Perched on one of Manhattan’s southernmost points, Pier A Harbor House — a renovated pier at the bottom of the West Side Highway with incomparable views of Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty — finally opened in 2014 after a decades-long delay to great fanfare.
But bad luck still seems to loom over the 28,000-square-foot dining venue, whose prime downtown location made it the perfect match for Financial District office workers and tourists heading from the Staten Island Ferry to the World Trade Center site.
ABC reports that the owners of the establishment, which shut in 2020 due to COVID-19, owe the city a whopping $32 million in rent payments.
The outlet notes that the city shelled out $30 million in taxpayer money to restore the pier’s Victorian structure to make the dining destination a reality.
The owners, the father-and-son team of Harry and Peter Poulakakos, in exchange inked a 25-year lease with the city and vowed to pay $39.1 million in rent during that span.
While the Poulakakoses reopened other eateries in town — including the nearby Harry’s NYC, Le District and Adrienne’s Pizza Bar — Pier A Harbor House never followed suit after its pandemic-related closure.
What’s more, the establishment started falling behind on its rent payments in 2018. That’s according to a 2021-filed state Supreme Court lawsuit cited by ABC — and filed by the dining destination’s lenders, which added Pier A handed over its keys to the Battery Park City Authority in the summer of 2020.
“Defendants also misled Plaintiff about Borrower’s finances during the course of the Loan, and concealed the fact that, between February 2018 and October 2018, it had completely ceased paying the rent it owed to BPCA under the Lease, until it finally faced total dispossession of the Premises,” the lawsuit reads.
However, in 2021, a judge dismissed the suit, concluding that the charges of fraud and misrepresentation were insufficiently proven.
Through its public affairs consultant, the Battery Park City Authority declined to share Pier A updates with the network and info on the back rent. It also wouldn’t comment on who now owns the property.
City Councilman Christopher Marte, who represents this area, told ABC he’s also been trying to find out updates about the pier.
“No one 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 the money to bounce back.”
