Daily News from New York, New York • 116

-Sunday, November 19. 1989 KeepsOnBuilding lfe, FROM PAGE ONE of the most lucrative real estate deals of the '80s when he and his partners bought a package of 14 Manhattan buildings and parcels of land for $230 million in late 1986 then flipped them nearly 10 months later, on Oct 19, for $350 million. With an uncanny sense of timing, Macklowe' was one of the few New Yorkers to turn a huge profit on Black Monday. Still, Macklowe has felt the presence of constant scrutiny. Three years ago, Macklowe was forced to renovate a 20-block stretch of esplanade along the East River as punishment for changing the design of the lobby in one of his residential towers without -getting Planning Commission approval.

Other builders in the same situation probably would not have been censured at all, industry sources say. "Harry Macklowe is under an appropriate level of scrutiny for someone of his track record," says Jon Lu-komnik, a spokesman for city Controller Harrison Goldin, an outspoken opponent of Hotel Macklowe construction. "He is not virginal." "When you are a first offender, you get the benefit of the doubt But when it happens too often, the old platitude of 'Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on takes effect," he says. 'Well, no one in the city gov-" ernment wants to get caught being fooled a third, fourth or fifth time." Never say die Despite -the troubles, Macklowe says, "I never thought about giving up development in Manhattan. I have never done anything wrong or anything of which I am ashamed." Today, there are five Macklowe projects on the rise nationwide.

And in April, he'll open the first of the Ho- See MACKLOWE Page 7 and midtown's 44-story Grand Central Tower, an office building, not to mention the shiny new 52-story Hotel Macklowe near Times Square, and seven other buildings in the city. In all, Harry Macklowe, 52, has developed more than twice as many Manhattan towers as Donald Trump, while getting less than 1 of Trump's publicity. All about the Rolling Stones "I think it's wonderful that you can go see the Rolling Stones and know all there is to know about Mick Jagger and Keith Richards," Macklowe says with the slight accent of Westchester lockjaw. "But developers are not superstars. Developers are not, and should not really be, personalities." For the first 25 years of his career, Macklowe, president of the Macklowe Organization, was able to keep his name out of the newspapers and do his deals in relative obscurity.

But in January 1985, two buildings on W. 44th St that were part of a Macklowe assemblage were demolished without permits and without disconnecting' the water, electricity or gas service. Mayor Koch called for blood. Harry Macklowe met the press. The newspapers portrayed him unfairly he says as a developer gone amok.

Macklowe became a lightening rod for anti-development feeling in the city, for which some in his industry have yet to forgive him. He also met a grand jury, which indicted his contractor and demolition company with charges of reckless en-dangerment but did not return an indictment against him. Still the city filed a civil suit against him. It was settled out of court for $2 million that was supposed to fund new single room occupancy units. He thought it was all over.

Bring up that fateful night nearly five years later, with the gleaming hotel reaching more than 50 stories above the site of the demolition, and Macklowe says the issue is moot "Everybody examined me as carefully as they could, and if there were a way they could have found me culpable, they would have," he says, agitated, pacing around his chair. "Everybody knows it wasn't me." "Frankly," Macklowe adds, "I didn't really want to speak to you because I thought this would come up." Blaming the press He blames the press for any link today between his name and the demolition long ago. He points to a recent story, written without his input, headlined: "Midnight demolition How, he asks, does it haunt him? Clearly, it hasn't hurt his business or his business sense, he says. Since early 1985, he has built and leased the mixed-use Metropolitan Tower, the residential Rivertower on E. 54th St and Riverbank West on 42d St.

He has two other local projects under way, Hotel Macklowe and an office tower on W. 55th St, and has purchased development sites and begun construction on hotels in L.A and Chicago. 1 v.t Macklowe also flayed a Tiand in one' w1 5 ROMMIUO DAILY NEWS ROBERT aemontiorvof twobulkkngs on Wv44th St between Sixth andSeventh'Aasi'lniL986fabeSde il wr..