NYC NOW - December 13, 2023: Midday News

Episode Date: December 13, 2023

Over 200 firefighters spent hours fighting an early morning blaze at a deli in the Bronx. Meanwhile, Keith Lee, the viral food influencer whose reviews can make or break a restaurant's fortunes, is posting about his time in New York City. Plus, authorities continue to search for the cause of Monday's partial building collapse in the Bronx. WNYC’s Michael Hill spoke with Lawrence Ubell, CEO of Accurate Building Inspectors, to explain the warning signs of an unstable building. Finally, WNYC’s Ramsey Khalifeh looks at why the price of Christmas trees has skyrocketed.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Wednesday, December 13. Here's the midday news from Lance Buckley. More than 200 firefighters needed hours early this morning to extinguish a blaze at a Bronx deli. It broke out around 330 at West 231st Street and Godwin Terrace in Kingsbridge, where the fire raged through neighboring businesses, Assistant Chief Thomas Curreo says fires in commercial buildings can be complicated.

There are multiple ceilings in a lot of these stores and occupancies. Multiple ceilings have put up over time. It takes a lot of time to try to get at the fire and knock it down. Officials say one person suffered minor smoke inhalation at the scene, but five of the stores next to the deli were severely damaged the cause of the fires under investigation. A food influencer whose reviews can make or break at restaurant's fortunes is Hosting about his time in New York City, WNYC's Catalina Gonella reports on his travels through the five boroughs. Keith Lee has amassed a loyal TikTok following who flocked to the restaurants he reviews.

It's been called the Keith Lee effect, and it's been having immediate results in the city. At first, fans like Nicole Hagler were questioning Lee's dining choices, like a salmon chopped cheese or pizza from touristy slice chops in Manhattan. I was, like, confused. Like, who eats? I never even knew there was a salmon chop cheese. But then he reached out to a local food TikToker. That's how he ended up reviewing Taste of Heaven in Williamsburg, where Hegelor was waiting to order.

I just wanted to see what the, what the foo was about. You know, the Keefley effect. Lee didn't say where he plans to go to next. But if past this precedent, long lines will likely follow. It's 44 right now, right around our high and lots of sun and breezy conditions this afternoon. This is WNYC. NYC. On WNYC, I'm Michael Hill.

Authorities continue to investigate the collapse of that seven-story building in the Bronx this week. It's still unclear what caused the corner of the structure to suddenly fall, but now some of us may be looking for signs of where in our own homes, but not every crack in the wall, though, amounts to catastrophe. Larry Ubel is the CEO and managing partner of accurate building inspectors. It's an inspection firm that serves New York and New Jersey. You Bell joins us now to walk us through what we should do when we have concerns about our buildings. Larry, what are the most common morning signs of something going wrong that you see in buildings,

especially older buildings? Well, first of all, buildings are telegraphed when they're having a problem. It's very unusual for a building to all of a sudden collapse or fail. The biggest indicators are cracks and not generally not vertical cracks, but horizontal cracks or sore tooth. diagonal cracks and cracks that are constantly changing size or shape. In other words, they're getting larger or the sides of the cracks do not line up anymore. The other big indicator is windows and doors no longer opening and closing easily or actually being stuck in their positions. If a window used to open and it doesn't anymore, that's a problem. Same thing with doors. So those are the big

indicators of movement. And so something, or you see the facade actually separating from the window frame or from the building structure itself. That's a big indicator that there is a structural problem and the building is going to fail. So, there we should not just dismiss this as, well, maybe the building is still settling. No. Well, settlement is a misnomer. Buildings do not tend to settle. Once they are built, the soil gets its maximum compaction. And so if you're having movement, it's actually deflection of different building components. In other words, they're bending. And that's not a good thing. But what I would advise people to do, and you don't want to really call the buildings department or HPD over every little crack, not to say that you shouldn't call them

when there's an issue, but you can be, we have citizen scientists, we have citizen farmers, well, we can have citizen engineers. And what I mean by that is that if you see a crack, you could put data marks, which are marks that we use to see movement over this crack, which in other words, draw an X and then a cross over the crack, somewhat like an asterisk, and take a picture of it and date it. And if those lines don't line up anymore after or let's say three months, six months or a year, that tells you that crack is in movement, and you should call HPD, and that does two things.

One, you know something's happening, but now you have a record of where the building has started, almost like a baseline, and HPD could do something with that. Having them come in one day, they're just seeing from that point on, but if you can give them information of what's happened in the past, that is very useful to engineers and architects

to make determinations of, what's going on in a building. Larry, when we've already called 3-1-1, but we still have concerns about what's happening in our home or building, if after all the reporting and so forth, you see that no action is being taken. What do you do? I'm going to say then here's,

and this is not an easy option, move out. If it's unsafe, if you feel that things are in bad shape, and one of the other indicators you can see is if you look up the wall of the building from the ground, and look up the wall and you see that wall is bulging or moving, then it's time to, it's time to leave. But that's not always an option for people, unfortunately, who are in dire situations and have limited housing. I mean, this limited housing, especially among low income and middle income housing in the city is horrible. And we're not really getting that big a dent into the problem.

So people just have to keep calling and calling, you know, and also I'm going to say, say, also calling the fire department. This is under, this is under their jurisdiction of saving people. If there is a problem with a building and you feel it's a horrible, it's a, it's an imminent situation of a building and failure, then it's time to call the fire department and let them know what's going on.

And Larry, would you, yes, pardon me, what you expect the fire department to like someone to come and say, okay, this building is unsafe and get the buildings department in here and it, and may evacuate the building?

Well, they have a, you know, they have a louder bullhorn than you do. And so they would get, you know, they would probably, if you called them, they would probably get other people involved, such as the Department of Buildings and HPD. If you feel that situation warrants it. But again, buildings don't fail all of a sudden. This happens over a long period of time. And I think even the situation in the Bronx, this was a situation that was manifesting itself for some period. time. And so I can't really opine or have an opinion on what's going on in that building because I

really haven't been on site. But I have seen what happens with buildings. And usually the biggest problem of buildings is neglect. Larry, we have just a minute left, but I have to ask you, a lot of us live in older buildings. Are there any special precautions we should take? Just look for cracks that are in movement. That is the biggest thing. Look for cracks in a movement. Look for walls that aren't straight and true anymore or are they going out more. That is really what you need to look for, especially if you just recently painted and all these cracks are popping up, that's an issue, and you should take concern about that. Larry, Ubell, CEO managing partner of accurate building inspectors, we'll have to leave it there.

Larry, thank you. Thank you. Tis the season when New Yorkers cram Christmas trees into their space challenge departments. But for many, the cost of them. of the beloved Tannenbaum's, has become too expensive. W&MIC's Ramsey-Coliphae reports. Christmas tree mongers across the city say the cost to buy a spruce or a fur

has grown to ridiculous heights. Like Gregory Walsh, he's the owner of Greg's Trees in Brooklyn, and with his big white beard and red winter hat, he bears a striking resemblance to Santa Claus. Prices have gone through the roof again. Like, we were shocked. But why are trees so expensive?

Leading arborists say the problem is more than a decade in the making. The National Christmas Tree Association says a lot of family farmers went out of business during the 2008 financial crisis. Spokesperson Jill's sidebottom says that's created long-term supply problems, causing a current shortage of trees across the U.S. It takes five to ten years to grow a Christmas tree. It takes two to five years to grow a seedling, so you can see why it's taking that long to get the inventory up.

Local farmers from the New York Christmas Tree Association say the higher prices are also result of higher shipping and labor costs associated with recent inflation. Many New Yorkers, like Babatunday Akawi, are frustrated by the added expense this holiday season. We are definitely going to factor in price. Working class people should be able to afford to celebrate the holidays with dignity. The hope now is that the supply will rebound in a few years as growers begin planting more trees in New York and across the country. Remzi Khalifa, WNYC News.

Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WMYC. Catch us every weekday three times a day for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. More soon.