Governor Hochul’s Housing Proposals

Last month, Governor Hochul held her State of the State speech, outlining her policy proposals for 2023. Most notably, she recommended a series of policy changes to create 800,000 new units of housing. She laid out numerous proposals, including municipal housing targets, transit-oriented development, legalizing accessory dwelling units (ADUs), and reviving the 421-a tax abatement. Together, these proposals are intended to reduce the barriers to create new housing and provide more incentives for developers to building new housing, particularly affordable housing. 

While the municipal housing targets is a new proposal, the others were put forward last year ,but backlash from suburban lawmakers caused support to dwindle. As 2022 was an election year, legislators were much more skittish about supporting the construction of so many new housing districts. With neither the governorship nor state legislative seats up for election in 2023, there is hope that legislators will be more likely to tackle controversial housing issues. 

AIANY strongly supports the Governor’s proposals to create more housing. This comes on the heels of the chapter’s recent support for other housing proposals, such as ADU legalization and the SoHo/NoHo Rezoning. Furthermore, AIANY supports taking a more holistic approach to combatting the housing crisis by bringing vacant units back onto the market. As political debates over housing evolve during the coming months, AIANY will keep its members updated.

Policy Points

• Earlier this month, AIANY members joined volunteers from several other organizations to support the continuation of the Open Restaurants program by meeting with New York City Council’s members and borough presidents. While council members recognize the program’s economic benefits, there is still resistance due to strong political opposition from neighborhood groups. AIANY will continue to strongly advocate for outdoor dining’s continuation and will keep members apprised of opportunities to participate. 
• AIANY and its allies held a successful Advocacy Day in support of a statewide gas ban on January 24 in Albany. This came on the heels of Governor Hochul’s renewed call for a statewide gas ban in new buildings, which would start in 2025 for smaller buildings and 2028 for larger buildings. In addition to the Governor’s proposal, the State Legislature is pushing ahead with the All-Eletric Building Act (A920/S562).