Case Name: In the Matter of the Application of The City of New York, Appellant, Relative to Acquiring Title Wherever the Same Has Not Been Heretofore Acquired for the Same Purpose in Fee to the Real Property That Shall or May Be Required for the Widening of Chrystie Street, from Canal Street to East Houston Street; Forsyth Street, from East Broadway to East Houston Street; Hester Street, Broome Street, Rivington Street and Stanton Street, from Chrystie Street to Forsyth Street, Together with the Additional Lands to Be Acquired in Connection Therewith, in the Borough of Manhattan, City of New York. Charles E. Hughes, Jr., and Others, Respondents
Court: New York Supreme Court, Appellate Division
Jurisdiction: New York
Decision Date: 1932-07-01
Citations: 236 A.D. 321
Docket Number: 
Parties: In the Matter of the Application of The City of New York, Appellant, Relative to Acquiring Title Wherever the Same Has Not Been Heretofore Acquired for the Same Purpose in Fee to the Real Property That Shall or May Be Required for the Widening of Chrystie Street, from Canal Street to East Houston Street; Forsyth Street, from East Broadway to East Houston Street; Hester Street, Broome Street, Rivington Street and Stanton Street, from Chrystie Street to Forsyth Street, Together with the Additional Lands to Be Acquired in Connection Therewith, in the Borough of Manhattan, City of New York. Charles E. Hughes, Jr., and Others, Respondents.
Judges: 
Reporter: Appellate Division Reports
Volume: 236
Pages: 321–330

Head Matter:
In the Matter of the Application of The City of New York, Appellant, Relative to Acquiring Title Wherever the Same Has Not Been Heretofore Acquired for the Same Purpose in Fee to the Real Property That Shall or May Be Required for the Widening of Chrystie Street, from Canal Street to East Houston Street; Forsyth Street, from East Broadway to East Houston Street; Hester Street, Broome Street, Rivington Street and Stanton Street, from Chrystie Street to Forsyth Street, Together with the Additional Lands to Be Acquired in Connection Therewith, in the Borough of Manhattan, City of New York. Charles E. Hughes, Jr., and Others, Respondents.
First Department,
July 1, 1932.
Arthur J. W. Hilly, Corporation Counsel, of counsel [Joseph F. Mulqueen, Jr., Joel J. Squier and J. Joseph Lilly with him on the brief], for the appellant.
Clarence J. Shearn of counsel [Charles J. Nehrbas and Martin Lippman with him on the brief; Cook, Nathan & Lehman, attorneys], for the respondent Charles E. Hughes, Jr., ancillary receiver.
Charles Lamb of counsel [ Talley & Lamb, attorneys for the owners of damage parcels Nos. 1, 150, 237, 338-341 and 377; Edward J. Dowling, attorney for owner of damage parcels Nos. 59-62 and 117-119, inclusive], for certain respondents.
Isaac E. Bermant of counsel [Henry Herz with him on the brief; Skinner & Bermant, attorneys], for the respondents Hyman Stein-berg and others, owners and claimants, etc.
Samuel L. Teitler of counsel [Samuel B. Newman, attorney], for the respondent Harry A. Voice.
Harry Lesser of counsel [Lesser & Lesser, attorneys], for the respondent Samuel M. Krauthamer.
Leslie J. Tompkins of counsel [Dominic L. O’Reilly and James Regan FitzGerald with him on the brief], for the respondents as to damage numbers 204, 205.
Dominic L. O’Reilly of counsel [James Regan FitzGerald with him on the brief; Egan & O’Reilly, attorneys, and A. M. Frumberg, attorney for Marknew Realty Co., Inc.], for the respondents as to damage numbers 63, 64,192, 193,194, 195 and 219, 220.
Ira B. Livingston of counsel [Livingston & Livingston, attorneys], for the respondent Oscar Lloyd Realty Corporation, owner of damage parcel No. 256.
Louis Salant of counsel [Joseph J. Cunningham with him on the brief; Stein & Salant, attorneys], for the respondents Fannie A. Kallis and another, owners of damage parcel No. 241.
Barnett E. Kopelman of counsel [Alexander Liebman with him on the brief], for the respondent I. Ptaschnik & Son, Inc., a lessee for damage parcel Nos. 338-341.
S. G. Nissenson of counsel, for the respondent Nathan Himowich, as owner of damage parcel No. 342.
Bernard Sobol of counsel [F. W. H. Adams with him on the brief; O’Brien, Boardman, Conboy, Memhard & Early, attorneys], for the respondents The Chase National Bank of the City of New York, as successor to The Equitable Trust Company of New York, as trustee for Beatrice Fiorenza Cenci, claimant for parcels 78, 79, 80 and 81, and United States Trust Company of New York and Donald Harper, as trustees of the estate of Eleanora Lorillard Spencer Cenci, deceased, claimants for damage parcels Nos. 82, 83, 84 and 85.
Leffert Holz of counsel [Benjamin F. Schreiber with him on the brief; Schreiber, Buchter & Rathheim, attorneys], for the respondents Milton Brinn, owner of award for damage parcels 167, 168; 270 Grand Street Corporation, owner of award for damage parcels 233, 234; Gustave Goetz and others, owners of award for damage parcels 239, 240.
Louis A. Rosenstein of counsel for the respondent Fanny E. Krooks, owner of damage parcels Nos. 361 and 362.
Joseph B. Schwartz of counsel [Smith & Schwartz, attorneys], for the respondent Rosi Luca, owner of damage parcels Nos. 69 and 70.
Ignatius Castelli of counsel for the respondent Charles Lampedusa, owner of damage parcels Nos. 298 and 299.
Nathan L. Goldstein of counsel [George Schenker and Irving S. Dorf with him on the brief], for the respondents owners of damage parcels Nos. 99 and 100, and 365, 366 and 367; lessees of damage parcels Nos. 257, 375 and 377.
Francis P. O’Connor of counsel [Edward W. Murphy, attorney], for the respondents James Nash Webb, claimant of damage parcel No. 6; Ernest Plath, claimant of damage parcel No. 31, and George M. Adrian and others, claimants of damage parcels 121 and 122.
Albert A. Hovell of counsel [Sidney A. Clarkson and Harry W. McChesney with him on the brief; Hovell, McChesney & Clarkson, attorneys], for the respondent Harry W. Perlman, damage parcel 238.
Reginald S. Hardy of counsel [Conroy & Hardy, attorneys], for the respondent Kate Rubino, as sole surviving executrix, etc., of Joseph C. Rubino, deceased, owner of damage parcel No. 4.
Samuel Rubin of counsel [William W. Conrad, attorney], for the respondents Stancar Realty Corporation and others, owners of damage parcels Nos. 113, 114, 120, 258, 314, 315 and 359, 360.
Affd., 260 N. Y. 583.

Opinion:
Townley, J.
The awards made to claimants in the last partial and separate final decree entered in this proceeding on January 12, 1931, are questioned upon two grounds: (1) Upon the ground that there is an inequality between the amounts awarded for the damage parcels contained in this decree and the amounts awarded for the damage parcels which were contained in the first partial and separate final decree entered in this proceeding dated August 6, 1930; (2) it is claimed that the amounts awarded for damage parcels Nos. 153 and 154 (the Libby Hotel property) were excessive.
A brief consideration of the conditions under which the awards for the damage parcels involved in the first separate decree were made demonstrates that the amounts of such awards afford no indication of the value of the other parcels involved in the proceeding and afford no basis upon which a claim of inequality of award can be made.
Prior to the vesting of title about sixty per cent of the owners involved in this proceeding had made certain so-called option agreements which were to form the basis of the compensation to be paid for their property. Options were given in all on approximately 202 parcels. In June, 1929, a resolution was adopted by the board of estimate and apportionment authorizing the city comptroller to purchase from the respective owners of these various parcels the awards to be made them in the condemnation proceeding to be initiated. While it is true that there was no power in the city to hold the owners to their option agreements, as a matter of fact* when the case came on for trial, these owners either defaulted or came into court and said they were satisfied with the option prices. The corporation counsel also stated to the court on the record that the proper procedure for the option holders was simply to rest on the city's figures. While the options themselves were not made a part of the record, it was stated without contradiction by counsel for one of the claimants that the city's expert had in each instance appraised the option parcels at the amounts stated in the option agreements. Upon the trial no evidence of value was offered as to these parcels excepting the testimony of the city experts whose appraisals were accepted by the court and incorporated in the separate decree which was entered covering nothing but the so-called option appraisals. The consequence of this method of assessing the values in condemnation is that the owners in many cases, who defaulted at the hearing or consented to accept the figures of the city's experts, have received substantially less for their property than has been given to owners who have litigated the issue of value.
It is the claim of the corporation counsel on this appeal that the amounts awarded to the contesting owners are too high because the trial court did not feel itself bound to consider the awards made under the option agreements and the judgment entered thereon as evidence of value in relation to the litigated parcels. There has been no appeal by any of the owners who accepted the city's figures under the so-called option agreements, and the only question is one of evidence. Certainly, the judgment on these awards under the option agreements is not in any sense an adjudication binding upon the contesting claimants, and, as res inter alios acta, it is not even admissible in evidence against them. An examination of the corporation counsel's stand, as indicated above, shows that were the option prices to be put in evidence as showing value, they would be unworthy of serious attention since they were not litigated values, but were awards made on consent for reasons entirely personal to the owners of the parcels. In effect, however, the same units of value used in making those awards were before the court, because the same expert testified for the city in the contested claims and on cross-examination was required to explain his system of assessing the option parcels.
The decree in the contested cases represents the result reached by the trial court after viewing the property, hearing the expert witnesses for the claimants, and after hearing the same character of testimony from the city's expert as was given in support of the option awards. We conclude that while the awards under the options may have been low, we are not concerned with that fact on this appeal and think that the record fully supports the judgment.
The only single award seriously attacked is that made for the Libby Hotel property, damage parcels Nos. 153 and 154. This property consisted of a very extensive bath establishment which was patronized not only by people in the neighborhood but by people from all over the city. Two questions were raised: (1) Whether this establishment was a proper improvement in the locality, and (2) what was the fair value of the improvement. At first, the city conceded that it was a proper improvement. There was some public agitation thereafter, and the trial court had a further hearing at which the city attempted to show that it was not a proper improvement. At this second hearing the city produced four witnesses. Of these four witnesses, three had never been inside of the building and the fourth had never been in any part of it except the lounge on the first floor. None of them had any experience in the operation of Turkish or Russian baths and none of them knew anything about the amount of business done, the number of patrons or the demands for this type of building in that locality, although one admitted that that neighborhood was a bath house neighborhood in which many similar establishments were located. The evidence on behalf of the claimant amounted to a full disclosure of the nature of the building, the number of patrons, the prices that they paid, the popularity of the baths in the neighborhood, and the type of accommodation required by such patrons. The witnesses for the claimants were acquainted with the needs of bathing establishments and gave as their opinion that it was a suitable improvement. The trial court was fully warranted on the record in so holding.
As for the amount awarded, there was a conflict of evidence as to the reasonable value of a building of the type of the Libby Hotel. The city's experts, who testified to the reasonable value of certain parts of the work in the construction of such a building, gave figures which were widely at variance with the figures of the actual cost of the building a short time before the condemnation, which costs were based on contracts awarded after the receipt of com petitive bids. There is no reason for thinking that the prices paid under the contracts awarded on those bids were not fair and fully representative of the true market cost at the time the bids were made. The conflict before the trial court was one of speculation based on opinion unfortified by facts, as contrasted with the most satisfactory type of evidence that could be given, namely, the- actual cost of this structure at a time not long anterior to the condemnation and before any substantial decrease in construction costs in this city.
Attention has been called to the fact that this venture became involved in financial difficulties and that the mortgage upon the building was subsequently foreclosed. These conditions may readily have resulted from conditions wholly unconnected with any question as to the building being a suitable improvement for the land upon which it was located. Faulty financing, bad management, or any one of a number of causes might easily have brought about this result. This record contains no evidence satisfactorily establishing that this building was not an adequate improvement or that the financial troubles in which the venture became involved were produced by that fact.
We find no error on this record, and the decree so far as appealed from should be affirmed, with costs.
Merrell and McAvoy, JJ., concur; Finch, P. J., and Martin, J., d'ssent.