Lacey Tauber (BP Reynoso's office) on COPA, conversions, and code enforcement task forces

Good afternoon, Chair Sanchez and members of the committee.

Thank you for holding this hearing today.

I'm Lacey Tauber.

I'm representing Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.

As you can see, my testimony is kind of long, so I'm going to summarize.

I'm going to start with the legislation on today's agenda, two pieces of it, just so that I make sure that I get this in.

The borough president has been a big supporter of COPA.

As we heard today, it's an important policy for stabilizing communities and fighting the housing crisis.

And he wants to thank Councilmember Nurse for the thoughtful updates to the bill and urge the council to move quickly to pass it again.

On Intro 178 on the Office of Conversion Assistance, we think this bill is well-intentioned to assist developers with office-to-residential conversions.

However, we are concerned that it might unintentionally encourage manufacturing to residential conversions.

based on the way the bill is written, and urge the council to take a look at that, just because as the city continues to make policy that eats away at our industrial districts, we decrease the opportunities for

the almost 600,000 New Yorkers, predominantly people of color, who are employed in this industry in high-paying jobs with low barriers to entry.

And what I really wanted to talk about today is the intersection of code enforcement, housing preservation, and tenant supports.

And so our office has an example in the housing task forces that we've developed in both North Brooklyn and East Brooklyn that...

We want to sort of lift up as an example for the administration to move ahead with their commitment to strengthening code enforcement, preventing displacement.

So what these task forces do is they are interagency and interorganizational coordination to address poor building conditions, constructionist harassment, and address neglectful landlord behavior.

Basically how it works is that the organizers create a list of problem buildings based on their experience working with local tenants, and these are from CBOs in the community.

They work together to get consensus on the most distressed buildings and prioritize them.

They share a list with relevant agencies and meet monthly to review.

The agency sees you.

These coordinate to address conditions in the identified buildings through roof-to-cellar inspections and other interventions.

And since these programs'inception, hundreds of buildings have received interventions that they might not have otherwise.

This model encourages regular coordination between local organizers and city agencies.

It formalizes a system that streamlines communication and efficiency between tenants, advocates, and government.

And it means tenants are more likely to be home when inspectors come, negating the need for multiple visits, and helps to hold landlords accountable through multiple violation types and pressure points.

So we encourage the administration to look at this, because we think they could achieve many of Block by Block's goals by expanding this model throughout the city.

And we also want to stress the importance of working with established local organizations.

Their relationships within their communities, cultural competency, and sustained on-the-ground presence are critical for this work.

Finally, I just want to address something Councilmember Riley said about preventing displacement.

That's our first priority, but as we're doing more development throughout the city, inevitably there is going to be some primary displacement of tenants by demolition or major renovation or even

the expiration of regulatory agreement.

And so I just wanted to draw the council's attention to Intro 250, which we introduced with Councilmember Hudson to create a tenant relocation assistance program.

So we encourage the council to schedule this bill for a future hearing that will maybe also examine the fair housing growth strategy that just came out.

Thank you.