Tenants Storm Albany, Nearly Taste Small Victory

On September 10, 2009, over 150 tenants from a variety of housing and community groups from all corners of New York City and Westchester County traveled to Albany with a simple message to tell our State Senators: we have waited long enough for rent reform!!! It was starting to look like our relentless pressure this past spring was finally paying off. A week before the one-day session, we were promised votes on two of the ten rent reform bills that passed the Assembly last February. The first bill would prevent owners from taking limitless apartments out of rent regulation and evict tenants through the "owner use" loophole. The second would end the "preferential rent" loophole where landlords lure apartment seekers with a lower "preferential" rent while registering a higher legal maximum rent with the State, and then sock the tenants with increases of hundreds of dollars at lease renewals - a widespread practice that under current law is legal. We were hoping to come home with victories on these two bills, and then build the momentum to help pass the more controversial bills, including the repeal of vacancy decontrol. We were close to these two important victories. But then came Carl Kruger - conservative Democrat from south Brooklyn and ally of the real estate lobby. (Kruger has taken hundreds of thousands of dollars of real estate money in the past year alone.) Democratic leaders polled their members and found that Kruger would vote against our bills if they came to a vote on September 10. At the same time, Long Island Democrat Brian Foley was not in Albany for the one-day Senate session because his father died earlier in the week. Assuming that tenants had all of the Democrats except Kruger on their side, with Foley away for the day, that left us with 30 Democratic yes votes. With only one solid Republican vote - Frank Padavan of Queens - that would have brought us to only 31 votes, when 32 votes are required for legislation to pass. The Democratic leadership decided at the very last minute to take these bills off of the agenda for the day's session rather than see them voted down. As this scenario was coming to light, tenants in the hallway outside the Senate were loud and impatient, directly confronting several Democratic Senators who have stood in the way of rent reform over the past year (whether in public or behind the scenes) including Carl Kruger, Pedro Espada (Bronx), and Jeffrey Klein (Bronx/Westchester). The echoes of our chants - some directed at individual Senators - filled the Capitol building, and the boisterous nature of our protests compelled Democratic conference leader John Sampson of Brooklyn to call a few leaders of tenant organizations into a meeting. Sampson, the new Senate Democratic leader, told the tenant representatives that he supports our legislative platform and is committed to passing our bills. He said that he understood that we are impatient and frustrated, and agreed that we had good reason to be angry, but he did not want to put bills up to a vote until they were assured of passage. He said that he is committed to finding ways to pass as much of this legislation in the coming months as possible. Importantly, Senator Sampson said that our mass mobilizations to Albany over the last few months have instilled a sense of urgency on our issues within the Senate Democratic conference. Other Senators have made the same point. Eric Schneiderman (Manhattan/Bronx) explained that normally he does not favor dragging people to Albany when nothing is going to happen, but in our case he thinks that the daily mobilizations have kept tenant issues alive. While we would like to have walked away with legislative victories on September 10, it is clear that our physical presence in Albany in the last few months has been key to the campaign as a whole, and that this will continue to be the case. Our momentum is building. We will win this fight! The Senate is rumored to return in late September (as well as the Assembly), and we must be there. Please stay posted and be prepared to return with Met Council to Albany when we find out the next date that the Senate is scheduled to meet.

Stuy Town Tenants Return To Court

Last March, the State Appellate Court ruled unanimously in favor of Stuyvesant Town & Peter Cooper Village tenants, citing that owner Tishman Speyer, and previous owner MetLife, did not have the right to deregulate some 4,400 apartments while receiving a $24 million J-51 tax abatement.

The New York State Court of Appeals will hear arguments on the J-51 "Roberts" ruling on Thursday, September 10.

If the lower court ruling is upheld, Tishman Speyer will be forced to return the affected units to rent-stabilized status, lowering rents for many tenants currently paying market rate prices. It would also be forced to reimburse current and past tenants for money that they have paid above what the legal regulated rents should have been. An estimated 300,000 units city-wide whose owners receive J-51 benefits may be affected by this ruling.

The court convenes on September 10 at 2:00pm. To watch the oral arguments live on the Internet that day, go to http://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/.

The case comes as Reuters reports that the borrowed interest reserves that were part of the loans used to buy Stuy Town & Peter Cooper Village could run out in four months. The interest reserves on the property fell to $56.5 million at the end of July, down from the $400 million at the time the loans were underwritten.

Tishman Speyer purchased the two megadevelopments in 2006 for $5.4 billion, with the intention of converting as many rent stabilized units as possible to market rates. While a tenant victory in the Court of Appeals would officially halt this plan, the development was already in financial trouble, as Tishman wasn't able to push out the rent regulated tenants out as fast as they had projected.

Tenants Rights Upheld In Court

Last week, a Manhattan judge ruled that an amendment to New York City's Human Rights Law obligates landlords to accept section 8 housing and other federal subsidies for units that are already rent stabilized and for those tenants who moved in after the law was already enacted. The case was brought on behalf of a group of tenants whose landlords refused to accept their payments when they tried to use Government vouchers to pay their rent.

Met Council's 50th Anniversary Fund Drive in Full Swing

Met Council is only one week into our 50th Anniversary fund drive, and so far the support from our members has been very strong. Many thanks to all of our members who have given so generously to Met Council during this crucial time! If you haven't yet donated, please consider making a contribution.

For 50 years, Met Council has relied solely on the voluntary contributions of our membership to fund our crucial organizing and advocacy work. This financial independence has allowed us to take the bold stances our members rely on us to take: fighting for home rule, holding elected officials accountable, and stronger tenant protections.

Today Met Council is a leader in the fight to repeal vacancy decontrol, protect Section 8 and Mitchell Lama housing, and put an end to MCI abuse. With our members' continued support, we look forward to leading the fight for tenants' rights for the next 50 years.

You can send your donation to Met Council's office at 339 Lafayette St, Suite 301, New York NY 10012. You can also donate online by logging onto metcouncil.net and clicking on the PayPal link.

A Victory for Brooklyn Tenants

The Division of Housing & Community Renewal has objected to a landlord’s request for a 100-car underground garage at the west end of Joralemon Street in Brooklyn Heights.

As it turns out, the proposal was in direct conflict with the intended use of the area, which is for recreation. This is because the proposed ‘green roof’ on top of the garage would not adequately replace the courtyard, causing the destruction of a series of trees and increasing vehicular use, thus affecting noise and sight reduction, and environmental standards within the community.

This is a great victory, for both the Riverside Tenant Association and all NYC tenants. It demonstrates that owners don’t always get their way. While the Pinnacle Group is appealing this decision, the Riverside Tenant Association is confident that its appeal will be rejected, as decisions in favor of tenants are rarely overturned.

However, the Riverside Tenant Association is $11,000 in debt to its legal counsel. If you would like to help them with this burden please send donations to:

Riverside Tenants Association
Brooklyn GPO, Box 6841
Brooklyn, NY 11202-6841

Where We Stand with Legislative Reform

Weeks after the legislative session in Albany was scheduled to end, the fight to reform our rent laws this year continues. Senate Democrats are back in the majority, but the conference remains fractured in the wake of the Republican coup of June 8 and the stalemate that followed for more than a month afterward. Though the tenant vote was key to putting Democrats in the majority in the state senate last November - for the first time in over 40 years - it has been clear that the conference leadership has been

hesitant about pushing crucial pro-tenant legislation, including the bills to repeal vacancy decontrol and protect tenants in former Mitchell Lama and project-based Section 8 buildings.

At the moment, it seems likely that the senate will return later in the summer to address so-called controversial legislation, including rent reform.

It is well understood that tenants are a core Democratic constituency, but without constant pressure from us, our issues will be sidelined. Some Democrats are trying to play both sides of this issue - collecting landlord lobbyist money while posturing as pro-tenant progressives - and for those politicians, the easiest way to keep up this game is to allow events to play out so that these bills never come to a vote. Ultimately, these senators need the tenant vote in order to stay in office, so we are reminding them that pushing through our package of bills is the most important test of their credibility on tenant issues.

Years of work went into getting pro-tenant politicians elected. Over the past year, the Real Rent Reform and New York Is Our Home coalitions have mounted an impressive campaign to reform our rent laws - organizing protests and rallies, canvassing, phone calling, and meeting with politicians. When the coup on June 8 threatened to derail efforts to pass rent reform legislation this year, member groups of these coalitions from across New York City and the suburban counties sent 40, 50, and 60 tenants per day to Albany every day of the session to protest outside the senate chambers. Our presence helped keep our bills on the top of the Democrats' agenda, and reminded the party leadership that our priority issues could not be put off to another year.

Our last large mobilization was this past week, on Wednesday, July 15. Over 60 tenants held a lively protest outside the senate chambers, and got senators to publicly sign a pledge committing themselves to pushing our priority bills through this session. The absence of Senator Daniel Squadron, who was away on his honeymoon, gave the Republicans extra leverage for the day, and the session was delayed until late in the night. Without Squadron's vote, passage of our bills would have been difficult, and by being in Albany at this critical juncture, we kept ourselves in the spotlight. Our bills did not come up for a vote, but we got commitments from senators to bring them to a vote before the final session. Many thanks to the steadfast tenants who came on this trip and the many others who went to Albany previously!

It is now clear that it was not only the June 8 coup that threatened to derail the tenant agenda, but also the opportunity created by the ensuing chaos for hesitant Democrats to avoid voting on our legislation and thereby truly earning their pro-tenant credentials. Our efforts so far, built on the foundation of tremendous tenant activism, have kept us on the cusp of a victory. When a session is called over the summer to bring our bills to a vote, please plan on making the trip to Albany with Met Council!