HPD Announces Start of Heat Season and Releases Last Season’s Stats

On Oct. 1, 2020, HPD announced the start of the 2020 – 2021 heat season, in which all residential building owners are required to maintain specific indoor temperatures. From Oct. 1, 2020, through May 31, 2021, building owners must maintain indoor temperatures at 68 degrees when outdoor temperatures are below 55 degrees during the daytime and a minimum of 62 degrees indoors overnight regardless of the outdoor temperature. Hot water must be provided at 120 degrees year-round.

HPD also shared statistics on the previous “heat season.” Here are some interesting numbers from the 2019 – 2020 “heat season”:

• 170,171 total heat and hot water problems were reported to the city through 311 (this number includes duplicate calls), a decrease of 27 percent as compared to the previous heat season.
• 98,320 unique heat and hot water problems were reported (this number doesn’t include duplicate calls).
• HPD inspectors attempted 104,052 heat and/or hot water inspections (this number includes multiple inspection attempts in response to a complaint). HPD inspectors wrote 3,547 heat and 5,164 hot water violations, which is a decrease of 22 percent and decrease of 10 percent as compared to the previous heat season.
• HPD completed a total of $1.1 million in heat-related emergency repairs, such as fuel delivery, boiler repairs, or hot water repairs. All ERP costs are billed to the property.
• HPD filed 1,662 heat cases in court and collected $634,497 in civil penalties. An additional $196,000 was collected in heat settlement penalties.
• HPD collected $195,727 in heat inspection fees.

HPD also noted the top community boards that had heat or hot water complaints in each borough during the 2019 – 2020 heat season:

• Manhattan Community Board 12 (Inwood and Washington Heights) had 11,954 complaints.
• Bronx Community Board 5 (Fordham, University Heights, Morris Heights, Bathgate, and Mount Hope) had 10,243 complaints.
• Brooklyn Community Board 14 (Flatbush, Midwood, Kensington, and Ocean Parkway) had 5,850 complaints.
• Queens Community Board 4 (Corona, Corona Heights, Elmhurst, and Newtown) had 4,510 complaints.
• Staten Island Community Board 1 (Arlington, Castleton Corners, Clifton, Concord, Elm Park, Fort Wadsworth, Graniteville, Grymes Hill, Livingston, Mariners Harbor, Meiers Corners, New Brighton, Port Ivory, Port Richmond, Randall Manor, Rosebank, St. George, Shore Acres, Silver Lake, Stapleton, Sunnyside, Tompkinsville, West Brighton, Westerleigh) had 1,071 complaints.