Sally Stroman testifies on bidding process and change order costs

Good afternoon.

I'd like to thank this council.

You are all spot on.

You left me a little bit to say, but I'm going to say what I'm going to say anyway.

First of all,

The housing rate in New York City as of 2024 was 1.4%.

Obviously, there need more housing to be built.

That's a big question and a big job to do.

My second question is,

Mitchell-Lamba programs are insufficient.

Oversight, maintenance, backlog, financial mismanagement, and instability.

The bidding process needs to be looked into as the same vendors work on developments over and over throughout the city.

Secondly, when contracts are signed, why are there so many change orders?

Every time there's a change order,

For instance, if we sign a contract for plumbing, I'm just making up a number, let's say for a million dollars.

Why is there a change order that they missed something, they didn't look at something, they found something?

That's a cost to the co-op.

My co-op is not in a particularly unique situation, but it's throughout the city of New York.

And I'm begging the council to come up with a solution and work with all co-ops to have maybe a tenant committee.

Where we can all sit down and address our issues to you because we're the ones that's living in the conditions that I hear many of my

sister co-ops, regardless if it's city or state.

Thank you very much.

Thank you so much.

Do any of the council members have questions?

I just want to thank you so much for coming down.

I know it's a long way.

I think I saw you at the park the other day at Ford Independence Park, as Eric likes to joke.

I'm always in his district.

But thank you.

I know, I know.

And then Ms.

Jean Hill is yours and not mine.

That's okay.

But thank you for coming.

I hope that you know that we're going to continue to follow up on this.

And as you heard, there's going to be this roundtable that we're going to put together.

And so we'll let you know about that.

And thank you, HPD, for still being here.

Hearing everything they have to say.

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yes, so do I.

Nice.

Only one?

Okay, so next we have Eric Furman.

If you could come up.

You have a solo panel.

You by yourself.

Oh, okay.

St.

James Park, of course.