Executive Summary

As New York City begins to envision its recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and the movement for racial justice captures our national attention, the need for safe, healthy, and affordable housing for all New Yorkers has never been more dire. Yet over the last seven years, Mayor de Blasio’s siloed approach to housing planning, with separate and unequal treatment of private housing, public housing, and homelessness, has failed to reduce racial and economic disparities and serve the needs of the lowest-income New Yorkers. This year, we will elect new local leadership. The challenges of this moment require bold leaders who will shake up the systems that have failed us and implement creative programs and priorities that acknowledge housing as a human right. This document provides guidance on how the next administration can ensure the right to a roof for all by rejecting austerity, ending homelessness, promoting racial equity, and prioritizing housing opportunities for those who need them most.

Priority 1

Create an Integrated Housing Plan to End Homelessness and Promote Racial Equity The next administration must create and implement an Integrated Housing Plan that brings together all the agencies involved in housing, building, and planning to create one coordinated strategy focused on ending homelessness and promoting racial equity. In order to accomplish this, they must create a new position of Deputy Mayor for Homelessness, Housing and Planning, and shift responsibility for oversight of and coordination between all relevant agencies, as well as creation of the plan, to this new Deputy Mayor.

Priority 2

Prioritize Need Over Numbers The Integrated Housing Plan must focus on providing permanent, deeply affordable housing for those who need it most and preserving public housing without privatization. 

Priority 3

Improve Access to Affordable and Supportive Housing The north star of the Integrated Housing Plan must be ending homelessness. It must prioritize an interagency approach that streamlines the process for finding and securing affordable and supportive housing options, as well as promoting fair housing. 

Priority 4

End Real Estate Speculation by Supporting Community Ownership The Integrated Housing Plan must stabilize neighborhoods by creating and preserving 100% permanent, affordable housing that is community built and community owned, and working to keep existing residents in their homes.

Priority 5

Ensure All New Yorkers Have Safe and Healthy Housing The Integrated Housing Plan must ensure that no one is permanently displaced due to poor housing conditions or harassment, secure our communities by ensuring the long-term viability of the city’s affordable housing stock, and guarantee that every New Yorker has a safe, healthy, and stable home.

Priority 6

Support Planning that Centers Local Knowledge Within a True Citywide Framework Planning must be a key part of the Integrated Housing Plan to ensure that residents’ voices are meaningfully incorporated, and to create an equitable approach that centers fair housing and neighborhood priorities so that no single community can stand in the way of critical citywide needs, such as affordable housing development and homeless housing.