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TESTIMONY

Anita Laremont, Partner at Fried Frank Law Firm, on support and suggestions for City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal

5:36:10

·

3 min

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Anita Laremont testifies in support of the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal, highlighting its potential to address New York City's critical housing supply needs. She focuses on the proposal's approaches to facilitate housing development while raising concerns about the elimination of the voluntary inclusionary housing and inclusionary housing certificate program.

  • Laremont suggests a 15-year vesting period for existing certificates and an additional 10 years for their sale and use if the certificate program is eliminated
  • She warns that transitioning to Universal Affordability Preference (UAP) in R10 districts may effectively result in a downzoning due to higher costs and less favorable tax treatment
  • Laremont urges careful consideration of how changes are implemented to ensure they further housing development rather than diminish it
  • Support for the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal
  • Proposal facilitates housing development to address critical housing supply needs
  • Concern about the elimination of the voluntary inclusionary housing and inclusionary housing certificate program
  • Suggestion for a 15-year vesting period for existing certificates and an additional 10 years for their sale and use
  • Concern that transitioning to UAP in R10 districts may effectively result in down zoning
  • Urges careful consideration of rules to ensure they further housing development rather than diminish it

[EXPERIMENTAL]

Which elements of City of Yes for Housing Opportunity were discussed in this testimony?

  • UAP
  • Residential Conversions
  • Parking Mandates

The following are AI-extracted quotes and reasoning about which elements of the proposal were discussed in this testimony.

This is a quick, close approximation. Occasionally, the connection between a testimony's transcript and specific elements of City Planning's proposal is tenuous.

Read about this AI-generated analysis here.

UAP

"providing for affordable housing in many additional neighborhoods through universal affordability preference among other changes."

This quote directly mentions the Universal Affordability Preference (UAP) as one of the changes in the proposal.

"I'll also note that transitioning to UAP and R10 districts, which are currently our most dense districts, it's effectively a down zoning. It is very unlikely that developers will use UEP in these districts to attain 12 F AR."

This quote discusses potential issues with implementing UAP in R10 districts, showing that the speaker is analyzing the UAP element of the proposal.

Residential Conversions

"expanding opportunities for office to residential conversion"

This quote directly mentions the proposal's aim to facilitate the conversion of office spaces to residential use, which is a key part of the Residential Conversions element.

Parking Mandates

"eliminating costly parking requirements"

This quote directly refers to the removal of parking mandates, which is a key element of the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal.


About this analysis:

This analysis is done by AI that reasons whether or not a quote from the testimony discusses a particular element of the proposal.

All the prompts and data are open and available on Github.

You can search for testimonies that mentioned a specific element in the table on the main meeting page.

When an element is explicitly stated in the testimony (e.g. "Universal Affordability Preference" or "UAP"), the analysis is accurate.

But the connection between a quote from the testimony and an element of the proposal is sometimes implicit.

In these cases, the AI might eagerly label a testimony as discussing a proposal when the connection is tenuous, or it might omit it entirely.

↗ Why are there transcription and diarization errors?
Anita Laremont
5:36:10
Hello, everyone.
5:36:11
My name is Anita Laramont, and I'm a partner at the law firm of Fried Frank.
5:36:16
It's really a pleasure to stand here today to testify in support of the city of yes for housing opportunity proposal on my behalf and on behalf of Rivni.
5:36:25
This proposal embodies approaches to facilitate the development of housing, which remains really an existential issue for our city.
5:36:32
We are in a critical need of significantly more housing supply.
5:36:36
And this proposal moves boldly forward in allowing for growth through establishing new zoning districts that will permit greater density where appropriate, expanding opportunities for office to residential conversion, eliminating costly parking requirements and providing for affordable housing in many additional neighborhoods through universal affordability preference among other changes.
5:36:58
I want to speak briefly about an element of the proposal that I suggest be given further consideration.
5:37:04
The proposal would eliminate the current voluntary inclusionary housing and inclusionary housing certificate program.
5:37:11
This program has played a significant role in financing the development of affordable housing.
5:37:16
Not for profit and for profit developers of affordable housing in the city, by allowing developers of this affordable housing to sell inclusionary bonus rights.
5:37:25
To nearby market rate developers.
5:37:28
The program is sometimes viewed as favor on the basis that it facilitates affordable housing off-site.
5:37:34
That's peculiar.
5:37:36
The fact is that the program has underwritten the development of a 100 percent affordable housing by high quality developers.
5:37:43
In fact, many of the very same developers that the city itself provides subsidy to for a 100% affordable housing and elimination of the program will require these developers to depend even more on scarcity subsidy.
5:37:57
If however, it's clear that the certificate program is going to be eliminated I urge careful consideration being given to how this is done over time.
5:38:06
Today, certificates exist in the marketplace, and projects that will generate certificates are planned or are underway.
5:38:14
I believe that it's important to provide a significant 15 year vesting period certificates to continue to be generated and an additional 10 years for those certificates to be sold in use.
5:38:24
This timeframe is necessary to ensure that certificates retain their value in a period of diminishing opportunities for their use and to allow for the nonprofit and profit sector that develops affordable housing through the sale of the certificates to establish new funding streams.
5:38:41
I'll also note that transitioning to UAP and R10 districts, which are currently our most dense districts, it's effectively a down zoning.
5:38:49
It is very unlikely that developers will use UEP in these districts to attain 12 F AR.
5:38:54
Due to higher construction costs, already higher site acquisition costs and less favorable treatment under the 485x tax abatement program per sites of more than 150 units.
5:39:05
Now I know that your goal here is to develop tools that's further development of housing rather than to diminish it.
5:39:11
I hope that you will just ensure that the rules you wanna act to just that.
5:39:14
Thank you.

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