Noah Fecks The bagel burger at Tompkins Square Bagels did not get a warm reception from our local expert.

When we got wind of the bagel burger at Tompkins Square Bagels, we knew just the person to try it. So we called Josh “Mr. Cutlets” Ozersky, the East Villager who wrote “The Hamburger: A History.” Would the bagel burger replace the one at Veselka as his favorite? Or would it be too sacrilegious for a burger purist?

The Bagel Burger at Tompkins Square Bagels has the distinction of combining the worst hamburger in the East Village with one of the most disappointing bagels; but that’s not why I hate it so much. At first, it struck me that the clownishly oversized bagels, as puffy and bloated as parade floats, would actually serve a burger well.

A traditional bagel, which is what I had hoped for, would have been far too dense and chewy for any form of ground beef: a single bite would have sent the meat squishing out to the sides, or swallowed up all its juices entirely.

But one of these augmented, airy confections might be OK. And so they might have been, had not the place chosen to cheap out and serve a gray, pasty puck of meat that woudn’t look out of place in a convenience store refrigerator. Thin as a cat’s ear, without even a hint of taste or moisture, this thing would have been overwhelmed by a slice of wonder bread.
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The Local is following progress at the soon-to-open NoHo outpost of Mile End with an eager appetite. Today we spotted a sign noting that the Montreal smoked meat Mecca is hiring cooks and servers. A co-owner of the restaurant, Noah Bernamoff, recently told Grub Street that he was hoping to open this month. One thing is for certain: Katz’s will be facing some of its stiffest competition since the days of the Second Avenue Deli once Mile End does open.

Suzanne Rozdeba The Cut, at 120 East Seventh Street.

A new barbershop, The Cut, is opening up at 120 East Seventh Street, next door to the Turntable Lab and across the street from Butter Lane and the Big Gay Ice Cream shop.

The shop was still closed at 1 p.m. today, with no word yet on when its touted grand opening will occur. But shiny new chairs, barber’s tools and mirrors could be seen neatly in place inside the store.

There’s also no indication whether pricey cuts and Sweeney Todd cocktails — a la the Blind Barber on East 10th Street — will be on the menu, or whether it’ll be as social of a spot as Perfection on Avenue C, where co-owner Hubert Phillip said it best: “A haircut is 80 percent of where the night will take you.”

Following the recent gun battle near the Baruch Houses and the arrest of an alleged armed member of the Money Boys gang, The Lo-Down reports that State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is calling for a gun buy-back program in the Lower East Side. “Far too many of my constituents live in fear of violence. We must take proactive steps to take guns out of the hands of criminals so that our streets are safer,” Mr. Silver wrote in a letter to Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance. A recent buy-back program in Crown Heights netted 29 semi-automatics.

Suzanne RozdebaPolice officers at the scene of a bank robbery this morning.

While taking photos for an upcoming story about the loss of parking spaces that will result from N.Y.U.’s proposed expansion (check back soon!), The Local was alerted to a robbery at CitiBank on Laguardia Place near West Third Street.

A police officer at the scene said that at around 9:30 a.m. a white male wearing a black hat, sunglasses and a black jacket flashed a gun at the bank and then fled. A police spokesman did not yet have information regarding whether the suspect escaped with any money.

An hour after the incident officers were still lingering at the scene and barring any customers from entering the bank.

Heather Hollland These little dogs may be romping, but one local found that they, and their owners, are generally a sensitive bunch.

Tompkins Square Park has two dog runs: one for large dogs and another for small and timid ones. And it’s not just the dogs that are different – their owners seem to make up two distinct communities.

I recently took my friend’s Boston terrier, Chuck, to the small dog run (Chuck is not a big dog. I’ve seen bigger cats). It’s a serene place where most of the owners sit on a deck under a beautiful old American Elm. A man wearing white jeans and pink sunglasses spoke into a pink cell phone with a Hello Kitty bauble hanging from it. A woman sang a song about “all the little animals” (it’s refrain was about veganism) and handed out fliers depicting animal abuse at slaughterhouses.

Michael Clemens The gate that separates the big dogs from the toys.

The dogs in this area are precious. The Yorkies, Maltese and Chihuahuas don’t pick up toys as much as gently lick them. Some have coats more brilliantly white than the bleached teeth of their owners. Occasionally they play or wrestle with each other in the sand, but it’s a pretty civil affair.

Chuck didn’t exactly fit in this environment. He tore into the park like a kamikaze pilot, blazed around it twice, and tackled a Yorkie. As he held the dog’s paw in his mouth and forced it into submission the vegan stopped singing, Hello Kitty looked at Chuck in disgust and the Yorkie’s owner began yelling at me.
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As we noted on Saturday, Billy Leroy planned to fold up his tent following a late night funeral bash and place it in a casket. Tim Schreier, a community contributor for The Local, was there to snap photos of the somber scene. According to him, the casket was on loan from a friend, which raises the obvious question: what lucky stiff will be laid to rest in the box that once held Mr. Leroy’s storied tent?

Tim Schreier

Top of the morning to you, East Village.

Our community contributor Tim Schreier snapped the above photo while attending a Code Pink protest that culminated in Union Square on Saturday. The group of under 100 protesters marched from Zuccotti Park in recognition of International Women’s Day. To see more photos from the scene check out Mr. Schreier’s photostream.

A tipster tells EV Grieve that Artichoke Pizza has expanded into the neighboring storefront that was occupied by Curly’s Vegetarian Lunch only two weeks ago. Grieve also notes that a tile bearing the “R” from the long gone Ratner’s restaurant has finally been removed thanks to renovations in Met Foods. If you’re feeling nostalgic you can still buy buttons from the waiters’ uniforms.

Following up on our coverage of Billy Leroy’s goodbye bash on Friday night, The Times attended the funeral procession for the tent “that had been patched so many times it was now more plastic than canvas.” Check back shortly for some more photos from the solemn ceremony.
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The hand in formaldehyde, the dusty Styrofoam mannequins and the subway signs for sale were long gone. But last night Billy Leroy and around 200 friends celebrated the now-closed antique shop on the Bowery a final time, raising their beers inside the iconic tent that will soon be six feet under.

“It’s sad, but it’s a new beginning,” said Mr. Leroy, patting the coffin like an old friend as neighborhood characters like Clayton Patterson, director Jim Jarmusch and writer Anthony Haden-Guest mingled with the crowd. “It’s an outpouring of love. All of my friends are here. It’s really amazing. I didn’t realize how much people love this place.”

The love was not in short supply because Mr. Leroy’s eponymous shop on East Houston Street at Bowery, which he ran for 10 years, had to close on Jan. 1. In the place of the store will go a two-story development, though the story isn’t entirely tragic. The tent will be gone, but the landlord, Tony Goldman, has assured Mr. Leroy his store will have a space in the building when complete.

By 8 p.m. the tent was at capacity as old friends and the crew from Mr. Leroy’s upcoming film rocked out to the bands The Naked Heroes and The Virgins. Two hours later the funeral bash had spilled out to the sidewalk.

At one point Mr. Leroy — a raconteur if there ever was one — grabbed the mic and shared a tale from his tent’s glory days. “A homeless dude came into the store and he brought me some pieces of junk. I said, ‘Dude, I don’t want this crap. Bring me like a human head or something,’” he recalled. “The next week, he was on 12th Street and saw a beautiful trunk. He was going to bring me the trunk, but it smelled funny. Inside the trunk was a young lady, dead. He was going to bring her to me, but he freaked out, and the cops took the trunk. His name is Spider, and he’s probably slithering around here somewhere.”

Not surprisingly, that wasn’t the only example of gallows humor last night.
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If you’re looking to take in some art this weekend, head uptown to The Art Show at the Park Avenue Armory, where admission goes towards the Lower East Side-based Henry Street Settlement.

And if the Upper East Side isn’t your thing, the Brucennial is on Bleecker Street at Thompson Street. Tim Schreier, a community contributor for The Local, recently snapped some photos of that show as well.

Would you like to shoot photos for The Local? Join our Flickr group.

OK dear readers, what the heck are these blind items all about? A fourth intriguing message has appeared in the window of the law office of Zenon B. Masnyj on East Seventh Street that hints at questionable goings-on at a credit union. Mr. Masnyj has told us in the past that he prefers to let the notes speak for themselves — the most recent one, pictured to the left, vaguely hints at “our money, their secrets.” Any East Village gumshoes have an idea what’s going on? Let us know in the comments or E-mail us.

Daniel Maurer

Life Cafe’s bar was still standing last week when The Local reported that one of the shuttered cafe’s two landlords had given up trying to come to terms with the other. If the lingering fixture gave you hope that there might be an eleventh-hour rapprochement in time for outdoor brunching season (which, apparently, is already upon us), you can set it aside.

A peek into the space last night revealed that although the summer specials are still pitifully up on the chalkboard, the wooden bar decorated with covers of Life magazine has now been dismantled. Rentheads, if you’re looking for souvenirs, this might be the time to keep your eye on the sidewalk.

Oh, and speaking of brunch, Grub Street reports that the Beagle is now serving it. Pancakes with foie-gras maple syrup, anyone?

N.Y.P.D. The suspected slashers.

The police are on the hunt for two men who they say sliced two other guys outside of IHOP on March 3.

According to the police, the dispute between the men began at around 6:20 a.m. at the house of pancakes on 14th Street. That’s when things escalated and the 25-year-old and 27-year-old victims were cut with an unknown object.

Both suspects, who are thought to be 20 to 25 years old, then fled the scene.

Tim SchreierRetna (right) with Mista Oh! (left) and mentors from The Art School w/out Walls.

Marquis Lewis, a.k.a. Retna, returned to the scene of his Houston Street mural today, to donate $5,000 to a program that teaches at-risk youth to create street art similar to his own.

The artist, who painted “A Conversation with a Great Friend” on the wall at Houston Street and Bowery last week, said that his donation to the Gowanus-based organization, Cre8tive YouTH*ink, was triggered, appropriately enough, by a conversation between friends in which Carlo McCormick, an East Villager and the Senior Editor of Paper magazine, connected him to Jerry Otero, a.k.a. Mista Oh!, an educator who runs the non-profit.

Last year, Mr. Otero, along with artist Ray Smith, launched The Art School w/out Walls, a program that connects at-risk kids in low-income neighborhoods with mentors who help them create public art. The program aims to expand into dance, music, and sports – hence the $5,000 check that Retna handed over at the wall today. Read more…

Evan Bleier

The city has whacked a bodega on Avenue D with a hefty fine, and not because it was selling “loosies” or illegal Four Lokos. Indeed, the Sergio Deli Superette’s stock resembles that of other bodega: Goya products, six packs, the daily paper. And that’s exactly why it’s in the city’s cross-hairs.

According to the Certificate of Occupancy that was issued in 1940, 127 Avenue D was zoned for use as a “garage for not more than five automobiles and storage.” When a city inspector following up on a complaint confirmed in December that the building was storing beer cans instead of cars, Bernard Margalit, the owner of the building, was hit with a $6,000 fine. Read more…

Giuseppi Logan, the saxophonist who made a name playing with John Coltrane and other jazz legends before disappearing for decades, is back in the studio. In a Kickstarter video, producer and folk singer-songwriter Ed Pettersen recounts hearing in 2009 that “one of the most expressive and innovative free-jazz saxophonists of the 60s” was homeless and busking in Tompkins Square Park. “When I heard about this,” he says, “I said I have to find Giuseppi. I have to work with him because he was one of my favorite sax guys.” Read more…

The proposed redrawn Congressional map would make the neighborhood look a bit less like a jigsaw puzzle of districts, meaning that – for the most part – only one member of Congress would answer to the East Village instead of three.

Currently, the East Village is divided into three congressional districts — the 8th, 12th and 14th — which are represented by Jerrold Nadler, Nydia Velázquez and Carolyn Maloney respectively. Under the proposed redistricting, the East Village would be dominated by the 12th District, with the 7th covering only the area east of Avenue D. Read more…

Suzanne Rozdeba

As one of Benjamin Shaoul’s buildings loses a tenant, another one is gaining one: Bea’s Café, a new coffee shop, aims to open next month in a building that has brought criticism to the ubiquitous developer.

A sign in the window of 514 East Sixth Street touts Bea’s as “an espresso bar and more.” Read more…

Evan Bleier Patricia James at Housing Court

A Housing Court judge initially moved to evict a resident of Two Bridges who owes over $14,000 to the New York City Housing Authority yesterday, but then postponed the ruling, leaving 67-year-old Patricia James fearful that she’ll end up in a shelter.

During a hearing in Housing Court yesterday, Judge Verna Saunders initially granted a judgment of possession for the Housing Authority and asked both parties to work out a stipulation agreement. But Ms. James ultimately rejected a proposal that would’ve allowed her four months to vacate her apartment if she paid the back rent. She argued that the Authority’s requested sum of over $14,000 didn’t reflect changes in her income over the past year.   Read more…