Tenants Living Amid Rubble in Rent-Regulated Apartment War
Photo Credit: Dave Sanders of the New York Times
Mireya Navarro’s article “Tenants Living Amid Rubble in Rent-Regulated Apartment War” captures the consequences of gentrification and rising housingprices on a microcosmic, personal level. These rising prices and its resulting strain on landlord-tenant disputes can be seen in immigrant families that live in rent-stabilized units in 98 Linden Street of Bushwick, Brooklyn.
Eight months earlier, the landlord sent a notice requesting access to two rent-stabilized units on the ground floor for structural epairs. The workers that arrived demolished the kitchens and bathrooms of the apartments within a few hours. Nearly a year later, these kitchens and bathrooms remain in their dilapidated state.
Juan Calero and Gloria Corea, 67, immigrants from Nicaragua and the inhabitants of one of the units since 1990, pay $675 a month for rent, a value that is less than half the market rate. They share the apartment with their two children and two grandchildren. The family says they cannot afford anything over $1,000 , as only their daughter’s husband, Rolando Cajina, holds a job as a maintenance worker.
The landlord, Joel Israel of Linden VenturesL.L.C., claims that the building is structurally unsound and insists that all tenants move out. Datafrom the Rent Guidelines Board suggests that when the units are vacant, the landlord is allowed to bump the rent to or over the deregulation threshold of $2,500 a month on vacancy and improvement related increases. While the struggle on 98 Linden is not the norm, it is indicative of increased tensions and stakes as rising housing prices make it increasingly difficult for low and moderate income New Yorkers to afford. Gentrifying neighborhoods can even double or triple the stabilized rent, causing tenants to face illegal pressures that may even include demanding proof of citizenship.
With nowhere else to go, the family borrows the bathroom and kitchen of their second floor neighbor as they continue their standoff with their landlord. Calls to the landlord were not returned.
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/25/nyregion/in-new-york-push-for-market-rate-housing-pits-landlords-against-tenants.html
Thanks for this article, it’s literally insane. The absolute craziest is that last November, some guy testified that the tenants had vandalized their own apartments because they were being evicted… and the judge dismissed the case.
My sister recently got the chance to see Spike Lee at her school, and he used the opportunity (a screening of Do the Right Thing) to speak at length about the downside of gentrification and the negative implications it has for the cultures of certain neighborhoods. From what she told me, he spoke about the large-scale negative consequences. It is definitely interesting to hear these personal, small-scale stories about the reality of gentrification on an individual level. Unless you are familiar with it firsthand (I am not), it is easy to look at the benefits of gentrifying a neighborhood (better resources, infrastructure, social institutions, tax revenue) and not take into account individual human rights, which are clearly being violated as in this case.
Though the article indicates that Mr. Israel is culpable for nearly 400 housing code infractions, his name is nowhere to be found on the mayor’s aforementioned worst landlord watchlist.
I think this article brings up several interesting points.
I Think it is unfair that the tenants who lived in a rent controlled apartment – meaning they were promised that the price would remain stable for a certain period of time – have to look for another place to live when there is limited cheap housing available. This is especially true because the reason they are being evicted – structural damage – was caused by the landlord himself. Though it is also true that the tenants vandalized their apartment, the landlord broke plumbing fixtures and the floors in parts of both apartments without permission and his act probably outweighs the vandalism of the tenants who were only trying to remain in their home.
On that note, the article mentions that Mr. Israel provided them with comparable affordable housing but they refused, I am assuming on grounds that 98 Linden Street was their home of 23 years.
I think this article sucessfully addresses the issues of gentrification. I wonder if all of New York city will ever be gentrified. Where will new immigrants live then? De Blasio said that he will try to make affordable housing available to increase the supply of apartments but others say that another crucial part in easing the crunch is to make sure less cheap housing becomes gentrified.
I do wonder how many rent controlled apartments have been lost in the last 40 years or so, as the article states itself – this case was not the norm.
An increasingly gentrified NYC needs an increasing number of service workers – restaurant workers, nannies, health care aides, maintenance workers, taxi drivers, etc. And these workers don’t make enough to live in more and more areas of the city. They are being forced out to farther reaches of the city that may still be relatively affordable (e.g. Eastern Brooklyn) and have ever longer commutes. What will happen if, as Ilizar says, all of NYC becomes gentrified? It will continue to require millions of poverty-wage workers to function.
Highly recommend trying this out: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/02/09/opinion/minimum-wage.html?_r=0
It’s insane that this is legal. But I really don’t see how we could fix it without really strict regulations that are problematic in their own way.