A year and a half ago, Dr. Harold Varmus went to Memorial Sloan-Kettering Hospital with impeccable credentials-former director of the National Institutes of Health, a 1989 Nobel Prize-and a mandate to rev up research at the East Side institution.

Dr. Varmus, Sloan-Kettering's new president, wanted to bring in renowned scientists. Attract research dollars. Make Sloan-Kettering, the cancer-treatment hospital, and Sloan-Kettering, the research center, symbiotic, simpatico, an engine and transmission perfectly in tune.

On July 18, in a hot and humid auditorium on the nearby Rockefeller University campus, Dr. Varmus found himself trying to articulate that plan before several hundred Upper East Side residents, most of whom were angry, if not downright hostile. Like Donald Trump and scores of other big-name would-be developers before him, he was subjected to the ultimate New York City experience: an appearance before a community board. And even with the air conditioner throbbing steadily in the background, Dr. Varmus looked like he was beginning to sweat just a bit.

Dr. Varmus' hopes for a revitalized Memorial Sloan-Kettering research center had taken the form of a gigantic new building on East 68th Street-a 440-foot-tall laboratory tower, with roomy offices and the latest in equipment, to be used as a lure to keep top researchers and attract new scientists and doctors to Sloan-Kettering's staff.

To build this building, Dr. Varmus will need money: $500 million to $700 million. But he's also seeking a substantial boost in the zoning for the institute's main campus, from 66th to 69th streets between First and York avenues. Which is where the community board comes in.

Standing before Board 8, his back to the hundreds of critics in the audience, Dr. Varmus made his case. But the board, and Sloan-Kettering's neighbors, had other things on their minds, such as what increasing the hospital's as-of-right building allowance will mean for the area in the future.

Increasing the allowable building height, while also designating the institution a "large-scale community facility"-a technical designation that would further ease future building restrictions-is like writing Sloan-Kettering a blank check to build in a neighborhood already congested and threatened by encroaching towers, some neighbors said.

"This board stands for good zoning," board member Teri Slater said. "The helter-skelter development in this neighborhood is not just driven by science, it's driven by development. We're about compromise; in this board, nobody gets everything they want."

But Memorial's attorney, Shelly Friedman-who also represents other powerhouse institutions like the Metropolitan Museum of Art-defended Sloan-Kettering's request for increased zoning, saying, "We're at a point where a conference room could not be added to this campus without a variance; this is unacceptable." Sloan-Kettering representatives were also quick to point out that they had already compromised on their proposed tower, which will be 80 feet shorter than the 520 feet they're allowed on that single site.

Dr. Varmus told the board the new research facility is badly needed to enhance the institution's ability to develop lifesaving treatments. "We've now entered the era of magic bullets, in which drugs are designed based on our knowledge of cancer research," Dr. Varmus told the board. "We live in an extraordinary neighborhood: Rockefeller University, Cornell Medical School, Memorial Sloan-Kettering-all of these create an environment where investigators, post-docs, students and faculty clinicians are bumping into each other …. This is a place where we generate an academic environment."

But not all members of the community-even the medical community in which Dr. Varmus figures so prominently-agree with his argument for consolidation. "They [Sloan-Kettering] know very well that everything doesn't have to be centralized or consolidated in one institute," Dr. Lawrence Yannuzzi, vice chairman of ophthalmology at the Manhattan Eye and Ear Institute, told the board. "To consider everything under one umbrella-that is not the way research is conducted today, and to lead the board or other public officials or governmental agencies, or the public itself, down a primrose path of misinformation by suggesting that we need this monstrously large complex in our neighborhood, with all the implications and the devastating potential impact, is wrong."

Manhattan Assemblyman Alexander (Pete) Grannis made the unusual suggestion that the world-class hospital ship its research to another borough: to Long Island City in Queens. "There has been overwhelming opposition to this project," he told the board. "It is roundly condemned in this community."

But Dr. Varmus dismissed the idea. "I don't want to sound strictly elitist," Dr. Varmus told the board, "but there is a difference between research and research that yields dramatic results. Dramatic results come from centers where the best people of many disciplines get together, incentivized by the presence of patients and students and post-doctoral fellows."

Dr. Varmus had plenty of supporters.

"I don't know any researchers; for all I know, they're a bunch of self-centered bastards," said Miriam Hecht, a math teacher at Hunter College, at the meeting. "But the fact is these people save a community of cancer patients. When you look at the tradeoffs, you can't trade that for the amenities of this privileged neighborhood."

The debate dragged on for hours, with both board members and neighbors split. Finally, Board 8 voted 22-19 to recommend that Sloan-Kettering's application be rejected, reversing a July 16 subcommittee recommendation supporting the hospital's plan.

The board's recommendation will now go to the borough president's office, which has 30 days to act before the issue goes to the City Planning Commission and City Council.

-Petra Bartosiewicz

Neighbors Praying That Buddha Stays Away

When Buddha Bar opened on the Champs-Élysées in 1996, it brought new glitz to one of Paris' most chichi districts and immediately jetted onto the A-list as one of Europe's top nightspots.

For some reason, that doesn't have the neighbors of a new Buddha Bar-set to touch down in Chelsea by next spring-boogieing across any dance floors.

A franchise of the Buddha Bar has leased space in the Chelsea Market, the gigantic shopping and dining complex at Ninth Avenue and 16th Street. At the July 18 meeting of Board 4, residents lambasted the plan, saying it will bring more noise, traffic and late-night activity in a neighborhood with plenty of residents who are trying to get some sleep.

Board 4 is involved because it can support or recommend the rejection of liquor-license applications.

The proposed location for the club is directly across the street from the Fulton Houses, the largest public-housing complex in Chelsea-a jarring juxtaposition with a venue designed to appeal to affluent customers, neighbors said.

Among their big worries, neighbors say, is that a 500-person capacity venue with a requested 4 a.m. closing could aggravate traffic, noise and pollution in an area already saturated by large nightclubs, including Roxy and Park within two blocks of the proposed site.

Buddha Bar would also feature live disc jockeys and a retractable roof, prompting concerns about noise. The bar's owners have offered to close the roof by 10 p.m., but residents are not satisfied.

"The only place in this city that needs a retractable roof is Yankee Stadium!" one elderly woman shouted from the crowd.

Melva Max of the Far West Chelsea Neighborhood Association was furious that Buddha Bar's proprietors have been marketing it to residents as a "family restaurant." With live music every night and a souvenir stand selling CD's and T-shirts, Ms. Max said, Buddha Bar is clearly a nightclub masquerading as a restaurant.

But Raymond Visan, owner of the Paris Buddha Bar, told The Observer: "There is a misunderstanding between what we are and what people think we are.

"We are a restaurant," Mr. Visan continued. "It's not a club; it's a restaurant and bar. We have lots of neighbors in Paris, and we don't have the slightest problem."

Despite residents' protests, Board 4 approved a letter to the State Liquor Authority in support of Buddha Bar's application. However, the letter included stipulations on late-night noise from music and air-conditioning equipment.

The State Liquor Authority held a hearing July 3 on Buddha Bar's application, but no decision has been reached, according to an S.L.A. representative. Mr. Visan told The Observer that construction is set to begin this fall, and the club should open by the spring of 2002.

-Beth Satkin

July 31: Board 1, South Bridge Towers Community Room, 90 Beekman Street, between Cliff and Pearl streets, 6 p.m., 442-5050.

Already Dr. Varmus, Memorial's president, has overseen the successful realization of a new 67th Street surgical facility and pediatric center now under construction. But neighbors of the sprawling Upper East Side complex-spanning 66th to 69th streets between York and First avenues-are just now learning about the next phase of Memorial's growth, and many find the community's prognosis worrisome.

Indeed, Board 8 is gearing up for an extensive review of the institution's latest plan, the construction of a mid-block 440-foot tower on East 68th Street. The project requires Memorial Sloan-Kettering to petition the Department of City Planning for a zoning change that will raise the existing height restrictions on several East Side blocks. Slated to break ground in 2002, the new facility has a projected budget of $500 million to $700 million and may not be done until 2007, Memorial officials said.

"The field of cancer research is just exploding," says Dr. Alan Houghton, chairman of immunology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering, who was commissioned by Dr. Varmus to evaluate the institute's expansion needs. "We're busting at the seams," he told The Observer, adding that the new 490,500-square-foot research building will serve as a much-needed replacement for the outdated and overcrowded Kettering Research Laboratory at 430 East 68th Street.

The two-phase project, still in the nascent stages of the approval process, calls for a 23-story Skidmore, Owings and Merrill–designed building to be constructed on the 68th Street site of what is currently the St. Catherine Catholic Church rectory. Memorial purchased the rectory from the church in 1995 for $15.4 million, as part of a deal that included the then-defunct St. Catherine's school and convent, which have since been demolished. Memorial has pledged to build a new rectory and auditorium for the church on the lower floors of the proposed tower and will provide interim housing for St. Catherine's clergy during construction.

Once the tower is completed-Memorial officials estimate by 2005-the adjacent Kettering Research Laboratory will be demolished and a building of as-yet-undetermined height will be constructed in its place. Completion of this second phase is anticipated in 2007.

For residents of the blocks surrounding the cancer institute, however, it is the institute's proposed rezoning, which includes a mid-block strip from 66th to 69th streets between First and York avenues, that they fear the most. "If Memorial is permitted to rezone these blocks, they will not have to seek any further permission from the city to tear down any buildings and put up much larger ones in that area," said Suzanne Fawbush, co-president of the Friends of St. Catherine's Park.

If approved, the rezoning request would substantially increase the permitted floor-to-area ratio on all buildings on those blocks. In addition to the zoning increase, Memorial has asked that the city recognize the institution's larger rebuilding ambitions, including replacing its main hospital building by 2011. While future projects are still subject to approval by the City Planning Commission, the hospital would have a great deal more flexibility in how much and how high they choose to build.

"I don't think there's a person that objects to Sloan-Kettering's need to update their facilities, but the problem is the height of the building. The community is very concerned about a tall tower in a mid-block," said Carolyn Greenberg, member of a Board 8 subcommittee formed to address Memorial Sloan-Kettering's plan.

At a May 15 meeting of the Board 8 subcommittee, more than 200 area residents showed up for a presentation of preliminary sketches of the proposed building by Sloan-Kettering's architects. "The people showed up because they didn't know anything … Sloan-Kettering has not been overly enthusiastic about getting the neighbors involved," Ms. Greenberg told The Observer. Memorial officials, however, said that they've already met with the community on several occasions.

The rezoning request is being reviewed by the Department of City Planning. Although no decision is expected until June, in March the agency released a preliminary report stating that Memorial Sloan-Kettering's plan "may have a significant effect on the quality of the environment … [and] an environmental impact statement will be required." The report went on to cite 16 of the plan's potentially harmful effects on the neighborhood, from transportation and noise to air-quality and construction issues.

If Memorial's application is ultimately approved, the institute will then formally submit its plan, along with an environmental impact statement, to the community board. The board's recommendation then goes to the City Planning Commission, which sends its vote to the City Council. Memorial officials said they're hoping for a Council decision by year's end.

As for funding the project, with $123 million in charitable contributions last year alone, Sloan-Kettering isn't worried. The institute's spokesperson, Avice Meehan, says a capital campaign is already under way and that reserve money will also be used; the remaining funds will be raised through loans or bonds.

For the researchers at the institute, meanwhile, the proposed plans are the stuff of a science geek's dream. "This is going to become a fulcrum between research and treatment in cancer," waxed Dr. Houghton.

-Petra Bartosiewicz

May 24: Board 2, St. Vincent's Hospital, 170 West 12th Street between Sixth and Seventh avenues, 10th floor, 7 p.m., 979-2272.