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Attorney General James and Governor Cuomo recently announced a lawsuit against a Queens landlord, Zara Realty, for violating rent stabilization laws and harassing tenants. The lawsuit alleges the landlord targeted tenants in at least 38 rent-stabilized buildings by charging excessive fees, coercing them into signing improper leases, illegally raising rents, and denying tenant rights.
State Senator Michael Gianaris and State Assembly Member Brian Barnwell have introduced legislation that would completely eradicate the MCI program. The proposed legislation represents a change from a previous piece of legislation that was introduced by Gianaris and Barnwell, which called for reforming the MCI program and extending protections to tenants who were subject to increases due to apartment renovations. The previous legislation did not advance.
Brooklyn City Councilmember Jumaane Williams is New York City’s next public advocate after winning a special election with a solid plurality of the vote. The special election was called by Mayor Bill de Blasio in January to replace Letitia James, who vacated the role when she became the state’s attorney general earlier this year. Williams had served on the council since 2010, representing Brooklyn’s 45th district.
Mayor de Blasio and Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia, the new interim NYCHA chair, recently released the city’s “Roadmap to Eliminating Childhood Lead Exposure,” following a 90-day review of all agencies’ policies related to lead prevention. The plan will screen every apartment for potential lead hazards, eliminate lead risks in NYCHA apartments and family shelters, target unsafe consumer goods, provide children with dedicated nurses, and link together all city agencies responding to lead exposure.
HPD Commissioner Maria Torres-Springer recently announced that 250 apartment buildings have been placed in HPD’s Alternative Enforcement Program (AEP). The added buildings each have enough Housing Maintenance Code violations to allow for enhanced enforcement by HPD, which may include roof-to-cellar inspections, fees, and an AEP Order to Correct underlying conditions and bring the buildings up to code.
Mayor Bill de Blasio recently announced that Maria Torres-Springer will step down as Commissioner of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development in early March to take on a new role as Vice President of U.S. Programs for the Ford Foundation.
A Manhattan judge recently blocked new legislation that required Airbnb to turn over detailed data about their hosts. The law, which was set to take effect in February 2019, would have provided the Mayor’s Office of Special Enforcement with the names and addresses of hosts, the type of dwellings being rented, the frequency of rentals, the rental income, and, in some cases, the account name and number where hosts receive their rental fees.
The city’s Department of Sanitation (DOS) will be conducting special curbside collections for mulching and recycling Christmas trees through Saturday, Jan. 12, 2019. Recycling trees and wreaths doesn’t just help the environment. It also helps eliminate the fire hazard posed by storing dried-out trees and wreaths in your building overnight or longer. The trees and wreaths may simply be put curbside until Jan. 12, and weather permitting, DOS will collect and compost the Christmas trees left at the curb.
In a speech last month at the New York City Bar Association, Gov. Andrew Cuomo outlined an ambitious agenda for the first 100 days of his third term, which started Jan. 1. As part of his agenda, the governor intends to reform rent regulations, including ending vacancy decontrol, repealing preferential rent, and limiting capital improvement charges.
Cuomo has stated that it will now be easier to enact many of the agenda items, since the Democrats gained nearly two-thirds of the seats in the Senate in November’s election. Democrats already lead the state Assembly.
For the first time, a group of low-income housing developers is teaming up with low-income tenant activists to push for rent regulation reforms. The New York State Association for Affordable Housing, along with groups that include the Legal Aid Society, VOCAL New York, Enterprise Community Partners, AARP, the Coalition for the Homeless, and the New York Housing Conference recently sent letters to state leaders urging specific pro-tenant changes when the rent laws expire in June.
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