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Affordable Housing

Affordable housing development must seek a better balance between market rate and affordable housing. Pioneers who have built our neighborhoods must not be forced to leave because they are victims of their own success, their housing should remain affordable so that they may realize the fruits of their labor.

As former Chief of Staff for Mitchell-Lama Subcommittee Chair, Assemblyman Jonathan L. Bing, I know the current issues facing affordable housing. I had the opportunity to work on the next generation of progressive legislation that would scale certain rent regulations to the consumer price index, so that new laws are always current and housing remains affordable for generations to come. But there is more to do and as your City Council member I will continue this work by reforming rent regulation, using market indices like the consumer price index, and expanding affordable housing.

In addition to fixing affordable housing and rent regulation laws, we must also create a centralized affordable housing resource. Affordable housing must be transparent, with easily accessible and searchable lists by address and qualification, rather than having to search through over a dozen different programs and agencies. We must open affordable housing by creating an easy centralized application process. Lastly, the waiting lists for all affordable housing must be publicly available to provide accountability where these waiting lists have been previously abused.

Our Town Questioning A Housing Plan by DANIEL FITZSIMMONS

http://www.nypress.com/local-news/20150331/questioning-a-housing-plan

Like Brewer, Upper East Side council member Ben Kallos is also concerned that developers are getting far more from these programs than what they’re giving back to the community, especially when the inclusionary housing program is combined with the controversial 421a tax break for developers that build affordable housing.

Kallos said while there’s been outrage over so-called poor doors, where affordable housing tenants have a separate entrance than their market rate counterparts, there should be more outrage over the “poor building.”

“There is very little difference between the poor door and the poor building,” he said.

Kallos believes that the inclusionary housing program and other initiatives designed to spur construction of affordable housing have not delivered on the promises that made possible their existence.

Issue: 
Affordable Housing

New York Observer Pols and Tenants Rally for ‘Rent Rollback’ by Will Bredderman

http://observer.com/2015/03/pols-and-tenants-rally-for-rent-rollback/

Councilmen Corey Johnson and Benjamin Kallos, fellow Manhattan Democrats, demonstrated with tenant groups ahead of the first 2015 meeting of the Rent Guidelines Board—and the announcement of three new de Blasio appointees to the nine-member panel charged with setting the annual increase for the city’s roughly one million rent stabilized apartments.

The Democrats chanted “fight, fight, fight, housing is a right” and “What do we want? Rollback!” with members of the Metropolitan Council on Housing and the Flatbush Tenants Council. Mr. Johnson and Mr. Kallos insisted that increasing property values, atrophying tenant wages and declining fuel costs justified a first-ever decrease in rents at regulated units.

Issue: 
Affordable Housing

Mayor de Blasio, Senator Schumer Announce $3 Billion in Federal Funds to Repair and Protect 33 Sandy-Damaged NYCHA Developments Housing Thousands - Largest FEMA Grant in History

"This $3 billion federal grant will help repair the NYCHA developments most hard-hit during Sandy, and, equally importantly, fortify them for future storms. During the storm, Stanley Isaacs in my district flooded, leaving many residents in despair. These funds will help secure Stanley Isaacs, and other NYCHA developments, so residents do not have to go through that struggle again," said Council Member Ben Kallos.