Staten Island: Van Duzer Street church cited for collapsed roof

The Islamic Masjid of Staten Island is on the hook for a $5,000 city penalty after Department of Buildings inspectors found the roof of its two-story brick building at 121 Van Duzer Street had collapsed inward, cracking the walls still standing by as much as six feet. The Environmental Control Board filed the violation on October 26, under infraction code 104 for failing to maintain a building wall or appurtenance.

For a community institution, a Class 1 citation is the most severe category the city issues short of a vacate order. It tells the respondent the building now carries an open structural hazard finding and a hearing date, not a routine maintenance note it can quietly clear.

Why it matters

Inspectors described a two-story brick structure with a roof that had already given way, pulling on walls that were never braced for the load shift. That combination, a failed roof plus unbraced walls with cracks reaching six feet, is the kind of finding that can trigger a full vacate order if a follow-up inspection finds the condition has worsened. Staten Island’s north shore carries a disproportionate share of the borough’s pre-war masonry stock, and this filing is a reminder that a Class 1 ECB violation does not wait for a fire or a storm to show up.

The numbers

The $5,000 penalty is fully unpaid as of the filing, with no partial payment logged against it. The violation sits at Class 1, the highest severity tier in the Environmental Control Board’s system, reserved for conditions inspectors consider an immediate hazard rather than a code lapse to fix on a normal schedule. The crack length inspectors logged, approximately six feet along the exterior wall, is the figure that elevated this from a roof repair job to a structural filing.

What’s next

The case is scheduled for an Environmental Control Board hearing on January 6, 2027, with the matter still listed as pending. The respondent can contest the violation, pay the $5,000 penalty, or document repairs before that date; none of those steps has happened yet in the public record. Until the building is recertified as sound, the filing stands as an open hazard finding against the property at 121 Van Duzer Street.

For more on how the city is handling aging building stock across the borough, see the New York market hub.