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REAL* ESTATE
AND
%) BUILDERS
NEW YORK, JULY 18, 1914
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REAL ESTATE BODIES ACTIVE FOR PUBLIC I
The Advisory Council Extencding Its Organization—Uniteci Owners'
Associations Open Permanent Office—Moving Against Death Avenue
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OWNERS of real estate are finally to
have headquarters and a central bu-
reavi of information of their own. The
need of a meeting place where all mat¬
ters afifecting realty may be discussed,
where city affairs and realty problems
may be considered, has been sorely felt
for years. The United Real Estate
Owners' Associations have just estab¬
lished such a place and have opened per¬
manent offices at 170 Broadway. Every
facility will be ofifered to taxpayers:
pamphlets and literature from the mu¬
nicipal and State departments will al¬
ways be available for distribution and
the latest realty records, periodicals and
atlases will be kept on file. Taxpayers
are invited to visit the headquarters, to
transact their business there and to use
the conveniences of the office for their
own purposes.
Henry Bloch. president of the asso¬
ciations, in outlining the program, stated
yesterday:
"The time will come, and before long,
when our headquarters will be the rec¬
ognized exchange for property owners.
We will have experts to advise, without
charge, as to the requirements of city
and State departments. We will have
every known realty record. We will
furnish appraisements. We will have
private conference rooms. We will have
an executive secretary and a staff of
competent assistants. In a word, we
will have a meeting place for every
real estate owner in New York. In this
way our association will accomplish
constructive work efficiently and effec¬
tively.
"The United Real Estate Owners' As¬
sociations have increased tremendously
in membership during the past year.
There are now eleven large associations,
having a combined membership of thou¬
sands of owners of real estate, affiliated
with the central body. The value of the
realty represented aggregates hundreds
of millions of dollars."
Council Extending Its Organization.
The effectiveness of real estate asso¬
ciations has frequently been undermined
by the belief that such bodies adopt no
course of action upon public questions
unless such action is extremely favorable
to the real estate fraternity or reflects
selfish desires of a few leaders, who
may be the vital factors in the mainte¬
nance of such organizations.
W^ithout doubt, unfounded suspicions
of this character have often off-set the
good work whicii the various real es¬
tate bodies have accomplished, and si¬
multaneously invidious criticisms have
not augured well for the real estate pro¬
fession as a whole. As a matter of fact,
many property owners and real estate
brokers have, at considerable expense,
devoted their efforts to the betterment
and welfare of the city and have un¬
selfishly contributed th^r time to.ward
the civic development of Greater New
York.
In order, therefore, to he in perfect
consonance with this admirable public-
Spirited tendency, on the part of many
^"THE REAL ESTATE BODIES of
"*â– the City of New York are stead¬
ily following up their successes of last
fall and winter and are putting their
strength more and more to better ac¬
count. They have come to the front
as the most effective and powerful
civic force of the day in the defense
of public rights. The Real Estate
Board, the Advisory Council of the
Allied Real Estate Interests, the
United Owners' Associations, the tax¬
payers' associations of the West Side
of the city, the City Club and Citizens*
Union, are all prominent in the news
of the day and are rendering real
service to the real people of New
York in important channels.
real estate owners and agents and brok¬
ers, the Advisory Council of Real Es¬
tate Interests will endeavor to make its
final decisions upon public questions of
such a broad and liberal character, that,
although primarily conserving the inter¬
ests of the real estate owners, they will
simultaneously be for the best interests
of the city itself.
The proper and reasonable conserva¬
tion of the interests of property owners
should be analagous to the best interests
of the city, inasmuch as the real estate
constitutes the chief source of city reve¬
nue. Co-operation between landlord and
tenant, between the public and the prop¬
erty owner, and between the city and
real estate organizations, is thus the key¬
note of the work of the advisory coun¬
cil.
A Publicity Committee.
In order to I)e fully advised upon
every public question that may arise and
in order to make its decisions as far re¬
moved from self-interest as possible the
council has appointed a publicity com¬
mittee, consisting of the real estate ed¬
itors of the New York newspapers. This
committee will advise the council with
reference to public sentiment and gen¬
eral feeling among the citizens of New
York as to the various propositions that
will be considered.
It will seek to make known through
the press and other means of publicity,
the wishes and true interests of real es¬
tate owners, and secure for them proper
consideration in the regulations of their
own affairs. It is hoped that by being
thus advised upon serious questions by
representatives of the various newspa¬
pers, that the conclusions of the coun¬
cil will reflect both the views of the city
and the public, as well as of the real es¬
tate owners.
The West Side Terminal Improvements.
The question of the proposed altera¬
tions in the freight line operated by the
New York Central and Hudson River
Railroad Company along the west side
of the city was revived during the past
week by a communication presented to
the Board of Estimate and Apportion¬
ment on behalf of the City Club, the Cit¬
izens' Union, the Independent Club of
the West Side, the West End Associa¬
tion, the Twenty-third Street Improve¬
ment Association. the Washington
Heights Taxpayers* Association, the
West Side Taxpayers' Association, the
Greenwich Village Improvement Asso¬
ciation, the Chelsea Association. Wom¬
an's Municipal League, League to End
Death Avenue, The Merchants' Asso¬
ciation of New York.
The deliberate plans and far sighted
views of the signers of the memorial
entitle it to become the basis for a cam¬
paign which shall at last settle finally
and successfully the one great unsettled
undertaking on which the future of Man¬
hattan depends.
Investigate Titles.
The allied associations have not for¬
gotten the rock on which the well-meant
plans of the sub-committee of the Board
of Estimate were wrecked last year, i. e.,
the failure of the city authorities to in¬
form themselves in advance of the legal
status of the title to the eight miles of
water front involved in this transaction.
This communication insists that "the
title of the city to lands along the wa¬
terfront should be investigated." and if
it contained no other recommendation,
it will have served an important purpose,
if it impresses upon the city authorities
that this is the necessary initial step in
the whole transaction, and that no short¬
cut scheme, undertaken without a full
comprehension and fair appreciation of
the city's legal rights to the water front,
will receive any support from these im¬
portant organizations. The West End
Association has profited greatly by the
thorough understanding of the legal sit¬
uation in Riverside Park, by its coun¬
sel. Mr. Charles L. Craig, and, if the
rights of the city and of the citizens
along the remainder of the eight miles
of waterfront were only as well under¬
stood and represented, as has been con¬
tinually insisted on by Mr. J. Bleecker
Miller—there would be great hope that
an agreement would be reached in which
the rights of the city and of the citizens
would not be sacrificed.
_ A Good Cause.
The recent decision of the Appellate
Division in the case of Hearst against
New York Central and Hudson River
Railroad Company, in no wise prejudices
the rights of the citizens, as heretofore
assumed to exist in Riverside Park, for
in that case it was stipulated that the
railroad was entitled to occupy the main
right-of-way, which its tracks then occu¬
pied. There was no such stipulation in
the former case of W^illson versus New
York Central and Hudson River Rail¬
road, which was tried by Mr. J. Bleecker
Miller, and in which an injunction was
awarded, although it was never enforced
hy Mr. Hearst's lawyers. There is there¬
fore every reason for W^est Side citizens
to keep up their courage in this fight
and insist with vigor on the preservation
of the most beautiful part of the great¬
est city of this continent froin becoming
an unsightly noisome freight yard,