Affordable Housing Project Proposal (Week of 2/26)

I found these readings a great follow-up to the documentary we saw about Community Board 1. For some reason, I kept thinking about Community Board 1 when reading about rezoning and I was drawing some parallels to the Crown Heights Tenant Union. I was thinking about the voice that these groups create for themselves and ho they should be heard more often. I also felt the frustration that comes when city officials choose not to listen. CHTU was another democratic group that is making a voice for themselves and doing so for their rights. I think affordable housing should be a right, as well as proper heat, hot water, solid ceilings, etc. It is absurd for renters to pay their tenants for caved ceilings, no heat, or no hot water. “It is not the renter’s responsibility to fix the boiler.” CHTU, and groups like it, would be a huge part of my affordable housing proposal. I definitely believe that there needs to be a democratic structure to regulate future rent increase and build communication between renters and tenants. I also think that state or city officials should work with a union like this to monitor their rights, aid in setting rent-stabilization laws, and monitor that no such laws are broken, as well as induce rent-freezes. I know that it is an extremely difficult thing to put in action, especially because of tenants, but rent-freezes seem like a much-needed tool to help the rent crisis/burden. In one of the articles, the writer wrote about a pattern in which people come in to rent, after some time, the rent goes up, the people move out, new people move in and the cycle continues. The writer mentioned staying in Crown Heights but noticing that she had new neighbors every so often. Rent freeze seems like a more secure way for renters to have the same apartments for a long period of time and continue to afford rent. In a proposal, I would push political officials to make a certain percentage of apartments, condos, studios, etc. not just rent-stabilized, but rent-frozen for a certain amount of time. As we mentioned in class, renters seem to be caught between the scissors, or jaws of the rent crisis/burden. Rent has continued to increase while wages have remained the same. My affordable housing proposal is collective action. I do not see the rent crisis/burden as an issue that can be resolved by one group of people or one tool. More groups like Community Boards, Tenant Unions, and understanding political officials need to participate to help fix the affordable housing crisis. I am also a fan of the idea of creating a public nonprofit organization in which those who can afford to, donate money to pay for the renovation of the New York City Housing Authority public housing projects. I really like this idea and because it is a way of enhancing the neighborhood’s livability without rezoning.

I am not a fan of rezoning. Rezoning was described as a “recipe for gentrification” in one of the readings. “Rezoning displaces the very people it is supposed to help.” I do not see how rezoning could ever be a solution to the affordable housing crisis. I feel that rezoning might actually perpetuate the affordable housing crisis because it displaces a huge number of people as well as drive up the rent in the surrounding area. Perhaps political officials see rezoning as a temporary fix because it can make “affordable housing,” create new jobs, new resources, and streetscape to enhance the neighborhood’s livability; however, all theses things are probably devised for the middle class, or upper middle class and not the working class and below. I see rezoning as an excuse for the political officials to put more power in the hands of the real estate market, or just the market in general, which is already an existing “pressure from above.” Housing is where people live, where they make life, where they find jobs, and create families. Political officials can not and should not ask people to relocate for rezoning purposes and promise that it is best for the development of the city, or that it is meant to create more affordable housing and then result in more overcrowding and displace entire communities. I don’t understand how Mayor de Blasio can promise rent freeze and then propose a rezoning project. It seems counter-intuitive to me.

“The median household income in the neighborhood is about $33,000, but in order to afford current asking rents in East New York, one would need to earn at least $44,000 for a one-bedroom or $56,000 for a two-bedroom apartment. Indeed, over two-thirds of East New York households are already spending more than what the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) defines as “affordable.”” I am entirely convinced that rezoning really is just a recipe for gentrification, which makes me grateful for the long process that it takes for a plan to get approved.

So my proposal for a class project is collective action. The best way I can think of doing this is creating some sort of social media platform and somehow combining all the ideas and possible solutions we think of together as a class, and sharing them with other people or groups who can have an influence on the affordable housing crisis. I know that many Community Boards have Facebook pages. My hope with a social media platform is that it can potentially generate enough attention so much that other Community Boards, Unions, existing non-profit groups, (maybe a stretch, but perhaps even) political officials, get in contact with us and there is an exchange of ideas. And even if the said social media platform does not get the attention I hope it would, it would be a way of bringing attention to a matter than members of a properly functioning democracy (as Mohammed said in class) should know about.