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PACIFIC RETAIL CAPITAL PARTNERS, THE CAPPELLI ORGANIZATION AND S.L. GREEN  PRESENTED THE LARGEST  PROPOSAL FOR DEVELOPMENT EVER IN WHITE PLAINS, (OR FOR WESTCHESTER COUNTY) LAST NIGHT, PROPOSING 6 APARTMENT COMPLEXES  (7 BUILDINGS TOTAL)FROM 9 TO  41 STORIES,  NONE OF WHICH VIOLATE ANY HEIGHTS, BUT WILL ADD 3,200 RESIDENTIAL APARTMENTS.

PARKING WOULD BE UNDERGROUND. WEINGARTEN SAID THE PARTNERS WOULD BUY THE PRESENT GARAGE FROM THE CITY AND DEMOLISH IT AND REMEDIATE ANY CONTAMINATIONS THAT MIGHT BE THERE. HE ASSURED PARKING AVAILABILITY WOULD BE ESTABLISHED FOR THE LIBRARY ACROSS THE STREET AND OTHER WORKERS IN THE MUNICIPAL AREA.

WEINGARTEN SAID DISTRICT GALLERIA IS A CONCEPT AND PRCP WAS PRESENTING THE DESIGN TO SEE IF THE CITY WAS  ENTHUSIASTIC ABOUT DIRECTION PRCP SEES FOR THE PROJECT.

RESIDENTS WOULD INCLUDE 12% AFFORDABLE HOUSING (384 OF 3,200).  MARK WEINGARTEN, OF DelBello Donnellan Weingarten Wise & Wiederkehr  REPRESENTING  THE PRCP GROUP SAID.

AN OVERHEAD VIEW OF THE 11-ACRE PROJECT. MR. WEINGARTEN SAID THE PROJECT WOULD ENERGIZE THE STREETS, LONG A MAYOR ROACH OF WHITE PLAINS DREAM, WITH STREET WELCOMING RETAIL  AND RESTAURANTS UP AND DOWN MAIN STREET AND MARTINE AVENUES, OPEN SPACE, A PERFORMANCE SQUARE AND A FOOD HALL, AND 7 RESTAURANTS, AS WELL AS UPSCALE RETAIL

The presentation began with ANNMARIE PLENGE, EXECUTIVE VICE PRESIDENT OF DESIGN, for PRCP) (pictured next to Mr. Weingarten introducing the project)  narrating a 12-minute flyover video of the concept, then the architect went into specific detail with still pictures from the video pictured above.

 This project reminded me of the old gray Rockefeller Center project in New York City which was started in 1931, funded by John D. Rockefeller. It was completed in 8 years and contained 19 buildings, and of course the Rockefeller Skating rink.

The design is  beyond contemporary, it has energy. is attractive, stunning.

Stunning is not always attractive to those who do not like change.

The sheer grandeur of the project  and design audacity  is highly unconforming to the downtown collection of buildings now under construction.

The District Galleria reflects  the glass and grandeur of the central  glass Opus hotel and the matching 41 story condominiums. It reaches out and connects to those glass towers that started the White Plains Renaissance.

I recalled Ayn Rand’s architect  character in The Fountainhead published in 1943.

Briefly Howard Roark,  as Wikipedia  describes the plot “is an intransigent young Architect who battles against conventional standards and refuses to compromise with an architectural establishment unwilling to accept innovation.

“Roark embodies what Rand believed to be the ideal man, and his struggle reflects Rand’s belief that “Individualism” is superior to “Social organization” “Collectivism_and_individualism.” 

“Roark is opposed by what he calls “second-handers”, who value conformity over independence and integrity.

 There is nothing ordinary, boring, or second-hand or conforming about “District Galleria”– it’s so out front and regal.

The Common Council, according to Councilman Justin Brasch, received the drawings Tuesday night, after the two presentations, commented avidly  one after another, eagerlt burst into spontaneous opinionated commentary

 Mr. Brasch objected to both the number of buildings and their heights. He called for  more affordable housing, and more local flavor.

Nadine Hunt-Robinson called for more connection to existing White Plains institutions, like the Thomas Slater Center, art from the White Plains Schools, the Youth Bureau inclusion, and called for reachout to minority and local contractors. Ms. Hunt-Robinson also said White Plains seeks to involve all the citizens in its endeavors and that District Galleria needed to balance that.

 Jennifer Puja, Councilwoman, echoed Ms. Hunt-Robinson calling for more city say in its development,as well as use of local contractors, and citizen merchants for what she called “Mom and Pop Popups.” She felt that affordable was definitely important and  as well as “affordable restaurants” and “affordable retail.”

 Mayor Thomas Roach spoke out three times reminding all in the room the concept was not yet a site plan, saying that a site plan had not yet been submitted.

But this baby was a splash!

Pacific Retail Capital Partners seeks a zoning change for the property at this time to change The Galleria to build residential buildings.

 In the  face of this barrage of Council concern, Mr. Weingarten (RIGHT) standing beside Louis Cappelli, assured the council that their concerns would be dealt with and could be worked out.

In a news release sent media this morning, the project details are described this way:

Nearly half of the project’s footprint is designated as open space, breaking down existing barriers and creating a quarter mile-long green promenade complete with pet playgrounds, pocket parks, and lush landscaping for community gatherings, outdoor events, public entertainment, and art. The District Galleria features a garden promenade designed to link the adjacent neighborhoods at eight different access points, providing a place for the public to live, shop, walk, play, engage and be entertained.

The redevelopment of the Galleria site would align with the city’s strategic plan to expand transit-oriented development. The project aims to enhance the city’s skyline with buildings of varied heights to maximize views and create a light filled and landscaped place of natural beauty and elevated design.

Annemarie Plenge, Executive Vice President of Design for PRCP, is the Master Architectural Designer of the project.

Plenge brings a wealth of more than 25 years of professional experience master planning large-scale mixed-use projects and is collaborating with world renowned architectural design and planning firm Gensler, along with Kimley Horn and Eric Rain Landscape Architecture to design this urban oasis.

“Experience driven mixed-use environments appeal to people’s desire for connection and belonging. They are poised to be the key in reviving our communities’ urban centers. The evolution of an enclosed mall to an open-air mixed-use development with the unified vision of The District Galleria is pivotal in evolving real estate for the next generation,” said Najla Kayyem, Executive Vice President for Pacific Retail Capital Partners.

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THE SUN RETURNED TUESDAY AFTERNOON AT 2:10 p.m.REVEALING ITSELF AFTER A WEEK OF OVERCAST SKIES AND 4 INCHES OF RAIN IN WHITE PLAINS NEW YORK USA. THIS MORNING IT MADE A DAZZLING SECOND APPEARANCE. DIDN’T YOU MISS IT? I KNOW I DID! WE ALL LIVE FOR THE SUN

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Don’t be surprised if masks come back to hospitals and nursing homes

The case for it, against it, and a big unanswered question

By Dr. KATELYN JETELINA

(Reprinted with Permission)

SEP 26, 2023

This will be the first winter with Covid-19 that we’re not in a public health emergency. This leaves a lot of questions open for the front line, like hospitals, health departments, and nursing homes, including: Do we reinstate mandatory masking in hospitals this fall/winter?

The scientific evidence shows a solid case for reinstating masks in hospitals and long-term care facilities. So much so that I think it’s worth pushing through the inertia.

Here’s the data’s story.

Setting the scene

Before the pandemic, hospitals ran on an average of ~65% occupancy. Wiggle room was built in, but in pre-pandemic times, it wasn’t unusual for hospitals to reach capacity during a bad flu season, especially in pediatric hospitals and ICUs.

The pandemic brought new realities:

1. We have a new virus in our repertoire of threats.
2. We have not increased our capacity.
3. Healthcare workers are burnt out and leaving in droves.
4. We have learned a ton about viruses, transmission, and available tools to help.

Enter the case for masks

Masks are one tool that can help keep capacity down and workers and patients healthy.

In-hospital respiratory infections are a problem, particularly for kids. If you go to a hospital, you’re at risk of getting an infection you didn’t have when entering the door. This isn’t new; nosocomial infections, like surgical site infections, ventilator-associated pneumonia, and catheter-associated urinary tract infections, have been a problem for decades.

We also see hospital acquired respiratory illnesses:

• One study (pre-pandemic) found in-hospital respiratory infections were 5 cases per 10,000 adult admissions; 44 cases per 10,000 pediatric admissions.
  • 13% of people died from in-hospital respiratory infections.
  • 2 of 3 in-hospital respiratory infections occurred during the fall and winter.
• Another study (during the pandemic) of 288 hospitals found that 4.4% of hospitalizations were due to in-hospital Covid-19 infections.

Community transmission increases hospital transmission. Close quarters, close contact, vulnerable people.

• One study found a 10% increase in community-onset SARS-CoV-2 infection rate was associated with a 178% increase in the hospital-onset infection rate.

Healthcare workers come to work sick. High workload burden, a sense of personal responsibility, a lack of paid sick time, and perceived expectations. This results in:

• A significant proportion (15-70%) coming to work sick with flu, for example.
• A Covid-19 study found 50% presenteeism while sick with symptoms.

Masks work . . . especially in hospitals.

Masks work on individuals. We have limited evidence on whether they work to reduce population-level transmission. But some of the most substantial evidence is in hospitals:

• A large clinical trial (pre-pandemic) found bacterial and viral infections were significantly lower among healthcare workers who continuously wore an N95 compared to other study groups, like those who wore a surgical mask or no mask at all.
• One review examined 40 studies on masks in healthcare settings (one randomized controlled trial and 39 observational studies). The majority of studies favored masking vs. not masking in healthcare.

What is the case for not making masks mandatory in hospitals?

There are a few reasons I’ve heard (beyond the normal “masks don’t work” argument):

1. We didn’t do it in pre-pandemic times.
   1. For the public, this is true. Donning a mask as a personal measure to prevent hospital infections is a new step we’ve taken during the pandemic. This is a highly contagious virus. And we’ve learned leaps and bounds, like the role of asymptomatic disease and viral transmission routes.
   2. For healthcare workers, masks have been a core tool for decades, especially when managing patients with potential respiratory infections. The questions are really when and where? Tossing the mask altogether has never been on the table in high-risk healthcare settings.
2. Negatively impacts healthcare workers. One study in Singapore found that one-third of nurses said wearing masks negatively affected their work, such as discomfort, frequent adjustment, and inability to concentrate.
3. Are these infections preventable? Hospital-onset Covid-19 infections occurred at similar rates as other health care–associated infections, like UTIs. A national goal is to reduce these, but this raises a good question about how preventable in-hospital respiratory infections are.
4. “I thought we were done with mandates!” There is a distinction between public mandates aimed at the population as a whole and a much narrower mandate for specific high-risk settings. If you don’t set foot in a hospital or long-term care facility, most (all?) mask orders won’t impact you.

The biggest question remains

If masks are reinstated, what are the on- and off-ramps, if any? There are a few options:

1. Keep mandatory masking throughout the year.
2. Universal masking during a window of time. For example, Marin County has decided to mask in hospitals from November through March after looking at respiratory trends in wastewater data.
3. Universal masking in high-risk units, like organ transplants and oncology. (Although there are high-risk patients throughout the hospital.)
4. Require masks based on hospital capacity. But what capacity? This would be confusing to patients going to different hospitals.

Like any policy, where you land on this ultimately comes down to values. (And we know nothing gets people’s blood boiling more than masks.)

Bottom line

Do not be surprised if hospitals and long-term care facilities return to mandatory masking soon. Some have already announced that they are coming down the pipeline.

Infectious diseases violate the assumption of independence— what we do directly impacts those around us. A low-cost, minimally invasive intervention, like masking, is a great way to start protecting our community’s highest-risk individuals this fall and winter season.

Love, YLE

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“Your Local Epidemiologist (YLE)” is written by Dr. Katelyn Jetelina, M.P.H. Ph.D.—an epidemiologist, wife, and mom. During the day, she is a senior scientific consultant to several organizations. At night, she writes this newsletter. Her main goal is to “translate” the ever-evolving public health world so that people will be well-equipped to make evidence-based decisions. This newsletter is free, thanks to the generous support of fellow YLE community members. To support this effort, subscribe below:

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WPCNR COVID SURVEILLANCE. Statistics from NY Covid Tracker. Observation and Analysis By  John F. Bailey. September 25, 2023:

The 167 Persons in Westchester County newly infected positive with Covid in 7 days since  Thursday, September 14 spread the very infectious new strains of covid to 1,260 persons in 7 days meaning that each person spread their covid infection to 7.5 other persons. Considering that the disease in the area is infecting 7 persons for every person testing positive within 2 days this is cause for concern. 

Covid is spreading fast, fast, fast.

The 2 week infected person spreading their covid to others in  the first two weeks in September  was one person infecting 2 persons, figured by  919 infections August 20 to 26 infecting 1,991 persons August 27 through September 9, a rising rate from the containing 1 to 1 infection rate in early August. Since September 9^th infections have risen in midweek to approximately 194 a day the first 5 days September 17 to  21.

You contact someone within 2 days you come down with symptoms perhaps cold symptoms or a slight fever, chills. The persons you saw within 24 hours to 48 hours you may have given the disease to.

In  a week September  14 to 21, 167 covid infections on the 14 have accounted for   1,260 new covid cases.

This week Westchester is on track for 1,358 new cases, the  7^th week of rising covid infections in a covid environment infecting faster at the rate of  186 cases a day (18.6 new cases a day for 100,000 segments of Westchester’s population, 10,004,000.) The 186 cases a day computes to 1,302 cases for this week; and if the spread rate continues at a 1 person newly infected infecting 7 other persons the disease will  spread exponentially.

The disease is spreading in the boroughs of New York City at the rate of  1,537 new covid cases a day.

Nassau and Suffolk are spreading at  a total for the two counties of 700 new cases a day.

The Mid-Hudson Region has Westchester leading infections with 161, Orange and Rockland with 78, Dutchess, 48, and Sullivan, with 11 and Putnam 7 for a total of 383 cases a day..

The number of antigen (home test positives) lab verified is running 33% of new covid cases in New York City.

In Westchester the antigen test verified cases  as part of the  161 Westchester total is 32%.

In Nassau and Suffolk County people are getting covid at the highest rate of all 7 counties and New York City.  Of  700 total covid positives in Nassau and Suffolk Counties, 52% of the cases, 361 were verified antigen positives. That says to me people are getting sick, going for antigen tests, testing positive with the ominous “+” sign and going for treatment.

If my extrapolations are on target based on the state numbers, the spread is not lessening. The disease is quick-spreading as shown by 200 a day infections in Westchester at midweek.

People are not being careful, not masking, and well the disease is exploiting their behavior.

The unknown factor are the infections of covid among school children going back to school districts not paying attention to infections, verifying covid cases in students, and not reporting them. If they are school as usual this will inflate cases among children and their parents and that is impossible to tell of the extent of what the “Invisible School Spread” will be.