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Berlin is to hold a referendum on a grassroots proposal that would force major property companies to sell thousands of their apartments to a public-owned body. A public petition for the idea, fueled by anger over surging housing prices, has gathered 183,711 valid signatures, which is more than the... View full entry
The United States House of Representatives has passed a substantial infrastructure bill that includes an addendum from New York Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez repealing the Faircloth Amendment, a 22-year-old regulation that caps the overall number of public housing units that can be built... View full entry
The New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) has struck a deal with five different private developers that will hand over the management and repair duties for seven public housing complexes to the selected companies in exchange for $1.5 billion in repairs. The deal will impact 5,908 housing units... View full entry
Beginning in early 2020, Berlin’s left-leaning government will freeze rents for five years. Landlords will be required to show new tenants the most recent rental contracts to prove they aren’t jacking up prices. They’ll also have to follow new rent-cap rules, which for many landlords could mean lowering rents by as much as 40%. Those who don’t comply will be hit with fines as high as €500,000 ($553,000) for each violation. — Bloomberg Businessweek
Writing in Bloomberg Businessweek, Caroline Winter and Andrew Blackman cover the fascinating political battle taking place in Berlin, Germany, where tenants' groups and landlords are navigating the impacts of recent rent-freeze regulations by the local government that aim to reign in unaffordable... View full entry
“No Section 8.”
You’ll find those words on rental listings across the country. Landlords use them to deter people who rely on the federal Housing Choice Voucher Program, formerly known as Section 8, from applying for their units.
Starting in January, a new California law will make that discrimination illegal.
— Capitol Public Radio
A new law is slated to take effect in California on January 1, 2020 that will prevent landlords in the state from discriminating against federal housing voucher recipients. The measure caps off a better-than-average year for tenants rights activists across the country—at the local... View full entry
Though the French capital and its suburbs house less than one-third the population of California, the region produced more new homes last year than the entire Golden State. — The San Francisco Chronicle
MIT Urban Planning doctoral candidate Yonah Freemark, writing in The San Francisco Chronicle, highlights the successes that have taken shape in Paris in recent years with regards to increasing housing production and affordability. The recipe for success, according to Freemark’s... View full entry
Under the Faircloth Amendment [signed into law by President Bill Clinton in 1999], the supply of public housing is capped at 1999 levels. In order to build a new public housing unit, the federal government is required to either abolish an existing unit or sell it to a private buyer. [...]
Article 34 of the California state constitution requires majority voter approval at the ballot for government-funded construction of any low-income housing project including public housing.
— San Francisco Examiner
Writing in The San Francisco Examiner, data scientist and fair housing advocate Sasha Perigo highlights the federal Faircloth Amendment as perhaps the most significant obstacle standing in the way of a trio of recently proposed public housing expansion programs that could vastly increase public... View full entry
California Senator and presidential contender Kamala Harris and California Representative Maxine Waters have introduced the "Housing is Infrastructure Act," a $107 billion bill that aims to upgrade and expand affordable housing across the country. The bill is the latest in a series of efforts... View full entry
Homes For All United States Representative Ilhan Omar has unveiled a new piece of legislation that seeks to reinvigorate public housing construction across the country by building 12 million new public and affordable housing units over the next decade. The so-called “Homes for All Act”... View full entry
New York City Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders have unveiled a bold initiative aimed at rejuvenating and decarbonizing the nation’s public housing stock. The visionary Green New Deal for Public Housing Act aims to bring sorely needed maintenance... View full entry
A first-of-its-kind deal to sell the air rights at a Fort Greene NYCHA development is nearing completion after months of negotiation.
The deal would transfer nearly 100,000 square feet of building rights from the Ingersoll Houses to a yet-to-be-built private development next door. In exchange, developers would provide nearly $25 million for maintenance at Ingersoll as part of NYCHA’s new long-term strategy to leverage private funds for the repair of its beleaguered housing stock.
— The Brooklyn Eagle
The deal will help a 183-unit mixed use development located next door to Brooklyn's Ingersoll Houses grow to 400 units in size. In exchange, the number of affordable housing units designed into the project will increase from 79 to 100, New York YIMBY reports. The proposed 202 Tillary Street... View full entry
Mayor Bill de Blasio announced on Tuesday that the city had tapped Gregory Russ as Nycha’s new chairman, following 14 months without a permanent leader and after an exhaustive nationwide search, which included a salary increase to entice reluctant candidates. — The New York Times
Gregory Russ, current head of Minneapolis Public Housing Authority, has been picked to lead the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA). Russ told The New York Times, “Nycha’s issues actually are not just important for New York City, but they’re important nationally.” Currently, Russ... View full entry
The Regional Plan Association of New York (RPA) has named Miriam Peterson and Nathan Rich of architecture firm Peterson Rich Office (PRO) as the organization’s inaugural Richard Kaplan Chairs for Urban Design. The year-long research position, funded to “address a critical need for... View full entry
The Berlin activists who staged a protest at a vacant government building didn’t imagine they’d end up leading a €140 million redevelopment project. — Places Journal
During the 1960s, the Haus der Statistik was built for the national statistics office for East Germany. The massive complex spreads over eight blocks at half a million square feet, comprising three connected mid-rises and some smaller buildings. As years passed, the Haus der Statistik's history... View full entry
Mayor London Breed’s proposed budget for the coming fiscal year will soar by $1.2 billion — making it the largest in city history — and boost investment in tackling the city’s most urgent problems: housing and homelessness. — SF Chronicle
The housing and homelessness crisis in major cities, especially in San Francisco, has been an ongoing issue. Mayor London Breed met with city officials and San Francisco residents to address new plans to address solutions towards the increased initiative towards housing and homelessness. With an... View full entry
