Opinion: We Need More Middle-Income Housing 

Mitchell-Lama was one of New York s majority of triumphant projects and the time has come for us to do it again The authors alongside tenants and other elected executives at a rally in promotion of Mitchell-Lama housing in April Photo courtesy of AM Epstein s office It is well-known that New York City is in the midst of an affordability situation While a large part of the response lies in helping low-income New Yorkers thrive through programs like Section an often overlooked population that is being hit hard by this emergency is the middle class A latest overview by the Society Utility Society of New York revealed that percent of eviction orders between and have been directed to middle-income households This is a percent increase from pre-pandemic years to Between and over people left the state percent of whom were from New York City Plenty of of these residents were middle and working-class people who left due to the high cost of living It is obvious that New York City requirements more units designated for middle-income residents A critical component of addressing this lies in creating new middle-income housing The Mitchell-Lama activity does just that providing affordable rental and cooperative housing to moderate and middle-income families function d u ac var s d createElement 'script' s type 'text javascript' s src 'https a omappapi com app js api min js' s async true s dataset user u s dataset campaign ac d getElementsByTagName 'head' appendChild s document 'u kmqsczew vunxutxmd' The activity started years ago when the city was undergoing rising costs of living compounded by the disinvestment of developers in middle-income housing Between and the Mitchell-Lama initiative successfully built over middle-income apartments As a aftermath housing costs stabilized and the city was able to prosper The undertaking was essential for preventing a middle-class exodus from New York City Mitchell-Lama was one of New York s majority productive projects and the time has come for us to do it again As members of the New York State Assembly representing Lower Manhattan including numerous Mitchell-Lama developments we know how integral these homes are to the generations of New Yorkers who have been able to grow up raise their families and age in place in these units We need modern sustainable housing for the middle class that is permanently affordable accessible and built to last With the past success of Mitchell-Lama city and state leaders have a blueprint for making middle-income housing attainable Indeed our colleagues in Albany have begun to see the inherent value in well-maintained readily available middle-income units In last year s state budget as well as this year s we put million aside for new middle-income housing for a total of million We also provided million in capital last year and million this year for a total of million to help fix up existing Mitchell-Lama developments and to build new middle-income housing These investments can create tremendous opportunities for home ownership for thousands of New York families the benefits of which are undeniable In addition to building wealth through equity homeownership is associated with increased society involvement and stability The sense of belonging created by homeownership leads to greater civic engagement and participation in local initiatives giving residents even greater control over the prosperity of their communities Now is the time to act New York has the opportunity to champion middle-income housing by working with developers and using city and executive property to jumpstart this expansion If we fail to take action the outcome is clear New York will continue to grow more and more unaffordable families will have to make greater sacrifices to make rent payments multiple will be forced to leave altogether and our cherished communities will erode Harvey Epstein and Grace Lee are members of the New York State Assembly representing Lower Manhattan The post Opinion We Need More Middle-Income Housing appeared first on City Limits