An 82-year-old widow who lives in a rent-controlled apartment in Brooklyn Heights’ ritzy Bossert Hotel is preparing for the fight of her life now that the landmarked building has been sold.
Monica Grier raised a family in the three-bedroom apartment that she rents for less than $1,000-a-month. She moved there in the late 1960s when the hotel, once considered the Waldorf-Astoria of Brooklyn and the place where the Brooklyn Dodgers celebrated their 1955 World Series championship, had become a home to transients.
Now, she’s lawyered-up because she fears new ownership — which is planning to return the well-maintained property to its glorious hotel past — will try to force her out.
“When they go altering things, there are a number of things that can go wrong,” said Grier. “You always wonder what is it, and I didn’t want to wait and see.”
But an attorney for the new ownership, Clipper Equity and the Chetrit Group, said Grier and the three other tenants that live in the building have nothing to worry about.
“The owner recognizes there are four protected tenants who live in the building and their rights will be fully protected,” said Michael Sillerman, who added that he hadn’t heard Grier had hired a lawyer.
But Grier’s attorney, Richard Klass, hinted that landlords will sometimes make life difficult on tenants with guaranteed low rents in hopes of forcing them out — and he wants to make sure that doesn’t happen to his client.
“Our concern is that they maintain the property and all the systems as they have in the past and continue to recognize their tenancy,” said Klass, Grier’s. “Whatever repairs or alterations are done to the structure, we want to make sure the inconveniences are kept to a minimum.”
The hotel, which sits on the corner of Montague and Hicks streets, was built in 1909 by lumber magnate Louis Bossert.
It was purchased by the Watchtower Bible and Tract society in 1988. That group, the corporation used by the Jehovah’s Witnesses for its business purposes, meticulously renovated the building as it used it as a space to house staff.
Grier moved in with her husband George 43 years ago, when the building was a much less fancy place where tenants were outnumbered by “guests.”
“Mostly, the four corners were apartments and a lot of the rest of the building was transients,” she said in her charming English accent.
Back then, it was much easier — and cheaper — to find a place in the building, and Grier and her husband even let one of her apartment go during a summer in Great Britain.
“When we came back, there was a woman we knew who had an apartment we liked, so we waited for her to be gone and then we took it,” she said.
And she’s lived there ever since.
Reach reporter Danielle Furfaro at dfurfuaro@cnglocal.com or by calling (718) 260-2511.
