NBA Commissioner David Stern — a master negotiator who works with billion-dollar collective-bargaining agreements — is fighting with some pesky contractors who want more money for work on the expansion of his Scarsdale home.
Stern, a lawyer who’s credited with turning the NBA into the model for professional-sports marketing, is said to earn $10 million a year. When a next-door neighbor put his house on the market last year, Stern and his wife, Linda, bought it with plans to tear it down and expand their property.
Anthony Lanza of Pat Lanza Construction, who was hired to demolish the house, is demanding $14,000 in addition to a contract they signed for $114,306. But Stern isn’t budging and told Lanza to get a lawyer — which he did, although no lawsuit has yet been filed.
“Mr. Lanza performed poorly but was fully compensated,” Stern told Page Six. “He tried to get more money out of me that he’s not entitled to.”
Meanwhile, environmental analyst John Griffin this week filed a small-claims
suit against Stern for $4,005 for asbestos testing on his property. “They haven’t
paid me a nickel,” Griffin told Page Six.
But Stern says he’s not paying Griffin for the work because Lanza didn’t consult him about the hire. “That’s between Mr. Griffin and Pat Lanza Construction,” he said.
And an expeditor hired by Lanza, who didn’t want to be named, says Stern and his wife are just plain “difficult people to deal with.” He said the Sterns fired him “maybe because they didn’t want to pay the balance for the bills.”
But the Sterns say the expeditor didn’t know anything about Scarsdale and “did not do a very good job.”