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Tuesday, December 10, 2019

McKee's Media - 12/10/2019



ARTICLES OF INTEREST TO TENANT ADVOCATES:


ZONING / DISPLACEMENT

NEW STATE CRIMINAL PENALTIES FOR 
HARASSING LANDLORDS
Georgia Kromrei: Cuomo signs bill to increase 

DEM. CANDIDATES' HOUSING POLICY

TAX BREAKS FOR BIG DEVELOPERS

WHO'S GOT THE POWER IN ALBANY?
Albany Business Review: Landlords, business groups 

TAX THE RICH IN ORDER TO. . . .

Friday, November 29, 2019

Dec. 3, 2019 - Tenants PAC celebration

Dance The Night Away to the music of The Love Handles. Join Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Corey Johnson to celebrate the great tenant victory in Albany earlier this year, and to wish Michael McKee a happy 80th birthday.

Tickets start at $80, more if you can afford it. Click on the button below to buy a ticket, or to make a contribution if you cannot attend. All proceeds will be used to support pro-tenant candidates in next year's crucial elections, and to fight for even stronger rent laws in Albany.

Tuesday, December 3
6:30 - 9:00 pm
The Cutting Room
44 East 32nd Street
(between Madison & Park Avenues)

CLICK HERE TO PURCHASE A TICKET

McKee's Media - Nov. 29, 2019

LANDLORDS UPSET AT NEW HOUSING LAW
John Leland: Real Estate thought it was invincible in New York. It wasn't. How the industry plans to rebound after a tough year (New York Times)
Josh Barbanel: NYC evictions are plunging under new rent control law (Wall Street Journal)
Georgia Kromrei: National landlord groups fund RSA/CHIP lawsuit against New York State rent law (The Real Deal)
Kathryn Brenzel: REBNY's new president James Whelan promises more aggressive effort to fight tenant protections (The Real Deal)
Middletown Times Herald-Record: New Windsor manufactured homes tenants protest upcoming rent hike
Elizabeth Kim: Met with unrelenting tenant opposition, landlord of Atlantic Plaza Towers backs down on installing facial recognition technology (Gothamist)

NEW RENT LAW:  STATEWIDE AND MOBILE HOME PARKS
Anna Gronewold: City of Albany moves towards opting into state rent control law (Politico NY)
Jeremy Moule: Rochester takes first step toward rent stabilization as mayor agrees to conduct vacancy survey (Rochester City Newspaper)


CITY DOESN'T COLLECT LANDLORD FINES / LANDLORDS ASK FOR $$
Gothamist: NYC fines landlords for lead but rarely comes to collect
Kathryn Brenzel: REBNY asks City to help landlords pay for lead abatement (The Real Deal)
NYCHA
Greg Smith: NYCHA monitor being paid $600 per hour (The City)

HOMELESS
Brooklyn Daily Eagle: Jehovah's Witnesses DUMBO hotel will become housing for formerly homeless New Yorkers

DISCRIMINATION AND DISPLACEMENT
Newsday: Black homebuyers & renters face discrimination from Long Island real estate brokers 
David Cruz: Special report: The vanishing Bronx homeowner (Norwood News)
New York Times: As Newark rebuilds, could black residents be pushed out?
Michael Kimmelman: Essex Crossing is the anti-Hudson Yards (New York Times)
New York Times: Surging rents, housing shortage leave working-class Californians at risk of displacement  

Friday, November 8, 2019

McKee's Media 11/08/2019

Tenants' PAC

ARTICLES OF INTEREST TO TENANT ADVOCATES:
MCI RULES RETROACTIVE

AIRBnB
Luis Ferré-Sadurní: Massive defeat for Airbnb as Jersey City voters overwhelmingly approve stricter regulations on short-term rentals (New York Times)  
REBNY unhappy with new rent laws

NEW YORK CITY

Thursday, September 12, 2019

McKee's Media, 9/12/2019



Tenants' PAC

ARTICLES OF INTEREST TO TENANT ADVOCATES:

OPTING INTO RENT STABILIZATION (ETPA)
Hudson Valley One: Kingston first upstate city 

WAREHOUSING and OTHER 
RESISTANCE TO NEW LAW

DHCR Goofs Then Corrects 

OTHER STATES PASSING RENT LAWS

TENANTS FIGHT BACK
Claudia Irizarry Aponte: Sunset Park tenants sue to 
compel restoration of building months after devastating 
fire left them homeless (The City)

State housing agency posts summary of new rent laws and lease rider

The New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR), which oversees the rent laws, has posted  on its website: 

So far, Stellar has been renewing stabilized leases using the OLD rent rider.  The new one will be binding since that goes along with the 2019 changes in the rent laws.  This rider also shows how market tenants trying to get back into rent stabilization can calculate what their stabilized rents would be.


Wednesday, August 28, 2019

McKee's Media - 8/25/2019

Tenants' PAC

ARTICLES OF INTEREST TO TENANT ADVOCATES

(excerpted)
 
New Rent Laws

Opting into the the Emergency Tenant Protection Act under 2019 rent law

A new memo is available from Tenants PAC to assist tenant groups and local elected officials who are considering whether to opt into the Emergency Tenant Protection Act of 1974.

The Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act of 2019, enacted June 14, removes the earlier arbitrary geographic restrictions on ETPA applicability and allows any city, town or village anywhere in New York State to opt into the state rent stabilization system.

To do so, the governing body of the municipality must first determine (based on precise data, normally by conducting a vacancy survey) that the net vacancy rate for the class of housing accommodations to be regulated is 5 percent or less, and then vote to declare a housing emergency.

Part I of this new memo describes the difference between the net vacancy rate and the gross vacancy rate, and why the standard for declaring a housing emergency is based on the net vacancy rate.

Part II of the memo summarizes relevant court cases going back to the 1974 enactment of the ETPA, involving landlord challenges to vacancy surveys and declarations of emergency in the three suburban counties of Nassau, Rockland and Westchester. These landlord challenges have sometimes been successful, more often unsuccessful.

Municipalities that vote to opt into the ETPA should expect a landlord lawsuit challenging their action, and need to be aware of precedent.

The memo is attached to this email as a Word document. It is also available on the Tenants PAC website (tenantspac.org) on the home page. Click on:

ISSUES INVOLVING RIGHTS OF CITIES, TOWNS & VILLAGES IN NEW YORK STATE TO OPT INTO THE EMERGENCY TENANT PROTECTION ACT OF 1974  

You can also access the court decisions described in the memo on the Tenants PAC websiteclick on the name of each case to access the actual court decision. The ten court decisions are not attached to this email. (I can email the attachments to you if you wish, but you can print them out from the website.)

Also on the Tenants PAC website, you can sign up to receive email notices from Tenants PAC, including our "Articles of Interest to Tenant Advocates" email blasts which go out one to three times a week to several hundred tenant activists. On the home page, click on:


For more information:
Michael McKee
Treasurer
Tenants Political Action Committee
(917) 669-2977

Sunday, July 14, 2019

Tremendous Victory in Albany: 2019 Housing Stability and Tenant Protection Act

After years and then finally months and weeks and days of tremendous pressure by tenants, and a change in party-control of the NYS Senate (yay, elections!), we now have the 



The new law will change many things state-wide for tenants.  Instead of making it easier for landlords to replace lower-paying tenants with higher-paying tenants (a great investment tactic for hedge funds), the new law makes it easier for tenants to keep their homes.   The summary below is not complete and is not legal advice. (See some other summaries here and here.)  In addition, the rent laws no longer have an automatic "sunset" date.  They are permanent, which may be why landlords have filed suit in federal court to undo the rent law changes


Click on "read more" for a comparison chart of some of the changes between what we had and what is in the new 

In addition, read explanations about it 
at 



Monday, May 20, 2019

McKee's Media, 5/20/2019

 

Sunday, May 5, 2019

Protest landlords who abuse housing court - Wed., May 8 at noon


The Right to Counsel Coalition has organized a rally to protest Stellar Management as one of the "worst evictors" :  taking hundreds of tenants to court in the zip codes that have Right to Counsel for low-income tenants.  This includes our zip code: 10025.  

Because tenants were generally represented, the majority were not evicted.  Bringing hundreds of cases that Stellar could only win if tenants were NOT represented suggests an abuse of the Housing Court system. 

THE RALLY IS 

THIS WEDNESDAY,  MAY 8, 2019 
at NOON 
in front of Stellar's main office at 156 William Street 
in lower Manhattan.

Take any train downtown to the Fulton Street station in Manhattan. 
William Street is one of the exits from the station. 

Tell Albany: End MCIs and Protect ALL Tenants

























MAY 14, 2019 - Take a free bus trip to Albany to let them know:  we need 

  • an end to inflated apartment improvement and "major capital improvement" building increases and 
  • protection for all tenants, not just those lucky enough to be rent stabilized. 

Make your voice heard!  The rent laws expire on June 15th, and Governor Cuomo, Assembly Speaker Heastie, and Senate Majority Leader Stewart-Cousins need to hear from each of us.  (Click here for a draft letter.)




Sunday, April 14, 2019

Time to Act!

The rent laws will be renewed this June in Albany.  
They don't just happen in a void.  The landlord lobby 
is out in force, and tenants have to be louder.  So urge 
our elected officials to support Housing Justice for All.  

May 2, 2019: Testify in person or by email to the NYS Assembly's Standing Committee on Housing.  

 **Click here to view public hearing notice** with details. 


Get on the bus for Albany on May 14th: 















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