As the Daily News put it:
Mayor de Blasio’s office inflated the benefits of a deal to keep affordable housing at the massive Stuyvesant Town complex in exchange for $220 million in taxpayer subsidies, the city’s budget watchdog agency found.
Per Town & Village:
The IBO estimated that while the deal was supposed to preserve 100,000 “apartment years” (the equivalent of 5,000 apartments for 20 years), 64,000 of those apartment years would have remained affordable anyway through rent stabilization. This would mean the deal really only saved 36,000 apartment years, not 100,000. The report also noted that when the sale took place, just over 5,000 apartments were already renting at below-market rates due to rent stabilization.
While there has been plenty of debate over just how “affordable” the 5,000 apartments that are preserved and leased through a lottery system actually are, according to the IBO, only three percent of those 100,000 apartment years are reserved for low-income households.
The Blackstone Group and Ivanhoe Cambridge bought the property for $5.3 billion in 2015, and received $220 million in tax subsidies to keep the 5,000 units affordable for 20 years.
Several officials have disputed the IBO report. For instance, Eric Enderlin, president of the city’s Housing Development Corporation who helped broker the deal, “said for the $220 million the city is sinking in, residents will save $505 million in rent compared with what they would have paid without the deal,” per the Daily News.
“We strongly disagree with it,” he said of the IBO report. “They’ve created this kind of academic, ivory tower model ... People live in these apartments, and you can’t know which apartments are going to be vacant.”
You can find a copy of the 23-page IBO report here.
I know the PCV-ST rental tenants were genuinely anxious about their future under the successive new owners, but the complex had already stopped being a resource for middle-income New Yorkers once Met Life abolished the waiting list and started pushing apartments through renovations and vacancy decontrol. However there was no reason to think existing rent-regulated tenants would lose their protection (unless it wasn’t their primary residence, which may be the case for some) and the new “affordable” units really aren’t.
ReplyDeleteIt’s perfectly legitimate for the IBO to analyze the deal and report its conclusions, even if — especially if — it challenges the press release story. Criticizing a financial analysis, as the City has done per the quote (“ivory tower academics”) is ridiculous, since it was the City’s own financial analysis and assumptions that underpinned the deal. They were just so eager to get credit for affordable housing units that they gave away too much.
This shifty accounting looks similar to what Don Jr. and Ivanka did to boost buyer interest by inflating sales at the former Trump Soho.
ReplyDeleteAll to bolster the bogus agenda of de Blasio's 10 year affordable housing program.
DeBlasshole Bullshitting us? Nahhh...couldnt happen he is a Progressive.
ReplyDeleteMaor Bill's admn. has been circling the drain of corruption since he was elected. His housing proram is a game of musical chairs. People in affordable housing move into housing that's more afforable with possibley more room. But it doesn't address the people on the street or are vulnerable and might end up on the street. Some progressive...
ReplyDeleteDe Blasio is full of sh*t.
ReplyDeletepiss off deblasio....
ReplyDeleteLittle late for the IBO to come out with this now. Would have been helpful before the deal was finalized. Sometimes it is hard to predict attrition of folks on rent stabilization. These numbers may prove to be wrong also. The mayor's deal guarantees the stabilized units remain.
ReplyDeleteNo - stabilization goes away in 2020 - this was a total giveaway spun for PR.
DeleteYou could not be further from the truth, 9:09 PM
DeletePer Town and Village:
ReplyDeleteWhile there has been plenty of debate over just how “affordable” the 5,000 apartments that are preserved and leased through a lottery system actually are, according to the IBO, only three percent of those 100,000 apartment years are reserved for low-income households.
Keep out the riff-raff that way.
Stabilization does NOT "go away" in 2020. The stabilization law regularly comes up for renewal, the next one is scheduled for 2019.
ReplyDelete