The beloved Fulton Fish Market stinks. Its decrepit premises in Lower Manhattan, where it has been since 1822, are largely open to the elements. So the city's decision to shift it to a massive new edifice in the Bronx was supposed to reduce the stench on the streets. But another kind of odour - just as tough on the nostrils - is now delaying the move.
There is a colourful, mobster-tinged past to the market, one of the world's largest - it handles about US$1 billion worth, or 68 million kilograms, of seafood each year. For many years, city and federal officials failed to control organised crime's grip on the market, which nestles in the shadows of the Brooklyn Bridge.
That was until 1995, when then mayor Rudolf Giuliani stepped in with a new law giving authorities the right to decide who could be employed at the site. It targeted in particular the companies that employed the unloaders - the only ones allowed to move the fish from trucks to the wholesalers.
The city alleged that, by controlling these companies, the mafia was able to extract payoffs from the fish sellers. In a city with such a lucrative restaurant industry, the potential for mischief is huge. As a result of Mr Giuliani's actions, some fish wholesalers were evicted and an outside fish-unloading company, Laro Service Systems, got the contract.
But, under the move to the new centre, the wholesalers can take over the unloading again. That, according to a lawsuit filed by a former Guiliani aide, Randy Mastro, on behalf of Laro two weeks ago, would allow the mob back in.
The suit got an initially sympathetic ear from State Supreme Court Judge Carol Edmead, who put the move on ice last week pending further hearings. 'The appearance of impropriety is so overwhelming,' she said. 'I hate to use this analogy, but the fish is smelling.'
