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TESTIMONY
Testimony by Perris Straughter, Director of Planning and Land Use for the New York City Council, on housing and land use
1:13:46
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6 min
Perris Straughter, Director of Planning and Land Use for the New York City Council, testifies on the city's housing affordability crisis and the council's role.
Straughter highlights the council's proactive leadership in approving rezonings and housing units, including the Fair Housing Framework legislation. He argues against the perception of the council as an obstacle, emphasizing the importance of democratic checks and balances in land use decisions and cautioning against returning to a time of less community representation and potential executive overreach. He supports reforms that build on the Fair Housing Framework, such as prioritizing planning in underperforming districts and increasing the City Planning Department's capacity.
- The City Council has led on housing, approving significant neighborhood rezonings and private site applications leading to tens of thousands of new units.
- Straughter defends the council's role, emphasizing checks and balances and opposing a reduction in community representation in land use decisions.
- Supports reforms like prioritizing neighborhood planning in districts not meeting fair housing targets and empowering the Speaker to hold council members accountable.
- Advocates for increasing the Department of City Planning's capacity to support proactive community planning and address the housing crisis.
Valerie White
1:13:46
Yes, please.
1:13:46
My
Perris Straughter
1:13:48
name is Paris well, first of all, thank you for the opportunity.
1:13:51
My name is Paris Strotter, and I'm the director of planning and land use for the New York City Council.
1:13:56
The commission is rightly focused on New York's housing affordability crisis and potential solutions to deliver more homes for New Yorkers.
1:14:04
Speaker Adrian Adams and the city council share that priority.
1:14:08
We've led on housing throughout, this term, starting in 2022.
1:14:13
We're on track to complete five neighborhood rezonings totaling nearly 50,000 units.
1:14:18
More than 25% would be affordable.
1:14:21
The city council has approved in this time nearly a 120 private site applications totaling over 27,500 units, the majority of which over 16,000 units are affordable.
1:14:34
The city council approved and improved, the City Of US zoning for housing opportunity text amendment zoning text amendment, which will bring over 80,000 new homes.
1:14:47
Council speaker Adams proposed, and the city council unanimously passed the fair housing framework legislation that will require a comprehensive plan for our housing needs, by establishing transparent housing targets to hold every neighborhood accountable for contributing its fair share.
1:15:06
Despite this clear record of of proactive leadership, the commission's discussion has centered on the alleged role of the city council as an obstacle.
1:15:14
This overlooks the biggest challenge to produce housing while selectively acknowledging how one part of government can be influenced to oppose housing and ignoring the executive's branch's vulnerability to influence.
1:15:29
This ignores the very real and democratic checks and balances and land use decisions.
1:15:34
The 1989 charter revisions replaced the undemocratic board of estimate with a representative city council that provided every New Yorker with an equal vote on land use matters.
1:15:44
This change came after major outcry on land use decisions that were, excuse me, outright racist and leveled black and brown neighborhoods, concentrated poverty, and segregated the city by race and class.
1:15:57
We know that without a check on executive control, appointed brow power brokers can ex destroy and remake neighborhoods.
1:16:05
Recent events in our city have left New Yorkers questioning whether the mayor has their best interests at heart, and there's a growing tore trend of executive overreach being normalized.
1:16:17
Our nation's president has led on that and created a constitutional crises or constitutional crises, excuse me, that undermine democracy and the separation of powers.
1:16:28
Black, Latino, and immigrant communities are under attack after gentrification has contributed to increased displacement.
1:16:36
I asked this commission, do we really want to go back to a time when communities had less representation?
1:16:44
What guarantees do we have that the mistakes of the past will not be wreck replicated?
1:16:52
Can I continue?
Sharon Greenberger
1:16:53
Yes.
1:16:53
Please do.
Perris Straughter
1:16:55
No.
1:16:56
We should make reforms that promote housing production and ensure accountability while preserving the power of local communities to have input, in projects and policies that affect their neighborhoods.
1:17:07
The city council is the most representative part of the city government.
1:17:11
Our members understand these communities at the most granular level.
1:17:19
Mayors and president I'm sorry.
1:17:21
Mayors and borough presidents are no less affected by political interests, NIMBYs, real estate developers, lobbyists, etcetera.
1:17:29
The checks and balances in EULIP exist to prevent one branch of government from becoming too powerful.
1:17:35
But the council does support reform.
1:17:37
The council agrees that there are certain types of minor of minor or clearly beneficial applications where the Euler process is an obstacle, including resiliency and sustainability related actions to protect against the effects of climate change.
1:17:53
The council also supports reforms that build on the fair housing framework law, including prioritizing neighborhood planning efforts in community districts that are failing to meet their targets, such ideas as requiring DCP, the Department of City Planning, to propose land use actions in response to the framework, increasing out of accountability for community districts that fail to meet fair housing targets, such as requiring community boards to approve land use changes that would that would achieve fair housing targets, but and providing them options and resources for them to initiate plans as opposed to a plan that's always initiated by the Department of City Planning, increasing the speaker of the city council's authority to hold council members accountable for advancing land use changes in community boards that are not meeting fair housing targets.
1:18:48
This would maintain the council's power to engage and problem solve while giving the speaker as opposed to the council of the of as opposed to council as a whole the power to decide what comes to the council for a vote.
1:19:06
The council wants to increase the capacity of the Department of City Planning and other city agencies to support communities willing to proactively plan and to help address the housing crisis.
1:19:17
DCP often says no to communities that want to plan and want to rezone, due to a lack of capacity, but the most effective way to sustainably build lots of housing, especially affordable housing, is to advance neighborhood plans and rezone neighborhoods.
1:19:35
We broadly believe that DCP and city agencies should city agencies should be provided with increased capacity for engaging in proactive planning.
1:19:45
The Department of City Planning should have a responsibility to engage the public around planning issues beyond rezonance, educating the public about neighborhood specific needs for infrastructure and for new housing.