Stewart-Cousins Backs Efforts To Promote Affordable Housing

YONKERS, N.Y. -- State Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate Democratic Conference leader, has joined members of the conference to unveil an affordable housing package aimed at ensuring fair housing practices throughout the state.

State Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins has joined with other Democrats to propose legislation that aims to promote affordable housing.
Photo Credit: *Contibuted*

Robert Mikulak

05/28/2015 5:00 p.m.

“The Democratic Conference has been at the forefront of efforts to ensure all New Yorkers are able to have access to affordable housing options in the communities they call home,” Stewart-Cousins said.

The Senate Democratic Conference proposals include renewing and strengthening rent control legislation for another two years through the Tenant Protection Act of 2015, as well as repealing initiatives that harm tenants such as vacancy decontrol and the vacancy bonus.

Senate Democrats also called for caps on rent increases allowed for individual and multiapartment capital improvements. The package of affordable housing legislation includes bills that would do the following:

Repeal provisions of state and city statutes that remove apartments from rent stabilization when they are vacated and could be rented for monthly rents of $2,500 or more.
Reregulate units deregulated due to vacancy since 1993 to their Dec. 31, 2014, rates.
Repeal provisions permitting rent increases of 20 percent or more upon vacancy of a rent stabilized dwelling unit.
Standardize the rental adjustment a landlord may impose for the total cost of an individual apartment improvement, reduce the increase allowed to 1/84th of the costs and require the Department of Homes and Community Renewal to issue a schedule of reasonable costs for repairs so that landlords can't fraudulently attempt to deregulate an apartment through improvements that may not have been made or for inflated claims of costs incurred.
Provide that major capital improvements be calculated as a rent surcharge and will not become part of the base legal regulated rent by which rent increases are calculated; requires the amount be separately designated and billed as such; prevents landlords from receiving a financial windfall from MCI funded by the state Energy and Development Authority.

There are rent-controlled apartments in the following communities in the 35th state Senate District represented by Stewart-Cousins: Ardsley, Dobbs Ferry, Greenburgh, Hastings-on-Hudson, Irvington, New Rochelle, Tarrytown, White Plains and Yonkers.

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