Brooklyn Heights residents may be holding their breath: The Post reports that a developer whom the Public Advocate has called a "slumlord" has confirmed that he bought the Hotel Bossert, which is for Jehovah's Witnesses members, on Montague Street: "He declined to reveal the purchase price but said the building’s original façade would be preserved and that he plans to have it running as a hotel again by 2014, pending city approval." more ›

Yesterday, the NY Times reported that an Upper East Side landlord was suing to evict Faye Dunaway, claiming that the Oscar-winning actress was not living in her rent-stabilized, one-bedroom walkup. Now, Dunaway has left three voicemail messages with the NY Times, explaining that her landlord can't sue to evict her...'cause she's not even living there anymore. more ›

The new argument against the Islamic community center and mosque planned for Lower Manhattan? The center's Imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf, will infest the hallowed ground near Ground Zero with bedbugs. It's being reported that Rauf, who owns a couple of apartment buildings in Union City, NJ, has let the properties deteriorate so badly that Union City is suing him for violating tenants' rights laws. NJ.com reports that the problems with the apartments include leaks, mold, bedbug and rodent infestation and fire hazards. The city has stationed a cop car outside one of the buildings since last week because residents have complained there are no working fire alarms! more ›

Yesterday, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio launched a new online slumlord watchlist, in an attempt to hold landlords accountable in a way they never have been before. "When you or I get a parking ticket, we have to pay. When a landlord gets a violation for a health and safety problem, they ignore it in many cases and then they ignore it and then they ignore it again," he told the Daily News. more ›

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio launched a new slumlord watch list today, with 153 wastrel landlords included to begin with. "We want these landlords to feel like they're being watched," de Blasio said. "We need to shine a light on these folks to shame them into action." more ›

You know you must be pretty sleazy when your behavior makes State Senate scofflaw Pedro Espada, Jr. blush. Yesterday the esteemed Senator from Bronxchester abruptly fired his deputy chief of staff, Onix A. Sosa, after the Times confronted him about Sosa's past work managing 35 buildings in upper Manhattan and the Bronx with close to 7,400 unresolved violations, including 1,100 deemed immediately hazardous. That kind of thing doesn't fly in Espada's office, at least not once the press catches wind of it. In a statement, Espada said, "I was shocked and, quite frankly, blindsided by this revelation." more ›

Permanent residents of the The Jane Hotel in the West Village say conditions at the shabby-chic reinvention of the old Hotel Riverview are so horrid that they've no choice but to picket outside the landlords' other establishments, which include celebrity favorite The Waverly Inn. On Wednesday night they made quite a scene outside the restaurant, and apparently won the sympathy of Hugh Jackman. The Post reports that as they chanted "Slumlords!" and "Rats!" outside, Jackman approached them to talk. Looking at photos depicting the dilapidated conditions at The Jane, he reportedly gasped, "Oh, my God." Diane von Furstenberg also showed some pity, asking, "Who are the slumlords?" That would be Eric Goode and Sean McPherson, who also run the Bowery Hotel, where the group protested last night over what publicist Ronn Torossian, their representative, calls "appalling conditions. Rats run [around] daily, asbestos lingers and 99 complaints have been filed in recent months with city housing authorities." more ›