ANHD Response to Mayor Adams’ “Get Stuff Built” Housing Plan

ANHD is deeply concerned by Mayor Adams’ Get Stuff Built housing plan announced today. Disappointingly, the Mayor stepped back from one of the key achievements of his April Housing & Homelessness Blueprint - to not set a problematic unit goal. As we have seen under past Mayoral administrations, big housing unit goals drive forward misguided production at the expense of focusing on and investing in the actual housing needs and solutions that could begin to address our housing crisis. 

Today, Mayor Adams has rashly set forth a goal to increase housing supply to 500,000 new housing units in the next 10 years. That number was approximately just 138,770 in the 6 years from 2014 to 2020. Yet with dwindling vacant land, no additional housing capital, Mayor Adams’ budget cuts to HPD, and perhaps most alarmingly no affordability and tenant protection commitments, today’s plan seems to allow luxury developments to further drive out average New Yorkers.  

New York City does not need more high-cost luxury units. Nearly 2/3rds of NYC renter households would qualify for 80% AMI or below “low-income” housing. And those same households account for more than 90% of NYC’s rent burden. This is the epicenter of our housing crisis -- our BIPOC neighborhoods, our immigrant communities, our fixed-income seniors, our refugees, our justice involved, and our unemployed and underemployed. This is where NYC needs to focus its efforts if we hope to turn the tide on this housing crisis. NYC must let go of its reliance on misguided trickle-down housing policies. Instead, we must prioritize investing in the real affordable housing solutions, not investing in real estate’s pockets.

ANHD and our members have been decades-long leaders in the fight to build truly affordable housing, preserve our existing affordable stock, ensure tenants’ rights, invest in our critical public housing, expand access to homeownership, and for NYC to develop without displacement. ANHD and our allies stand firmly behind the needs and priorities articulated in the 2021 Right to a Roof report. We cannot, and ANHD and our members will not back down from those efforts now. Together let’s tackle NYC’s long-standing affordable housing crisis the right way.