Will there ever be a new Tavern on the Green?
Despite cheery reports about last week’s Tavern site walk-through for prospective new licensees, some restaurant-industry pros privately are more dubious than they sounded in their public statements.
Among the points several made to us, on condition we not use their names:
* Where the old Tavern grossed up to $35 million a year, the stripped-down, “no catering” edition the city’s Parks Dept. wants might take in just $10 million, and operating costs would not be reduced by a commensurate amount.
* The requirements in the city’s request for proposals — including for landscaping, environmental features and even menu approval — are just as nitpicky as last time.
* And, most important, a new operator still must deal with the Hotel & Motel Trades Council union, aka Local 6 — the outfit that caused a previous licensee wannabe, Boathouse Cafe operator Dean Poll, to walk away.
But at least one restaurateur sees it in a more favorable light. Peter Glazier, whose Glazier Group owns Michael Jordan’s at Grand Central Terminal, calls the new RFP a “game-changer.”
He said, “The city has done a wonderful job leveling the playing field,” and that the terms are far more advantageous than they were the first time around — a fiasco that embarrassed City Hall, left the Tavern dark and put hundreds of employees out of work.
Proposals, including how much an operator is willing to pay for the 20-year license, must be submitted by March 30.
Glazier didn’t want to discuss specifics. But others we spoke to made strong arguments for the new terms. Most important, they said: Where the first RFP called for a 30,000 square-foot restaurant where the new operator might have to borrow up to $30 million for a massive buildout, the city now intends to pay for much of the exterior work — demolition and infrastructure.
With the Warner LeRoy-era Crystal and Terrace rooms demolished, the much smaller new Tavern would occupy only 10,320 square feet inside the original 19th-century “sheepfold” structure and 11,950 square feet of outdoor terrace space. “That would cost you maybe $5 million,” an insider said, bringing it within reach of a number of established restaurant operators.
Asked how many jobs Hotel Trades Council boss Peter Ward might demand, union lawyer and spokesman Josh Gold told us, “Probably less than the old Tavern” — which employed 400 — “but the number of jobs would depend on the operator’s specific plans.”
One person who took the tour interpreted that as meaning Ward was willing to give ground: “The last time was a catastrophe for everybody, and they’d like to get at least some of the jobs back.”
Some who checked out the site applauded the RFP’s more “flexible” labor language, which merely calls for applicants to “describe any examples of previous operations in a union environment” and to “show experience with harmonious labor relations.”
In comparison, the first RFP included a highly specific list of “labor retention requirements,” which essentially required Poll to keep 90 percent of the old Tavern work force.
But another prominent tire-kicker insisted, “It’s still set up to fail. [Mayor] Bloomberg has to show they tried to revive the Tavern, and if they can’t make a deal again, they can say they tried.”
The RFP states, “The first RFP did not result in an award of a concession” — a disingenuous characterization of the fiasco in which the city loudly trumpeted Poll as the new operator in mid-2009, and the subsequent failure of Poll and Local 6 to make a deal.
That not only kept Tavern closed for good after prior licensee Jennifer LeRoy’s contract expired at the end of 2009, it prompted Ward to viciously attack Poll at his then-nonunionized Boathouse — which in turn led to an ugly strike resulting in Poll having to accept the union there.
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The city is now down two (count ’em, 2) Oak Rooms.
It was announced last week that when the Algonquin Hotel reopens this spring after a four-month renovation, its famous cabaret room will be gone.
Meanwhile, the Plaza Hotel’s Oak Room — unrelated to the Algonquin’s — remains dark. In a statement, Plaza Executive Vice-President of Retail Kristin Franzese said only, “We have several prospective tenants, and negotiations are ongoing.”
We’re not holding our breath. The beautiful dining room and bar are notoriously difficult to operate (and, like Tavern, hostage to a Local 6 contract loaded with onerous work rules).
But unlike the Algonquin’s, the Plaza Oak Room is a designated interior landmark — meaning it can’t be gutted or altered. Let’s hope somebody has the courage to take it on — and the sense to make it a steakhouse, the only kind of eatery that can thrive in its masculine environment.
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Stanley Chera’s Crown Acquisitions and Centurion Realty have closed on the $70.85 million purchase of 103-107 Prince St., home to the city’s first Apple store. But it doesn’t mean any change is imminent at the Greene Street corner amidst SoHo’s most high-end shopping district.
A source reports that Apple has about seven years left on a 20-year lease it bought from Restoration Hardware back in 2001.
“The new owners see this as a long-term hold and don’t necessarily plan to enlarge the building, although it has some unused air rights,” an insider said.
The three-story building, a former US post office, is flanked by the Mercer Hotel and stores like Polo Ralph Lauren and Louis Vuitton.
The Apple store is closed for a $30 million renovation and expansion that will enlarge it to 30,000 square feet from little more than half that.
Apple’s current lease is “far below market,” we’re told. The Polo lease was signed at around $600 a square foot for ground-floor space.
If the Apple space were on the market today, retail sources said it might fetch $9 million. Of course, given that Apple is the world’s highest-valued company, a number like that wouldn’t likely give it pause.
The purchase, first predicted by The Post’s Lois Weiss last November, has a number of interesting facets.
According to city records, the property was previously owned as a corporation by five members of the Berk family, who have addresses in Westchester County, Virginia and Hawaii.
And it includes a bonus, of sorts: a tiny parcel at 144-20 243rd Road in Rosedale, Queens, currently home to a New York Public Library branch.
Crown — which owns the retail space at 666 Fifth Ave. — wasn’t likely in the market for a library when it went shopping.
But, as they say, sometimes you have to take the whole to get the part.