INSPECTORS NEEDED
Council hears cry for help amid the city’s housing crisis
City agencies are struggling when it comes to cracking down on the worst landlords amid an ongoing housing crisis and municipal belt-tightening even as they’ve made some strides, top officials said Monday
The heads of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) and Department of Buildings (DOB) detailed some of the main challenges they face at a City Council hearing on the budget. It came as the city has been grappling with historically low vacancy rates and a spate of high-profile construction incidents.
Both agencies have struggled with staffing issues in recent years thanks in part to the COVID-19 pandemic, a subject that came to the fore during the marathon budget meeting held by the Housing and Buildings Committee. Other topics included affordable housing creation, government enforcement and budget constraints.
“New York City is facing its worst affordability crisis in decades, driven in large part by housing costs,” said City Councilwoman Pierina Sanchez (D-Bronx), chairwoman of the committee.
“As the costs of rent and housing skyrocket, working- and middle-class New Yorkers who have been here for generations, who have helped to build our city, are struggling to remain in their homes.”
HPD reported record-setting affordable housing production last year and has filled more than 200 vacant positions, but its inspection and preservation efforts remain “overstretched,” according to Sanchez. HPD’s current vacancy rate has dropped to 8.4%, or 225 open positions.
“Despite immense challenges, every team at HPD, with our partners at [the Housing Development Corp.], are working tirelessly, and it’s making a difference for the people we serve, the people who depend on us. We’re optimistic, but we are not declaring victory,” said Commissioner Adolfo Carrión. “We collectively will need to be more proactive. We will need to work together to convert the resources in our 2025 fiscal year budget into housing wins citywide.”
City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams pointed out that the average time for capital project completion has increased, as has the approval period for housing lotteries, leaving some affordable apartments empty for months.
He and others congratulated HPD after the agency announced Monday it had helped secure a rare arrest warrant for one of the city’s most notorious landlords, Daniel Ohebshalom.
But when Sanchez asked what the Council could do to help clamp down on the worst offenders, Carrión said it’s an uphill battle. “Owners sometimes have the ability to tie the system up in knots — based on legitimate property rights — but they often abuse the system,” he said. “If there are authorities, new ideas about how to handle this process, we welcome that, any policy shifts that we can make.”
Williams, a Dem, said HPD and DOB both need more inspectors. DOB’s overall vacancy rate dropped to 5.7% from 22.7% in October 2022 — driven not by a hiring spree but a head count reduction, according to Sanchez.
There were seven construction deaths citywide in 2023 — a decrease, according to Buildings Commissioner James Oddo. But his agency has seen a “troubling” uptick in workplace injuries. Incidents involving a serious injury or fatality have steadily risen from 502 in 2021 to 540 in 2022 and 649 last year, according to city data.
Pointing to December’s partial building collapse in the Bronx — which happened in Sanchez’s district — Oddo said the agency needs “additional sticks” when it comes to cracking down on the worst violators. That could include expanding lien power and putting general contractor licensing “on the table again.”
“We are a compliance agency,” he said. “And, when we can’t get compliance, when we run out of sticks, we need bigger sticks.”