One day after the Rent Guidelines Board recommended raising rents on rent-stabilized apartments by up to 4.75 percent, three mayoral candidates weighed in on whether mayors should have more sway over the board’s actions.
City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said the City Council should have a say over the mayor’s appointees to the board, to ensure “broader consideration on every side of the fence,” referring to the concerns of tenants and landlords. She also said the mayor should have a “slight more bit of influence” given “what the city is going through” and potential threats from the Trump administration, though she didn’t elaborate.
Adams joined contenders Comptroller Brad Lander and former Comptroller Scott Stringer onstage during a mayoral forum on Thursday. The forum, held by the New York Housing Conference and NYU Furman Center, was skipped by other mayoral candidates. Sens. Jessica Ramos and Zellnor Myrie were unable to attend because they were called to Albany to vote on the state budget. Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Assembly member Zohran Mamdani did not accept the groups’ invitation to attend.
The Rent Guidelines Board’s nine members are appointed by the mayor, but are tasked with voting on annual rent increases independently after considering research on the economic state of stabilized housing and hearing public testimony. The final vote largely doesn’t follow the recommendations of the board’s own reports and often lands on increases that upset both landlords and tenants.
Lander said he would support legislation in Albany to make the board more independent. He also said he would push to keep rents as low as possible, but said the city’s housing department should do more to help a “subset, relatively modest” group of rent-stabilized owners facing “real distress.”
Stringer said the mayor has a right to try to influence the board, but its members should be independent.
“Sometimes a dose of independence and confidence in the people you hire, especially after watching this administration’s conduct, I think would be healthy,” Stringer told moderator Erroll Louis.
All three have indicated that they support a rent freeze this year.
The candidates also discussed how they would deal with potentially drastic federal funding cuts, given that 54 percent of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development’s operating budget comes from the federal government. For the New York City Housing Authority, federal funds account for 72 percent.
All three had similar ideas. To gird for possible budget shortfalls and recession, Lander said the city should bulk up its general reserve and its rainy day fund by adding $1 billion to each. He also called for reforms to HPD and NYCHA, related to “modernizing staff, modernizing systems, streamlining processes, improving technology.”
Stringer also called for a “very, very rainy day fund” of $1 billion, split evenly between the city and state, to get the city through next year’s Congressional midterm elections, in hopes that Democrats take back the House.
Adams agreed that the city should grow its rainy-day fund. She emphasized, however, that threats of federal funding cuts underscore the need to expand the City Fighting Homelessness and Eviction Prevention Supplement, or FHEPs, housing voucher program. The City Council’s attempt to do so was shut down by Mayor Eric Adams, whose resistance to the expansion was backed by a state court last year.
Lander said he would support an expansion of City FHEPs, but added that increases to income eligibility would require help from the state to pencil out.
Both Lander and Stringer criticized the current administration’s proposal to require some City FHEPS voucher holders to contribute 40 percent of their income toward rent instead of 30 percent. New York Apartment Association CEO Kenny Burgos said on Wednesday that now is the worst time to “pull support from the city’s most vulnerable residents, who live in the city’s most distressed housing.”
After the forum, only Lander and Stringer answered questions from reporters. When asked about land use reforms being considered by the City Charter Revision Commission, Stringer, who formerly served as Manhattan Borough President, supported giving borough presidents a more substantial role in the city’s land use review process. Lander said districts that do not approve an adequate amount of new housing should face consequences in the form of, potentially, less capital funding in the city’s budget.
Soon after the forum, Mayor Adams unveiled his $115.1 billion executive budget. New York Housing Conference commended the budget’s proposal to add $350 million for public housing programs and $46 million for supportive housing. The group, however, has warned about drops in HPD’s capital budget projected in the City’s Preliminary Ten-Year Capital Plan.
“We’re concerned about the city’s ability to meet its housing goals long term,” Rachel Fee, the group’s president, said in a statement. “To truly make New York more affordable, future budgets must sustain and grow capital funding for housing.”
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