PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Mark Levine, Manhattan Borough President, on City of Yes for Housing Opportunity
0:21:50
·
4 min
Mark Levine, Manhattan Borough President, strongly supports the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity (CHO) proposal, arguing it is crucial to address New York City's severe housing crisis. He emphasizes the outdated nature of the current 1961 zoning code and how CHO would modernize regulations to allow for more housing development.
- Levine highlights the current 1.4% vacancy rate as the lowest in 50 years, making finding housing extremely difficult for low and middle-income families.
- He argues that CHO could create an estimated 109,000 new homes, including both affordable and market-rate units, which are necessary to address the housing shortage.
- Levine also emphasizes the need for tenant protections, including strengthening the right to counsel law for housing court and supporting community-based nonprofits that assist tenants.
Mark Levine
0:21:50
Good morning, counsel colleagues.
0:21:52
Not used to this view of the chamber.
0:21:54
It's very nice.
0:21:55
Mister Sherry, I'm so grateful that you are the one leading this committee and grateful for this chance to testify today.
0:22:02
I've been to hundreds of counsel hearings over the years, and this is without a doubt, one of the
George Tormo
0:22:07
most
Mark Levine
0:22:07
important because New York City is in the midst of a crisis.
0:22:12
We are facing the worst shortage of housing in living memory and maybe the worst that this city has ever seen.
0:22:22
If you or anyone you know has tried to find a home recently, then you know this.
0:22:28
We are allowing so few homes to be built, and the vacancy rate on existing homes is so low just 1.4%, the lowest in half a century, that finding an apartment in this city is something akin to the hunger games.
0:22:47
Now, that's fine for wealthy New Yorkers.
0:22:50
They can just bid up the rent, and they'll get their apartment.
0:22:54
And that's fine for landlords.
0:22:56
They're more than happy to collect those inflated rents.
0:23:01
But for low income families, Even working and middle class families, this is a catastrophe.
0:23:09
The average rent for a market rate department in Manhattan is now over $5000 per month.
0:23:16
There will be people in homeless shelters tonight because of those rents.
0:23:21
There are bus drivers and nurses and teachers with no hope of living in this borough because of those rents.
0:23:29
Up until now, we've been confronting this crisis confirming our housing shortage with the zoning code from 1961.
0:23:38
From 1961, when we had the opposite problem.
0:23:43
It was a time when people were abandoning the city and planners were seriously worried we might have too much housing.
0:23:50
We have a zoning code that outlaws converting vacant offices to housing if the building was built after 1961.
0:23:58
Yes.
0:23:59
That is the current rule.
0:24:00
We have a zoning code that forces developers to build huge parking garages on top of subway stations instead of adding more apartments to their building.
0:24:10
We have a zoning code that outlaws the kind of shared housing that can give an affordable option for a young person starting out or someone who's just down on their luck and might otherwise end up on the street.
0:24:24
City of yes fixes all of that and much more.
0:24:29
The provision known as universal affordability preference would mean that buildings that might not be built or might be built as exclusively market rate would instead have 20% of their apartments locked in as affordable and perpetuity.
0:24:44
The total sum of all these provisions would be an estimated 109,000 new homes for the city.
0:24:53
This would be a game change for our housing crisis.
0:24:56
Now tens of thousands of those homes would be affordable.
0:24:59
Units that would be targeted to low income New Yorkers.
0:25:03
And affordable homes like this will not be built in absence of the changes city of yes would bring.
0:25:10
There also will be tens of thousands of market rate homes created, and we need them too, so that the bus drivers and nurses and teachers who are getting blocked out now will instead have a place to live so that we have negotiating power taken away from landlords and given to tenants.
0:25:28
And, yes, we must also have tenants who have a home that they need to keep.
0:25:34
That in part should mean strengthening our city's landmark right to council law and ensuring every tenant facing eviction has an attorney in housing court.
0:25:44
I was very proud to pass this law when I was sitting where you were in the city council, but it is not being fulfilled today.
0:25:51
There are thousands of tenants in housing court who are not being provided with an attorney.
0:25:57
Is urgent that we fix this crisis.
0:25:59
And we must invest more in the community based nonprofits, which are providing all manner of assistance to tenants, including organizing assistance.
0:26:08
But this will not be enough.
0:26:10
This doesn't help someone who doesn't currently have a home.
0:26:15
There's no getting around it.
0:26:17
We need to build more housing in the city.
0:26:20
We have got to remove the barriers put in place in our 1961 zoning code.
0:26:25
We need the 100,000 units that a more modern zoning code would unlock.
0:26:32
We need to pass city of yes.
0:26:34
Thank you.
