Anti-housing NYC pol Linda Rosenthal pays just $1,573 for palatial, 5-room rent-stabilized apartment

[bnew]

Anti-housing NYC pol Linda Rosenthal pays just $1,573 for palatial, 5-room rent-stabilized apartment

Nice living — if you can get it.

nypost.com

US NEWS
EXCLUSIVE​

Anti-housing NYC pol Linda Rosenthal pays just $1,573 for palatial, 5-room rent-stabilized apartment​

By Social Links for Jon Levine

Published Feb. 17, 2024, 10:49 a.m. ET

Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal has been holed up in a rent regulated apartment for four decades.Stefan Jeremiah for NY Post

Upper West Side Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal — who trumpets not being interested in building more market-rate housing for New Yorkers — has been living in a palatial, rent-stabilized apartment in a landmarked building for 40 years, paying only a fraction of the market rate.

The Democratic chair of the Assembly Housing Committee, pays just $1,573.37 a month to live in a five-room pad on the third floor of the St. James Court off Amsterdam Avenue, according to records viewed by The Post.

The “brick and stone structure was designed in the Renaissance Revival style, the upper façade peppered with limestone balconies and scrolled keystones . . . The residents of the St. James Court were, expectedly, well-to-do” noted a brief building history from Landmark West, an advocacy organization.

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Rosenthal pays $1,573.37 a month for her five-room apartment in Manhattan.AP Photo/Hans Pennink


“Gorgeous, Elevator Building with Laundry and Live-in Super!” gushed a StreetEasy description of the property.

Though it boasts five rooms, Rosenthal has modestly called the apartment “a one bedroom with another small room like a maid’s room.”

A similar five-room apartment in the building rents for $5,200 a month.

Rent stabilization in the Big Apple disproportionately helps wealthy older white people who live in Manhattan, such as Rosenthal, according to a 2019 analysis by the Wall Street Journal.

Rosenthal’s 1985 rent was just $580, records show.

She inherited the apartment from her grandmother, whom she once lived there with.

She’s not shy about the place either, publicly boasting about living in the rent-regulated space on her official Assembly website.

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The landmark St. James Court — where Assemblywoman Rosenthal pays well below market rate for her five-room apartment.Helayne Seidman


Rosenthal’s base salary as a member of the Assembly is $142,000.

She pockets an additional $12,500 for being a committee chair.

Rosenthal voted for a jumbo pay increase for herself and her Albany colleagues in 2022.

And despite her lofty elected position and committee chair, Rosenthal has expressed little interest in building new housing.

“I’m not that worried about non-affordable housing, actually,” she told a City Hall delegation during a hearing in December. “People who have means can buy, rent anything they need in this city.”

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Critics say its unfair for a state lawmaker to be cashing in on such a sweet deal.Helayne Seidman


The Adams administration is looking for ways to speed up conversions of unused office space into residential housing.

Albany lawmakers have balked at developer-led conversions which don’t include large numbers of affordable units.

Developers meanwhile have said that too many affordable units would make projects unprofitable.

What do you think? Be the first to comment.

“It certainly points to a need that rent stabilization for wealthy people needs to be eliminated. You know how they say tax the rich? I say increase the rent on the rich,” said Assemblyman Sam Pirozzolo (R-Staten Island).

Rosenthal defended her discount digs in a statement to The Post.

“Rent regulation protects tenants from prohibitive rent hikes and displacement, and it has provided me, my family, my west side constituents and millions of other New Yorkers with stability for decades I am proud to serve the community I grew up in, and I will continue to champion housing policies that protect all New Yorkers this legislative session,” she said.

 

[east]

negged for not spoilering those teeth, sorry it had to be you breh

 

[bnew]

 

[ORDER_66]

fukking bytch...

 

[Da King]

Now remember folks, if you don’t vote democrat you’re not really black

 

[MikelArteta]

all that money she's saving and her teeth are more crooked than a british person

 

[Godless Socialist CEO]

@bnew Since when did you start posting obvious hit pieces by the governor and adams without doing research? You know better than anyone the post is just a mouth piece of the right wing

She's not anti housing

infact She's the opposite and has been a major critic of Houcul's plan because it's just tax incentives which doesn't fukking help the poor

Linda Rosenthal: 421-a doesn’t create enough affordable housing​

The Assembly Housing Committee chair is calling for more than just tax incentives.​

Assembly Housing Committee Chair Linda Rosenthal, who began leading the committee at the start of the year, proposed a housing voucher bill that would help people who are struggling to pay rent. While it wasn’t included in Gov. Kathy Hochul’s housing plan, the bill highlighted Rosenthal’s focus on affordability in New York’s housing debate. City & State spoke with Rosenthal about wanting more affordable housing requirements in Hochul’s plan and whether the state’s now-expired affordable housing tax incentives were actually the best approach. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

You have raised concerns about the lack of emphasis on affordable housing in the governor’s housing proposal. Where do you see those shortcomings and how could they be addressed?

The governor proposed 800,000 new units within 10 years. However, the word affordable was not attached to that proposal. And I think that was a major deficit. It was startling, actually. The reports have come out within the last few weeks. But this is something that lawmakers have known for years, and the crisis is just building to the point where people are leaving this state. People of color are leaving, people of color who don’t earn in the millions of dollars, people who are struggling to feed their family, afford medical care and pay their rent, say, “I give up, I can’t do it.” So rather than worrying about all the billionaires and taxing them, we need to worry about the people who are exiting because it’s too expensive to rent here. Buying is beyond the capability of so many people, even as we want to encourage homeownership. So we have a big crisis here, and it’s not just all about that real estate wants what it wants. It’s about recognizing the reality and addressing it by putting in protections for tenants against burdensome, extreme rent increases, ensuring that they don’t have to fear eviction when they’re complying with all their responsibilities, such as paying rent (and) all the other things that go along with being a good tenant.

Do you think the minimum wage should be raised further to try to combat the housing crisis? What other measures could be taken that are not traditionally thought of as affordable housing solutions?

These minimum wage jobs do not lead to wealth, they lead to better existence. So if someone’s paid properly, they will have the money to shop in their local supermarket or their local small-business owner’s store. They won’t have to rely on food pantries, which we see people working full time at minimum wage jobs still have to rely on food pantries or other assistance to survive here. So while I’m glad we did increase the minimum wage in the future, it’s still not high enough. And that is a factor in keeping people in their homes: making sure that they earn enough. So while New Yorkers who think they’re safe and secure receive eviction notices, sometimes it’s also because the city didn’t process the vouchers, so that’s another complication. The lack of staff in crucial housing agencies within the city means that people who should live without worry about their rent being paid, now have that additional concern, and their landlords around them saying, “Hey, I didn’t get any rent, I can’t survive,” which I also understand, because they are relying on the money that the voucher will provide from the city. So that really needs to be remedied ASAP. And not reducing the amount of staff in these housing agencies has been proposed in the mayor’s budget.

You have been critical of the way 421-a and other tax incentives have been used in the past. What do you want to see out of tax incentive programs going forward?

We need to build affordable housing. And 421-a has been put out there as the solution to building more affordable housing. But we’ve seen, and there have been reports that back this up, that it doesn’t create enough affordable housing in return for forgoing taxes. The equation doesn’t balance. You know, if anybody wants a new 421-a-type program, we have to ensure that there’s more affordability. It’s not just about profits, from a policy point of view. The government has to encourage and help build apartments that are affordable to its residents, and future residents, because this also will affect future residents who will say, “I can’t afford to live in New York.” And that’s how the city and state will be drained of the future generations in the creative intellectual (space). The workers, anybody who sees what’s going on will say, “I love New York, but I really can’t afford to live there.” So you know, we’re biting off our future by not dealing with the present.