Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. We want to acknowledge something that took place yesterday in New York under the purview of the Robin Hood Foundation. Richard Buery, their CEO, who some of you know that name, he's a former New York City deputy mayor for strategic policy initiatives under Mayor de Blasio. He was very instrumental in the universal pre-K program and other things that de Blasio did that are having an effect to this day. Robin Hood, which focuses on the needs of poor people in New York City, took a deep dive yesterday at a conference they had on housing instability, and homelessness.

Consider for a moment that the number of people who slept in homeless shelters surpassed 100,000 for the first time this past June in New York City. That's partly but not only because of the influx of asylum seekers, but we should note that that number includes a lot of families with children. It occurred despite significant city spending on homelessness and housing. Even beyond New York City, upstate and rural regions have seen worsening housing access. Remember the fight over where and how to build more housing in New York brought lawmakers in Albany to their knees this past summer? Which is to say they argued, they fought, they debated, they introduced bills, and they failed to pass any.

The philanthropic anti-poverty organization known as Robin Hood did explore these issues yesterday in what they call a deep dive into New York's affordable housing crisis, bringing together some leading voices and policy advocacy and elsewhere. We will get an informed view of the root causes of housing instability, homelessness, and the affordable housing crisis in New York, perhaps the city's number one ongoing issue, and some potential policy solutions in an area where reform and action have been so difficult.

We've got two guests who were involved. Richard Buery is here, CEO of Robin Hood Foundation and former deputy mayor, and Rachel Fee, executive director of the group called the New York Housing Conference. Richard, welcome back to WNYC. Rachel, welcome. Thank you for coming on today.

Rachel Fee: Thank you so much. It's a pleasure to be here.

Brian Lehrer: Richard, do you want-

Richard Buery: Thank you, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: -to introduce people by way of any more background to what Robin Hood is and what you did yesterday?

Richard Buery: Sure, Brian, and thank you. Robin Hood is a 35-year-old New York institution and our mission is to fight poverty in New York City. We do that by investing in the most impactful organizations that are on the front lines of supporting New Yorkers in need and helping them to achieve economic independence. We also fight to advance policies that we know promote equal opportunity in our city. As you said, we were pleased to host this deep dive we call them, where we've tried to look deeply at critical topics plauging the city and bring together people who are critical to finding solutions, in this case, housing advocates, developers, elected officials, researchers, and others.

We had a really great conversation about what are the challenges here but most importantly, what are some of the things that we can do to move forward.

Brian Lehrer: Rachel, I'll give you a chance to introduce our listeners briefly to the New York Housing Conference. Who do you represent?

Rachel Fee: The New York Housing Conference is a statewide affordable housing policy and advocacy organization. We have been really focused on affordable housing, thinking through solutions at the city state and federal level. Yesterday was a great opportunity to really center the discussion on policy solutions to our affordable and homeless crisis in New York have to be grounded in data to meet the need.

Brian Lehrer: By way of a little bit of data, how much more expensive is it to rent or own a home now in New York City than it was say, 30 years ago? Rachel, do you have those numbers?

Rachel Fee: Prices in New York keep rising. I think especially coming out of the pandemic, renters really have been feeling the pressure. We have a supply shortage, which is exacerbated for low income New Yorkers, so they really don't have the housing choice that they need in the market. They don't have the buying power and that means that they're often living in poor quality housing, doubling up, or in worst case scenarios, experiencing homelessness. For the homebuyers, we know that it is getting harder and harder to get on the property ladder and we've seen considerable increases in home prices, especially in the New York suburbs.

Brian Lehrer: Richard, for you as a former deputy mayor as well as CEO of Robin Hood and seeing, as I referred to in the intro, how stuck Albany is where a lot of the bigger policy we would think needs to take place, what tools does New York City have to boost its supply of affordable housing on its own?

Richard Buery: Just to start, where you started with the challenge, I think everybody listening would agree that housing and the lack of access to affordable housing remains the critical drivers of a range of challenges that we face as a city because it's, of course, at center about people having access to safe and quality housing, but from that, stem a range of challenges. The schools you attend, the air quality where you live, the access to transportation, the access to food. There are so many things that stem from where we live and how we live.

It is the [unintelligible 00:06:14] challenges we face as a city, as a state. Right now, I think we have to think about how we [unintelligible 00:06:21] this challenge directions. One, of course, we want to make sure-

Brian Lehrer: Richard I'm going to jump in because your line is breaking up, my producer is going to talk to you and we're going to try to reconnect you and luckily, Rachel Fee is here, too. Rachel, let me throw that same question to you. What can New York City do on its own to significantly increase the supply of affordable housing, while Albany is politically stuck?

Rachel Fee: I think Albany needs to get unstuck first of all. We do have significant investment in affordable housing in New York, that's producing roughly 4,400 new construction units a year of affordable housing. The 421-a tax incentive program has been producing another 3,300 units annually and we know that that expired. We really need Albany to come to the table and think about how they can reform that program to make it work for New Yorkers, and really give the mayor the tools he needs to have a comprehensive, affordable housing plan.

There's other issues that the mayor has focused on, like office conversions, legalizing basement apartments, and even his new zoning text amendment includes an affordable housing bonus across the city. That's not going to be effective if we don't have the tax incentive reforms we need from Albany.

Brian Lehrer: Richard, I think we have you back now. Do you want to add on to that?

Richard Buery: Yes, I didn't hear all of what Rachel said there [unintelligible 00:07:58], I heard the end of it. I think there's just two things we have to work on. One is we need to make sure that we are providing support to tenants and renters. We know that strategies like housing vouchers work, we know that those things are making sure that renters have access to legal representation in Housing Court work, everything we can do to both stem the tide of evictions, but also to make sure that renters have the financial resources they need in the market are critical those things work and as a state and as a city, we need to continue to invest in those programs.

On the flip side, and this is what I heard Rachel saying at the end, unless we radically increase the supply of affordable housing, those tenant protections aren't going to help because those tenants will simply be competing for the same limited number of apartments. There's a ton that we can do to promote the development of affordable housing, but I would say that the city can't do it alone. It really requires state and city action to drive that forward. Part of what that means it's part of the spirit behind having a deep dive, but that too often people approach the question from an ideological perspective.

What that means is that common sense, realistic reform that can help spur the development of affordable housing don't gain legs, and that's what we saw in the last legislative session where we simply weren't able to make progress on things that we know work. Everything from creating a new version of 421-a, a new tax relief program, things like increasing limits on [unintelligible 00:09:47] area ratio, and some of the arbitrary limits that make it difficult to build concentrated housing, zoning reform. I think there are lots of great ideas out there I think the administration has put forth from really strong ideas, including through its City of Yes initiatives, which are a range of efforts that I think could meaningfully move the needle. Ultimately, we have to bring folks together in Albany and really remove some of the legislative and zoning barriers that stand in the way and to recreate some of the tax incentives that we know were critical, even if they weren't perfect in their initial iterations, reintroducing the tax incentives that we know are critical to spurring development and supply.

Brian Lehrer: Can we take a little bit of a deep dive on the tax incentives? You can't take as deep a dive as you did in your conference yesterday, but maybe go a foot or two below the surface of the water to explain to our listeners, this term that many of them have heard many times, but don't really know what it is, 421-a. It sounds like some bureaucratic paragraph buried 421 pages into some piece of legislation from decades ago.

I get the basics and I think a lot of listeners get the basics, that this is supposed to be a tax break for developers to include a certain amount of affordable housing, however, we define affordable, and things that they build, but why was this seen as so unacceptable that it got eliminated in Albany? How could it come back better? Rachel, do you want to take a stab at that?

Rachel Fee: Sure, I'd be happy to. 421-a is a tax incentive as you describe, Brian, and it's trying to encourage the market to build rental housing and requiring an affordable housing set aside. The other option for developers is to build the luxury condos we've seen popping up all over New York City. If we want to leverage the market and require them through the mandatory inclusionary housing program to produce affordable housing, especially in these high-income neighborhoods, is really important that we have a tax incentive that encourages them to do that.

I think some of the problems with the last version of the program were really the income levels targeted for the benefit. Too many New Yorkers felt like the housing that was being produced that was called affordable wasn't at rents that they could afford, and that's a policy choice, and that's one that Albany can easily fix.

Brian Lehrer: Richard, do you want to add to that?

Richard Buery: No, that's exactly right. I think all of us just need to continue to come to the table. I think we can all agree, and this was certainly the consensus at our housing deep dive, that without a comprehensive approach to supporting the development of housing, including by reintroducing some follow-up 421-a, there really isn't a path forward. After the RAND Corporation did some research to look at what are some of the key things that the state can do to significantly increase the supply of affordable housing, looking at research from around the country and clearly, one of the key drivers was adopting a replacement for the expired 421-a program.

Brian Lehrer: Mike in Jersey City, you're on WNYC. Mike, thank you for calling in.

Mike: Hi there, Brian. I'm literally standing at a cash register in Home Depot while I'm making this call. I'm an affordable housing landlord, as well as the person that set in motion all those developers' set-asides in New Jersey where they set aside 10% or more of the properties for affordable housing in return for density variations. Listening to these two people, who I'm sure are very good people, and well-intentioned, does a better job of illustrating what's wrong and why we have this intractable problem than pretty much anything else I can think.

Housing is a business. The only way to get enough capital to do the kind of development that's needed is to bring it in from the private sector. Robin Hood Foundation does not have enough money and the city of New York doesn't. What you need to do is structure things so that people can actually make money doing affordable housing which is possible. I don't get any subsidies other than Section 8 vouchers in my buildings. in New York, it's very simple, and all over the country for that matter. As much as I find it hard to believe, I'm agreeing with Kathy Hochul on this, she and Will Rogers are right, there is no more lands being produced.

The reason prices in real estate go up is there's no more land but more people. The only way to solve the problem is to change the zoning laws so that people can start building higher-density properties, particularly in the suburbs, so we can accommodate all these people. Otherwise, you've got a limited supply being bid on by an increasing number of people. It's basic economics, but you need to do it in a way so that you don't have to wade through so much paperwork that nobody wants to do, or you have dumb heads who design programs that apparently they don't know anything.

There are towns, such as the one I own buildings in, for example, where there are lots of properties that can be rehabilitated, the way Richard Ravitch said was much cheaper, and he's right about that. The fact of the matter is that you couldn't get a HUD loan for that, because HUD loans are only good if you want to borrow a million dollars or more, and that excludes a whole class of small entrepreneurs and let 1,000 maggots bloom, so to speak, they're all cut out.

What they should do, and this is my advice, and I don't want to volunteer for it, I'm busy, you get a bunch of actual real landlords who run real affordable housing, put them in a room, and do the unthinkable and ask them, "What should be done to make it possible for them to make a profit," it's possible, I make a profit, "to make a profit doing affordable housing?" When you set the conditions like that, you'll see they'll be just as interested in that as any other profit-making business enterprise. That's what you need to do. None of this tax credit, endless government programs stuff, it's not working, hasn't worked in decades. Maybe people could wake up and figure out it's a bad strategy. Thanks for letting me give my tirade.

Brian Lehrer: Mike, I really appreciate it. I think it's an important call. We heard the sounds of Home Depot in the background there, "Clean-up on aisle 9." By the way, can you pick me up some steam pipe insulation? Richard, what do you say to Mike? There's somebody who says he's making a profit as a private developer on affordable housing, and the kinds of tax incentive programs that we're talking about don't work, as opposed to the kinds of things that he put on the table.

Richard Buery: I think the challenge was it is not either/or. I actually fundamentally agree that modernization of the zoning laws to allow for things like increased density, transit-oriented development, so encouraging and allowing greater density in areas where there is public transportation, and therefore, making easier not only to develop property but develop property in the right place. All of that is critical because he's fundamentally right, Robin Hood does not have enough resources, the city of New York does not have enough resources to build the hundreds of thousands of units of affordable housing that we need. It needs to be profitable for developers to do that, and zoning is critical to that.

In fact, both Governor Hochul through her legislative priorities last year, Mayor Adams through his really powerful City of Yes initiative, which was designed among other things to create affordable housing by having modern innovation and changes of our zoning laws, things that just make more sense, these arbitrary barriers to development, it's absolutely right, but it doesn't mean that those things are all we need.

Those things can work in conjunction with tax incentives, working in conjunction with rental assistance, which again allows people to be able to afford the housing that's developed. All of these things have to happen together, I think one of the mistakes we make is to think that there is a silver bullet to problems like this. There isn't a silver bullet, there's a range of things we have to do on the supply side, and on the tenant side to make sure that New Yorkers can afford to live and thrive here.

I think we don't have to choose, I think we have to come together and it's not intractable. There is a path forward, there are things that we know work from research and experience. What we need to do is all come together, and we can put aside the place that we disagree, but at least make progress on the things that we know make sense.

Brian Lehrer: Do you want to add on to that Rachel?

Rachel Fee: Well, I think your caller was rightly frustrated with some of the bureaucracy around the affordable housing programs, which I could certainly relate to. I think that Richard is spot on it. There's no one magic bullet, we need a range of solutions to solve this problem. I think one is leveraging the market, especially in the high-income neighborhoods, to produce more housing. Two is keep investing in affordable housing, which we know is creating new production that's sorely needed. Then three is we have to keep investing in rental assistance, whether that's a Section 8 program through the federal government or looking at a new state rental assistance program like the Housing Access Voucher Program that's been on the table. These are all things we need to help New Yorkers afford their rent. At the end of the day, adding supply, thinking about this regionally is really the most important thing.

Brian Lehrer: Let's do one more caller here before we run out of time. Giovanni in Bed-Stuy, you're on WNY. Hello, Giovanni.

Giovanni: Hello. Thanks for the call. I would propose that if they want to deal with it, there's another Robin Hood approach. Right now, you see these tremendous amount of buildings all over Manhattan, even here in Brooklyn, see big 16, 17, 20 story buildings going up and they have market rates. What I would suggest is that, in many of these cases, they have to produce a number of units in the building that are adjusted for people who can pay less to get instead of paying 4,000 for a one-bedroom apartment, they might pay 1,500 or 2,000.

Why not charge a surcharge on the people who could afford that apartment rented to them and the difference between what someone who wanted to go into that and couldn't afford it, go into a Robin Hood fund?

Brian Lehrer: Interesting. Literally means testing rent I guess you're saying more than is done. Giovanni, I'm going to leave it there because we're running out of time. Richard, I'm going to throw two text messages on here that are common to listener sentiment right now. One person writes, "The most effective way to address the affordable housing crisis is to ensure a living wage. This will also go a long way to addressing crime." That's interesting. On the supply side or the demand side, rather than the opposite. Another one responding to one of the proposals that one of you made a minute ago, listener writes, "Good luck building density in the suburbs," because we know there was so much opposition. A few people are chiming in with that. Richard, give us a last thought on any of those. Obviously, we're not going to solve the problem here this morning.

Richard Buery: Just quickly, one, the first spot on, one of the most important things we can do is make sure that New Yorkers can actually afford to live here and central to that is developers promoting a living wage. I think that advocating for further increases in the minimum wage, that work actually pay is as critical. That plus we also do know that housing subsidies, housing vouchers have a tremendous impact if they work. We know that just for an example, homeless families that receive vouchers are 42% less likely to be separated from their children, they're less likely to experience food insecurity, less likely to experience domestic violence.

Not only can they afford to live, but they can live better lives because their lives are stable. Absolutely, putting more resources in the hands of people through food support, through better wages, through housing subsidies are absolutely critical. On density in the suburbs, promoting density in the suburbs has to be part of the solution. It's part of what Governor Hochul proposed. Obviously, there was rampant opposition to doing so. These problems, we can't look at them as city problems. We have to look at them as regional problems.

[unintelligible 00:23:52] oriented developments in our suburbs, in places where there is adequate public transportation, making sure that we are promoting development in those spaces, absolutely has to be part of the plan. This all has to come together for us to move forward. We can move forward. I think that's the real message. It's easy to look at these problems and to think they were impossible, they [unintelligible 00:24:14]. Absolutely, we can move forward.

Brian Lehrer: Rachel, just to put a pin in what Richard was just saying and this will be the last remark in this segment, I think we keep getting stuck in the same place, which is nobody wants more density in their neighborhoods and yet density is the key to affordable housing in a metro area like New York. Correct? Can we ever break through this politically?

Rachel Fee: We're going to break through this politically. I think that when I met with legislators, from the suburbs, all last session, as we're advocating in Albany, the first thing every single legislator said to me is we know we have an affordable housing crisis. We need to do something. Then they give a personal story of how it's affecting their family or their constituents. There's a willingness to take action, we just have to find the common ground to make change.

Brian Lehrer: Topics for many future shows, finding that common ground. Rachel Fee, executive director of the New York Housing Conference, and Richard Buery, CEO of the Robin Hood Foundation, and former New York City deputy mayor under de Blasio for strategic policy initiatives. Thank you for the deep dive that you took at your conference yesterday and for sharing some of it with us today.

Rachel Fee: Thank you so much.

Richard Buery: Thank you so much, Brian.

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