ANHD is calling on the City Council to revise the Administration's Mandatory Inclusionary Housing proposal and add additional options with deeper affordability levels to meet the full range of incomes and neighborhoods across the City.
By: Barika Williams
Good Morning. Thank you Chair Richards and to the members of the Subcommittee on Zoning and Franchises for the opportunity to testify.
My name is Barika Williams and I am the Deputy Director for the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development (ANHD). ANHD is a membership organization of NYC- neighborhood based housing and economic development groups- CDCs, affordable housing developers, supportive housing providers, community organizers, and economic development service providers. Our mission is to ensure flourishing neighborhoods
and decent, affordable housing for all New Yorkers. We have over 100 members throughout the five boroughs who have developed over 100,000 units of affordable housing in the past 25 years alone and directly operate over 30,000 units.
The de Blasio Administration's current MIH proposal misses the opportunity to create the guaranteed, truly affordable housing that many neighborhoods are demanding. The MIH proposal does not reflect or adequately serve the diverse range of incomes, populations or local communities or ensure that we are building sustainable inclusionary communities for all New Yorkers. Therefore, absent substantial changes that would guarantee truly affordable housing that neighborhoods and the city overall needs, ANHD cannot support the Administration's Mandatory Inclusionary Housing (MIH) proposal.
Having a well-designed mandatory affordable housing requirement is critical progress for fighting NYC's affordability crisis. ANHD has been the leading organization calling for a Mandatory Inclusionary Housing policy because we believe that the City needs a new baseline for how affordable housing gets built in all communities.
ANHD is calling on the City Council to revise the Administration's Mandatory Inclusionary Housing proposal and add additional options with deeper affordability levels to meet the full range of incomes and neighborhoods across the City.
MIH can and should be a powerful affordable housing tool, and is one that ANHD and our groups have pushed for over a decade. We believe this type of policy presents an opportunity to put in place a "new normal" where every neighborhood and site that is upzoned will include guaranteed affordable housing that is permanently affordable and truly meets the needs of the local community.
However this administration’s MIH proposal misses a key opportunity to create a new and effective centerpiece housing program that both helps address the city’s affordability crisis and creates inclusive communities. ANHD has done extensive analysis of the City’s previous voluntary Inclusionary Housing Program, voluntary R10 program, the City's own MIH Market and Financial Study, the City’s MIH proposal, as well as the programmatic structure best practices, and lessons learned of inclusionary housing programs from across the nation. In addition, ANHD put-on a half-day Inclusionary Zoning policy convening that included local government officials and policy experts from Chicago, San Francisco, Oakland, and DC.
Based on our research and analysis, the affordability levels set by the Administration's MIH proposal are too high to meet the needs of the needs of NYC residents and neighborhoods.
The Administration's MIH proposal presents three options, with affordability level requirements ranging from 60% of Area Medium Income (AMI), or $1,200 for a 2-bedroom, up to 120% of AMI, or $2,500 for a 2-bedroom. The Administration's MIH proposals affordability targets of primarily 60% Area Median Income (AMI) and above leave out nearly half on New Yorkers and are the levels already served by current housing programs. Communities cannot be asked to accept the impact of major upzonings that generate high rent units without being guaranteed the benefit of needed truly affordable housing.
At these affordability levels, MIH misses the core of the housing crisis and even the core of NYC's population. Nearly a third of New Yorkers fall below 40% AMI, and of the more than 1.1 million households that are rent burdened, 83% or 938,000 are below 60% AMI. In many communities, the income levels required in the City's MIH proposal would further gentrification, rather than help provide the affordable housing that local residents need and that stabilizes communities.
ANHD deeply respects the community voices and feedback that have been expressed through the land use process and MIH must be mindful of respecting these voices and take these concerns into account. MIH must be more than a one-size-fits-all solution. The Administration's MIH proposal’s three affordable housing options are insufficient to serve the diversity of populations, incomes, and neighborhoods. There are a variety of valid concerns that have been raised throughout this the land-use process and the Administration’s final MIH policy needs to take into account this community feedback.
The Administration’s MIH proposal and the Mayor’s Housing plan do not have mechanisms in place to proactively prevent the displacement and harassment of tenants, or to proactively preserve communities’ nonsubsidized affordable units in the face of these rezonings.
Building market-rate housing, even if there is some affordable housing as part of the deal (including future potential MIH units), is not a neutral act. We know from hard experience that bringing in more market-rate housing increases displacement pressure in existing private market low-rent housing throughout the neighborhood. The number of NYC apartments with monthly rents below $1,000 fell by nearly 13 percent between 2011 and 2014. If rezonings ultimately lead to a net loss of affordable housing despite the construction of new affordable units, we will see the city’s affordable housing crisis deepen further. The City’s increased housing production / rezoning strategy must be matched with an equally robust set of proactive and enforceable anti-displacement, anti-harassment, and preservation policies in order to ensure diverse and sustainable communities in our City.
MIH can and should be an important new piece in our City's affordable housing toolbox, but it is only one tool. MIH alone will not create, let alone preserve, all the affordable housing needed for any neighborhood in the City. This is why it is key to make clear that MIH is starting point for what neighborhoods can ask for from developments, and not a finish line. Community residents, housing groups, community boards, and local elected officials need to maintain the ability to ask for more affordable housing, using other housing policy tools outside of and in combination with MIH to meet the needs of local communities and the city as a whole.
We also want to ensure that any MIH affordable units are protected, enforced, and monitored. Therefore we believe that administering agent should be non-profit organizations who are not an affiliate of, an owner or managing agent of the project. These HPD pre-qualified not-for-profit organizations are committed to ensuring the long-term compliance with the releasing and resale on affordable units because these are units that are a part of their communities and can provide homes to local neighborhood residents. We believe that HPD should be the secondary administering agent option only when a not-for-profit organization is unavailable or not fitting.
ANHD supports the MIH modification incorporated by the CPC which help ensure any developer’s application to escape affordability requirements is absolutely necessary and proven as scrutinized by City specialists. The CPC modifications change how a developer can apply for a waiver from the MIH regulations. The modified MIH proposal now requires that any developer’s application for a MIH wavier claiming “financial hardship” must also include a financial review by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, which has staff with real-estate finance and underwriting expertise. This is in addition to the previously required review before the only the Board of Standards and Appeals which is primarily has an oversight and administrative review capacity. This change is important to ensure the efficacy of the MIH policy. However, the core of the Administration’s MIH proposal must be improved.
Specifically ANHD is calling for the MIH proposal to be revised as follows:
Thank you again for the opportunity to testify.