MARKOWITZ CONDEMNS RENT GUIDELINES BOARD INCREASES

“I am disappointed that the Rent Guidelines Board has once again ignored the pleas of tenants and average New Yorkers by issuing a 4.25% increase for one-year leases and a 7.25% increase for two-year leases on rent-stabilized apartments in New York City. One month ago I urged the board to vote down any and all rent increase proposals. I still believe the call made by landlords this May for yet another increase far beyond the rate of inflation was unfounded.

The Rent Guidelines Board’s five-to–four vote to hike rents will impose an unnecessary hardship on working people with modest incomes when last year revenues for landlords again far outpaced costs in every borough.

No one disagrees that a landlord who properly maintains a building has the right to a fair return, and there are sufficient programs in place for individual landlords who are experiencing hardships to apply for rent increases.

Shrinking the pool of rent-stabilized apartments accelerates the loss of affordable housing, bringing tenants a step closer to being rent poor and at the mercy of the most competitive real estate market in America.

The Rent Guidelines Board’s decision is detrimental to Brooklyn and New York families with modest, working, and middle incomes, bringing us dangerously closer to a city I never want to see – a New York that is home only to the very rich and the very poor.”

-Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz