Governor Cuomo, Tuesday night, offered a brief outline of a proposed new 421-a plan that would require projects with more than 300 units in Manhattan below 96th Street or on the East River in Queens and Brooklyn to pay construction workers $65 an hour or $50 an hour in wages and benefits, respectively. The State would pick up $15 an hour of the labor cost from unspecified funds and the projects would have to have 25-30% affordable units on some unspecified basis.
Tenant screening services would have to be licensed by the City and would have to provide full details of parties, complaints, and dispositions of any Housing Court histories reported under a bill introduced in the City Council this week. The idea is to prevent owners from just seeing that the prospect was involved in a Housing Court action without context. The level of detail required, however, would probably preclude screening agencies from collecting the information economically.
New construction has kept median rent levels almost flat in Manhattan and Brooklyn from July to July and down in Queens, according to the latest Elliman Rental Report released Monday. Significantly, the percentage of vacancy leases with concessions has doubled since last summer.
The City has launched a 2-5 year effort to require zoned commercial carting franchises, citing environmental reasons; but some question whether it will have the desired benefits or merely increase union involvement and costs.
The City Council, Tuesday, rejected the first affordable housing project it has considered under the Mandatory Inclusionary Housing rezoning adopted last Spring. The building in Inwood was opposed by neighborhood residents. Although the idea behind the Mandatory Inclusionary Housing plan was to create a general framework for affordable housing, the Council Speaker was quoted as saying “Every project in every district is different.”
The City Planning Commission ruled Monday that the MIH requirements did not apply to a proposed building project in Chelsea, but the Manhattan Borough President is forcing the City Council to review the decision, reinforcing concerns that the Council will micro-manage every application.