July 29, 2021

A Record Fiscal Year

Most New Construction of Affordable Housing Ever

On Monday, we joined Mayor de Blasio and Deputy Mayor Vicki Been to announce that the City secured 28,310 affordable homes through new construction and preservation deals in Fiscal Year 2021. That figure includes a record-breaking 11,322 new affordable homes, 64% of which are affordable for families of three earning less than $53,000. This year, the city also secured a record number of affordable homes for seniors (3,299) and homeless families (2,788).

The announcement was made at Bronx Commons, a 305-unit affordable housing development that combines deeply affordable housing with a dynamic new music hall, solar rooftop, pre-school, and other retail and recreational space. Developed by non-profit WHEDco and BFC partners, Bronx Commons is emblematic of the City’s vision for transformative affordable housing developments. Watch the Mayoral announcement at Bronx Commons here.

It has been a truly difficult year for this city, and we’re proud to have doubled down to serve the most vulnerable New Yorkers, including the lowest-income families, seniors, and those experiencing homelessness. In total, we've now created and preserved 194,480 affordable homes since 2014 through Your Home NYC, Mayor de Blasio’s housing plan. This means New York City is on track to create and preserve 200,000 affordable homes by the end of this administration and 300,000 affordable homes by 2026.

More than Just Numbers

From the outset, the Mayor’s housing plan was designed to build a more equitable, affordable, and vibrant city. Numbers are an important metric for accountability towards those goals, but they don’t tell the full story. Behind each and every one of the affordable homes created or preserved since 2014, there is a New Yorker who gets to live a better, healthier life because they’ve been connected to quality housing they can afford and where appropriate, with the services they need. Hear their stories in their own words.

Through Your Home NYC, we have not only focused on creating more homes for the most vulnerable New Yorkers, but we have also pushed the envelope on the design of all our affordable housing to promote the health, equity, and sustainability of our city; changed the way we worked with communities to plan for the future of neighborhoods anchored by transformational affordable housing developments; prioritized increasing the number of M/WBE and nonprofit partners in our affordable housing work and deepening their financial stake in those projects; and promoted affordable ownership opportunities to help build wealth across generations. Read more about the plan and our progress this fiscal year.

Better Connecting New Yorkers to Housing

Training M/WBEs and Non-profits to Become Marketing Agents

Year after year, HPD has worked to make its marketing and lease up process faster and fairer to better connect New Yorkers to affordable housing. Last week, HPD, Goldman Sachs, LISC NYC, and Enterprise Community Partners celebrated the first two graduating classes of Pathways to Opportunity, a free training program for Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises (M/WBEs) and non-profit firms interested in becoming affordable housing marketing agents for the NYC Housing Connect lotteries. Now, nearly 60 individuals across 34 firms have access to this growing field, and soon, applicants will benefit from a better trained, more diverse, and larger marketing agent workforce. Learn about some of our graduates and their firms.

Reaching Veterans and Housing Insecure New Yorkers

This month, we joined forces with the New York City Department of Veterans’ Services to hold a 2-week application drive to assist and educate veterans applying to lotteries through NYC Housing Connect and the City’s Mitchell-Lama program. Anyone looking for help preparing for and applying for Housing Connect, should contact a Housing Ambassador, and veterans can also turn to VetConnect for support.

Strengthening Neighborhoods

Edgemere Community Land Trust RFEI

We want to bring a Community Land Trust to the Rockaways! On July 6th, we released a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI) for a Community Land Trust partner to pursue affordable homeownership opportunities on vacant, City-owned lots in Edgemere and ensure sustainable development of open space. This RFEI advances a key goal from the Resilient Edgemere Community Plan. Also, as part of implementing the Plan, HPD is proposing a set of land use actions which will codify a resilient land use strategy and facilitate development, including development under this CLT. Interested parties should apply by Sept 10, 2021.

Celebrating our Hometown Heroes

Finally, on Wednesday, July 7th, New York City honored its Essential Workers with a Hometown Heroes Ticker Tape Parade! In the toughest of times, essential workers, like nurses, first responders, educators, city workers, and so many more saw us through the COVID-19 crisis, and we couldn’t be more thankful. Meet the six HPD staff who represented the hundreds of amazing frontline workers that helped our agency keep up its essential services throughout the pandemic. Read about the work of our inspectors here.

Louise Carroll
HPD Commissioner