PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Emily Goldstein, Director of Organizing and Advocacy at Association for Neighborhood And Housing Development (ANHD)
0:13:26
·
120 sec
Emily Goldstein from ANHD supports the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity (CHO) proposal as a step towards equitable housing distribution in NYC, but recommends several changes to maximize affordable housing creation. She emphasizes the need for deeper affordability requirements and incentives for a higher ratio of affordable to market-rate housing within the proposed density limits.
- Suggests requiring a deep affordability band in the Universal Affordability Preference, rather than allowing it through averaging
- Recommends incentivizing 30-50% affordable housing instead of the standard 80/20 split
- Expresses concern about the lack of affordability requirements in transit-oriented and town center zoning proposals for buildings with 10+ units
- Advocates for affordability components in all neighborhoods to ensure fair housing distribution
Emily Goldstein
0:13:26
Good morning.
0:13:27
Thank you, Chair Riley and members of the committee for the opportunity to testify today.
0:13:31
My name is Emily Goldstein.
0:13:32
I'm the director of organizing an advocacy with the Association for Neighborhood And Housing Development Or A And HD.
0:13:39
A And HD has long supported a more equitable distribution of housing development across New York City to ensure that every neighborhood is doing its part and unfair burdens don't continue to fall on marginalized communities.
0:13:52
We believe CHO is an important step in this direction, but we have several recommended changes to ensure that the zoning can actually maximize affordable housing, not just market rate housing.
0:14:04
In particular, in the universal affordability preference, we recommend requiring a deep affordability band rather than simply allowing it through averaging.
0:14:15
We also recommend creating more incentive to have a better ratio of affordable to market rate housing rather than sort of an eightytwenty across the board.
0:14:26
We believe that can be done within the scope of the current proposal by reducing the maximum allowed for market rate housing and keeping the total the same.
0:14:36
So you're incentivizing 30, 40, 50% affordable as opposed to just the 80 20, but within the current proposed density.
0:14:45
I'd also like to highlight that we are concerned that the transit oriented zoning and the town center zoning proposals don't have any affordability component at all.
0:14:55
And while that may be practical for very small buildings, we believe there should be required affordability in those proposals for buildings that are 10 units and above to ensure that all neighborhoods are getting some affordable housing.
0:15:09
We believe that's both important from an affordability perspective and from a fair housing perspective to ensure that certain neighborhoods aren't sort of being left out of the affordability equation.
0:15:20
Our full testimony submitted online has a variety of additional recommendations.
0:15:24
Again, appreciate the time to test by today.
