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?
Again, owner-use is NOT A LOOPHOLE.
It is a well-tested point of law.
If you think the law is wrong, fine.
But the owners are doing nothing illegal, and actually nothing particularly uncommon.
The law allows them to occupy a building that they own.
Anyone claiming this is ABUSE (not really intending to live there, flipping the apts etc etc) is really just assuming that all landlords are evil scum and all rent stabilized tenants are angels.
A court will decide if the owners intentions are legitimate or not.
9:27 you make a good point. Perhaps tenants should have known that their right to a rent stabilized apartment could be gone in a flash (and I’m assuming that clause in the Rent Stabilization Law has been in place for as long as the law has, and not some recent addition).
However, let’s face it — most people aren’t reminded when signing their rent-stabilized lease, “hey, we can make you move whenever we decide to take over your apartment ourselves”. There’s no “discount” to your rent because you might have to move any year. But there is a discount for new buyers of buildings with rent controlled or rent stabilized tenants. Lots more people here could buy brownstones if they were willing to do what it takes to evict people, but most people would rather settle for a smaller, more affordable house with no tenants than benefit from a forced eviction of long-time apartment dwellers.
But the abortion analogy is a poor one — you either get an abortion or you don’t. How about the analogy with Scarano’s “mezzanaines”? He simply used a loophole he found in the law to do something that most architects would find abhorrent. But what he did was “legally allowed” (they just couldn’t be called “floors”, but perfectly fine to have them).
I am not demonizing the people that bought the rent stabilized building, but I AM judging them (that is, I am judging them if they got a sharp discount in the price they paid for their home). They are using a loophole. I do find the Prospect Heights owner -occupation of the buildng more legitimate if they do truly want to take over the house and live there for a long time. But to take it over, triplex it, live in it for a year and then sell it would be abusing that law. The east village couple who could legally evict all tenants because they needed 60 rooms for their family home is truly sickening, sorry. If they need 60 rooms, they’re rich enough to buy a nice home somewhere else. They bought that building at a discount because most people don’t have the audacity to do that to other people to save a buck.
It’s also perfectly legal for someone to convince some poor old person to take out a high interest home equity loan on their 40-year home that is now worth a million dollars. But, yes, my personal morals are such that I would judge harshly a salesman who made big commissions from legal loans whose end result is to cause a homeowner to lose their house.
It’s about what you are willing to do to save or earn money.
The poultry farming remark was in response to the posters who were screaming that no one deserved a rent stabilized (not controlled) apartment, despite that being the law. They wanted that law repealed. I was just pointing out that we all benefit from various laws, and if their philosophy was that homeowners should have the right to do anything they want on their property, then they should also be opposed to the zoning which prevents their neighbors from having chickens.
9:09 – Nice thought, but most low income renters pay next to nothing (or nothing) in income tax as it is. A Mortgage tax deduction is not a subsidy, its an incentive to work hard and not penalize you for using your hard work (i.e. capital) to invest in property.
No one knows the real stories of the Tenants OR the Landlords – who is to say that the Landlords dont have their own hard-luck stories, afterall they are the ones that have invested the time and money in this building that they bought legally and are not even allowed to live in, they are not doing anything illegal by exercising their right to live in a building they own. The tenants are the ones that are being unlawful by remaining there, they are probably not even paying rent and using all this publicity to distract from that.
4:49
Doesn’t your logic also go for the tenants. They presumably should have known that Owners can reclaim rent stabilized units for their personal use as stated in the “Rent Stabilization Law”
You should then agree that “You [rent] a property knowing the restrictions on it, so don’t cry poor me when you try to get (legally) around them[by appealing to public sentiment]. Just [rent] another property, or accept the criticism. After all, didn’t Scarano just try to “legally” get around the laws and everyone here is so quick to criticism him.
Why do some of you want to hold tenants to a different moral standard than owners?
hey 4:49
maybe these owners also knew the law before they bought…
they are LEGALLY ALLOWED (when a judge rules) to move tenants on if they want to occupy their building
your argument is about your personal morals, not about the law
and yet you bring in obvious illegal issues like, what, poultry farming etc?
here’s an arguement after your own…
i may not advocate abortion, but by law women are allowed the choice
it’s an unfortunate system (in my opinion), but i don’t demonize or judge the women who choose to use the freedom the law allows them.
Thanks, 5:33pm (I’m 4:49). I also wanted to add that 12:03am’s post about all of us benefiting from the mortgage tax deduction subsidy is right on. Talk about welfare for the rich — I guess it’s completely fair that if you buy an expensive home with a big mortgage, you get to save a huge amount more on your taxes than the middle class person whose mortgage is 1/10th of yours. While low income renters pay a much higher % of tax on their significantly smaller income, since they can’t afford to buy anything and benefit from the deduction.
My hope here is that the vehement critics of rent stabilization here are really just one or two sad people with too much time on their hands. I’m no knee-jerk defendant of rent control/stabilization laws, and anyone who abuses them should lose their rights. However, many people got their rent stabilized apartments in an up front, legal way, making an agreement with their landlord to live somewhere which was not at the time an especially desirable location in exchange for a rent stabilized apt. It was never part of the bargain that if, 20 years later, the area becomes “hot”, the landlord could simply kick out the tenant.
That’s sort of like the city/state suddenly deciding to end all zoning, and you being told, “tough luck, kiddo”, what right did you have to protest, we should all be free to build whatever we want. Hey, maybe the city could even just decide to lift the landmarks’ protection on neighborhoods! Let anyone in FG and Park Slope tear down their brownstones and build mini-mcmansions like you see on Ocean Parkway. Just because you bought your brownstone in a landmarked neighborhood gives you no right to think that government has to keep such a silly law in place, so just live with it.
Well said 4:49