City Council bill takes aim at worst landlords

Volume One, Issue 31, April 20 - 26, 2007

By Albert Amateau

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Councilmember Letitia James of Brooklyn introduced new housing legislation on April 17 that would crack down on landlords of the city’s worst-maintained building who refuse to repair hazardous conditions.

The Safe Housing Act proposes that the city would identify 200 buildings with the most housing code violations each year and target them for aggressive inspection, follow-up and comprehensive repairs.

The bill gives landlords four months to repair immediately hazardous conditions, and if they don’t, the city’s housing agency would step in to make emergency repairs and bill the landlords for the cost of these repairs.

“Thanks to tremendous collaboration between the Council, the Administration, tenant and housing advocates, and landlords and building owners, we will soon have the legislation necessary to address the dangerous inaction of reckless landlords,” Quinn said.

“This historic bill has been three years in the making, and I’m extremely proud of the work we’ve done to improve enforcement of the city’s housing code,” said Councilmember James, the bill’s lead sponsor. “With this new bill, hundreds of buildings each year will be repaired by the city when landlords ignore city laws,” James said.