Adams' 'City Of Yes' Plan To Beef Up Housing Production Gets First Public Airing

New York City could be poised for major housing changes as another part of Mayor Eric Adams’ City of Yes plan advances through the hearing process. But if the first public hearing is any indication, getting a major citywide zoning change approved is going to mean walking a hard-fought road.

Adams administration officials presented the proposal to update city zoning rules before the City Planning Commission Wednesday during a marathon hearing that lasted well over 12 hours. The plan would allow for increased housing production across all of its 59 districts.

Components include making office-to-residential conversions easier, legalizing accessory dwelling units, building higher-density housing around transit hubs and removing mandatory parking minimums for new multifamily developments.

But one question underpinned public comments during the hearing, especially amid the myriad comments in opposition from the public: Do New Yorkers understand zoning regulations well enough to know what the housing component of City of Yes will mean?

“Many community board members, let alone members of the public, not all versed in the nuances of zoning, still do not fully grasp some aspects of this text amendment,” said Chris Marte, city council member for an area that covers Lower Manhattan. “This lack of understanding is perhaps my deepest concern.”

The City of Yes for Housing Opportunity is the third part of Adams’ sweeping zoning reform plan, following similar proposals for economic opportunity and carbon neutrality that were passed by the city council earlier this year. 

The thesis behind the proposals is simple. Much of the city’s zoning dates back to regulations passed in 1961, resulting in zoning regulations that do not serve NYC in 2024. In response to that, as well as the city’s rental housing crisis and record low vacancy rates, City of Yes proposes more flexibility in what can be legally counted as housing as well as making it easier to build new housing. 

“Zoning either allows housing to get built or it doesn't,” Citizens Housing and Planning Council Director Howard Slatkin said during his testimony. “Zoning doesn't actually make the housing get built. Money is what makes the housing get built.”

The city has tax incentives in place in order to fund affordable housing construction, he said. But zoning remains an obstacle, which is why he showed up to speak in support of the policy on Wednesday.

“The more restrictive we make the zoning, the more we add restrictions on the circumstances under which you're allowed to build housing, the less housing we will get,” he said.

Measures include allowing backyard cottages, garage conversions and basement apartments to become legal housing options, known as accessory dwelling units. It would re-legalize housing with shared kitchens for studio apartments, outlawed since the 1950s, as well as housing above commercial properties in low-density neighborhoods.

The plan could also strip away some of the red tape for vacant office and commercial buildings hoping to pursue residential conversions, facilitate housing developments on underutilized space belonging to residential, faith-based or other campuses and permit three- to five-story apartment buildings within a half-mile of public transit.

New multifamily developments would also be able to do away with mandates for how many parking spots need to be built based on the number of housing units added. Proposed multifamily developments could also increase their size by 20% if they commit to the additional housing being permanently affordable for New Yorkers earning 60% of the area median income.

That component is a sticking point for the Real Estate Board of New York, which advocated for the city to keep its existing density bonus system that allows the affordable housing to be built off-site and have an 80% AMI minimum, The Real Deal reported.

A REBNY spokesperson said the group supports the new density bonus, but opposes the piece of the City of Yes proposal that would replace the existing Voluntary Inclusionary Housing program.

But the overall plan, if passed, could supercharge NYC's housing industry and will spread the development of new buildings equitably among neighborhoods, developers and advocates said.

“All serious housing policy experts agree that it is this undersupply of market rate housing that is driving up housing costs for everyone,” Dan Kent, CEO and president of affordable housing developer Lantern Organization, told Bisnow. “These are actually really modest zoning changes that are spread out carefully across different neighborhoods in a manner that is very sensitive to context.”

But of the three plans, housing may be the most controversial so far. While housing advocates, developers and individual residents who showed up to the hearing largely voiced support for the proposal, their views were at odds with other New Yorkers who appeared onscreen to testify from different parts of the city. 

Residents from Richmond Hill to Howard Beach, low-density neighborhoods in Queens, appeared via Zoom to testify against the proposal, arguing that their communities are poorly equipped to handle more housing and that the rezonings would change the character of their neighborhoods.

“People have moved into these communities for a reason — for light, air and space. And for tranquility, to get away from the hustle and bustle of Manhattan or other areas that have a lot of apartment buildings,” Carina Nieves, a Richmond Hill resident, testified via Zoom. “In Kew Gardens, there have been multiple homes that have been knocked down due to the rezoning, and none of those apartment buildings are actually affordable for the people in my community.”

Two elected officials from Queens, council members Joann Ariola and Vickie Paladino, said the proposal would be disastrous for residents in their districts. Queens Borough President Donovan Richards has also raised concerns about certain aspects of the proposal. 

“City of Yes as it stands would be an unmitigated disaster and we cannot allow it to pass in its current form,” Ariola, whose district covers the Rockaway beachfront and Ozone Park, said via Zoom. “It would also effectively eliminate the ability of communities to advocate for their own wellbeing.”

Of the 59 community boards in NYC, 35 have voted against City of Yes, while just 15 have voted in support of the measure, The City reported.

Weighing in on individual rezonings on a case-by-case basis through a process known as Uniform Land Use Review Procedure is one of the duties of community boards. That would disappear with City of Yes, critics of the plan said. 

“Taking away community board input via ULURP and instead handing responsibility over to government could spell the beginning of the end for neighborhoods across the city,” Ariola said. “It opens the door for large developers to trample upon small businesses and homeowners.”

But other elected officials believe the zoning changes, and the shared burden of building more housing across all the city’s districts, are the only way to mitigate the housing crisis. The Manhattan Borough Board voted Tuesday morning to approve 15 of the recommendations in the proposal, Borough President Mark Levine said in his testimony.

“This represents a major change, unprecedented in the history of Borough Board votes, on major zoning changes over recent decades,” he said. “I think it shows broad-based support in an era of desperate affordability challenges, amidst the urgent need to help catalyze the production of what potentially could be 100,000 new units unleashed by the passage of this proposal.”

Levine said the proposal should be modified, including a sunset date for office-to-residential conversions, mandating programming space for supportive housing and adding tools to ensure that developing on empty land on NYCHA or religious campuses wouldn’t mean a loss of green space. 

Fried Frank partner Anita Laremont told Bisnow that she supports City of Yes, but she believes some issues, like the elimination of the city’s voluntary inclusionary housing program, still need to be addressed.

“That program has actually funded a huge amount of affordable housing,” she said, adding that it has supported 100% affordable developments from both nonprofit and for-profit developers. “They haven't put in place something to substitute that.”

Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson also suggested changes, including that the Department of Buildings add more inspectors to ensure that ADUs are compliant with building codes. Additionally, she voiced opposition to the move to eliminate parking minimums.

“This proposal may work in many high-density areas with significant access to transit. But simply put, it does not work in many neighborhoods in the Bronx, particularly the East Bronx, where we have transit deserts,” she said. “The only way we take residents out of vehicles is if we make the alternative better. And simply put, that has not happened across the Bronx.”

However, removing parking requirements was one of the most popular items mentioned at the hearing. Parking spots are costly to build and are often underutilized, advocates from nonprofit Open Streets argued.

After Buffalo got rid of parking minimums in 2017, 47% of major developments in Buffalo built less parking than would have previously been allowed, per a 2021 study from researchers at SUNY Buffalo and the University of Buffalo cited by policy analyst Micheal Sutherland.

Ultimately, experts argued, parking is another flashpoint that demonstrates how an existing zoning regulation doesn't necessarily benefit New Yorkers.

“The proposal does not ban developers from building parking,” Carlo Casa, director of policy and research at the New York Building Congress, said as he testified in support of the proposal. “Rather, it allows for more flexibility so that project managers can best meet the needs of each unique site rather than a one-size-fits-all approach. This translates to more housing for New Yorkers.”

UPDATE, JULY 18, 2:15 P.M. ET: This story has been updated to clarify REBNY's position on a piece of the City of Yes proposal.