PRESS RELEASES
Release Date: June 20, 2003
CONTACT: Lenore Neier, CSSNY, 212/614-5425
Report by the Community Service Society Reveals Critical
Housing Resource in New York City is Threatened
Government Preservation of Federally Subsidized
Low-Income Housing Essential
Related Documents:
New York, NY, June 20, 2003 – A new
report by the Community Service Society of New York (CSS),
Keeping
the Doors Open: HUD-Subsidized Housing in New York City,
by James DeFilippis, Housing Policy Analyst, chronicles the
history of federally-subsidized, low-income housing in New
York City. It provides an analysis of the estimated losses
to essential housing stock and includes recommendations for
government at every level to help preserve this valuable resource.
Highlights from the report include:
- Over 9,000 subsidized housing units – about 10%
of the total built – have been lost - the vast majority
in the last five years.
- The average income for assisted households in New York
City is $11,570 per year, and over 75% of the properties
have average incomes of under $15,000 per year, demonstrating
that HUD-subsidized housing is providing affordable housing
to economically vulnerable families who cannot afford private
market rents. Over 80% of these low-income families are
black or Latino.
- While assisted developments can be found in neighborhoods
of varying race and class composition, they are disproportionately
concentrated in poor, nonwhite neighborhoods, with 37% of
its population living in poverty and 86% non-white.
- The most potent threat to the future of affordable housing
stock is owner terminations. This occurs when owners either
prepay their assisted mortgages (buy out) or opt-out of
their subsidy programs. Upon termination, owners can raise
rents to market levels or attempt conversion to coop/condo
ownership, removing the properties from the stock of affordable
housing.
“For tenants in properties that are converted to market
rent, the only lifeline they have to prevent their eviction
is in the form of Section 8 vouchers, which themselves have
an uncertain future,” stated David R. Jones, president
of the Community Service Society.
CSS Recommendations to Preserve Housing Resources
Federal Policies:
- Strengthen federal incentives to encourage owners to stay
in programs or sell their properties to “preservation
purchasers”
- Increase technical assistance to residents of distressed
or subsidy-terminating properties
- Recapture unspent subsidies due to terminations
State and Local Initiatives:
- Create resident safeguards
- Extend rent regulation to HUD-subsidized developments
undergoing termination
- Require owners to mitigate resident displacement and housing
loss
- Underwrite preservation with financial incentives
- The city’s Department of Housing Preservation and
Development must rigorously monitor owners’ compliance
with financial rules and tenant protections
- Create a mayoral office to oversee preservation of federally-assisted
housing in New York City
James DeFilippis, author of the report, emphasizes that adoption
of these recommendations would preserve affordable housing
for the tens of thousands of families that depend on federal
assisted housing in New York City, and ensure that the decades
of public subsidy in these resources will not be lost. Many
of the recommendations are cost-free, and could be enacted
even in the current unfavorable fiscal climate. It is imperative
that we take action to preserve the affordable housing that
we currently have and protect the interests of those who need
it most - low-income New York families.
For over 150 years, CSS has pursued a mission that is
aimed at the poor but which benefits all: to identify and
eradicate the problems creating and perpetuating poverty in
New York City. CSS is an independent, nonprofit organization
that assists those in need to defeat the problems of poverty
and more fully participate in productive community life.
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