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The Board of Elections opted not to strike four housing and land use proposals from November’s general election ballot after the City Council claimed they were misleading voters.
Four ballot measures aimed at speeding up affordable housing construction and eroding the City Council’s powers over land use will be on the ballot in November after they survived a Board of Elections vote that could have stripped them off the ballot.
After the City Council claimed that the questions were written to mislead voters about how the ballot measures would limit legislative authority on land use decisions, the Board of Elections voted unanimously Tuesday to keep the questions.
The ballot measures, which would alter the City’s Charter, include:
- A “fast track” for affordable housing that skips Council review for projects in the 12 New York City neighborhoods building the least housing.
- A review board made up of the mayor, Council speaker, and borough president that can override Council decisions on land use.
- Cutting out City Council review of smaller housing projects across the city
- Creating a centralized city map
It would have been an unprecedented move for the Board of Elections to disapprove a ballot measure on those grounds, though the City Council claimed that the 12-person body had the authority to do so.
The vote was a win for “Yes in My Backyard” YIMBY groups in the city, who cheered the ballot measures. They argue that making it easier to build housing will chip away at the city’s severe housing shortage, where just 1.4 percent of units are vacant. Several prominent politicians, like Comptroller Brad Lander and other housing experts, came out in support of the proposals.
Opponents in the City Council decried the Board’s Decision, calling attention to the Council’s work to approve more housing through rezonings in recent years: “To be crystal clear, our opposition is about preserving the public’s power to make development better, and housing more affordable, for everyday New Yorkers,” Speaker Adrienne Adams said in a statement.
Here’s what else happened in housing this week—
ICYMI, from City Limits:
- Fewer than a third of the low-income New Yorkers facing eviction who qualify for free legal representation in housing court under the city’s landmark Right to Counsel program are actually getting those services, an Independent Budget Office analysis found—reigniting calls for lawmakers to better fund the initiative.
- “The number one thing is we have to stick together as a people, right?” housing advocate and activist Charisma White said on the latest episode of the Hear our Voices podcast, which shares stories and resources about family homelessness. “If we don’t stick together, we won’t make it anywhere.”
- Why are so many “affordable” apartments in New York City still so costly? That’s thanks to “a little-discussed federal bureaucratic mechanism called the High Housing Cost Adjustment,” argues architect and researcher Eddie Palka, who says the formula ends up “systematically excluding working New Yorkers from programs designed to help them.”
ICYMI, from other local newsrooms:
- The City Council passed a bill that will require the city to regularly publish the number of vacant units in its supportive housing network, Gothamist reports.
- City Council members are negotiating details of a plan to rezone downtown Jamaica, Queens, for more housing, as the proposal heads to a final vote soon, according to the Queens Daily Eagle.
- Public hearings took place this week on casino plans pitched for Brooklyn and Queens, The City reports.
- A new Political Action Committee plans to spend $3 million convincing New Yorkers to support the aforementioned housing ballot measures up for a vote this fall, according to the New York Times.
- A residential building boom is underway in Downtown Brooklyn, the New York Post reports.
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