529 E. 235th St. Estates LLC v. City of New York

2025 NY Slip Op 25254
CourtNew York Supreme Court, New York County
DecidedNovember 25, 2025
DocketIndex No. 156175/2025
StatusPublished

This text of 2025 NY Slip Op 25254 (529 E. 235th St. Estates LLC v. City of New York) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering New York Supreme Court, New York County primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
529 E. 235th St. Estates LLC v. City of New York, 2025 NY Slip Op 25254 (N.Y. Super. Ct. 2025).

Opinion

529 E. 235th St. Estates LLC v City of New York (2025 NY Slip Op 25254) [*1]

529 E. 235th St. Estates LLC v City of New York
2025 NY Slip Op 25254
Decided on November 25, 2025
Supreme Court, New York County
Kingo, J.
Published by New York State Law Reporting Bureau pursuant to Judiciary Law § 431.
This opinion is uncorrected and subject to revision before publication in the printed Official Reports.


Decided on November 25, 2025
Supreme Court, New York County


529 East 235th Street Estates LLC, Plaintiff,

against

The City of New York,
NEW YORK CITY DEPARTMENT OF BUILDINGS, Defendant.




Index No. 156175/2025

For Defendants City of New York and the New York City Department of Buildings:
Jerald Horowitz, Esq., Assistant Corporation Counsel, New York City Law Department.

For Plaintiff 529 East 235th Street Estates LLC:
Eytan Goldschein, Esq., Goldschein Law Practice Hasa A. Kingo, J.

The following e-filed documents, listed by NYSCEF document number (Motion 001) 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22 were read on this motion to DISMISS.

With the instant motion, defendants the City of New York ("City") and the New York City Department of Buildings ("DOB") (collectively, "Defendants") move, pursuant to CPLR § 3211(a), to dismiss the complaint filed by plaintiff 529 East 235th Street Estates LLC ("Plaintiff"). Defendants contend that no justiciable controversy exists to warrant declaratory relief absent a collection action; that RPAPL § 1501(1) is inapplicable to façade civil penalties because such penalties do not constitute encumbrances on title; and that Plaintiff failed to [*2]exhaust available administrative remedies, including the waiver procedures set forth in 1 RCNY § 103-04(d)(5) and (e). Plaintiff opposes. The motion is fully submitted, with the parties having filed memoranda of law, supporting affidavits, and presented oral argument on November 25, 2025. For the reasons that follow, Defendants' motion is granted, and the complaint is dismissed in its entirety.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiff is the owner of real property located at 529 East 235th Street, Bronx, New York (the "property") (NYSCEF Doc No. 2, complaint ¶ 10). As alleged in the complaint, the DOB has imposed façade violation penalties on the property under Local Law 11 of 1998, otherwise known as the Façade Inspection Safety Program ("FISP").[FN1] The violations in question include Violation No. 113007LL1198NRF44988, imposed on November 30, 2007, in the amount of $17,250.00, Violation No. 083013FISPNRF01159, imposed on August 30, 2013, in the amount of $4,250.00, and Violation No. 073118FISPNRF00350, imposed on July 31, 2018, in the amount of $100,000.00 (id. ¶ 12-14). The total amount of the violations is $121,500.00 (id. ¶ 14).

It is undisputed that Plaintiff failed to file the required FISP reports for multiple successive cycles. As a result, DOB issued the three violations identified above, each carrying a monetary penalty that remains unpaid and continues to appear on the Department of Finance's records for the property. Plaintiff neither challenged nor satisfied these penalties through DOB's Facade Unit, which provides a mechanism—via the "Waiver of Civil Penalties" process under 1 RCNY § 103-04—for owners to contest alleged errors in façade-related violations.

Instead, Plaintiff filed this action on May 12, 2025, naming the City and DOB as defendants. The complaint's first cause of action seeks a declaration that CPLR § 214's three-year statute of limitations bars enforcement of the penalties. The second cause of action, brought under RPAPL article 15, requests cancellation of record of the penalties under RPAPL § 1501(1) as "clouds" on title (NYSCEF Doc No. 2, complaint ¶¶ 10, 17-24).

Defendants moved on June 12, 2025 to dismiss under CPLR § 3211, asserting (a) the declaratory judgment claim is premature and advisory, (b) the RPAPL claim fails because the violations are not "instruments, liens or other encumbrances" on title, (c) Plaintiff did not exhaust administrative remedies (e.g. Facade waiver procedure), and (d) other procedural defects. No collection action was pending when the complaint was filed. The motion is now ripe for decision.


ARGUMENTS

In support of its motion, the City contends that the complaint fails to state a viable cause of action for declaratory judgment because no justiciable controversy exists regarding the statute of limitations unless and until the City initiates an action to collect the penalties. The City further asserts that the RPAPL claim must be dismissed because the cited violations do not constitute a cloud on title. In addition, the City argues that Plaintiff has not articulated any cognizable basis for relief in the nature of prohibition or mandamus. Finally, the City maintains that this action is barred because Plaintiff failed to exhaust available administrative remedies before commencing suit, including the procedures for challenging or seeking a waiver of the civil penalties at issue.

Plaintiff opposes the motion and argues that, because it is not seeking a waiver of the violations, no administrative remedy exists that could provide the relief it seeks. Plaintiff further contends that the relief sought is not speculative, asserting that the violations cloud title to the property insofar as the associated penalties appear in a publicly accessible database and, in its view, "run with the title" upon transfer of the property. Plaintiff maintains that RPAPL § 1501 expressly authorizes an action to compel the determination of any claim that, based on public records, might be asserted against it, and that such an action may proceed even where the court must address the applicable statute of limitations. Plaintiff therefore argues that it is entitled to declaratory relief—both as a matter of law and public policy—because the City's position would permit violations to remain indefinitely on public record, outlasting not only the statute of limitations for collecting the penalty but even the ten-year period for enforcing a judgment.



DISCUSSION

On a motion to dismiss brought under CPLR § 3211, the court must "accept the facts as alleged in the complaint as true, accord the plaintiff the benefit of every possible favorable inference, and determine only whether the facts as alleged fit within any cognizable legal theory" (Leon v Martinez, 84 NY2d 83, 87-88 [1994] [citations omitted]). Ambiguous allegations must be resolved in the plaintiff's favor (see JF Capital Advisors, LLC v Lightstone Group, LLC, 25 NY3d 759, 764 [2015]). The court must be liberally construe the complaint and "accept as true the facts alleged in the complaint and any submissions in opposition to the dismissal motion" (511 West 232nd Owners Corp. v Jennifer Realty Co., 98 NY2d 144, 152 [2002] [internal citations omitted]). However, a pleading consisting of "bare legal conclusions" is insufficient to defeat a motion to dismiss (Leder v Spiegel, 31 AD3d 266, 267 [1st Dept 2006], affd 9 NY3d 836 [2007], cert denied 552 US 1257 [2008]) and "the court is not required to accept factual allegations that are plainly contradicted by the documentary evidence or legal conclusions that are unsupportable based upon the undisputed facts" (Robinson v Robinson

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Bluebook (online)
2025 NY Slip Op 25254, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/529-e-235th-st-estates-llc-v-city-of-new-york-nysupctnewyork-2025.