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TESTIMONY
Testimony by Howard Slatkin, Executive Director of Citizens Housing and Planning Council, on land use process reform
0:11:39
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3 min
Howard Slatkin, Executive Director of Citizens Housing and Planning Council, testifies on flaws in the land use process.
He argues that the current system not only allows some neighborhoods to refuse housing but also encourages inadequate housing everywhere, citing the practice of "hungry hungry hippos zoning" where council members secure affordable housing commitments met by public subsidies without increasing overall affordable housing.
- Slatkin highlights that the land use process suffers from local members blocking housing and practices that shift finite housing subsidies without increasing the total affordable housing supply.
- He cautions against combining community board and borough president review periods, suggesting it might diminish the borough president's influence.
- He proposes enhancing the borough president's role later in the process, such as allowing them to trigger an appeal vote after a city council decision.
- Slatkin also warns that shortening the City Planning Commission public hearing timeline could hinder the submission of modified applications addressing complex issues.
Howard Slatkin
0:11:39
Good evening, vice chair Greenberger, chair of the jury, and commissioners.
0:11:43
Howard Slatkin.
0:11:44
I'm executive director of Citizens Housing and Planning Council.
0:11:47
Happy to be back to talk about the recommendations you are currently considering for the news reports.
0:11:51
Certainly.
0:11:54
Thank you.
0:11:56
As the commission sorts through recommendations that address identified flaws in the land use process, I urge you to be mindful that the problem is not just that some neighborhoods refuse to allow housing at all, but also that the system encourages inadequate housing everywhere.
0:12:12
We've discussed the major flaw that that exists that local members are able to shut down housing applications in their own districts for all intents and purposes, but there is also, for instance, another common practice that I've called hungry hungry hippos zoning.
0:12:25
This is when individual council members use the EULAR process to secure affordable housing commitments that can only be met by publicly subsidizing housing.
0:12:33
It's an obvious, political victory for a member to be able to say they're getting more affordable housing for their district, and it also sounds like a substantive victory for affordability.
0:12:43
But this is often illusory because it, this practice just shifts the same pool of finite housing subsidies that exist from one neighborhood to another, doesn't increase the amount of affordable housing that gets built in the city, and rezoning only for subsidized housing doesn't actually increase the effective zoned capacity in the city, which is still limited by the amount of subsidy available.
0:13:05
As long as decisions are viewed through local blinders, we will always have shortcomings in our land use review process and its ability to meet our housing needs.
0:13:14
I also wanna caution the commission about the idea of combining community board and borough president review into the same sixty days, which sounds like a thirty day savings, but it may, in fact, diminish rather than enhance the borough president's bully pulpit during the process, Forcing the VP to take an early position, issuing concurrent potentially a concurrent conflicting recommendation would often be a greater liability, to a borough president than, for instance, to the community board.
0:13:44
In contrast, enhancing the borough president's role closer to the end of the process, for instance, as CHPC has proposed, allowing a borough president to, trigger an appeal vote following a city council vote, would do more to elevate their broader geographical perspective.
0:14:02
Also, making the city planning commission public hearing occur thirty days earlier would make it virtually impossible to submit a modified or a application that addresses issues that are beyond the scope of the original application.
0:14:17
This is something that is already difficult in the current process, but would become virtually impossible.
0:14:22
So a shortened process like this may be appropriate for minor or straightforward applications rather than for other more complex applications.
0:14:32
To the extent that reforms oh, I'm out of time.
0:14:35
I wanted to, just briefly suggest that when reforms are applied to geographies where housing reduction is deemed inadequate, that the determination should be essentially automated and based on objective data rather than on targets set by city, mayoral agencies or the city council.
0:14:49
I can elaborate on that or any of the other points as the commission wishes.
Sharon Greenberger
0:14:53
Thank you so much.