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TESTIMONY

Thomas Devaney from Municipal Art Society on City of Yes for Housing Opportunity zoning amendment

8:07:01

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3 min

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Thomas Devaney, Senior Director of Land Use Planning at the Municipal Art Society (MAS), expresses support for the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity zoning amendment. He views it as a good start to addressing New York City's housing crisis by unlocking the 'missing middle' in housing production through incremental citywide zoning changes.

  • Devaney supports the plan's equitable distribution of housing density, including provisions for town centers, transit-oriented development, accessory dwelling units, and universal affordability preference.
  • MAS recognizes the modest projections of the amendment, with an estimated 109,000 new housing units by 2039, of which only 20% would be affordable.
  • Devaney emphasizes the need for a comprehensive approach that includes city and state incentives, funding tools, and infrastructure support to fully address the housing crisis.
  • City of Yes for Housing Opportunity is a good start to address the housing crisis
  • The plan aims to unlock the 'missing middle' in housing typologies
  • Supports equitable distribution of housing density across the city
  • Supports transit-oriented development, accessory dwelling units, and universal affordability preference
  • Supports office-to-residential conversions and elimination of parking requirements
  • Projections for new housing units are modest (109,000 by 2039)
  • Zoning is just one tool; a comprehensive approach is needed
  • The city must ensure social and physical infrastructure meets neighborhood needs with increased density
  • MAS will provide further comments on campus infill, community engagement, and heat island impacts

[EXPERIMENTAL]

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

  • UAP
  • Residential Conversions
  • Town Center Zoning
  • Parking Mandates
  • ADU
  • Transit-Oriented Development
  • Campuses

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

"We've been encouraged to see tile centers zoning, transit oriented development, provisions for excess accessory dwelling units, universal affordability preference, including the proposal."

The speaker directly mentions 'universal affordability preference' as one of the elements they are encouraged to see in the proposal.

Residential Conversions

"We also support incentives for office to residential conversions"

The speaker explicitly mentions support for office to residential conversions, which is a key aspect of the Residential Conversions element of the proposal.

Town Center Zoning

"We've been encouraged to see tile centers zoning, transit oriented development, provisions for excess accessory dwelling units, universal affordability preference, including the proposal."

The speaker mentions 'tile centers zoning' which is likely a misspelling or transcription error for 'town center zoning', indicating that this element is discussed and supported.

Parking Mandates

"We also support incentives for office to residential conversions and the elimination of parking requirements and expanding transfer of landlord development rights."

The speaker explicitly mentions support for 'elimination of parking requirements', which directly relates to the Removing Parking Mandates element of the proposal.

ADU

"We've been encouraged to see tile centers zoning, transit oriented development, provisions for excess accessory dwelling units, universal affordability preference, including the proposal."

The speaker directly mentions 'provisions for excess accessory dwelling units' as one of the elements they are encouraged to see in the proposal, which refers to the Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) element.

Transit-Oriented Development

"We've been encouraged to see tile centers zoning, transit oriented development, provisions for excess accessory dwelling units, universal affordability preference, including the proposal."

The speaker explicitly mentions 'transit oriented development' as one of the elements they are encouraged to see in the proposal.

Campuses

"We will be providing long written comments that will explore using campus infill to produce more portable housing, ways to engage NIGHT YOUR RESIDENTS ON PLANNING AND DESIGN AND ALSO ADDRESS HEAT ISLAND IMPACT."

The speaker mentions that they will be providing comments on 'using campus infill to produce more portable housing', which relates to the Campuses element of the 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?
Thomas Devaney
8:07:01
Hello.
8:07:01
Can everybody hear me?
Dan Garodnick
8:07:03
You can.
Thomas Devaney
8:07:04
Great.
8:07:06
I crossed a good morning, and I've written Good evening to everybody.
8:07:11
The commissioners, and thank you, Cherilyn Nick.
8:07:13
Thomas Davaney, senior director, Land use of Planning as a Municipal Art Society.
8:07:19
While a zoning tax amendment let alone zoning will not solve the city's housing crisis, city of the ass for housing opportunities, city wide approach to new housing production is a good start.
8:07:30
City of US is rooted in the notion that restrictive and outdated zoning regulations have stifled housing production and contributed to significantly to the current housing crisis, to address the housing crunch.
8:07:42
The city seeks to unlock the missing middle, the long neglected middle of the housing spectrum, building typologies between single family and mid rise apartment buildings that are comparatively less expensive to build, but have been prohibitively that have been prohibited by zoning.
8:07:58
CWS offers a host of incremental citywide zoning changes are arguably the most significant in 50 years designed to add a little more housing in every neighborhood.
8:08:07
MAR supports the city's plan to equitably distribute more housing density across the city.
8:08:12
It's been encouraged to see tile centers zoning, transit oriented development, provisions for excess accessory dwelling units, universal affordability preference, including the proposal.
8:08:22
We also support incentives for office to residential conversions and the elimination of parking requirements and expanding transfer of landlord development rights.
8:08:30
There's no question that New York City has grossly underperformed or producing sufficient housing.
8:08:34
Especially in low density, low density residential areas.
8:08:38
And the housing that has been produced has mainly been high end out of reach for most new workers.
8:08:42
At the same time, one third in New York of New York residents now pay more than 50% of their income and rent.
8:08:48
Given the magnitude of the housing supply problem, In the attention and volume of documentation, CVS has generate generated, the annotated drop text alone spans 1400 pages.
8:09:01
CVS projections are rather modest according to the DEIS by 2039.
8:09:09
The city of yes to protect it to produce a maximum of 109,000 incremental new housing units, which translates to about 7300 per year.
8:09:18
And of those, only 20% or a maximum of 22,000 would be designated as affordable.
8:09:25
MAS recognizes that zoning is one tool that to create new housing in a deeply unaffordable city like New York.
8:09:33
Addressing the housing crisis requires a comprehensive, multifaceted approach It synthesizes a broad range of city and state incentives and funding tools.
8:09:41
Additionally, with City of Gas and the lifting of the residential f a r cap in mind, the city must support communities by ensuring that social and physical infrastructure meets neighborhood needs when density increases in each district.
8:09:56
We will be providing long written comments that will explore using campus infill to produce more portable housing, ways to engage NIGHT YOUR RESIDENTS ON PLANNING AND DESIGN AND ALSO ADDRESS HEAT ISLAND IMPACT.
8:10:11
THANK YOU.

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