Q&A
Expansion of building types eligible for residential conversion
4:48:52
·
146 sec
The discussion focuses on the expansion of building types eligible for conversion to residential use under the City of Yes proposal. Chair Garodnick explains that the plan now includes other underutilized spaces beyond just office buildings.
- The proposal aims to include faith-based organizations, schools, and other underutilized spaces in zones where residential use is allowed
- This expansion is new and would not have gone through ULURP previously
- The council member expresses surprise at the inclusion of schools in the conversion plan
Selvena N. Brooks-Powers
4:48:52
So I think we should get clarity because even, like, today, I noticed in a testimony about the conversions of the office space, which I've told you I'm in support of, but that was based on our conversations of office space.
4:49:05
Today, I noticed you included schools.
4:49:08
That was never ever said before publicly.
4:49:11
Not to me at least, and I've always read it to be something else, but I also wanted to understand When you talked about the district fixes, what has led to less housing from your vantage point being created?
4:49:28
And how will this change now generate the housing because you said before, like, based on the current zoning, more housing could have been built, yet it wasn't built.
4:49:39
So I wanna understand that, and then also, like, you do explain how we preserve the landmark buildings.
4:49:45
Because if we're looking to create housing, making sure that we're not losing landmarks in the city of New York.
Daniel Garodnick
4:49:53
Great.
4:49:54
Thank you.
4:49:55
First of all, as it relates to office, to residential conversion.
4:49:59
Notably, office to residential has occupied a lot of public attention because it feels to meet the moment.
4:50:08
19% vacancy rate in office buildings, 1.41% vacancy rate in housing, you know, people rightly make the connection, including this council when it passed the law to create a task force to study this issue.
4:50:20
But as part of this proposal, we also wanted to include other types of buildings to be eligible.
4:50:25
So long as They are in a zone where residential is allowed.
4:50:31
We thought that a faith based organization with a, you know, a school building that they were not using anymore or a a convent or any anybody else with an underutilized space that could be
Selvena N. Brooks-Powers
4:50:43
Would that go through U LERP still?
4:50:45
That that Is that the one person is it the less than 1 person?
Daniel Garodnick
4:50:48
No.
4:50:49
No.
4:50:49
That would not but that was not that was not something that would have been eligible before.
4:50:53
It was totally outside of our adaptive reuse rules.
4:50:57
So we'll come back to you as to what the 0.8% of 1% was in that category.
4:51:02
But in this situation, we wanted to enable more buildings to have the opportunity if residential was allowed.
4:51:08
So
Selvena N. Brooks-Powers
4:51:09
because it's new, then they wouldn't even go through or you learn because this is a new thing.
Daniel Garodnick
4:51:12
That's right.
4:51:13
This is new.
4:51:15
As for district fixes, what we have found is
