Mamdani Wants to Add 18K New Homes on Staten Island
That would represent nearly 10 percent more residences over the next five years
By Amanda Schiavo August 20, 2026 11:32 am
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There’s a joke about how Staten Island got its name. Dutch settlers sailing into New York Harbor saw the 14-mile land mass and exclaimed “Is zat an island?” (You have to read it with the accent.) Is it the reality of how one of New York City boroughs got its name? No, but as the saying goes, “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend.”
Fast forward to 2026, and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has some big plans for the little island across the harbor from Manhattan. He is hoping to see a 9.5 percent growth in new homes on Staten Island over the next five years, or about 17,675 new homes across the borough, according to a growth plan from the Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) released Wednesday.
“As the city commits to ambitious housing action through the Block by Block plan, the draft Fair Housing Growth Strategy provides a framework for measuring need and understanding where we should grow, with fair housing at its center,” Sideya Sherman, director of the Department of City Planning, said in a statement.
Staten Island is broken up in three segments: North Shore, Mid-Island and South Shore. The South Shore and Mid-Island are the island’s least dense areas. However, residents and elected officials on the South Shore have historically pushed back on more residential development in their neighborhoods, so the mayor could be facing an uphill battle.
“Staten Island is probably the most perfect place in the world because you’re 20 or 40 minutes away from the largest city in the country, but at the same time it’s like being in New England,” Stuart Saft, a real estate lawyer with Holland & Knight, previously told Commercial Observer. “I’ve been to Staten Island, and it’s a magnificent place to be.”
The mayor isn’t just targeting housing growth on Staten Island over the next five years, mind you. The draft lays out a strategy to bring more housing across all five boroughs, with the HPD estimating that to significantly combat New York’s housing crisis, the city will need to add about 700,000 new homes over the next decade.
“To overcome our housing crisis, we need every neighborhood in every borough to do its part,” Dina Levy, commissioner of the HPD, said in a statement. “The Fair Housing Growth Strategy is a roadmap to a fairer and more affordable city.”
Amanda Schiavo can be reached at aschiavo@commercialobserver.com.
