NYC News - Local News

Dozens of tenant advocates packed into Hunter College Assembly Hall to protest the Rent Guidelines Board’s final vote, June 21, 2023. | Jonathan Custodio/THE CITY By Jonathan Custodio, The City This article was originally published on Jun 21 8:59pm EDT by THE CITY NEW YORK - Landlords will be able to hike rents by 3% later this year for more than one million rent-stabilized apartments. By a 5-4 vote at the Hunter College Assembly Hall on Wednesday evening, the board approved a maximum rent increase of 3% on one-year leases, and a maximum rent increase of 2.75% in year one and 3.2% in year two on two-year leases. The allowable increases — slightly lower than last year’s — apply to leases signed on or after Oct. 1, 2023 for rent-stabilized apartments, which represent almost half of all rental units in the city. “Finding the right balance is never easy, but I believe the board has done so this year,” Mayor Eric Adams said in a statement released after the vote. “We also kn

Police are looking for this man in connection with a robbery crew that has struck at least four businesses in the city. -Photo by NYPD By Dan Gesslein  Manhattan Voice  June 21, 2023  MANHATTAN - Police arrested a homeless man in connection with a robbery crew that has struck at least four times throughout the city.  Police arrested 19-year-old Eugene Jones who is homeless. He has been charged with four counts of robbery.  Cops are searching for at least three other men caught on surveillance video robbing four commercial establishments including a bakery and two dry cleaners. The latest robbery took place inside a beauty salon in Kips Bay. At around 5 pm on June 12, two of the suspects walked into the salon on East 33rd Street. Cops said the suspects walked inside the store and demanded cash from the 43-year-old employee. She handed over $264 from the register and a cell phone, investigators said.  Jones was arrested shortly after this robbery. Cops said in two other case

Healthy Thieves Steal Hundreds of Dollars in Vitamins, Threaten Workers with Box Cutters  Police are searching for three men in connection with the robbery of a Duane Reade in Chelsea. -Photo by NYPD By Dan Gesslein  Manhattan Voice  June 21, 2023  MANHATTAN - Cops are looking for a trio of shoplifters who menaced Duane Reade workers with a box cutter to make off with hundreds of dollars worth of vitamins.   Police released surveillance video of the three suspects who allegedly robbed a Chelsea drug store down the block from the Fashion Institute of Technology. At around 10:18 pm on June 12, three men dressed in dark colors entered the Duane Read at 333 7th Avenue in Chelsea and began removing items, cops said. The items taken are vitamin products.  According to police, as the men tried to leave the store without paying they came across a store employee. Cops said one of the alleged shoplifters pulled out a boxcutter and threatened the worker.  The men then left the store wi

A pile of charred electric vehicles sat near the scene of a deadly e-bike repair shop fire on Madison Street in Chinatown. | Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY By Greg B. Smith and Claudia Irizarry Aponte, The City This article was originally published on Jun 20 7:05pm EDT by THE CITY NEW YORK - When firefighters fought a blaze sparked by a lithium-ion battery in Chinatown early Tuesday that killed four people and injured two others, it wasn’t the first time the FDNY had arrived at the HQ E-Bike Repair shop. On May 9, department inspectors visited the shop to follow up on safety violations issued in 2022. The FDNY had earlier cited the store for illegally using extension cords to charge bikes — an especially dangerous way to power the volatile lithium-ion batteries that give e-bikes and other electric vehicles their zip. On their return visit, FDNY reps looked around and didn’t see any batteries being charged, and so deemed the store cleared. Yet the FDNY did not check o

Police are looking for this man for an assault on a woman on the Upper West Side. -Photo by NYPD By Dan Gesslein  Manhattan Voice June. 20, 2023 MANHATTAN - A man looking to bum a light for his cigarette off a woman ended up beating her and tried to rob her on the Upper West Side, cops said. Police released surveillance video of the suspect who appears to be holding a cigarette at the time of the incident. At around 11:30 pm on June 17, a 42-year-old woman was walking on the Upper West Side in the vicinity of Broadway and West 79th Street. According to police, a man decked out in denim, approached the woman and asked for a light for his cigarette. Suddenly the man began to repeatedly punch the woman in the face and arm, cops said. The attacker then kept yanking on the handbag the victim was clinging to, cops said. However, the attacker was unable to wrestle the bag free from its owner and he fled empty handed. Cops said the suspect fled eastbound on West 79th Street.  T