MITCHELL-LAMA RESIDENTS COALITION

Vol. 26, Issue 1 WEBSITE: www.mitchell-lama.org Summer 2020 MLRC holds first membership meeting, Extended eviction relief via Zoom, since onset of Covid-19 for NYS tenants during Covid-19 restrictions he first general membership meet- fill out the Census so that our state can get ing of MLRC since the Corona virus the money it deserves and keep as many enants in New York State who find it difficult exploded all over the world was held representatives as possible. The Senator also Tor impossible to pay their rent during the Ton July 19 via the popular online or virtual updated the group on the legislative session Covid-19 pandemic will not face eviction while the meeting app known as Zoom. expected that occurred the week of July 20. pandemic lasts, even if the previous moratorium The group's members were notified Manhattan Borough President Gale lapsed. of the meeting by postcard. As a result, doz- Brewer also urged everyone to fill out the Under a new law signed by the governor in ens of ML residents called in. MLRC hopes 2020 Census. She reported on her work July, the moratorium will continue so long as the to expand its email database for future to provide food to the neediest residents, virus-related restrictions are in effect. To protect notifications, and is asking residents to send described the Open Streets program, and themselves, tenants will have to claim financial their email addresses to info@mitchell-la- urged us all to support our local mom and hardship deriving from the pandemic. ma.org. pop stores. She has been working with our However, the new law, the Tenant Safe The July meeting opened with a ML neighbors at 65 West 96th Street. Harbor Act, does not stop landlords from seeking moment of silence in remembrance of New Warren Harding, Chair of the evictions of tenants who owe previous rents. Those York affordable housing advocate Tom Wa- Mitchell-Lama United Steering Committee, back rents will still have to be paid, after the crisis ters, Congressman John Lewis, and all the reported on the newly-formed Mitchell-La- is over. victims of the Corona virus. ma United. (See story page 2). Formed in The law was sponsored by Senators Brad After Co-chair Ed Rosner gave a February, this umbrella group has been Hoylman and Liz Krueger and Assembly member legislative report, he explained that MLRC working on the preservation of the M-L Jeffrey Dinowitz. has had to suspend print production of this housing stock. With weekly meetings, the Prior to passage of the new law, a federal newsletter during the pandemic. However, Steering Committee has produced position judge dismissed a landlord lawsuit seeking to end an electronic version is in the works, and papers for distribution to elected officials the NYS eviction moratorium on the grounds that will be available at the MLRC website (as and housing advocates. it violated the owners' due process. The judge ruled are all previous editions). Reports were presented on Atlantic that the court could not hear the case because the Among the attending elected offi- Plaza Towers and Rochdale Village. The moratorium did not completely end the obligation cials, NY State Senator Luis Sepulveda of owners of Atlantic Plaza Towers, a former of tenants to pay rent. the Bronx, fearful of impending evictions, ML rental, sent each resident a letter ex- In July Democratic legislators advocated urged rental tenants to apply as soon as plaining how to apply for the Covid Rental for three bills to further rent and mortgage aid for possible to the Covid Rental Assistance Assistance Program, because it benefits tenants and homeowners, and eviction and fore- Program. He also urged all New Yorkers to both the residents and the owner. closure relief. See story page 4.

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MLRC General Membership Meeting

Note: During the Covid-19 pandemic, the next meeting will be held online via Zoom. Members will be informed by regular mail

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Mitchell-Lama Residents Coalition PO Box 20414 Station Park West 10025 NY York, New Page 2 Summer 2020

New Mitchell-Lama advocacy group forms to coordinate lobbying and protection efforts UPCOMING EVENTS

new coalition of three Mitchell-Lama preserving and protecting our Mitchell-Lama organizations has formed to strength- developments," according to a statement pre- en advocacy efforts on behalf of M-L pared by the group. Aresidents. Among its initial efforts will be the MLRC The new group, Mitchell-Lama Unit- preparation of a "white paper"(i.e., a "best way" ed,which came into being in February, will not to proceed) on legislative and policy recom- General Membership replace any of the three founding members: mendations; securing support from state and Meeting Mitchell-Lama Residents Coalition, Brooklyn local representatives; and protecting M-L resi- Mitchell-Lama Task Force, and Cooperators dents from the Covid-19 pandemic. United for Mitchell-Lama. Rather it will coor- The group welcomes new members. Note: During the Covid-19 dinate lobbying and information efforts de- Anyone seeking to join is invited to send an pandemic, the next signed to "advocate for the shared objective of email to [email protected] meeting will be held online via Zoom. Three tenant advocates unseat Members will be informed incumbent Dem Assembly members by regular mail hree Democratic tenant advocates organizing, she founded the Greenpoint Sexual unseated long time incumbents in the Assault Task Force, and was endorsed by Pro- CONTACT: [email protected] New York State Assembly in the July gressives Cynthia Nixon and Zephyr Teachout. Tprimaries, continuing a trend of victorious Mitaynes, backed by the Democratic progressive candidates that began last year Socialists of America, immigrated to the USA with the victories of four insurgent Democratic from Peru as an indigenous native. She told congresswomen (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of NY1 that she recalls watching in fear as scores New York, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Ayanna of neighbors in her building in Sunset Park, Pressley of Massachusetts, and Rashida Tlaib of where she had been living since the age of five, Michigan.) were evicted in 2006. She soon became in- Marcella Mitaynes upset Félix Ortiz volved with a local community organization. Mitchell-Lama Residents in Brooklyn's 51st District; Emily Gallagh- Phara Souffrant Forrest, also backed Coalition, Inc. er defeated incumbent Joseph Lentol in the by the Democratic Socialists of America, is a borough's 50th District; and Phara Souffrant 31-year-old nurse from Crown Heights. In her Officers Forrest ousted Walter Mosley in the 57th run for office, she focused heavily on tenants Co-chairs: Jackie Peters District. Together the three districts represent rights, and refused "special interest" donations Ed Rosner the neighborhoods of Red Hook, Sunset Park, according to an interview with New York Carib Sonja Maxwell Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Clinton Hill and News. She supports the NY Health Act, which Crown Heights. calls for Medicare for all, and the Good Cause Treasurer: Carmen Ithier Gallagher, 36, served on the borough's Eviction Bill which calls for universal rent con- Corresponding Sec’y: Katy Bordonaro Community Board 1. In addition to her tenant trol. MLRC NEWSLETTER STAFF

Editor: Ed Rosner JOIN THE MITCHELL-LAMA RESIDENTS COALITION Assistant editors: Katy Bordonaro Sonja Maxwell 2020 Jackie Peters INDIVIDUAL: $15 per year; DEVELOPMENT: 25 cents per apt Managing editor: Nathan Weber ($30 Minimum; $125 Maximum) Name ______Circulation: 5,000 Address ______City______State ______Zip code _____ Articles, letters and photographs are Evening phone______Day phone ______welcome. Send to MLRC, PO Box Fax ______E-mail______20414, Park West, New York, NY 10025. Fax: (212) 864-8165. Voice Current ML: Co-op ______Rental______Mail: (212) 465-2619. E-mail: Former ML: Co-op ______Rental [email protected] Development ______President’s name ______Donations in addition to dues are welcome.

NOTE: Checks are deposited once a month. Mail to: MLRC, PO Box 20414, Park West Finance Station, New York, NY 10025 Summer 2020 Page 3 HUD moves rapidly West Village Houses finalizes to gut fair housing rules co-op privatization process on ethnicity and gender ne of the last bastions of affordable program. The tenants worked with the city to he Department of Housing and Urban De- cooperatives in New York City has convert the complex to an affordable coop- velopment has launched two new broad- become a free market cooperative, as erative with funds from the Housing Devel- sides against the Obama Administration's Tefforts to promote fair housing for people of all Othe residents of West Village Houses complet- opment Fund Corp. The co-op then received ed a process to transform their development lowered taxes and forbearance on repaying ethnicities and colors and for transgender people. from affordable to market rate housing. the mortgage owed by the original owner to In the first instance, HUD Secretary Ben The final move, which entailed clos- the city. Carson has removed a rule that required localities ing of a process started in 2018, when the An additional requirement agreed applying for federal aid to actively or "affirmative- development’s tax abatement policy ended, to by the new co-op owners was to keep a ly" promote fair and integrated housing, that is, to was finalized in June 2020. (Actual planning ceiling over purchase prices, so that the coop- add teeth to the 1968 Fair Housing Act, thereby for the change began in 2004, as tenants erators, who for decades benefitted from ML preventing the resegregation of neighborhoods. organized to retain as much of the affordable rent restrictions, could not “make a killing” In the second case, it is proposing a rule units as possible.) on any sales. This provision was another to allow single-sex homeless shelters to reject The complex, which began life as a effort to keep the complex reasonably afford- transgender women. Mitchell-Lama tenant development, consists able for future residents. Regarding ending affirmative efforts by of 418 walkup apartments spread out over 42 No more. The very location of West states and localities, Carson originally justified buildings in Manhattan’s West Village. The Village Houses virtually guarantees that sales eliminating the original Obama rule, which was push for construction of the complex, which prices will reach the stratosphere, when the first proposed two years ago, by saying that end- began in 1972, was largely led by Jane Jacobs, economy, collapsed by the Covid-19 pan- ing it would “reduce… the regulatory burdens of the legendary nonprofessional urban plan- demic, recuperates. local jurisdictions," because the rule was "un- ner who spent much of her life battling for But as resident Katy Bordonaro workable" and "a waste of time." people-friendly environments, and fighting noted, "The housing is still affordable to the Today, however, a darker motive for elim- the encroachment of luxury high rise devel- original tenants. And we are going to work to inating the affirmative efforts rule is indicated: it opments and inner city highways. keep it that way but for the last two years, we is widely seen as a racist "dog whistle" to white In 2002, residents organized in re- have been stuck in limbo without a tax break suburbanites who President Trump feels would sponse to the owners’ plan to exit the M-L and yet still under some of the restrictions." welcome efforts to prevent Black and Brown peo- ple from becoming their neighbors. “I am happy to inform all of the people living their Suburban Lifestyle Dream that you Co-op City residents lead NYC will no longer be bothered or financially hurt by having low income housing built in your neigh- in completing US census forms borhood…” he tweeted on July 29. This tweet reinforces one of Trump's n the United States, as of mid-May 2020, who live in the cooperative,” said George previous tweets, in which he said, referring to a only around 60 percent of residents had Torres, district manager of Community NewYork Post article on ending the affirmative completed the current census form. In Board 12. “We are active federal, state, and fair housing rule, that “The Suburban Housewives INew York City as a whole, the number is municipal workers. The people who live here of America must read this article. [Joe] Biden even lower—around 49 percent. are the backbone of the unions representa- [the presumptive Democratic candidate for Pres- But in five adjacent districts in the tive of this great city.” ident] will destroy your neighborhood and your Bronx, the count soars to 70 percent. And in Torres noted that the residents tend American Dream. I will preserve it, and make it two other adjacent tracts, the count is not far to be active in a variety of community strug- even better!” behind. gles, as when the MTA sought to change Regarding discrimination on the basis of Those seven districts comprise the long-established bus routes in the area, only sex, HUD is proposing a new rule to allow man- home of Co-op City, the largest cooperative to face intense opposition. Such collective agers of single-sex homeless shelters to bar trans- housing complex in the world (15,000 apart- endeavors, he said, tend to unite residents. gender women, thereby gutting the Equal Access ments), constructed under the Mitchell-La- Other factors, such as religion, may Rule passed under the Obama administration. ma program. also play a role. The Bronx Clergy Task The proposed rule would also allow the shelters The issue is crucial, because the pop- Force, a unit of the borough president’s to deny admission to anyone who the managers ulation count of an area—city, state, etc.—is office, had contacted twenty religious -in or employees assume might be transgendered, a key factor in the allocation of billions of stitutions to urge members to complete the based upon "a range of factors” that might in- federal dollars, and in the number of seats in Census form. clude, for example, how the individual dresses. the House of Representatives. And a nonprofit group, African To justify the new rule, the Trump admin- So what accounts for the discrepan- Communities Together, have manned phone istration is arguing that it would protect women cy in Census completion, especially in light banks to urge residents to do the same. who are not transgendered from "men" who of the fact that throughout the Bronx as a It helps that the group’s members would enter the shelter to abuse them. whole, the percentage of Census fillers is have mastered numerous foreign languages, Advocates for transgendered people dis- even lower than in the city? including Afemi and Yoruba. pute that argument, arguing that the rule instead “I think it’s the nature of the people would force many transgendered women to live on the streets. Page 4 Summer 2020 Bronx Botanical Gardens plans Albany Dems offer 3 bills to build 450 affordable units for rent and mortgage relief emocratic legislators in Albany are promoting n additional stock of affordable velopment, the Gardens (also known as three bills to further protect unemployed ten- housing units may be located in "the green space") has provided an acre of ants and homeowners from rent and mortgage the near future on an unlikely land currently housing several Dburdens and loss of homes while the Covid-19 business Alocation: a segment of the Bronx Botani- small commercial structures. restrictions continue. cal Gardens. The project will start with the The bills would outlaw evictions and foreclo- In February, media sources construction of 188 apartments for sure proceedings for a full year after the pandemic ends; reported that the Gardens and a private seniors who earn up to fifty percent of cancel both rent and mortgage payments while the crisis developer have agreed to construct 450 the area median income (AMI), which continues; and offer aid for homeless families seeking below market rate apartments on the amounts to $37,750 a year. An on-site permanent housing. Garden's northwest corner, in the bor- social service agency, Fordham Bedford Some 200,000 New York State residents lost their ough's Bedford Park section. A segment Community Services, will be available to jobs during the peak of the crisis. of those apartments will be set aside for the seniors. In May, the legislature alloted $100 million to the elderly. That phase will be followed by help the state's tenants pay rent through a voucher pro- However, the agreement was the construction of another 260 units for gram, but as of July, the Division of Homes and Commu- reached before the Covid-19 pandemic families earning between thirty and one nity Renewal has not released "guidance" for acquiring exploded. The virus, along with the en- hundred thirty percent of AMI. the funds, so no tenants have yet benefitted. suing economic shutdown, may well put A current grocer, Cherry Valley, those plans on hold. will occupy the ground floor, and will Teaming up with Douglaston De- expand by 20,000 square feet.

DiNapoli: HPD failed to monitor M-L management firm's expenses MLRC Developments he City's Department of Housing DiNapoli acknowledged that part Preservation and Development has of the problem is that contracts under These developments are members of the failed to exercise proper oversight $10,000 do not require official approval Mitchell-Lama Residents Coalition Tof a Mitchell-Lama management compa- or competitive bidding. But HPD also ny in spite of a report two years ago that neglected to give "guidance"on how to Individual Membership: $15 per year the company was derelict in its no-bid deal with any contract under $100,000, Development Membership: 25 cents per apt contracts, according to a report by State DiNapoli said. ($30 minimum; $125 maximum) Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. RY spent $10.7 million in no-bid In an audit released in June, contracts. Donations above membership dues are welcome DiNapoli found that HPD ignored two of The comptroller also noted that the Comptroller's earlier recommenda- RY was lax in insuring that costs from its Adee Towers Assn tions, and only partially implemented the contractors were "reasonable," and suffi- Amalgamated Warbasse Meadow Manor remaining four. cient to warrant rent increases. Arverne Apartments Michangelo Apartments Bethune Towers 109th St. Senior Citizens The company in question, RY RY attempted to secure rent Castleton Park Plaza Management, which manages Linden increases to offset its contract expenses, Central Park Gardens 158th St & Riverside Dr. Plaza in Brooklyn, sought to increase ten- but the effort failed when HPD found Clayton Apartments Housing ants' rent by claiming cost overruns. But inconsistencies in invoicing, untracked Coalition to save Affordable Parkside Development those costs were never fully monitored by inventory and unmonitored transactions. Housing of Co-op City Pratt Towers Concerned Tenants of Sea Promenade Apartments HPD. Park East, Inc. RNA House Concourse Village Riverbend Housing Dennis Lane Apartments River Terrace Covid-19 tip from a resident at RiverView: 1199 Housing River View Towers Esplanade Gardens Rosedale Gardens Co-op 'Workers: Wear booties as well as masks!' Franklin Plaza Ryerson Towers Independence House Starrett City Tenants Assn he following suggestion was sent apartment. Of course all wear Tenants Assn St. James Towers to the MLRC by a resident of Riv- Independence Plaza North Strykers Bay Co-op T masks. Since no one knows Inwood Towers Tivoli Towers erView Towers, a M-L development in HOW Covid-19 is transmitted, Jefferson Towers Tower West Manhattan's Sutton Place neighbor- asking maintenance workers Knickerbocker Plaza Village East Towers hood: Linden Plaza Washington Park SE Apts to wear paper booties over Lindsay Park Washington Square SE Apts "Ask maintenance staff their work shoes is a good Lindville Housing Westgate Tenants Assn to put on paper booties (in Lincoln Amsterdam House Westgate suggestion for Mitchell-Lama Manhattan Plaza Westview Apartments addition to the mandatory residents, if not for everyone." Marcus Garvey Village West View Neighbors Assn masks) BEFORE entering an Masaryk Towers Tenants West Village Houses Summer 2020 Page 5 City issues draft proposal Sunnyside master plan: 12,000 affordable units, to promote housing fairness mass transit, park areas two-year effort to promote housing assistance benefits, especially in amenity-rich master plan that envisages the creation equity in New York City culminated in (i.e., more affluent) neighborhoods. of around 12,000 affordable apartments, Aa draft of a mini-master plan released ¶ Create more independent and inte- large areas of open park and urban in June by Deputy Mayor for Housing and grated living options for people with disabili- Aspace, minimum auto traffic with significant Economic Development Vicki Been. ties. public transportation, all in the Sunnyside The draft, "Where We Live," was ¶ Make equitable investments to area of Queens, was released in March by the accompanied by a call for additional public address the neighborhood-based legacy of city's Economic Development Corp. (EDC), participation in responding to the contents, discrimination, segregation, and concentrated a non-profit that functions in many ways as a beyond those who participated earlier this poverty. public agency. year. In the introduction, the city noted that For the second goal of facilitating "eq- Developed by the urban planning firm the draft combined "input from hundreds of uitable housing development" in both the city Practice for Architecture and Urbanism, the residents and over 150 community-based and and the region, the draft suggests: plan seeks to build on the success of Co-op advocacy organizations with data from dozens • Exploring opportunities to accelerate City in the Bronx, the sprawling 15,000-unit- of governmental agencies." land use review and remove obstacles to the Mitchell-Lama development, while avoiding People wishing to comment may approval of affordable housing development, the mistakes. The plan is available athttps://bit. access the plan on social media using the particularly in amenity-rich areas with limited ly/3gCuhRd hashtag #WhereWeLiveNYC. (The 200-plus affordable housing options; page draft itself , with a guide to participation, • Supporting changes to New York A virtual mini-city can be accessed here or at https://bit.ly/3e3x- State legislation that facilitate housing devel- If it ever comes to fruition, the proposal, WWo). opment, such as removing the state cap on which had been in the planning stage for two Written in English, Spanish, residential floor area ratio; years, would create a virtual mini-city atop the Chinese and three other languages, the • Reviewing the effect that historic dis- massive train yards owned by Amtrak. draft consists of six major goals, each tricts have on the supply of housing at a range Four years before the actual planning of which is accompanied by a series of of incomes; exploring ways to balance the began, the railroad company had approached the strategies to accomplish it. need for historic preservation with the need city to suggest they cooperate on some type of For example, to meet the first goal, for new housing; long-range planning for the area. that of combatting ongoing complex discrim- • Expanding the Housing Ambas- According to EDC, the plan released in ination, the plan suggests the strategies of in- sadors program to provide direct assistance March "was shaped by over 100 public inter- creasing testing to identify where the discrim- to residents navigating the affordable hous- views, four community workshops, three large ination is taking place (e.g., which brokers ing search and application processes, with a public meetings, a digital town hall, walking and realtors are committing it), increasing city specific focus on outreach to residents using tours, and group discussions with over 145 or- agency resources to handle public complaints, rental assistance; ganizations to understand the pressing needs of and exploring the possibility of new regula- •Expanding outreach and support the communities surrounding the Yard." tions. services for the NYCHA Family Reentry The five other goals include: Program, which reunites justice-involved New No market-rate housing ¶ Facilitate equitable housing develop- Yorkers with family members in NYCHA As currently envisioned, all the housing ment in New York City and the region. housing. will be considered affordable, that is, nothing ¶ Preserve affordable housing and pre- Strategies for the remaining goals ap- will be market rate. Three thousands units will vent displacement of long-standing residents. pear under each goal. be reserved for families earning below 30 per- ¶ Enable more effective use of rental cent of the area median income, or roughly $29,000 per year for a family of three; another three thousand will be set for the same size CHIP: 25 % of NYC tenants skipped rent in May households earning less than 50 percent of AMI, or about $48,000; and the remaining six thou- oughly a quarter of the city's residential CHIP used the findings to plead for sand units will be available at rents modeled Rtenants and two-thirds of ground floor federal funds to compensate the owners after Mitchell-Lama housing, that is, for house- retail tenants skipped their rent payments for their loss of rent money. Jay Martin, the holds earning 100 percent of AMI. during May, a direct consequence of the group's executive director, said that “Unless The scale of the housing is envisioned Covid-19 pandemic. the federal government steps in to help renters as being in sync with the surrounding Queens The data was released by the Com- and owners in a big way, we are going to see communities, including high-rise structures munity Housing Improvement Program, or a housing disaster the likes of which we have closer to Long Island City and mid-rise struc- CHIP, which represents owners and managers never seen." tures nearer to Sunnyside. of around four thousand rent regulated apart- While rent collections in general—that In releasing the plan, EDC noted that ments. is, regulated and unregulated units—were the selection process of choosing developers will On a nationwide level, the percent of down fifteen to twenty percent, according to emphasize "prioritizing minority- and wom- residential tenants who were forced to skip the Rent Stabilization Association, an own- en-owned firms," and will embrace community rent payments was half that of New York— er-group, collections were up among tenants land trusts and "green building technologies like around twelve percent—according to a Na- in regulated apartments who received Section mass timber, passive and highly efficient build- tional Multifamily Housing Council report. 8 subsidies. ings, and rainwater capture." Page 6 Summer 2020

Residents near Gowanus Canal Son of former M-L official demand NYCHA fix before rezoning buys semi-stabilized J. he city should pay more attention to Among the demands expressed at the Adams in Forest Hills dealing with the myriad problems of meeting were up-front funding of the public the neighborhood's NYCHA com- housing development, and eliminating the elson Management Group, whose prin- Tplex before they move ahead to approve sewage entering the canal. They also want- cipal owner is the son of a former city zoning changes to the area surrounding the ed the creation of an environmental special commissioner of Mitchell-Lama housing Nwho eventually became one of the largest owners Gowanus Canal, according to residents of district. Brooklyn's Gowanus neighborhood (which Fixing NYCHA's problems, including of M-L developments in New York, has purchased abuts several other communities). mold, lead, inoperative elevators, leaky pipes the John Adams, a partially rent-stabilized 115- The residents, along with environ- and lack of heat in the winter, were front and unit development in Forest Hills. mentalists and local officials, met in Febru- center. "Fix our homes before you rezone!” At a cost of $26.5 million, the purchase ary, just prior to the onset of the Covid-19 was a chant by the members of the Gowanus adds to Nelson's holdings of some 3,500 apart- shutdown. Neighborhood Coalition for Justice and the ments in twenty buildings. Among his properties The meeting was one of several com- Families United for Racial and Economic are Hillside Homes, Winthrop Gardens, and Le- munity confabs held to discuss a proposal Equality. land House. released in January 2019 by the Department Regarding sewage repair, rainstorms After leaving municipal service, Daniel of City Planning. often flood the sewers, thereby overwhelm- Nelson, the father, was the "first owner in NYC The proposal, according to the DCP, ing waste treatment plants. This results in to buy-out of the Mitchell-Lama program and "lays the foundation for how the Gowanus raw sewage entering the city's waterways. eventually brought all of his properties out of the neighborhood can grow and change and be- The city needs to develop and share a plan to program," said Katy Bordonaro, MLRC's Corre- come a thriving, inclusive, and more resilient deal with this problem, the environmental- sponding Secretary. Gowanus." It attempts to "support mixed-use ists insisted. "Because they were constructed before growth with affordable housing, [develop] Responding to the complaints, Jane 1974, they all became rent stabilized apartments. areas to maintain and grow Gowanus’ com- Meyer, a City Hall spokeswoman, said that Subsequently, some became co-operatives." mercial and industrial businesses, and [offer] “This administration is committed to revers- Robert Nelson's current purchase, the John special tools to activate ground floors and ing decades of disinvestment in NYCHA that Adams, is a 112,596-square-foot property that create new public spaces." affects the residents that call it home,” Meyer contains 54 free-market, 57 rent-stabilized, and But the creation of "new" spaces was said. “The city is exploring all ideas to ad- two rent-controlled units. The mixed-use building not as essential as fixing the problems in dress significant concerns related to NYCHA also features two ground-floor office spaces, along existing spaces, residents maintained. to ensure funding for necessary repairs.” with numerous amenities, according to the Nelson website. So far as landlords go, Nelson "is viewed Kips Bay NYCHA tenants worry in a fairly decent light," Bordonaro said. "He has made a few missteps--as with facial recognition, as privatized management proceeds but has then sent out the letter regarding applying for COVID rent relief to his tenants." ublic housing tenants in one of Man- all residents know the status of the project hattan's neighborhoods are alleging and answer resident questions.” Further, that they are kept in the dark con- although some residents may have to move Pcerning their future, as NYCHA begins its temporarily, hospitality suites will be made NYC Voucher terminations process of transforming the development to available to those wishing to leave during halted until further notice private management. renovation. The development is located in the Depending on what happens during n a public message to the city's tenants and borough's Kips Bay neighborhood, which the pandemic, roughly 62,000 units are "community partners," the Department of extends roughly from East 23rd to East 34th scheduled to be converted over the coming Social Servces announced that "While the HPD Streets, from the East River to around Third years under two programs, RAD (Rental ISection 8 Customer Service Office is closed to the Avenue. Assistance Demonstration) and PACT (Per- public, the HPD Section 8 team is still available to Because of a lack of information manent Affordable Commitment Togeth- the public. Voucher holders facing rent hardships from management as renovation proceeds, er). Under RAD, units will be converted to due to drops in income should email DTRAI@hpd. many tenants are living in "total abject fear," Section 8 contracts; under PACT, NYCHA nyc.gov or fax at 212-863-5299. according to Melanie Aucello, president of engages in public-private partnerships to "During this time, any HPD Section 8 the tenant association, who was quoted in renovate and manage. Accord to the Author- voucher set to expire will be automatically re- The City, an online news source. ity, "The federal RAD program ensures per- newed. Clients do not need to reach out to HPD Among the tenants' concerns are manent affordability, while New York City’s for an extension. what will happen to them as renovation PACT ensures some of the strongest resident "All subsidy terminations in process are proceeds during the Covid-19 pandemic, protections in the country." suspended until further notice. All tenant con- and whether they will have to move. Some Still, in addition to individual com- ferences & briefings are postponed & will be tenants may have to temporarily relocate plaints, many tenants fear the conversions to rescheduled. All hearings for appeal are cancelled until renovations are completed. private management will spark an increase until further notice. HPD will continue to pay the NYCHA's management, however, in gentrification, leading to subsequent pres- subsidy until final determinations are made." claimed that it has set up meetings to "let sures to vacate. Summer 2020 Page 7 Affordable housing news Local Housing Briefs from around the nation One in 100 NYC newborns to commercial landlords. A previous rule had go directly to a homeless shelter National: End of eviction One out of every one hundred babies temporarily banned evictions, held up rent moratorium will most harm born in New York City during 2019 went increases, and prohibited late fees. people of color directly from the hospital to a shelter for Also in D.C., Black Homes Matter, The end of the temporary evic- the homeless, according to a new report which models its name after the organization tion moratorium in housing benefiting from the Coalition for the Homeless. Noting that sparked the largest anti-racism move- from federally backed mortgages ― that in December 2019, nearly fifteen thou- ment since the civil rights/black power era, is covering about twelve million apart- sand families slept in shelters, a soaring 46 calling for the city council's fiscal 2021 bud- ments ― is likely to impact most heav- percent increase over the past ten years, the get to include investments in public housing ily on communities of color, largely group criticizes Mayor de Blasio's housing repairs, emergency rental assistance, and oth- because Black and Latinx tenants pay plan for "creating a glut of high-rent units er needs that disproportionately affect Black a higher share of their income on rent instead of investing in the production of DC residents, especially now since Black and than White tenants. The moratorium, desperately needed extremely low-rent Brown communities are at greater risk of set because of the Covid-19 virus, will apartments." But it also notes that "This Covid-19 exposure than white residents. end towards the end of July. Accord- imbalance will finally begin to shift with the ing to the US Census Household Plus enactment of Local Law 19 of 2020, which survey, forty-four percent of Black Seattle: Amazon to build will require the City to allocate a minimum tenants have little or no confidence that they homeless shelter on campus of 15 percent of apartments to homeless will be able to afford their next rent payment. Amazon has partnered with a local New Yorkers in new City-subsidized build- (Several states have their own eviction bans, homeless shelter to construct a new shelter ings over 40 units." such as New Jersey, which covers some ten- on the state's college campus. The effort is widely presumed to be the corporate behe- ants in hotels, and San Francisco, which bars HPD notes slumlords Covid-19-related evictions permanently.) moth's response to criticism that its presence and expansion has skyrocketed the city's face $400,000 in fines The city's department of Housing Chicago: One-time rent grant rents, thereby contributing to an upsurge in homelessness. Preservation and Development said in program overwhelmed March that slumlords in Manhattan and the by applications Bronx are facing almost $400,000 in pen- To address the difficulty of paying Minneapolis: Low-income alties for some six hundred fifty violations rent during the Covid-19 economic shut- tenants co-op buildings in six buildings. Among buildings whose down, Chicago's housing department offered of former slumlord owners face fines is 31 Mt. Hope Place in one-time grants of $1,000 each, enough for After winning a landmark $18.5 the Bronx, where its owners racked up 179 two thousand of the city's tenants. During million lawsuit for thousands of their land- violations and more than 75 falsified re- the first few days of the program, eighty- lord's former tenants, Latinx families in pairs. three thousand people applied. Also, for five Minneapolis buildings suffering from landlords of affordable housing, the city years of neglect celebrated in July not only a Evictions in city offered a new grant program to compensate legal victory but their success in buying and transforming the buildings into a tenant-run down notably last year for shortfalls in rent. Evictions in the city have declined cooperative. After the city revoked the slum- fifteen percent in 2019, largely a result lord's real estate license, in 2017, the owner Missoula, Mont: Motel will of two laws: one that mandates a right agreed to sell off his sprawling slum empire. shelter Covid-19 homeless to counsel for low-income tenants facing (He was further barred from owning rental The City Council approved the housing court issues; and the other the properties in the city for five years.) Tenants purchase in April of a small motel in the ground-breaking tenant protection act secured funding for the purchase from the downtown area that had been fully function- passed by NY State in June 2019, which nonprofit Land Bank Twin Cities, which in ing since the 1940s, for use as a short term sought, among other things, to prevent turn received grants from the Local Initia- housing fix for homeless people who test evictions through huge rent increases for tives Support Corp. and a zero-interest loan positive for Covid-19, and would therefore stabilized tenants. (These laws, however, from a city program. need to isolate or self-quarantine themselves. were passed before the Covid-19 outbreak, If and when the pandemic ends, the hotel, which has resulted in massive job losses, The Sleepy Inn, may be used for permanent Oakland: New anti-harrasment threatening the ability to pay rent.) low-cost housing. rules protect tenants New amendments to the city's law Hotels for permanent Washington, D.C. Owners will limit rent increases in one year (to the consumer price index plus 5%) and late fees homeless housing? must offer rent payment plans Housing officials are exploring (to 3% of rent); and will prohibit eviction Many tenants in the nation's capital whether to convert some of the city's ailing for new roommates, if the landlord unrea- who are having difficulty paying rent because hotels, which have been reeling under the sonably refuses to allow them. Harassment of Covid-19 now have the right to negotiate decline in tourism during the Covid-19 cri- includes lockouts, utility shutoffs, removing a rent payment plan with their landlords, sis, as permanent Single Room Only (SRO) tenants’ belongings and ousting tenants from thanks to a new rule passed by the D.C. housing for the city's homeless population. their homes, all of which have been exacer- Council. The rule applies to landlords who Construction of SROS ended in the 1970s. bated during the Covid-19 pandemic. have at least five residential tenants, as well as Page 8 Summer 2020

Stuy-town, Cooper Village tenants New landlord-tenant sue owners over degregulation plan mediation program to

enants in Stuyvesant Town and said that “We are confident that the debut in the city Peter Cooper Village filed suit in court will reaffirm the 2012 Roberts n effort to facilitate landlord-tenant disputes TMarch against their landlords, settlement, which explicitly stated that Athrough mediation rather than through alleging that the owners' plan to dereg- these J-51 units should no longer be housing court was announced by the de Blasio ulate certain apartments would violate a subject to rent regulation as of June administration in July. The aim of the program is new state law, the Housing and Stability 2020.” to help lower income tenants, or any tenant in a Tenant Protection Act, passed last June. Tenants, however, argue that vulnerable situation, avoid eviction. When the owners, subsidiaries the new state law, passed in 2019, bars The Landlord-Tenant Mediation Project of the private equity firms Blackstone deregulation even after J-51 ends. Ac- ,to be administered by HPD, will accept ten- and Ivanhoe Cambridge, purchased the cording to State Senator Brad Hoylman, ants who are referred by Community Dispute two east side complexes in 2015, at a the tenants are right. "We stated in the Resolution Centers, which will be located in all cost of $5.23 billion, they assured ten- law that there is no expiration date on boroughs. The centers will focus on tenants who ants that 45 percent of the apartments, rent-stabilized housing," he said. have no access to lawyers. or around five thousand units, would Although the city and the state The aim of the program is to persuade remain affordable. But they argue today are both included in the lawsuit, the de landlords to avoid lengthy eviction proceedings, that a settlement reached in 2012 guar- Blasio administration appears to be sid- especially in the current Covid-19 situation antees that six thousand units would ing with the tenants. An administration which has forced many tenants out of their jobs, revert to deregulated status once they spokesperson said that the "terms of the thereby exacerbating the difficulty of paying rent. were removed from New York State's earlier litigation make clear that these J-51 tax exemption, a program intended homes are subject to the stricter rent to stimulate property renovation and laws and tenant protections and they improvement. must remain under those protections." LIHC: Affordability A spokesperson for the owners 'out of reach' for many ew York State residents must earn at ANHD calls for aid beyond least $32.50 an hour in order to afford a two-bedroom apartment. But the rent and eviction freezes Nofficial minimum wage here is $14.50 an hour, or less than half of what is needed. mong the first in the nation to ¶ Temporarily suspend mortgag- Further, workers here who earn the min- call for moratoria on rents and es and issue a moratorium on mortgage imum wage will need to clock in one hundred Aevictions during the Covid-19 actions and ten hours per week to meet the average "fair pandemic, the Association for Neigh- ¶ Provide emergency support for market" rent without spending more than 30 borhoods and Housing Development, a affordable housing developers percent of their incomes. People spending more leading community advocate, has now ¶ Rehouse those overcrowding in than that percentage are said to be rent-bur- issued several additonal demands, such impacted residences dened, or, if severe enough, rent-poor. as utility fee decreases and nonprofit ¶ Reduce utility payments Data on the relationship between earn- assistance. ¶ Implement financial protec- ings and housing affordability in every state Arguing that "Historically mar- tions for small businesses appear in a new report, "Out of Reach," by the ginalized neighborhoods and commu- ¶ Issue a moratorium on ULURP National Low Income Housing Coalition. Al- nities will be most acutely impacted processes [ULURP stands for urban though the data are statewide, they often under- and left particularly vulnerable," the land use review procedure] state the situation for renters in various cities, group noted early on that in "New York, ¶ Provide emergency fiscal sup- like New York. (In the city and surrounding low-income communities of color and port for nonprofits areas, the required wage is fifteen dollars.) immigrant communities will face the ¶ Fund universal paid sick leave, On the national level, the report notes brunt not only of the medical crisis that childcare, and unemployment insurance the "Twelve of the 20 largest occupations in the is upon us, but also the growing eco- ¶ Suspend all debt — including United States pay a median hourly wage that is nomic crisis in the form of evictions, student loans, credit card, and medical less than what a full-time worker needs to earn mounting debt, job loss, and community debt to afford a modest apartment at the national disinvestment." ¶ Issue a moratorium on ICE average fair market rent. The workers in these Following is a summary of AN- ¶ Ensure immigrants can safely occupations account for more than 38% of the HD's requests: access healthcare and services total U.S. workforce, excluding farmworkers." ¶ Issue a moratorium on evic- ¶ Issue a moratorium on low-lev- In no governmental jurisdiction of the tions and pass Good Cause eviction el arrests and other criminal proceed- US can a worker "earning the federal or pre- regulations ings vailing local minimum wage afford a modest ¶ Freeze commercial and residen- ¶ End Medicaid cuts and provide two-bedroom rental home at fair market rent by tial rents free COVID-19 testing and care working a standard 40-hour work week." ¶ Extend residential rent-regulat- ed leases