Opinion: NYC Needs Land and Housing for People, Not Profit

As the city and state pour subsidies into for-profit improvement that fails to serve those the greater part in need District Land Trusts CLTs offer a proven and powerful way to ensure lasting affordability protect tenants and begin to repair longstanding racial and economic injustices Housing advocates rallying Tuesday in lower Manhattan for passage of the Neighborhood Land Act in the City Council Photo by Adi Talwar From the South Bronx to East New York and beyond communities are working to reclaim land for citizens good take housing off the speculative industry and ensure permanent affordability through locality land trusts CLTs and neighborhood-led advance On Tuesday the City Council held a historic hearing on the Population Land Act a groundbreaking slate of bills backed by -plus groups that would enable CLTs and other nonprofits to dramatically expand the supply of deeply and permanently affordable housing in low-income and Black and brown neighborhoods RELATED READING Social Housing Supporters Revive Push to Boost Nonprofit Public Ownership More than tenants and district groups testified in encouragement of the bills which include the Society Opportunity to Purchase Act Intro giving CLTs and other qualified nonprofits a first right to purchase multifamily buildings when landlords sell as well as General Land for Population Good Intro requiring the city to prioritize CLTs and other nonprofits in general land dispositions The package also includes a resolution calling on New York State to enact the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act Together these bills represent a bold shift toward neighborhood stewardship equity and long-term housing stability The need for such a shift couldn t be clearer or more urgent In contemporary times more than half of Black and Latino New Yorkers face housing insecurity the consequence of decades of disinvestment displacement and speculative advance As the city and state pour subsidies into for-profit enhancement that fails to serve those preponderance in need CLTs offer a proven and powerful way to ensure lasting affordability protect tenants and begin to repair longstanding racial and economic injustices Public land trusts are nonprofit community-governed organizations that own and steward land for the constituents good Rooted in civil rights movements CLTs represent a powerful approach to taking land and housing off the speculative sector preventing displacement and advancing population self-determination In fresh years the CLT movement has grown by leaps and bounds from just two CLTs a decade ago to more than currently operating in every borough New York City s CLTs now steward more than permanently affordable rentals and shared equity cooperatives as well as green spaces affordable retail storefronts neighborhood and commercial hubs and more Among the movement s up-to-date wins Last year the East New York CLT worked with organized tenants to purchase their -unit apartment building from a neglectful landlord the first purchase of its kind by a CLT in New York City The CLT is now coordinating with tenants to make long-overdue repairs and convert the building into a tenant-owned affordable cooperative After a decade of sustained advocacy in the South Bronx the Mott Haven Port Morris Group Land Stewards secured rights in to transform an abandoned city-owned property into a Robustness Teaching and Arts HEArts Center The CLT is also waging a campaign to ensure an accessible waterfront in an environmental justice population that lacks healthy green spaces and where one in five children suffers from asthma On a Queens peninsula devastated by Hurricane Sandy the ReAL Edgemere CLT was selected to redevelop vacant city lots for climate-resilient affordable homeownership and open space The grassroots CLT is engaging society residents countless of whom live in masses housing through a robust and inclusive group planning process Cooper Square CLT New York s veteran CLT formed in has long stewarded more than deeply affordable apartments on Manhattan s Lower East Side Now the CLT is organizing tenants in two rent-stabilized buildings it rescued from tax foreclosure Northwest Bronx District and Clergy Coalition launched the Bronx CLT in to build shared wealth and collective governance over Bronx land In addition to other locality ownership wins NWBCCC has secured commitments for four sites in the Belmont neighborhood that the CLT will preserve as permanently affordable cooperative housing Borne out of activist opposition to Amazon s planned headquarters in Long Island City Queens the Western Queens CLT is at present focused on securing rights to the same site a square foot publicly owned Dept of Training building in Long Island City to create manufacturing jobs an immigrant street vendor commissary and artist and public spaces This Land Is Ours CLT formed in contributed to a effective bid to the NY Archdiocese that will develop a decommissioned religious property into more than newly constructed affordable apartments The CLT also is working to acquire and convert two city-owned parking lots to permanently affordable low-income apartments for families and seniors Even with these and other gains the city s CLTs face steep blockades to scaling up chief among them access to land and capital The Society Land Act would begin to change that By giving CLTs a first right to purchase buildings when landlords sell COPA would enable communities to intervene before speculators swoop in Meanwhile Constituents Land for Society Good would empower CLTs to transform vacant general land- a precious reserve into truly affordable housing vibrant society and green spaces and more The City Council has taken initial initiatives to foster the upsurge of New York s CLT movement including by funding CLT learning organizing and technical assistance in the city budget since Groups have leveraged modest funding awards to deliver outsized results building deep bases of assistance in their communities acquiring and rehabilitating their first properties partnering with mission-aligned developers and much more We now need New York City to go all in on its patronage for CLTs through robust funding and plan assistance that enables them to seize opportunities to bring land and housing into district control The Locality Land Act is an essential step forward The city s deepening housing situation demands bold systemic solutions CLTs are already showing what s feasible ensuring real affordability preventing displacement and putting land in society hands Beyond exclusively building more communities are organizing through CLTs to ensure land and housing are developed and stewarded over generations for the residents good Deyanira Del R o is executive director of New Business activity Project Matthew Shore is senior organizer at South Bronx Unite and a member of the Mott Haven-Port Morris Locality Land Stewards Brianna Soleyn is a board member of the East New York Public 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