FOREST HILLS—The City’s Inspectional Services Department (ISD) will inspect Bicon Dental Implants after receiving a letter from the Yale Terrace Neighborhood Association asking it to revoke the company’s occupancy permit, according to spokesperson Lisa Timberlake.
Bicon did not respond to a request for comment.
Bicon, a 501 Arborway company, has stirred controversy in the area by demolishing a 19th century house at 21 Yale Terrace for a new development. The neighborhood association had tried to stop the company from doing that. But now the local neighborhood association is seeking to yank Bicon’s entire occupancy permit.
Yale Terrace Neighborhood Association member Gerry O’Connor sent a letter on behalf of the group to ISD Commissioner William Christopher on May 28. The letter asks ISD to revoke Bicon’s occupancy permit because the company apparently uses its property for several uses—including operating a dental clinic, a laboratory and a training facility—that are not permitted under the City’s zoning code. Those concerns also were raised several years ago, when ISD claimed it could find no such uses at Bicon despite them being advertised on the company’s website and in dental industry trade publications. O’Connor’s letter includes images from the Bicon website showing such services.
The letter says that quick ISD action is necessary because Bicon is once again expanding with the Yale Terrace redevelopment.
“Only if the City strictly follows the requirements of the Zoning Code will the neighbors obtain the due process and substantive protection they deserve,” O’Connor wrote.
“The Commissioner received the letter regarding Bicon Dental Implants,” Timberlake said in a June 1 email to the Gazette. “He will have the district inspector conduct an inspection of the premises and review the current occupancy.”
Bicon has a history of controversial expansions and operations that have drawn neighborhood complaints, City citations and City Council hearings.
Berta Berriz, the former owner of 21 Yale Terrace, says that she was “deceived” by a buyer who claimed to be a family-minded local grandmother into selling the historic house to the neighboring Bicon Dental Implants. Berriz did not want to sell the house to Bicon.