For Immediate Release: December 6, 2024
Contact: press@socialists.nyc

NYC-DSA Council Members Vote Yes on City for All Housing Package

NYC-DSA stands with Socialist Council Members Tiffany Cabán and Alexa Avilés who, together with Council allies, secured $5B for working class New Yorkers 

NEW YORK, N.Y. — On Thursday, NYC-DSA City Council Members Alexa Avilés and Tiffany Cabán voted in favor of a modified City of Yes for Housing Opportunity zoning reform package, greatly improved by $5 billion in critical investments committed through the Council’s City for All housing plan. The efforts of our Socialists in Office and their allies in the Council’s Progressive Caucus are important steps toward creating housing in New York City that will be affordable for all of us, not just the rich.

Council Members won significant modifications to City of Yes and secured critical new investments through their City for All plan:

• $2B in capital funding for NYCHA, Mitchell-Lama, and low-income cooperatives — foundational pillars of housing stability for working class New Yorkers. This investment includes $200 million to strengthen NYCHA’s Vacant Unit Readiness program, which conducts critical repairs of Section 9 apartments and helps get New Yorkers into public housing more quickly.
• Over $400M for CityFHEPS vouchers and conversion of housing for homeless New Yorkers. This injection of funds is sorely needed after Eric Adams spent the past year obstructing a CityFHEPS expansion, claiming the city could not afford to support our most vulnerable neighbors.
• More than $2B in infrastructure investments like stormwater drainage systems, open space improvements, flood mitigation, and sewer upgrades to ensure our City is protected from the escalating dangers of climate-fueled flooding.
• The creation of thousands of rent stabilized units at prices that working class families can actually afford. Where City of Yes previously required 20% of units in every qualified new development to be priced at 60% of the Area Median Income (AMI), our Socialists in Office fought to reduce the price to 40% AMI, meaning these new apartments will now be affordable to households earning $40,000-$70,000 per year.

Though City of Yes is not the answer to New York City’s affordability crisis, nor does it represent our socialist vision of housing as a universal public good, NYC-DSA is proud of the concessions that our Socialists in Office were able to secure for working class New Yorkers. They were clear from day one: without transformative investments in housing for working class New Yorkers, Mayor Adams’ City of Yes would not pass. We will continue to hold this administration accountable, and make sure that they deliver on the investments our city so desperately needs.

New Yorkers want real change. We must continue to build working class tenant power and expand on socialist housing victories like the 2019 tenant protection laws and Good Cause Eviction. We must continue the fight for tenant-controlled housing by passing the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act and establishing a Social Housing Development Authority in Albany. And we need the next mayor of NYC to be someone who will use every power at their disposal to make this city a livable home for all New Yorkers!

Let’s build the future together.

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ABOUT NYC-DSA:  New York City Democratic Socialists is the NYC local chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, the largest socialist organization in the United States with over 85,000 members. NYC-DSA is run by its 6,500+ members who are working together to build a New York that works for the working class in the five boroughs.