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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Emily Goldstein, Director of Organizing and Advocacy at Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development
4:45:27
·
3 min
Emily Goldstein, representing the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development (ANHD), testified on various housing-related issues and funding requests. She advocated for increased funding for community housing preservation strategies and the Displacement Alert Project, and urged for more targeted allocation of housing capital resources.
- Called for an increase in the community housing preservation strategies initiative to $4,950,000
- Requested continued funding for the Displacement Alert Project run by ANHD
- Emphasized the need to target housing capital resources towards preservation of existing affordable housing and acquisition of distressed rent-stabilized portfolios
- Urged funding and full implementation of the City FHEPS program and Right to Counsel
- Highlighted the importance of properly staffing city agencies to improve efficiency in code enforcement and processing of affordable housing development applications
Emily Goldstein
4:45:27
afternoon, my name's Emily Goldstein.
4:45:28
I'm the Director of Organizing and Advocacy at the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development or ANHD.
4:45:33
Thank you for the opportunity to testify.
4:45:35
Just hit on a few brief points and submit longer written testimony.
4:45:39
First, in light of the escalating housing crisis, we call on the city council to increase the community housing preservation strategies initiative to 4,950,000.
4:45:49
This initiative has not received an increase in many years, and we all know inflation and escalating costs are very real.
4:45:55
This is funding that enables 45 community based organizations to provide essential on the ground services from helping with scree applications to helping to form tenant associations and everything in between.
4:46:07
We also asked for continued funding for the Displacement Alert Project, which ANHD runs.
4:46:12
This is a resource that helps elected officials, your staff, and organizers throughout the city proactively identify and reach tenants at risk of displacement in communities citywide.
4:46:24
Third, we urge that housing capital resources be more directly targeted to two priority areas.
4:46:33
One is preservation of existing affordable housing.
4:46:36
We have severe needs to maintain the affordable housing that we already have in our communities serving extremely low income households.
4:46:46
Nonprofit developers are still struggling with lingering arrears as well as increased operating costs and resources need to be provided order to put these portfolios back onto sound financial footing for the long term.
4:46:58
Second, we have both a challenge and opportunity of private but often rent stabilized portfolios that are in distress and that could be brought into the long term of permanent affordable housing portfolios of ideally non profits but even for profits, but real resources are needed to enable that to happen.
4:47:19
We commend HPD for their recently released updated neighborhood pillars term sheet.
4:47:23
That term sheet is realistic in the costs that it takes to preserve those kinds of distressed portfolios.
4:47:31
The other thing I'll note in keeping with what Allison mentioned, we really need to be targeting our resources towards deeper affordability.
4:47:39
The breakdown of where the need is is very clear, and the targeting of our resources is not matching that.
4:47:47
A couple of other quick notes.
4:47:50
We urge funding and also full implementation of the Citi Pheps program as well as Right to Council.
4:48:00
These are two, among others, but two key proven and known programs that help to reduce homelessness, prevent eviction, and that need to be funded and implemented properly.
4:48:14
And finally, just to note that the city agencies need to be staffed to actually do their full work.
4:48:21
Everything from code enforcement to processing of affordable housing development applications is sort of in these lags and delays that are costing us both in resources and in human cost.