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MAP: Where Affordable Housing Is Most Threatened in NYC

By Amy Zimmer | September 22, 2016 4:01pm
 ANHD map
ANHD map
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ANHD

MANHATTAN — Tracking displacement of New York City's renters — or understanding exactly why people are forced out of their homes — is a tricky task. But a new map seeks to identify where it's likely to become a crisis.

The Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development launched its Displacement Alert Project (DAP) map Thursday as a tool to give activists and policy makers more information by showing where displacement pressures are most acutely felt. (To see the map, click here.)

ANHD’s interactive online data map shows, building by building, the combination of risk factors that play into affordable housing loss.

Those factors include the loss of rent-regulated units, the volume of Department of Buildings permits (which can indicate that an apartment or building has been recently vacated and is now being renovated or demolished) and the spike in purchase prices of the buildings (which can indicate that the landlord plans to charge market-rate or luxury prices).

The organization found that the city lost more than 156,000 rent-regulated units between 2007 to 2014, with Manhattan leading the way, with 74,900 rent-regulated units lost over that time, followed by Brooklyn, which lost 41,500 rent-regulated units.

The analysis also found that in more than 5,400 buildings, the 2015 sales price per unit increased by more than double the 2010 area average.

Neighborhoods like Bushwick, Ridgewood, Sunset Park, East Harlem, Astoria and the Upper West Side, for instance, were among hotspots for displacement.

“The DAP Map has already shown us a correlation we've long understood exists around the loss of affordable housing in New York City,” said Brandon Kielbasa, director of organizing at Cooper Square Committee, “that high volumes of renovation and construction often goes hand-in-hand with the depletion of affordable, rent regulated housing, a fact that should inform the city policy discussion.”