The Daily News has the story of a woman who has lived in the same apartment for 50 years—she pays $147.08 per month. Now the landlord, the Berkeley Carroll School, wants her out. They’re also closing the Berkley Carroll Child Care Center that was in the building. I sort of assumed the building was owned by Methodist Hospital.

"It’s like closing a box, it’s like a death. How do you just go on?"

When
the Berkeley Carroll School – which charges up to $29,000 a year per
pupil – bought the site in the 1980s, Taliercio was offered $50,000 to
move out, she says.

Her rent was $147.08 a month, and she
refused the offer. But as every other tenant vacated the building, she
and her husband, Steve, became the sole occupants.

Two years ago, she was approached again and told she would receive $20,000 if she left. Her rent is still $147.08 a month.

"I can’t even think about [leaving] because it really upsets me," said Taliercio. "My children are buried at Green-Wood Cemetery
five minutes away, and I can go over there a few times a week. That’s
why I don’t want to leave. I just don’t think they’re being fair."

Rent-controlled tenants are exempt from eviction unless the landlord is a nonprofit organization, like Berkeley Carroll.

The school, in an application to the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal’s Office of Rent Administration, says it intends to renovate the entire premises to "provide for classrooms, workspaces and support spaces."

Taliercio
says the home contains precious memories of her two deceased children,
who were twins, and 50 years in a Brooklyn neighborhood that has
undergone huge changes.

"Besides the apartment holding all the
memories, my whole life has been here," she said. "It’s made a big
turnaround. I remember the race riots – people left, but I stayed.

"I couldn’t afford to rent around here anymore, but I don’t want to leave Park Slope."