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TESTIMONY

Dan Kent, President and CEO of Lantern Organization, on increasing market-rate housing production to address homelessness and affordability in New York City (NYC)

8:03:28

·

3 min

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Dan Kent, representing Lantern Organization, supports the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity initiative, particularly praising the Universal Affordability Preference provision. He argues that despite New York City's leadership in affordable housing production, the city faces a severe homelessness crisis due to restrictive zoning codes and low housing supply.

  • Emphasizes the need to increase market-rate housing production, citing that NYC's housing production rate is only 20% of cities like Austin or Seattle
  • Argues that allowing more market-rate housing development, in addition to affordable housing, is crucial to solving homelessness and affordability issues
  • Supports the proposal as a thoughtful approach that asks all neighborhoods to contribute moderately without radically transforming any single area
  • Supports the Universal Affordability preference provision
  • New York City has the highest rate of homelessness despite being a leader in affordable housing production
  • Current zoning code and land use process reduces housing supply
  • Low vacancy rates contribute to homelessness and high rents
  • Need to allow more development of market-rate housing alongside affordable housing
  • New York City's housing production rate is much lower than other cities like Austin or Seattle
  • Current rules prevent housing from being built
  • Market-rate housing and private developers should be seen as part of the solution
  • The proposal is thoughtful and asks every neighborhood to contribute a little
  • Small changes like new apartment buildings or ADUs won't significantly alter neighborhoods
  • Increasing housing supply will help relieve pressure on New Yorkers struggling with affordability

[EXPERIMENTAL]

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

  • UAP
  • ADU
  • Transit-Oriented Development

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

"And first, I'd like to applaud the Universal Affordability preference provision This provision will help lantern and our peer organizations produce even more affordable in support of housing in New York City."

The speaker directly mentions and expresses support for the Universal Affordability Preference provision, which is a key element of the City of Yes For Housing Opportunity proposal.

ADU

"If a couple of your neighbors get ADUs, your neighborhood's still gonna be a lovely place to live."

The speaker mentions ADUs (Accessory Dwelling Units) in the context of neighborhood changes, which directly relates to the ADU element of the City of Yes For Housing Opportunity proposal.

Transit-Oriented Development

"If there's a new three or four story apartment building next to your train station."

The speaker mentions building apartment buildings near train stations, which aligns with the Transit-Oriented Development element of the proposal that aims to add housing near public transit.


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?
Dan Kent
8:03:28
Good evening, everyone.
8:03:29
Thank you for the opportunity to share my thoughts.
8:03:31
My name is Dan Kent.
8:03:33
I'm the President and CEO of Lantron Organization.
8:03:36
We are a non profit developer of affordable and supportive housing in New York City.
8:03:40
And have over 1500 units throughout the Bronx, Manhattan, and Brooklyn.
8:03:45
And first, I'd like to applaud the Universal Affordability preference provision This provision will help lantern and our peer organizations produce even more affordable in support of housing in New York City.
8:03:58
And I think it's worth noting that New York City has long been a national leader in the production of affordable housing and permanent supportive housing.
8:04:07
Despite that success, however, New York City has the highest rate of homelessness of any city in the United States.
8:04:16
Our rate of homelessness is five times greater than other cities like Austin, Texas or Chicago.
8:04:24
So why is that?
8:04:25
Why do we have record setting homelessness and record settingly high rents?
8:04:31
The reason is we have a zoning code and a land use process that reduces the supply of housing.
8:04:39
We have one of the lowest vacancy rates of any city in the United States.
8:04:44
When you look at cities that have low rates of homelessness, well, guess what?
8:04:49
They have higher vacancy rates.
8:04:51
So how do we solve the problem?
8:04:53
How do we address the root cause?
8:04:56
We do so.
8:04:57
By not only helping groups like Lancer develop affordable housing, but more importantly, we allow the development of market rate housing.
8:05:06
Markery housing is a good thing.
8:05:08
And right now, we don't produce nearly enough of it.
8:05:11
Our rate of housing production in New York City is about 20% of the rate of housing production in Austin, Texas or Seattle, Washington.
8:05:21
They're producing five times more housing on a per capita basis.
8:05:24
Than we are.
8:05:26
And that's because the rules we have in place in this city are set up to prevent housing from being built.
Dan Garodnick
8:05:33
That is a fact.
Dan Kent
8:05:35
So if we want to solve the homelessness crisis, if we want to solve the affordability crisis, We need to start looking at market rate housing is a good thing.
8:05:44
We need to start looking at private developers as part of the solution and as our partners.
8:05:50
Because groups like Lantron, we're not gonna be able to develop enough affordable and supportive housing to get us out of this mess that we've created as a city.
8:05:57
We need to change the rules.
8:05:59
We need to produce more housing of all types in every neighborhood.
8:06:02
And I have to say, this proposal is incredibly thoughtful.
8:06:07
This is not radically transforming any neighborhood.
8:06:10
It's asking everyone to do a little bit.
8:06:13
And I promise you if if there's a new three or four story apartment building next to your train station.
8:06:20
If a couple of your neighbors get ADUs, your neighborhood's still gonna be a lovely place to live.
8:06:25
This is still gonna be a great city, but it's gonna relieve pressure on the 1000 of New Yorkers who can't make ends meet because of the crisis we created.
8:06:35
Thank you.

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