Siofra Neary, director of the Manhattan Sailing School. (Photo: Terese Loeb Kreuzer)

According to the American Sailing Association, the Manhattan Sailing School is the biggest adult sailing school in the country. It can accommodate up to 78 students a weekend.

The junior sailors go in Optimists. "They are light and look like bathtubs," said Neary. "Four kids work together to ready them for sailing. Then each child has his or her own boat."

The school can work with 25 children a week.

The school for juniors and teens is run through the New York Harbor Sailing Foundation. It was founded by the North Cove Marina's commodore, Michael Fortenbaugh, and a few of the Manhattan Sailing Club members as a non-profit organization to teach kids to sail.

The adult program is run by the Manhattan Sailing School.

Basic sailing for adults is a two-day course that costs $390. The classes last for 10 hours each day. Teens get a five-day course from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. for $390. The classes for juniors are also five days and cost $590.

There are scholarships available for the junior and teen sailors. To apply, the kids write about why they want to learn to sail and the family submits a tax return.

"Everyone can learn to sail," said Neary. In Ireland, she said, she learned how to work with disabled people. "I had to teach someone to sail with blindfolds on and to sail using only one hand," she recalled.  

There are 15 instructors for the adult program, seven for the teens and five for the juniors.   

"Everyone who works here loves sailing," she said. "Many instructors have other jobs as well but come here on the weekends because they love to teach sailing. They want to share that love. They work in finance, the Coast Guard, for the government, in marketing and advertising."

Neary said that after the basic sailing class, students will be competent and confident at crewing on a boat. "Everything you need to do on a boat, you will be able to do, but you'd want to have an experienced person with you," she said.  

In addition to basic sailing, there are courses in racing and in basic coastal cruising. In that course, the participants get on a boat on a Saturday morning and sail to Sandy Hook, N.J. where they stay overnight. Then, they sail back the next day. That costs $590 plus the hotel.   

Classes for adults start on April 26 and go through Oct. 19. The classes for children are in July and August.

"The best part of sailing down here is that you get a completely unique view of the city," said Neary. "Out on the water, it's quiet and calm and peaceful and yet you're still in Manhattan. It's an experience you can only have here because of what 'here' is."  

As she speaks, she doesn't stop smiling. 

"In New York, you can become the person you want to be," she said.  "I weirdly feel more at home here than I feel in Dublin."

- Terese Loeb Kreuzer

For more information about the Manhattan Sailing School, click here. 

SOUTHBRIDGE TOWERS OFFERING PLAN

Southbridge Towers is a middle-income, Mitchell-Lama co-op. (Photo: Terese Loeb Kreuzer)

To the editor:

(Re: Letter to the editor, "Southbridge Towers Offering Plan," DPNYC, 4/23/14.) This is in reply to Seymour Schleimer's letter in Downtown Post NYC in which he says that taking Southbridge Towers out of the Mitchell-Lama program would give shareholders the opportunity to "live the American dream of owning your home, with all the rights and advantages of owning real estate equity."

We, here at Southbridge Towers, are already living the middle-class American dream of home ownership. We wouldn't have to purchase our apartments if SBT should privatize because we already own them!

Every shareholder I've ever met here was overjoyed to buy into a "limited equity" co-op at a most affordable price. Who among us bought into SBT thinking that somewhere down the line, personal gain would justify pulling up the ladder behind us and depriving others of the same opportunity we continue to enjoy?

The buildings and grounds at Southbridge Towers have been, at least in part, modernized with taxpayer-subsidized loans and grants available to limited equity co-ops. Without subsidies and grants from the City and State for the social and support services we now receive, we will either lose those services or pay market rate for them. We own with pride and gratitude to the taxpayers of the State of New York.

Under the offering plan we would not be able to simply leave our apartments to heirs. Should the new plan go into effect, with only one exception, shareholders would have to bequeath their apartment to their heirs in a will. Succession could only take place after the shareholder dies. The heirs would be required to pay 33 percent of the market value to the Apartment Corporation plus all brokerage and legal fees before taking possession of the apartment.

Currently, shareholders can "transfer their apartments to certain family members without paying a transfer fee" (see Plan p. 7).

An alleged advantage of the offering plan is that it would enable reverse mortgages. However, government-backed reverse mortgages are not available to co-ops in New York.

In addition, a building and apartment containing friable asbestos (as SBT does) may not qualify as collateral for an equity loan.  This issue is most inadequately addressed in the Plan.

Mr. Schleimer lauds removal of "the power of the state agency to control the fate and management of the co-op." DHCR [Department of Housing and Community Renewal] would be replaced by a co-op Board of Directors with the right of refusal of just about everything and no regulatory oversight agency to rein in excesses. The Board would have the right to refuse a potential buyer and to refuse a person to whom a shareholder wished to sublet. Among other powers, the Board could deny or limit a shareholder's right to renovate an apartment or to make two bedrooms out of one.

Many co-op boards have been taken to court by shareholders over abuse of authority.

For these reasons, and others, I am opposed to the offering plan.

Roberta Singer

Southbridge Towers Shareholder

From the editor:

Downtown Post NYC welcomes letters to the editor. DPNYC reserves the right to edit letters, if necessary, for length and clarity. The Lower Manhattan community is faced with some thorny situations about which people disagree. Letters expressing disagreement are welcome so long as they remain respectful of other's opinions and refrain from personal invective. Send letters to editor@downtownpostnyc.com

Correction: The letter to the editor in DPNYC, 4/23/14, was incorrectly headed "Stockbridge Towers offering plan." It should have said, "Southbridge Towers offering plan."