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Meet the New Boss: State Senate Dems MIA on Rent Reform
By
John Del Signore
Published Mar 30, 2009
Modified Mar 30, 2009
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By
John Del Signore
Published Mar 30, 2009
Modified Mar 30, 2009
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For years now, tenant activists have dreamed of a State Senate controlled by Democrats, because then they'd finally get changes to the rent regulation laws that the Republican majority had so consistently blocked. But advocates for rent reform are now dismayed to find that Democratic Senators are as beholden to landlord campaign donations as the GOP. Albany watchdog group NYPIRG reports that since January 2007, Democratic lawmakers have accepted more than $1 million in donations from landlords, about $500,000 less than Republicans raked in.
The Daily News notes that Brooklyn Senator Carl Kruger, who has 40,000 rent-stabilized units in his district, took in $27,700 from landlord lobbyists, and has yet to take a position on the issue. Groups like Tenants PAC are working to change the vacancy decontrol laws that landlords have exploited to take thousands of apartments out of the rent-stabilized system. Under the current laws, they can do this if rents reach $2,000 a month and household income exceeds $175,000, or if renovations on a vacant apartment require raising the rent above $2,000.
Though the Assembly has passed 10 rent reform bills since November, reform in the Senate is tied up in committee, just like in the Republican era! Pedro Espada, chairman of the housing committee, opposes reform because he says it would just help the affluent: "If we rubber-stamp the Working Families Party housing agenda, we would virtually provide protections for people who earn $175,000 or more annually — which is essentially a Manhattan-based constituency."
Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal finds Espada's argument specious, noting that far fewer units (4,223) are decontrolled because their occupants earn $175,000 a year, compared with the 70,000-plus decontrolled by becoming vacant. Many tenants in rent-stabilized apartments complain that landlords pressure them to leave so they can make renovations and get out of the rent stabilization system; that's why the City Council passed the Tenant Protection Act last March. Rosenthal tells the News, "This has nothing to do with the rich. This is about a calamity for people of middle-income means. "It’s not a Manhattan issue. That’s what landlords are saying."
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reform
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John Del Signore
Originally from the Albany area, John Del Signore has called NYC home since 1995. In addition to his thousands of meticulously-crafted bespoke blog posts for Gothamist, his writing has also been published in The Awl, Deadspin, The Nervous Breakdown, and performed at The Brick Theater in Brooklyn.
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Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
Gothamist is funded by sponsors and member donations
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