NEW YORK, N.Y. \u2013 Elected officials and community leaders announced Tuesday a lawsuit to stop the New York City Charter Revision Commission\u2019s ballot proposals they say would \u201cradically change\u201d the city\u2019s land use processes.<\/p>\n
A host of community leaders, elected officials from across the five boroughs, and Big Apple residents rallied in front of City Hall Tuesday morning in support of the lawsuit.<\/p>\n
The lawsuit alleges that the Charter Revision Commission violated the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) and the City Environmental Quality Review (CEQR) in approving the ballot proposals without conducting a mandated environmental review. Opponents of the ballot proposals say an environmental review would have provided voters with \u201ccrucial information\u201d before they head to the polls.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn its zeal to push through these protocols, the (Charter Review) Commission wholly ignored a critically significant and legally required step. Despite the wide scale land use impact that implementation of these proposed policies will have, the Commission conducted no environmental review of its proposals whatsoever,\u201d the lawsuit alleges. \u201cYet, such review was essential here, because without the benefit of knowing what the environmental impacts of these far-reaching land use changes will be, the voters will be deprived of vital and statutorily mandated information needed for them to cast an informed, intelligent, transparent and democratically trustworthy vote,\u201d the lawsuit alleges.”<\/p>\n
The plaintiffs are asking a judge to annul the Charter Revision Commission\u2019s ballot proposals and direct the Commission to conduct an environmental review. The lawsuit was filed in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan Tuesday morning by attorney Jack Lester and Lawrence Marks, a former New York State Chief Administrative Judge.<\/p>\n
Several of Staten Island\u2019s elected officials are part of the lawsuit, including Rep. Nicole Malliotakis, Sen. Andrew Lanza, and Councilmembers David Carr and Frank Morano.<\/p>\n
Carr and Morano issued the following joint statement: \u201cNot only would these ballot proposals drastically change the character of our neighborhoods and take away our local input, but voters won\u2019t even be able to weigh the significant impact they would have on our communities because the Charter Revision Commission failed to do a legally required environmental analysis. We refuse to allow these bogus, illegal, and deceitful questions to go to the ballot to mislead voters into taking their own power away. We stand with our constituents in trying to preserve our communities.\u201d <\/p>\n
Mayor Eric Adams appointed the Charter Revision Commission in December 2024., with the goal of tackling the \u201ccity\u2019s housing crisis.\u201d In August, the Commission adopted five ballot proposals, including three that specifically address the city\u2019s Uniform Land Use Procedure, or ULURP.<\/p>\n
\u201cWho would have predicted that preventing voters from having a voice on the future of housing and land use in New York City would be the issue that unites the far left and far right? This is no different from Speaker Adams and her NIMBY colleagues trying to have these independent proposals undemocratically removed from the ballot before voters can decide,\u201d said City Hall Press Secretary Kayla Mamelak. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter if you are for or against these ballot proposals, everyone should agree that New Yorkers deserve democracy and the right to decide for themselves the future of housing in our city.\u201d<\/p>\n
Said a Charter Revision Commission spokesperson: \u201cWe will review the suit. We are confident in the rigor of our work and the legal basis for these proposals, which are intended to address the dire housing crisis that is forcing lifelong New Yorkers out of our city. It\u2019s unfortunate that, even as New Yorkers are already voting, MAGA opponents of these proposals are working to inject chaos into our democratic process and prevent voters from having a voice on the future of housing and land use in New York City.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ballot proposals<\/p>\n
Three of election 2025 ballot proposals focus on streamlining affordable housing processes:<\/p>\n
-The first would fast track publicly financed affordable housing applications, particularly in community districts that produce the least affordable housing, while maintaining Community Board review. A \u201cyes\u201d vote would fast track applications at the Board of Standards and Appeals or City Planning Commission, while a \u201cno\u201d vote would leave affordable housing subject to longer review and final decision at City Council.<\/p>\n
-A second housing-related proposal would simplify review of modest amounts of additional housing and minor infrastructure projects, significantly reducing review time while maintaining Community Board review. The final decision would rest with the City Planning Commission under this proposal, rather than requiring City Council approval.<\/p>\n
-The third housing proposal would establish an Affordable Housing Appeals Board comprising the Council speaker, local borough president and mayor to review Council actions that reject or change applications creating affordable housing.<\/p>\n
If approved, the new appeals board would take over the mayor\u2019s existing ULURP veto power, and would be able to overturn a Council land use decision if two members of the board agreed to do so.<\/p>\n
A \u201cyes\u201d vote would create a three-member board to reflect Council, borough and citywide perspectives, while a \u201cno\u201d vote would leave affordable housing subject to the mayor\u2019s veto and final decision by City Council.<\/p>\n
The ballot proposals come on the heels of the adoption of the controversial \u201cCity of Yes\u201d rezoning. <\/a>The housing plan, which represents the most significant citywide zoning initiative since the 1960s, aims to bring a city-estimated 80,000 units of new housing to the five boroughs through a series of zoning regulation changes to things like accessory dwelling units, parking mandates and transit-oriented development.<\/p>\n In a similar lawsuit, the Common Sense Caucus, as well as dozens of other elected officials and community groups, also alleged the \u201ccity violated basic procedures required under city and state law in adopting the comprehensive overhaul of the city\u2019s Zoning Resolution.\u201d That case is currently pending in New York State Supreme Court, Richmond County.<\/p>\n If you purchase a product or register for an account through a link on our site, we may receive compensation. By using this site, you consent to our User Agreement<\/a> and agree that your clicks, interactions, and personal information may be collected, recorded, and\/or stored by us and social media and other third-party partners in accordance with our Privacy Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK, N.Y. \u2013 Elected officials and community leaders announced Tuesday a lawsuit to stop the New York…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":268789,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5122],"tags":[5229,405,403,5226,5225,5228,5227,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-268788","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-new-york","10":"tag-new-york-city","11":"tag-newyork","12":"tag-newyorkcity","13":"tag-ny","14":"tag-nyc","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-united-states-of-america","17":"tag-unitedstates","18":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","19":"tag-us","20":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115298151140417225","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268788"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268788\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268789"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}