City Of Yes Poised To Undergo Changes After 2-Day City Council Hearing

New York City Council members have spent two days hearing testimony on the potential impacts of a proposed zoning reform that could result in sweeping changes for housing development across the city.

The clock is ticking. Before the end of the year, the city council must decide whether to pass Mayor Eric Adams' City of Yes for Housing Opportunity proposal or reject it.

The council could also alter the proposal, and its minority leader, Joseph Borelli, told Bisnow he expects changes. Those would require approval from the City Planning Commission, which OK'd the current version of the plan in September.

“I don't see the scenario where this passes without some indication from the speaker that there'll be an alternative plan that's going to go back to City Planning,” Borelli said.

City council members spent Monday questioning Dan Garodnick and Adolfo Carrión, commissioners for the NYC Departments of City Planning and Housing Preservation and Development, respectively, on the implications of the zoning reform for their constituents.

On Tuesday, city residents, neighborhood groups, developers, lobbyists, labor unions and the borough presidents for Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens spoke during a day of public testimony.

The hearings and testimony solidified the common ground underpinning the proposal: Advocates and members of the public are largely aligned that City of Yes could help NYC solve its housing crisis, Garodnick told Bisnow.

“We heard a clear consensus on the need for action to address our housing crisis,” he said in an emailed statement Wednesday. “With a majority of testimony in favor of City of Yes and recent polls showing a large majority of New Yorkers supporting the proposal, there is a clear mandate to enable more housing in New York.”

The proposal could deliver as many as 109,000 new housing units by 2039, The City reported. It proposes allowing housing units on top of businesses along commercial strips and close to transit hubs and letting developers build bigger multifamily projects as long as there are more affordable units included in the developments.

Some of the more controversial proposals include removing parking minimums in housing projects, permitting accessory dwelling units and allowing for denser housing projects in all pockets of the city. Borelli said there is enough disagreement about parking and ADUs that he anticipates modifications to the zoning text.

“This all comes down to how many votes are needed to pass this and who’s asking for what in those votes,” Rachel Fee, executive director of the pro-housing group New York Housing Conference, told Bisnow Wednesday. 

Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso remained firm in his support for the proposal, praising the council in his Tuesday testimony for “coming together and doing something as one,” as opposed to “doing spot work or spot zoning or spot fixes to one school or one neighborhood.” 

The zoning reform is essential in creating circumstances for more housing development but will not be enough by itself to tackle NYC’s housing crisis, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said in her opening remarks Monday.

“New Yorkers also need deeper affordability, expanded pathways to affordable homeownership, strengthened tenant protections, the removal of barriers to housing vouchers, investments in their neighborhoods, and more,” she said.

But beyond a need to secure more affordable housing amid the city’s lowest apartment vacancy rate on record, two issues that flared up in the CPC hearing in July remained prevalent themes throughout the two-day hearing.

Not all elected officials were in favor of removing parking mandates, which are requirements that developers building multifamily projects include a certain number of parking spots.

“People are parked in Ridgewood and Glendale and Middle Village in front of hydrants,” Council Member Robert Holden, who represents parts of Queens, said Monday, according to Gothamist. “My district can’t find parking.”

Accessory dwelling units also remained controversial, with some council members arguing that the infrastructure to ensure that basement apartments are safe isn't feasible in some parts of the city. 

ADUs have been a source of disagreement even among borough presidents. Reynoso told Bisnow in September that he couldn't vote for City of Yes without ADUs. But Queens Borough President Donovan Richards said ADUs are a “nonstarter” in some parts of the borough, local newspaper Queens Daily Eagle reported.

Garodnick presented a counterargument Monday that many basement units are already rented out illegally and that the change to legalize them gives the city a chance to make them safe, The City reported.

It will be up to elected officials to determine where they feel compromise is appropriate, Fee said. 

“I think there’s a good amount of support for the proposal as is, but I do think to get it over the finish line, you’re looking at members representing districts that have some low-density neighborhoods that have communities that are calling for those kinds of changes,” she said.

The proposal has support from pro-housing groups, unions and advocates, many of whom testified Tuesday.

“To do what is needed — catalyze housing production of all types, for everyone, in every neighborhood — the city council should pass the City of Yes as is,” Sean Campion, director of housing and economic development studies at the Citizens Budget Commission, said in his testimony.

The CBC, as well as NYHC, Citizens Housing and Planning Council, Open New York, Open Plans and labor unions including Hotel & Gaming Trades Council and 32BJ SEIU, said the plan should pass without any exceptions for neighborhoods, restrictions or conditional approvals. 

Some of the city council’s more conservative members, however, remain on the fence.

Borelli, who represents the 51st Council District on Staten Island, told Bisnow that he is open to negotiation but that he remains concerned that City of Yes would negatively impact his constituents.

“Everyone chose to live in Staten Island because they wanted to live in a suburban part of the state, and this remains the most affordable part of New York City to live in,” he said. “I think over a decade, it would fundamentally change the character of a neighborhood. That is the purpose. There's no way to add density and apartment buildings where none currently exists and say that that doesn't change the character of a neighborhood.”