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COURIER LIFE, J M B G AN. 25–31, 2019 23
KAPUT: The owners of My Mandarin grocery store took
down the tent on Jan. 10 after the city slapped them with
several violations for the illegal structure.
Department of Buildings
It’s a tent
takedown!
Grocer demolishes its outdoor
extension ruled illegal by city
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
Call it the winter of this grocer’s discontent.
The owners of a Brighton Beach grocery store
dismantled an illegal tented extension of their
market, after the city ordered its demolition earlier
this month.
Workers tore down the burgundy tent covering
Brighton Beach Avenue grocer My Mandarin’s
outdoor produce section on Jan. 10, after Department
of Buildings offi cials slapped the store’s operators
with four violations and a stop-work order
for unlawfully pitching the structure, agency
spokesman Andrew Rudansky said.
But the tent — which Rudansky said went
up without a permit and featured illegal electrical
and plumbing, among other issues — was not
nearly as dangerous as its critics alleged, according
to My Mandarin’s lease-holder, who blasted
the city for forcing him to remove what he called
an attractive addition to the market.
“This is not humanity, this is animality,” said
Roma, who refused to give his last name. “You
build something that’s beautiful, and then you
just have to destroy it again.”
Destroying the tent will cost the grocer millions,
said Roma, who added he will now use the
space near Ocean Parkway that the structure
once covered as a loading and parking area, like
the building’s previous owners did.
“This made me lose millions of dollars,” he
said. “We’ll be working without the tent. It’s a
loading and parking zone, where we’ll be loading
trash.”
But the public tent-à-tête between the city and
My Mandarin isn’t over yet — some of the violations
issued to the grocer came with fi nancial
penalties, requiring its owners to make a March
appearance before a judge with the Offi ce of Administrative
Trials and Hearings, who will determine
the amount of the fi nes, according to Buildings
Department records.