than $212,000 in penalties over the years, according to the email and court documents.

Work is expected to start in the next three weeks, according to a spokesperson for the city Department of Housing Preservation and Development, which handles demolition orders from the Department of Buildings. Razing the structure could take about six weeks to complete. Water and sewage have already been cut off from the building, which dates to 1883.

Calvin is the last living member tied to the estate that owns the property, according to court filings. His mother, Surprise Calvin, died in 1993 without a will. He was made co-executor of the estate in 1997 with a sister, who has since died.

Calvin had moved out, but started showing up at the property after his mother’s death and attempted to make repairs, including cleanup from a 2001 fire, said Steve Aronson, who has lived next door for nearly five decades and is leading the neighbors’ fight to save the building.

When the Landmarks Preservation Commission began its enforcement efforts in 2023 to address work that needs to be done at the building, a lawyer for the agency met with Calvin, who told him that he did not have the funds, court records show.

Calvin has not been seen at his childhood home since the COVID-19 pandemic, when “smoking, dealing, hollering and loud music” became the norm at the stoop, said Aronson. At their own expense, Aronson and others on the block purchased and installed a construction wall in 2022 for $3,000, and the loitering stopped, he said.

“Everyone feels this was money well spent,” he said.

At Thursday’s hearing, attorneys from the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission will ask a Kings County surrogate court judge to transfer administration of the property from Calvin to the city’s public administrator. Department officials, along with the 40-plus members of the Committee to Save 44 Berkeley Place, say the move could buy enough time to find an investor who can make necessary repairs and rehabilitate the structure.

The home is located in an extension of the Park Slope Historic District, a 2016 add-on that encompasses 292 buildings, including carriage houses, churches and a convent and is considered by the commission to be “one of Brooklyn’s most architecturally distinguished areas,” according to the designation report.

The two-family dwelling at 44 Berkeley contains 2,660 square feet, property records show. It functions as a four-story house, with its partially below-grade first floor known as an “English basement,” said Jonathan Miller, president and CEO of Miller Samuel Inc., the Manhattan-based appraisal and research firm.

The median sales price for 11 two-family homes that recently sold in the neighborhood is $3.15 million, he says.

As is, the building could be worth about $1 million, and “many times that if restored,” the Landmarks Preservation Commission says in a court filing. Miller agrees, describing how even under unlivable conditions, “shell” properties are valuable in the Park Slope real estate market for their land and exteriors.

“Houses like this are rarely demolished, because there is a premium paid for restoring the original facade,” Miller said. “Tearing it down is throwing money away, and potentially damaging the value of the adjacent properties by building a new structure. In this neighborhood, architectural authenticity is what the market demands.”

Without reconstruction, the home’s loss would damage the block in other ways, residents said. “It’s entirely enclosed with buildings,” said Aronson. “So a demolition would immediately open up our backyard. The miscreants around may very well take advantage of that.”

Brooklyn Councilwoman Shahana Hanif, who represents the district, got involved in August.

“The deterioration of the site presents a myriad of issues for local residents, and I support restoring this long-neglected building and bringing it back to a safe and livable condition,” she said.

Saving the building for a potential sale will allow Calvin to receive part of the proceeds, according to a commission court citation. If torn down, he will still be responsible for the penalties as well as the estimated $595,000 demolition that will be billed to the property — plus about $65,000 in overdue real estate taxes and other charges and fees owed to the Department of Finance, according to city officials.

“I wish he got the support he needs to keep his home,” Daphne Douge, 48, who owns a Brooklyn-based wellness company and has known Calvin for years, told The Post.