Located on one of Manhattan’s southernmost points, Pier a Harbor House – a renovated pier at the foot of the West Side Highway with incomparable views of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty – finally opened in 2014 after a decade long delay With great fanfare.
But bad luck still looms over the 28,000-square-foot dining venue, whose prime downtown location made it a perfect match for financial district office workers and tourists heading to the World Trade Center site on the Staten Island Ferry.
abc report The owner of the establishment, which was closed in 2020 due to COVID-19, owes the city a whopping $32 million in back payments. The outlet notes that the city spent $30 million in taxpayer money to restore the pier’s Victorian structure to make the dining venue a reality. The father-son team of owners, Harry and Peter Poulakos, in turn signed a 25-year lease with the city and vowed to pay $39.1 million in rent during that period.
While the Poulakos’ reopened other eateries in the city — including nearby Harry’s NYC, Le District and Adrienne’s Pizza Bar — Pier a Harbor House never followed suit after a pandemic-related closure.
Not only this, the establishment started falling behind in paying its rent in 2018. That’s according to a state Supreme Court lawsuit filed in 2021 Quoted by ABC — and filed by the lenders to the dining destination, with Pier A handing over its keys to the Battery Park City Authority in the summer of 2020.
“The Defendants also misled the Plaintiffs about the borrower’s finances during the course of the loan, and concealed the fact that, between February 2018 and October 2018, he completely stopped paying the rent owed to BPCA under the lease until she eventually faced total eviction from the premises,” the lawsuit reads.
However, in 2021, a judge dismissed the lawsuitConcluding that the allegations of fraud and misrepresentation proved to be insufficient.
Through its public affairs advisor, the Battery Park City Authority declined to share the Pier A update with the network and information on back rents. It also would not comment on who owns the property now.
Christopher Marte, the city councilman who represents the area, told ABC he was also trying to get updated information about the pier.
“Nobody wants to see an empty beautiful pier in Lower Manhattan,” he told the outlet. “I think we should use it for tourism. The city needs money to bounce back.