A COGE Member On How New York City Can Boost Affordable Housing

Two extremely troubling recent headlines underscored the mounting challenges in addressing New York City’s affordable housing crisis: Rents hit a record high while the number of vacancies in denser boroughs plummeted. 

These headlines underscore how far we have to go to ensure every New Yorker has a stable, quality home that doesn’t break the bank.

Data show that the median average monthly rent on new leases in Manhattan surged to a record high of $5,000 in July — up 6.4 percent from 2025 — while the number of available units plunged by more than 69 percent. In Brooklyn, the median rent hit a record $4,500 a month, with available units dropping by 27 percent.

In addition, in August, the Mamdani administration announced that just 12,491 affordable homes were preserved or created in the first six months of 2026 — the lowest half-year total since 2022.

We all know that New York City is one of the most expensive places in the nation, if not the world, to build affordable housing. This is due to a wide array of factors, from rising insurance costs to the scarcity of land and a byzantine permitting and regulatory system.

Against this backdrop and recognizing that there are some matters outside its control, it’s critical that the government do everything in its power to make it easier, faster and more cost-efficient to build and preserve affordable units in all five boroughs.

The Mamdani administration has taken steps in the right direction with the proposed Streamlining Procedures to Expedite Equitable Development (SPEED) reforms and the Block-by-Block housing plan. Now voters can help build on this progress by approving the ballot proposals advanced by the mayor’s Commission on Government Efficiency (COGE) in the November election.

I had the privilege of serving on COGE. Together with my fellow commission members, we spent months hearing from a range of residents, business owners, advocates and elected officials from every borough to gather information, agency by agency, about how city government can be modernized, streamlined and improved to benefit all New Yorkers.

The five proposals that will appear on the ballot are the result of considerable collaboration and compromise. Three of them, in particular, will help remove impediments to the construction and preservation of the affordable housing the city so desperately needs.

Perhaps most important from an affordable housing development standpoint is Prop 4, which would create a centralized permitting hub for construction across city government. 

Today, developers must navigate more than a dozen agencies and secure 40 separate approvals across 18 offices before a single shovel goes into the ground. Every handoff represents a potential delay. For affordable projects financed on thin margins with strict subsidy deadlines, delay can mean the difference between a project getting built or not. 

Prop 4 consolidates those approvals into one hub, lets more Department of Buildings (DOB) divisions sign off on certificates of occupancy, and centralizes waterfront permitting under one agency. It doesn’t touch safety review or public input — it just smooths unnecessary friction and complications.

Two other measures on the ballot reinforce that goal. Prop 3 would cut the timeline to sell or lease small city properties from seven months to 90 days, potentially turning more vacant public land into housing. 

Prop 2 would speed up city contracts with nonprofit housing providers, from 13 months to six, without weakening labor standards.

These proposals are grounded in process. They are not a sweeping overhaul and admittedly don’t go as far as some advocates would like. But they reflect real collaboration and input.

The New York Association for Affordable Housing (NYSAFAH) members have welcomed the ability to work with City Hall and appreciate its willingness to listen to our concerns. To be clear, we don’t agree on everything. We’ve raised real concerns about the administration’s enforcement-first approach toward privately owned buildings, penalizing responsible owners for the actions of a few bad actors, with no clear path to timely violation clearance after cure for non-distressed properties. But we share this: New Yorkers deserve high-quality, affordable homes, and the government shouldn’t stand in the way of building and preserving them.

These ballot proposals are a continuation of that work. I ask New Yorkers to look closely at them and carefully weigh their merits, keeping in mind that every month a project waits for a permit is a month someone spends paying too much for too little space, or not finding a home at all. This November, please consider voting “yes.”

Carlina Rivera is president and CEO of the New York State Association for Affordable Housing and a former member of the New York City Council from Manhattan.