Mayor’s City of Yes for housing falls way short

After listening to hundreds of people on the Zoom, with an equal number in the room at 120 Broadway, the New York City Planning Commission stood for 14 hours into the wee hours of the morning to listen to New Yorkers as they rejected all or parts of the thousand-page zoning change proposal.

In what would have been only explained as a very boring meeting on zoning, became the most important thing going on Wednesday, July 10. From every corner of the city, ordinary people showed up and spoke from the heart about the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity.

I have been to many hearings and participated at both sides of the table, but this hearing was one of a kind. Generally, the agency holding the hearing tries to get it accomplished in a quick and efficient manner. That was not the case July 10.

I can’t put my finger on it; perhaps it was inexperience on the part of the chair. Even so, the chair was very quick to keep people who were against the City of Yes to three minutes — never calling names ahead, as is the custom.

Not so for the people who were favorable — some who were on the original self-serving blast team that created the new zoning for developers. It wasn’t just the chair — each of the other commissioners took turns, with multiple questions to those who were in favor of the proposal, to explain the reasons why they were in favor of this or that, seemingly rehearsed.

Maybe the commissioners were trying to have a teaching moment. Perhaps they were stalling to get more people to match the number of people against. One will never know the truth. For sure, not one decision maker heard what we said. 

That’s not the worst part of the hearing.  The conversation to get rents that are affordable to the majority of New Yorkers was totally bizarre from the start. Let me be clear, there is no mandate for affordable housing in these proposals.  Ridiculously, they believe a program to build more luxury housing will incentivize developers to build more affordable housing.  Unfortunately, the way supply and demand works is, as you build more units, rents go down.  

They also tried to use the term “affordable housing” to embarrass a few elected officials brave enough to stand in front of the planning commission to reject the plan. They actually pulled out a list created by a nonprofit to let them know their district ranked among the lowest for affordable housing units created. Those elected officials set the record straight.  

This was certainly a bizarre and long hearing.

All I could say is, I was very proud of New Yorkers who showed they were well informed. The people came up with a great idea. Let the 35 community boards that voted “no” off the hook. Start a pilot with the remaining 14 who voted in favor.

Then come back after two years, and let us know how it worked.  

Elected officials, keep watching.