While providing a decent summary of the three plans on the table for the 421-a program, The Times takes a Goldilocks stance on the issue. “What [New York City] needs most of all is housing that people can afford,” the paper wrote. “The law needs to be re-tailored to reflect that need.” Fair enough, but what about the three plans? Bloomberg’s doesn’t have enough teeth, the paper figures, and the Yassky/Palma/James plan is too anti-development (it “frightens smaller developers and lenders who believe that requiring everyone everywhere in the city to provide housing for low-income residents would make it uneconomical to build housing for moderate-income people, who are also being increasingly frozen out of the market”). By default, Speaker Quinn’s plan is an acceptable compromise. “Although her bill might well be improved by the healthy debate now taking place in the council, it is more generous than the mayor’s original proposal and more flexible — and less threatening to the overall market — than the Palma-Yassky proposal.” More important than the nuances of the bill is the timing: the current law expires at the end of ’07 and given how disfunctional Albany is, The Times reckons that state lawmakers will need an entire year to get anything done.
A Push for Affordable Housing [NY Times]