Furious Upper East Side residents, scrambling to salvage belongings from their evacuated Second Avenue buildings, charged yesterday that bureaucratic blunders by the city and the MTA have left them suddenly homeless.
Tenants said they had to rush back from vacation and couldn’t take advantage of new leases because the already-teetering structures along the Second Avenue Subway construction route were suddenly deemed unstable by Buildings Department officials.
“The city should do a better job of making sure the building isn’t going to fall down,” said John LaGrosse, who lives at 301 E. 92nd St. and rushed back from a Cape May vacation when his friend told him about the evacuation order.
There’s no telling when the 40 newly displaced residents will be allowed in their apartments again. The Big Easy bar on Second Avenue also was forced to close.
“I was shocked when the Buildings Department said I had to move out,” said Jeremy Meattey, who signed his lease June 15.
“I was moving in the last of my stuff at the time.”
Another building on the block, 1772 Second Ave., was suddenly shut down last month.
The MTA and Buildings Department claim the construction has nothing to do with the evacuations.
But tenants say Buildings should have enforced past violations and the MTA should reduce construction vibrations.
“The MTA and the city are equally to blame,” said Dayna York, evacuated from 301 E. 92nd St.
The DOB is blaming the owner, listed as 1766-68 Associates, LLC.
“We issued an order to do repairs, and it appears that was not done,” DOB spokesman Tony Sclafani said.
An MTA consultant sent a notice to the DOB in October 2006, around the time the construction began, about the poor conditions of the buildings on the block, agency records show.
The DOB didn’t respond to the memo, sources said.