Evening Roundup: EPA Cancels Union Contract, Questions Over Plan to Move NYPD Duties to New Agency, the New Harlem Renaissance Cultural District and Cuomo At...

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Janae PIerre: The EPA cancels its union contract. Questions over a plan to move NYPD duties to a new agency. The Harlem Renaissance Cultural District, and Cuomo attacks Mamdani for living in a rent-stabilized unit. From WNYC, this is NYC Now. I'm Janae Pierre. The EPA is terminating contracts with its union. In a memo to staff, the agency says that it was following an Executive Order issued back in March that bans collective bargaining. President Trump cites national security concerns as a reason for the move. Union officials say it stands to affect over 600 employees in the New York City area. In April, the American Federation of Government Employees filed a lawsuit to block the ban, but a federal court upheld the president's actions.

Last month, the agency also placed more than 100 employees on leave for protesting EPA policies, some of which were in our area. The union says it will fight this decision. In our previous episode, we mentioned a plan from New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani to shift some NYPD responsibilities to a new agency. WNYC's Charles Lane reports the plan is drawing both praise and skepticism.

Charles Lane: Mamdani says his new Department of Community Safety should handle homelessness, mental health, and violence prevention. The idea is to reduce the NYPD's role in social services without reducing its headcount. Some experts say that makes sense if they can hire the staff and if the new head of the department has as much political power as the Police Commissioner. Former NYPD watchdog Mac Muir says the plan's association with the movement to defund the police causes friction.

Mac Muir: "Defund the police," not popular. It's a negative term. I think what Mamdani's doing, five years later, is saying, "What are the positive outcomes and how can I focus on those?"

Charles: Muir says it doesn't help that a policy advisor to Mamdani is Josie Duffy Rice, an outspoken critic of the police associated with the abolished police movement. Duffy Rice says the politics of showing support to the police actually hurts public safety.

Josie Duffy Rice: There's this entire rhetoric around police support, and often, that rhetoric leads to policy that's bad for police and that's bad for the people who are being policed.

Charles: Mayor Eric Adams and former Governor Andrew Cuomo, who are running for reelection as independents, have criticized Mamdani for his association with the "defund" movement. Guardian Angels' founder Curtis Sliwa dismissed the proposal as rebranding.

Janae: Harlem Week is still underway, and New York State is marking it with new laws honoring the neighborhood's legacy. Governor Kathy Hochul signed legislation officially creating the Harlem Renaissance Cultural District. The area goes from 110th to 155th Street, between 5th Avenue and the Hudson River.

Another bill renames the 110th Central Park North subway station as 110th Malcolm X Plaza. Hochul says the change is a tribute to the Civil Rights leader's impact and an invitation for more people to learn about his life and work. The area will be recognized as sacred ground for Black art, music, and thought, echoing the creativity of the 1920s.

Andrew Cuomo and Zohran Mamdani are in a tussle. This time, over housing policy. More on that after the break.

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Andrew Cuomo: Rent-stabilized units, when they're vacant, should only be rented to people who need affordable housing, not people like Zohran Mamdani.

Janae: Former Governor and mayoral candidate Andrew Cuomo is going viral for a series of social media posts attacking his rival, Zohran Mamdani, over housing policy. Cuomo slammed Mamdani for living in a $2,300-a-month rent-stabilized apartment that could otherwise go to a homeless family. He then proposed a new law that would prevent landlords from leasing empty rent-stabilized units to "wealthy tenants." He's calling it Zohran's Law. The posts have sparked some intense debate about housing and rent laws.

WNYC's Housing reporter David Brandt has been following the story. Now, David, we know New York City has about a million rent-stabilized apartments, but what is Cuomo actually proposing here?

David Brandt: Well, that's a great question because he doesn't have many details here. His plan, what he's calling "Zohran's Law," would be to prevent landlords from renting empty rent-stabilized apartments to wealthy New Yorkers. Now, he hasn't answered any of my questions about what would constitute a wealthy New Yorker or how this would be implemented. He hasn't added any additional details in other news outlets. The New York Post did a story after he tweeted, and he, it seems like, maybe did a short interview.

There was a quote from him in that piece, but they also say there's no details here, so it's hard to say exactly what he wants, but you mentioned it in the question. There are a million rent-stabilized apartments in New York City. These are apartments where the annual rent is set by a board appointed by the Mayor, the Rent Guidelines Board. You remember, a few months ago, they approved a 3% increase. Tenants living in those apartments have the automatic right to a lease renewal, so there's some pretty strong protections for renters here.

These apartments really run the gamut, from low-priced apartments in Bronx buildings that were built a century ago, to really expensive new units in places like Hudson Yards or other midtown Manhattan highrises, where, in exchange for property tax breaks, the landlords will have to keep the rents rent-stabilized, so it's all different types of housing. It was never set up as an affordability program designed specifically for low or middle-income tenants.

That would be a new way of thinking about it. I will say that there was, for about 25 years, some state laws that did allow landlords to take apartments out of rent stabilization if they found that their tenants were making-- I think it started at $200,000 a year, I think it ended at $250,000 a year, and if they could prove that, they could deregulate that apartment and begin charging whatever they wanted. That came to an end in 2019 when who was Governor? Andrew Cuomo. He signed a law getting rid of that loophole.

Janae: What does Mamdani have to say in response to Cuomo's proposal?

David: Mamdani had a press conference where he addressed Cuomo's comments, and he said this shows he's living "rent-free" in Cuomo's head. He also said, why didn't Cuomo institute this during his decade-plus tenure as Governor? Because it's the state that sets the rent laws and oversees the rent-stabilization system for New York City, so he could have done it then. Mamdani also said that he thinks the protections that are part of the rent-stabilization system-- those minimal annual rent increases, that right to a lease renewal, those should apply to all tenants.

Janae: What do housing experts have to say about all of this?

David: Well, people have really strong opinions on rent stabilization. There are many housing experts who say it's great and that it protects tenants and protects people from exorbitant rent increases and allows them to stay in their apartments. A lot say, actually, it's bad for the market, bad for housing overall, discourages new development, but what they agree on here is that this proposal would be really hard to enact.

First off, we don't have many details, but a means-testing proposal where you have to do income verification to determine whether someone earns too much or earns below a certain threshold to qualify for one of these apartments, that would be really hard for the state's housing agency to actually enforce. You're talking about tenants living in around a million apartments, that then the state would have to verify their income or go through all of this paperwork before someone moves into an empty apartment. I

t would just prolong the moving process and wouldn't actually do much to help New York City solve its housing crisis. What they say is that we should be focused on building more housing, and building more housing especially for the lowest-income New Yorkers, that would then receive subsidies from the government to make it work for landlords and for the tenants.

Janae: That's WNYC's David Brandt. Thanks for listening to NYC Now from WNYC. I'm Janae Pierre. We'll be back tomorrow.

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