PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Margy Brown, Executive Director of Urban Homesteading Assistance Board (UHAB) on Affordable Homeownership
2:23:46
·
151 sec
Margy Brown, Executive Director of UHAB, testified in support of increasing affordable homeownership opportunities in NYC, emphasizing the importance of preservation and inclusion of low-income New Yorkers in homeownership plans. She highlighted UHAB's 50-year history of empowering residents to become homeowners and the transformative power of homeownership in revitalizing neighborhoods.
- Stressed the cost-effectiveness and impact of preservation in creating and sustaining homeownership, particularly for low-income communities
- Highlighted the opportunity to transform distressed rental buildings into quality cooperative homeownership for tenants
- Mentioned receiving outreach from over 100 tenant associations interested in purchasing their rental buildings
- Emphasized the need for investment in existing affordable homeownership, specifically low-income cooperatives
Margy Brown
2:23:46
Good afternoon.
2:23:47
Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
2:23:50
My name is Margie Brown.
2:23:51
I'm executive director of Uhab.
2:23:54
Over the last 50 years, Uhab has empowered low and moderate income residents to take control of their housing and become homeowners in the buildings where they already live As firsthand witnesses to the transformative power of homeownership to revitalize neighborhoods and stabilize lives, Uhab is thrilled to see the canceled interest in bolstering the city's homeownership.
2:24:16
Specifically, we support a focus on preservation and the inclusion of low income New Yorkers in the homeownership plan.
2:24:25
Preservation is the most cost effective way to create and sustain homeownership on a large scale and is also the most impactful approach, reaching deeper levels of affordability and ensuring that low income New Yorkers have access to the security, empowerment, and intergenerational wealth wealth building that homeownership provides.
2:24:45
The city's aging and distressed housing stock is a crisis and an opportunity.
2:24:50
By investing in homeownership through preservation, we create a pathway for tenants in distressed rental buildings to reclaim their housing as permanently affordable quality homes.
2:25:00
How household living in these conditions are overwhelmingly low income people of color systematically excluded from traditional homeownership opportunities.
2:25:10
Transforming substandard housing into quality housing and housing security into homeownership for the communities most in need accomplishes so many of our shared housing goals and achieves housing justice like few other homeownership models do.
2:25:26
Over the last 2 years, you have has received outreach from over a 100 tenant associations across the city who are interested in purchasing their rental buildings and transforming them into cooperative homeownership.
2:25:38
Increasingly, We are also hearing from building owners looking to offload failing or unprofitable rental housing through tenant purchases.
2:25:47
The collapse of the Signature Bank Portfolio has Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
2:25:54
I do just quickly want to say that in investment in the city's existing affordable homeownership, specifically low income cooperatives, is another key component of ensuring that we're expanding homeownership opportunities and not losing existing homeownership as fast as we're creating new.
2:26:13
Thank you so much.
2:26:14
I encourage you to read the rest.
2:26:16
Thank
