{"id":205405,"date":"2025-09-06T16:29:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-06T16:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/205405\/"},"modified":"2025-09-06T16:29:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-06T16:29:13","slug":"nonprofit-bosses-turned-historic-park-avenue-armory-into-private-club-on-taxpayers-dime-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/205405\/","title":{"rendered":"Nonprofit bosses turned historic Park Avenue Armory into ‘private club’ on taxpayer’s dime: community"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bosses at the nonprofit Park Avenue Armory on the Upper East Side have turned the national landmark into their \u201cown personal country club\u201d \u2014 while fighting to kick out two dozen child cadets from the nation\u2019s oldest afterschool program<\/a> in its building, The Post has learned.<\/p>\n

The nonprofit running the space \u2013 the Seventh Regiment Armory Conservancy \u2013 has been\u00a0using the 145-year-old building to host exclusive affairs like fashion shows by Giorgio Armani, Marc Jacob and Oscar de la Renta and after-parties attended by the likes of Beyonce, Victoria Beckham and Orlando Bloom.<\/p>\n

Pharrell Williams, Helen Lasichanh, Karl Lagerfeld, and Beyonc\u00e9 were at a Chanel fashion show hosted in 2014 at the Park Avenue Armory. WireImage<\/p>\n

Brooke Shields, Orlando Bloom, Anna Wintour, and Francesco Carrozzini attended the Giorgio Armani fashion show at the Armory last fall. Kevin Mazur\/Getty Images for Giorgio Armani<\/p>\n

While nonprofit executives rub elbows with boldfacers, they\u2019ve neglected their mandate to preserve the historic site and, critics allege, fudge numbers to score public funding as it bleeds money.<\/p>\n

In 2006, the Conservancy secured a 99-year state lease on the valuable property \u2014 a cavernous building that spans an entire city block bounded by East 66th and 67th Streets and Park and Lexington Avenues \u2014 which was once used for military training, drills and storing weapons.<\/p>\n

At the time, it said it would model its conservancy after the one that cares for Central Park, which was recently exposed by The Post for doling out<\/a> sky-high executive paychecks.<\/p>\n

Restoration was supposed to be the first priority under the lease from the state, which owns the land, but in 19 years the Conservancy has managed to fix up just four of the building\u2019s historic rooms. A dozen others remain in disrepair, sources told The Post.<\/p>\n

The Park Avenue Armory occupies an entire city block on the Upper East Side. J.C. Rice<\/p>\n

Instead, it\u2019s hosted posh high-society galas with cocktails, performances and dinners going for $10,000 a plate, attended by the likes of Julianne Moore, Anna Wintour and Jeffrey Epstein madam Ghislaine Maxwell.<\/p>\n

It even hosted the wedding celebration for its event coordinator Liz Bickley in September 2022 \u2014 on the nonprofit\u2019s dime.<\/p>\n

Disgraced socialite Ghislaine Maxwell has been among those to attend annual galas at the Park Avenue Armory. Bloomberg via Getty Images<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re very close to our staff . . . we\u2019re a family,\u201d the Conservancy\u2019s CEO Rebecca Robertson said in defense of the wedding during a 2024 deposition in the cadet-eviction case. She admitted their inner circle got to use the space for free for private functions.<\/p>\n

Such policies have raised questions about how the $19.8 million the conservancy has received in taxpayer funds since 2020 is being used.<\/p>\n

CEO Rebecca Robertson has called the nonprofit\u2019s staff \u201cvery close\u201d and like \u201ca family.\u201d AP<\/p>\n

\u201cThey say they have this mission, but what they\u2019ve created is a private social club. This is not about culture or history or anything,\u201d slammed Upper East Sider Jay Stallard.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s enraging the community even more is the deep-pocketed group \u2014 led by real estate heavyweight Adam Flatto<\/a> and holding $160 million in assets, much of it offshore in the Cayman Islands \u2014 could easily afford the restoration it promised.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s an arrogance there,\u201d said Alida Camp, an Upper East Side resident. \u201cThey ought to show some more respect for the fact that they have a lease with the state, and it\u2019s on state land. It\u2019s not private property for them. I just I find their attitude, that behavior, very offensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adam Flatto, pictured here with Maxwell in 2004, has been on the conservancy\u2019s board since its creation in 2006, and its co-chair since 2013. JIMI CELESTE\/ Patrick McMullan<\/p>\n

The Conservancy received $1.4 million from the federal Paycheck Protection Program in both 2020 and 2021, claiming it would allow it to preserve 189 jobs during the pandemic, according to public filings.<\/p>\n

But nearly half of the $2.8 million it received went to CEO Rebecca Robertson over those two years. She pocketed $645,104 in total compensation in 2020, and $623,813 in 2021.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not known how many jobs were preserved with the remaining $1.5 million. A deposition from an unrelated slip and fall lawsuit revealed that the nonprofit only had dozens of people on staff, not hundreds, before the pandemic.<\/p>\n

Brie Larson, Orlando Bloom, and Aaron Taylor-Johnson at a Giorgio Armani after-party at the Armory last fall. WWD via Getty Images<\/p>\n

And despite the massive public funding it\u2019s raked in, the conservancy has still managed to run a deficit almost every year since 2016. It was $12 million in the red in 2023, the last year for which tax filings are publicly available.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile the conservancy has been fighting tooth and nail to evict the Knickerbocker Greys, the youth cadet group that\u2019s been meeting for an hour per week after school since 1902 in a small room in the Armory\u2019s basement \u2013 in defiance of a bill signed last year by Gov. Kathy Hochul<\/a> that prohibited the group from kicking out the Greys.<\/p>\n

Despite the bill and a Manhattan court judge ruling in the Greys favor last month, the conservancy has told the children they were only allowed to come by the Armory to retrieve their belongings, according to a source in the group.<\/p>\n

The Knickerbocker Greys, an afterschool child cadet group, had been at the Armory for 120 years. Obtained by the New York Post<\/p>\n

In the Aug. 20 ruling in Manhattan civil court, Judge Jeffrey Zellan shamed the execs for being \u201cunable or unwilling\u201d to let another non-profit use a space of \u201cless than a thousand square feet in a building occupying an entire city block.\u201d<\/p>\n

But the nonprofit execs wasted no time filing an appeal by Aug. 25. In court filings, the conservancy maintains evicting the children is necessary \u201cto further its public goals.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThese kids should be honored and not treated like second class citizens,\u201d Stallard said. \u201cIt\u2019s disgusting. . . . the audacity is just right in front of you, it\u2019s just impossible not to see.\u201d<\/p>\n

Victoria Beckham, Marc Jacobs, and Jennifer Lopez at a fashion show in 2008 at the Park Avenue Armory. WireImage<\/p>\n

In response to inquiries by The Post, the nonprofits execs had the audacity to call Hochul\u2019s bill \u201cillegal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are challenging this unlawful bill which would set a precedent that allows the state to seize and assign legally leased spaces to another party,\u201d a spokesperson said.\u00a0\u201cThe bill is a result of cronyism and machine politics.\u201d<\/p>\n

Models walk the runway during the Marc Jacobs Runway 2024 Show at the Park Avenue Armory last February. Getty Images<\/p>\n

The conservancy also said it raised and invested more than $174 million in the renovation and restoration of the building, but did not specify how many rooms that represented \u2013 or answer questions about the use of the space for parties, or the number of people it has on staff or how many jobs besides Richardson\u2019s were saved with the pandemic relief funds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bosses at the nonprofit Park Avenue Armory on the Upper East Side have turned the national landmark into…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":205406,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,20179,49022,472,5248,405,403,5226,5225,15418,5228,5227,23099,14416,67,586,132,5230,68,1154,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-205405","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-army","10":"tag-ghislaine-maxwell","11":"tag-history","12":"tag-metro","13":"tag-new-york","14":"tag-new-york-city","15":"tag-newyork","16":"tag-newyorkcity","17":"tag-nonprofits","18":"tag-ny","19":"tag-nyc","20":"tag-park-avenue","21":"tag-salaries","22":"tag-united-states","23":"tag-united-states-of-america","24":"tag-unitedstates","25":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","26":"tag-us","27":"tag-us-news","28":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115158303810749631","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=205405"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/205405\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/205406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=205405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=205405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=205405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}