Public and Urban Policy Brown Bag | NYC’s Affordable Housing Plan Under de Blasio and the Limits of Local Initiative in Making Housing Affordable

In the spring of 2014 New York City’s newly elect, Mayor Bill de Blasio, launched an ambitious plan to build or preserve 200,000 housing units over 10 years—a goal that was subsequently raised to 300,000 over 12 years. Nearly five years later, the city is on pace to meet these goals. However, despite its accomplishments to date, advocates have criticized the plan for failing to provide housing that is affordable to most residents of low-income neighborhoods, and, perversely, for aggravating the affordable housing crisis by fostering gentrification.

In this talk, Alex Schwartz, Professor of Urban Policy at Milano and author of, Housing Policy in the United States, provides an overview of the de Blasio plan, placing it in the context of the city’s previous housing programs and the city’s current housing market dynamics. He argues that the shortcomings of the plan in delivering housing affordable to low-income households highlight fundamental limitations in the ability of state and local governments to address the housing needs of low-income residents.