Village Preservation: Docs Prove Parks Dept. Can Save Tony Dapolito

Local preservationist groups say that documents obtained from the Parks Dept. prove that the Tony Dapolito Recreation Center can be successfully repaired, contradicting the agency’s position that the aging building must be demolished as part of a planned reimagining of Clarkson Street.

Village Preservation says that the documents notably include a preliminary Parks Dept. report, from 2015, on “how to repair, modernize and return the facility to public use.” They also include a 2021 email sent by a Parks Dept. official, and another highly detailed visual report that appears to break down exactly how to conduct repairs.

The decrepit 118-year-old center has been closed since 2020, when repairs were ostensibly slated to be put into motion. Groups like Village Preservation believe that roughly $50 million worth of earmarked funds could sufficiently cover such renovations. The Parks Dept. itself had allocated $120 million for such repairs.

Instead, the Parks Dept. moved forward with a plan to knock down the building in 2024, initially calling the cost of repairs prohibitive. They now promise that a 35-story residential complex slated to be built nearby at 388 Hudson St., will include substantial recreational facilities; the city estimates that it’ll cost $165 million to build.

Parks officials also say that properly renovating the center, rather than demolishing it, would force them to axe some of its current recreational space–such as by axing a lane from the three-lane pool.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who at one point indicated that he’d like to preserve the center while campaigning, has yet to reverse demolition plans originally put forth by Eric Adams’s administration.

The newly obtained documents were provided via a FOIL request by Sommer Omar, founder of the Coalition to Save the Public Recreation Center Downtown.

The 2021 email, sent by Parks Dept. rep. Costas Vanezis to the architect Layng Pew, includes a link to the state of Tony Dapolito’s structural beams. Vanezis wrote: “GOOD NEWS IS THAT IT CAN BE TEMPORARILY SHORED SO THAT YOU CAN REOPEN THE FACILITY - BUT THEY WILL NEED MORE TIME TO DEVELOP THE DETAIL - TIMEFRAME TO FOLLOW IN THE REPORT.”

Village Preservation held a rally focused on the new documents outside of the recreation center on March 29, which was attended by numerous local residents and preservationists, including Omar. VP Executive Director Andrew Berman began the rally by chanting “Don’t demolish, renovate, Tony D is worth the wait!”

“For almost two years now, we’ve been told that the Tony Dapolito Recreation Center has to be demolished—that it was just beyond repair, and there’s no alternative,” Omar said.

“The city...disclosed a trove of files that undermine almost everything we’ve been told to date,” she added. “There is not a single file, document, or communication within this record that says that the building has to be demolished.”

State Assembly Member Grace Lee also appeared at the rally, where she suggested that any demolition might end up requiring state legislative sign-off, as the Tony Dapolito Recreation Center is located on designated parkland.

“I’m here to say that we’ll continue to protect this property as protected parkland for generations to come,” Lee said.

In an interview with Our Town Downtown, Berman reiterated his belief that the new documents prove that the center is “absolutely repairable,” calling arguments otherwise “bogus.” He added that he thinks the documents “irrefutably prove that the Parks Department has been lying to us.”

“No building can’t be repaired,” Berman said. “We knew that there was nothing here that was that unusual, that couldn’t be fixed up, and isn’t renovated or repaired in other older buildings all the time.”

As for his response to the Parks Dept. stating that renovation would lead to alterations to the center’s current layout, Berman said that he finds such changes largely immaterial, as long as the building is preserved and maintains other recreational services.

“I’ll leave it to other people to debate whether a two-lane pool is still useful, compared to a three-lane pool,” he said. “It’s very clear that we’re gonna be getting new facilities across the street, no matter what, including a huge new pool. If that’s the case...turn [the Tony Dapolito] pool into pickleball courts, or a weight room.”