It’s getting harder and harder to read the current situation at Columbia as something other than a Roger Stone election op to distract and suppress the youth vote

“Calling this a pilot was the fig leaf that allowed them to play politics with boundaries” -Howard Slatkin Executive Director at Citizens Housing & Planning Council (CHPC) on the state’s go-ahead for a new basement&cellar legalization pilot in select city community districts. For City Limits
citylimits.org/2024/04/29/adv…

The Atlantic is publishing several of my essays (with a new introduction) in a book this fall!

On the Housing Crisis: Land, Development, Democracy will hit the shelves just in time for you to argue with your various relatives over the holidays.

So much ground work has been done in Brooklyn Community Board 5 on basement conversions that I can only sum this up as negligent. People have died, drowning in their basements in under 5 minutes. Next time someone dies like this, it will be on whoever demanded we be left out.

Whichever legislators did this, they may be afraid of being removed from their current position if it were exposed who played politics with a health and safety law and why.

Maybe we need some sort of amnesty program - they can register and fix the situation, without penalty?

The flip side of incremental progress is excremental intransigence

The basement and cellar pilot passed in the State Budget will advance important safety improvements in 15 Community Districts, but arbitrary geographic exclusions will hamper the program and leave many tenants & homeowners vulnerable.

Our full statement: bit.ly/49OeMRc

So, now we get to ask the detail-oriented Qs:

Is an owner-occupant of a two-family home who also owns shares of a REIT in a retirement fund a “small landlord”?