After hearing testimony from TCR's environmental expert (ending at 12:15 AM), the Board carried the hearing to a special meeting, which is solely for this application and which will be held on:
 

 
You can view TCR's plans or any of their reports and submissions, on any business day, 9am to 4pm, at the Planning and Zoning Office on the 3rd Floor of City Hall.
 
A word about Monday night's testimony. TCR took the unusual move of beginning with their environmental expert, rather than someone who would describe the proposed project to the Board, for dramatic purposes. TCR wants to immediately impress the Board that Neumann is a ticking time bomb, an environmental horror, which will spread to and poison Hoboken unless the Board approves TCR's project so TCR can jump in and save the city.  
 
The expert followed the script by producing charts with "blobs" of contamination seeping out, and long lists of evil-sounding substances, from arsenic on, which are found on the property. We should stress, though, that he was forced to admit that no imminent danger exists and that there is no evidence that the environment in the building is harmful to the people working there. Our Lawyer, (and others who are not connected with NLTA) will be cross-examining TCR's witness at the next hearing.
 
From our perspective, the important point to make is that the property is not a hazard so as to scare the Board into ignoring the zoning for the property, but a typical industrial property in a usable condition consistent with the Industrial zoning district it is located in.

Please download a Sept. 24th flyer (36kb pdf) and distribute freely!

We need to raise emergency funds for our legal warchest!

Neumann Leathers Tenants, if you are planning to participate in the Upcoming Hoboken Artists Studio Tour that is to take place October 19, 2008 - please be sure to get your application in by the Sept. 1 Deadline!

A copy of the application PDF is available here for download.

We strongly encourage all tenants to participate, as it brings greater awareness to our cause to the community at large! 

NLTA made its prescence known at the Hoboken Art and Music Festival on May 4th with a booth that featured "Faces of Neumann Leather" - photos of some of the artists and businesses here.

Dozens of Hoboken residents stopped by to reminisce about Neumann and voice their support for our efforts to save the buildings. For instance, an elderly Hispanic woman came over with her grandson (as translator) to tell us that her first job when she moved here in the 1950s was at Neumann Leather.

Neumann Leathers Open Studios
Sunday, May 18
1 p.m. to 7 p.m.

The public is invited to see the thriving arts community that still exists at Neumann, which is currently threatened by new development—development that will completely destroy one of the city’s last artistic and historic arts complexes. Extraordinary efforts are inplace to ensure the continuation of this wonderful Hoboken legacy, which will not only preserve some existing structures, but also creates new ones. The current “Piazza Plan,” which has been presented by the NLTA, will also create public space that will benefit all Hoboken citizens.

Click below to view 3 "SAVE NEUMANN" video appeals from NLTA members, created by Mark Gasper. Click play to watch each 30-second qucktime video.

TCR is continuing to show their 5-story, total eviction, total demolition plan to local condo meetings, city officials and council people, and has now sent their plan to the Hoboken Zoning Board with the likely outcome that the Board will not hear the application as Neumann is too large a project to move forward with only a zoning change and variances. There is recent legal precedent for this.

In the midst of this, TCR informed the NLTA that they had found a "local artist's group" to manage the "temporary" relocation of Neumann tenants off-site to empty the Neumann buildings in preparation for demolition. This group, named FABA (For Artists By Artists) was mentioned in TCR's plan, along with other information useful to NLTA.TCR couldn't or wouldn't at that time give us a name or phone number for this group but some steering committee members managed to ferret out FABA’s contact info. Tom Newman made contact with a principal of FABA, and once NLTA's presence and work at Neumann was made clear, FABA withdrew from their dealings with TCR.