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A Simple Way New York Can Help Renters and Owners


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A proposed housing reform (photo: Emil Cohen/City Council)


In June 2019, state lawmakers significantly altered a provision of the rent stabilization laws called preferential rents. It was the ability for a housing provider to offer a rent that was lower than the legal limit, where such limits apply. Under the change in law, tens of thousands of tenants with preferential rents are locked in to rent increases that can never be more than what is determined by the Rent Guidelines Board annually. 

But there are two sides to a coin. 

Rent-stabilized tenants struggling because of the COVID-19 emergency are asking their housing providers for a break on rent. If the building owner grants it, it becomes the new legal rent for as long as the tenant lives there—potentially 20 years after the pandemic is over. 

Let me give you an example. A 25-year-old renter pays $1,800-a-month for a stabilized two-bedroom apartment. They would like the rent reduced to $1,000 because their wages were cut in half. Many housing providers would consider cutting them this break for one- or two-year terms. Operating costs, insurance, and property taxes for an average New York City apartment add up to about $1,000 a month, so the building owner would be basically breaking even. Many would be OK with this during a pandemic, but under the current laws you are locked into that lower rent for however long the tenant lives there—which could easily be two decades. That would be $192,000 in potential rent loss. 

If the flexibility in preferential rents was reinstated then rent-stabilized tenants would be able to negotiate fairer rents during this crisis. A recent survey of the members of the Community Housing Improvement Program (CHIP) found that more than half of rent-stabilized housing providers would cut their existing tenants a break on rent if flexibility in preferential rents was reinstated. Even more would lower asking prices on vacant rent-stabilized units if they weren’t going to be locked into a long-term reduced rent. 

This will help housing providers too. Vacancy rates across the city are increasing at all price points. Owners need to keep their renters housed, even if they can only pay a portion of the rent. Many tenants are forced to move out of their homes in fear that they will accumulate debt they will never recover from, even though the building owner wants to cut them a short-term break. It is a lose-lose situation created by the laws passed in Albany and the pandemic. 

When members of the state Legislature passed the Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019, they never could have imagined a disaster like COVID-19. So, there is no shame in them tweaking the laws again to fit the new reality we face. It’s not an admission that they were wrong if they roll back this one provision, it is a demonstration that they can adapt laws as necessary to help people in a time of crisis. 

The other great thing about bringing back flexibility in preferential rents is that it doesn’t cost the city or state a dime in their budgets. This simple tweak to the laws could help thousands of people without adding to the multi-billion dollar deficits faced by the state and the city. And when times get better, the rents could simply go back to the legal rents that they were before.

We also believe the city and state should put more funding towards voucher programs to support renters in need, with forgiveness tied to property tax off-sets similar to the current SCRIE or DRIE programs. This will also allow property owners to reduce rents and help renters who can’t pay because of the COVID-19 emergency. The budget constraints make this hard, but in a time of crisis secure housing has huge benefits to the health and welfare of our city’s most vulnerable people.

We can start by reinstating flexibility in preferential rents, which comes with no budget cost. It’s a small step, but we have to start somewhere. 

***
Zachary Kerr is the president of the Community Housing Improvement Program (CHIP). On Twitter @nyc_chip.

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Note: this article has been corrected to say that the preferential rent system was "significantly altered" not "eliminated."

New York Must Replace Police as Responders to People in Mental Health Crisis


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NYPD response (photo: Benjamin Kanter/Mayoral Photo Office)


The police must stop killing people of color. The police must stop killing people experiencing mental health crises. The police must stop killing people of color experiencing mental health crises. And the police must stop the cover-ups. 

Daniel Prude, a Black man experiencing a mental health crisis, should never have been asphyxiated in the middle of the street on a snowy night, naked, begging and praying for help, held down and “hooded” with a bag over his head by seven Rochester police officers. But when something so heinous does happen – as it too often does – the public must immediately be made aware of it, and the officers must be held accountable. Instead, footage from the body-worn cameras of the officers who killed Prude was kept from the public for over five months, and the Rochester Police Department quietly determined the officers involved had done nothing wrong, despite the autopsy report clearly linking the police officers to the cause of death.

In New York City alone, 16 people experiencing mental health crises – 14 of them people of color – have died at the hands of the police over the last five years.

This needless killing must stop immediately.

The only effective way to address this ongoing issue is to remove the police from the situation entirely. Prude was a danger to no one but himself. He was scared and confused and needed help. He had a treatable medical condition. Police officers do not and cannot provide the help a person in Prude’s circumstances requires, any more than they could provide health care to someone experiencing a heart attack.

Mental health professionals, with specialized training and experience, should be responding to these situations – they can de-escalate crises and provide desperately-needed treatment. A team of trained first responders should also include “peers” who have experienced mental health crises firsthand, so they can offer the expertise and compassion an individual experiencing a mental health crisis requires.

Eugene, Oregon, already has a program in place that has revolutionized this area of public health by utilizing mobile crisis intervention teams made up of a medic and an experienced crisis worker and using trauma-informed de-escalation and harm reduction techniques. The program has been saving lives (and money) for over 30 years and demonstrates the many advantages of non-police emergency response teams.

Since then, places like Denver, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New Haven have put similar programs in place or recently voted to implement them. Adoption of such a program in New York City is long overdue. Correct Crisis Intervention Today – NYC (CCIT-NYC) has proposed an ambitious pilot program starting in two police precincts with the largest number of 911 calls relating to mental health, where trained teams of emergency medical technicians and peers would respond quickly and compassionately to de-escalate crises and prevent harm.

New York City must adopt the CCIT-NYC program immediately.

While the city considers alternative models to police response, the public needs quick access to unedited body-worn camera footage of police encounters with people experiencing mental health crises. As we saw in Prude’s case, such footage exposes beyond a doubt that police are not even remotely suited to respond to mental health crises.

Unfortunately, in most places, police departments and politicians speak out of both sides of their mouths on public access to body-worn camera footage. Politicians, including Mayor de Blasio, like to brag about police reform, but too often remain beholden to the status quo.

In June de Blasio promised that much NYPD body-worn camera footage would be released within 30 days after violent incidents. Yet, the release of footage continues to be quietly delayed. For example, civil rights organization New York Lawyers for the Public Interest requested footage of the fatal police encounter with George Zapantis. Despite the mayor’s new policy, the NYPD has refused to release the footage and has not even said when or if it will be released.

Prude’s tragic and grisly death is not an isolated incident. Time and again, footage of police interactions with people experiencing mental health crises shows the utter failure of police officers to properly respond under these circumstances, and how police responses lead to the unnecessary loss of human life.

New York Lawyers for the Public Interest has been forced to bring the fight for access to body-worn camera footage to the courts. Despite a three-year legal battle with the city, including landmark court decisions requiring full disclosure of footage of the fatal police shootings of Miguel Richards and Susan Muller, the NYPD continues to systematically deny public access to footage. As was the case for Prude, whose horrific death was, until recently, known to few, video footage plays a critical role in advancing accountability and reform. The mayor must take immediate action to ensure that unedited body-worn camera footage is available to the public without delay.

Not another life should be lost at the hands of the police. It is high time for New York City to institute a system for responding to medical emergencies that is totally separate from law enforcement. There is absolutely no place for police in the treatment of people experiencing mental health crises.

***
Marinda van Dalen is a Senior Staff Attorney with the Disability and Health Justice programs of New York Lawyers for the Public Interest and lead counsel in efforts to obtain body-worn camera footage.

Christina Sparrock, board member of Citizen Action of New York and CCIT-NYC steering committee member, has lived mental health experience and advocates for legislation to reform New York City’s response to mental health crises.

Kevin S. Parker is the New York State Senator for the 21st District in Brooklyn who, together with mental health advocates, is drafting legislation to change the response to mental health crises across New York State.

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Letter to the Editor: The Assembly Member’s Bad Bank Note


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A budget presentation (photo: Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography)


To the Editor:

In an op-ed recently published by Gotham Gazette, Assemblymember Ron Kim advanced an ill-informed and dangerous argument that, instead of issuing the $5 billion in debt the Mayor is seeking through the municipal bond market, the city should instead borrow from the Federal Reserve’s Municipal Liquidity Facility (MLF).

The MLF was created as part of the Federal Reserve’s response to the pandemic, to provide emergency cash-flow lending to state and local governments.

Assemblymember Kim argued that owing the Fed money is preferable to paying interest to wealthy bankers and investment firms, and suggested that since it is a federal entity, the Fed wouldn’t really expect the loan to be paid back: 

“Borrowing from the MLF is more like borrowing from a family member with a magical money tree in their backyard -- we don’t really have to worry too much about paying them back on time…The Fed will never come down on New York to bankrupt us, privatize public services, or negatively impact our credit ratings because their deficit ultimately adds real value to our communities.”

As Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell has stated, the MLF is a backstop to the municipal bond market, not a substitute. It is intended to help states and cities tide themselves over cash flow problems caused by situations like the extension of time granted to pay income taxes. Its loans are short-term only, to be paid back within three years. Most jurisdictions -- including New York City, which has a AA+ excellent bond rating -- will get lower interest rates and much longer terms in the municipal market, which is why only two entities with very poor bond ratings have actually borrowed from the MLF so far, the State of Illinois and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA).

The kind of long-term borrowing Mayor de Blasio seeks is not allowed through the MLF.

The dangerous part of Assemblymember Kim’s proposal is the suggestion that we would not have to pay back the MLF when the bill comes due, and that the Federal Reserve would not try to collect. 

The repayment terms of MLF bonds are the same as those of other municipal bonds in that they are required to have investment grade ratings and the Fed and U.S. Department of Treasury have the same enforcement rights and remedies as other bondholders. Among other conditions, such loans must be secured in a manner that "protects the taxpayer against loss” and cannot be made to insolvent borrowers and may not be forgiven. 

If the loans can’t/don’t get paid back on time it’s a default whether the Fed comes after the city to collect or not. That would be a disaster: our credit would immediately go to junk rating, and we would lose market access for all our municipal bonds, leaving us unable to pay for our capital program, which would have to come to a total stop.

I’m sorry, Assemblymember Kim, there is no magical money tree in a family member’s backyard. 

Sincerely,
Carol Kellermann, former president of Citizens Budget Commission

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Carol Kellermann was president of Citizens Budget Commission from 2008 through 2018.

 ***
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