Tenants Fight Eviction on Bergen Street
A Prospect Heights block party yesterday had homemade food, loud music and a louder message: Good neighbors do not evict neighbors. The Fifth Avenue Committee-organized event was aimed at drawing attention to the plight of four rent-stabilized tenants facing eviction from 533 Bergen Street, and it highlighted bubbling tensions over affordable housing, gentrification and Atlantic…
A Prospect Heights block party yesterday had homemade food, loud music and a louder message: Good neighbors do not evict neighbors. The Fifth Avenue Committee-organized event was aimed at drawing attention to the plight of four rent-stabilized tenants facing eviction from 533 Bergen Street, and it highlighted bubbling tensions over affordable housing, gentrification and Atlantic Yards. Councilmember Letitia James, State Senator Velmanette Montgomery and various activists spoke in support of the longtime tenants, who are fighting lawsuits from 533 Bergen’s new owners. The two couples that bought the building last year—Dan Bailey and Felicity Loughrey, along with Deanne Cheuk and Andre Wiesmayr—claim they want to evict the tenants because Bailey and Loughrey intend to construct a triplex for themselves out of the units. Under current laws, landlords of rent-stabilized buildings are allowed to evict tenants if they plan to live in the units themselves.
Most speakers called for reforming rent-regulation laws and maintaining affordability for low-income residents. Rents in Prospect Heights are increasingly beyond the means of most working-class families, said Councilmember James. We must preserve this community’s diversity. James and Senator Montgomery both characterized the push to evict 533 Bergen’s tenants as secondary displacement from Atlantic Yards. Brent Meltzer, a lawyer with South Brooklyn Legal Services who is representing one of the tenants, noted that if the landlords succeed with the evictions, 3,500 square feet that four families live in will be given over to just one family. The most basic articulation of the situation, however, came from Rosa Negron, one of 533 Bergen’s residents: How you going to evict people who’ve been living here all these years?
This is definitely enough to make me vote againt Tish James in the future. She has done a lot of good, but singling out these property owners who are not doing anything wrong or illegal is beyond the pale and shows a lack of judgment. There are other avenues and venues in which Tish James could push the agenda of affordable housing and mixed socio-economic communities. To vilify these individual property owners is disgraceful. It is not the responsibility of an individual property owner to ensure there is subsidized housing for the community.
lp
Please remember that these laws were created because of the abuses perpetrated by landlords when there was no regulation to protect tenants. And as they say the good suffer with the bad. But are these folks the good – when it comes to developers I would say the jury is still out. There doensn’t seem to be a method for the city to monitor whether the landlords live up to the terms and without that it seems to leave a large loophole which would allow abuse
What is unethical is for someone to believe they have an ownership interest in property when they do not. Depriving of that apartment does nothing. There are MILLIONS of available apartments in this country. This building was once a house. Some poor soul decided to convert it into apartments. Now someone wants to convert back into a house.
These renters could have purchased property but did not. Tough luck.
See, the real issue here that is heartless is the lack of respect for property rights. These people SUFFER because of a lack of affordable housing BECAUSE of oppressive zoning laws and rent control. If condescending posters like 10:32 just woke up and understood how things typically work, they’d realize this. Why in god’s name would ANYONE in the future convert a house to rental property, or even develop a rental building? The risks are so great.
The poor are hurt by your idealism. We could have tons of housing all over this city, but people like you prevent that. You make it too risky for developers to create rental housing. You support restrictive zoning that makes it impossible to construct multifamily housing for poor people just like these protesting renters.
In the end, you only have yourself to blame. Your inability to understand how society works has resulted in vast human suffering that scarcely exists elsewhere in the United States. Good work.
10:32 This says it all:
“If Letitia James is so concerned about the welfare of these families, then perhaps she should rent them rooms in her brownstone.”
If you are morally outraged by the concept of private property I suggest you offer housing to these tenants. Do you have any other personal property I can use? Maybe a car or some tools? I’ll be cooking dinner at your place tonight. Just because you paid for your kitchen doesn’t mean its yours.
Guest at 10.09 and 10.32: so let me get this straight (according to your insights). These owners have paid for this building with their own money, and are following the spirit and letter of the law in this matter. However, according to you, they must further pass muster with your moral judgment.
I commend to you the nation of Iran, where the Ayatollahs would second your sentiment.
Seems that the owners of this property and/or their attorneys are living it up at the top of this thread.
They paid a greatly discounted price for this property based on the fact that tenants were in place, and in doing so, they gambled. Their bet pays off if the tenants don’t manage to prove that the owner-use claim is a pretext. But if the bet doesn’t pay off, it’s not “unfair” — it’s a risk they took on.
Couldn’t agree more with 10:09. Just because it is legal to evict the current residents doesn’t mean that it is moral or ethical. There are few cases in capitalism where one person’s consumption directly causes someone else’s suffering, but that is the case here.
The new buyers could have found a single-family house, but they chose to throw their money around in a way that throws other people out of their longtime home.
The sense of entitlement among many posters on this site is amazing. Leave it to those who can afford a whole brownstone (or even the big bucks to own an apartment in Brownstone Brooklyn) to rush to defend their rights to do anything with their money at any time. “I paid for it, now it’s mine.” Well it may be legal, but it’s also selfish and heartless.
“I think it’s amusing–and very telling–that only the tenants in this story are judged by these posters to have a sense of entitlement. What about the people who bought the building? They feel they’re “entitled” to evict people so that they can own a one-family home. Why didn’t they buy a one-family home if that was what they wanted?”
Actually, the purchase of the property does entitle these owners to use the building in whatever manner they see fit. They have spent substantial capital and likely incurred the risk of a large motgage to EARN that entitlement.
What have the renters done to entitle them to dictate how much they pay for something they do not own? Lived there for next to nothing for years?
I am currently a renter, but have aspirations to own in the near future. I hate to think that after scrimping and saving and workking so hard for years while paying market rent, someone could possible dictate how I can use my own property in order to beenfit someone else.
tot he new owners next time buy a house that isn’t occupied with rent stabilized tenants that’s been living there forever..
To the renters, buy your own damn house and you have nothing to worry about next time. Stop perpetuating a cycle of poverty….
Maria