The cost to make a basement legal is enormous in terms of physical and monetary requirements. As someone who ponder and look into the cost - its not worth it not to mention the ongoing liabilities of a basement units. It be cheaper if I raise the roof of my house and build another unit. If the city offered me money and allowed the exception to my zoning to build another floor and keep it rent regulated for 15 yrs. Then its worth considering and better for the renter than any legal basement unit ever be.

You mean the same zoning laws that don't allow the basement to be legally habitable? if you going to +1 unit to building and change the CO..it might as well be +1 additional floor vs the basement.

um not a mere overflow...it can fill up rapidly and in drastic cases totally flooding basements quickly and trapping folks since it's the lowest point of a building,.

it has happen..heck even in ida and insert whatever major storm - folks complain their toilets/sinks erupted in geyser. they were no where near flood risk area. Why it happen? backflow. system was overwhelm, Feel free to google and read their stories.

and I'm telling you you don't need to be in a flood prone area to experience flooding. every basement and building has a risk

Doesn't need to be in flood prone area to be flooded considering most flooding is a result of backflow. Basements are lowest point in building so highly susceptible to backflow issues.

Adding another floor is a lot easier vs making a basement legal, better housing, better qol for renter and more feasible.

Ask the owner and renter...which they prefer another legalized floor unit or basement unit. they will pick the first one

Basement apts will always be suboptimal housing no matter how nice you make it and has inherit risks. so if we putting so much effort to make it legal and high cost...why not apply that effort to adding another floor which offers better value to owner and renter qol of such a unit.

There's a reason why so few ppl sign up for the pilot program - they don't want to make the basement legal, have to report the income and host of other rules they have to follow for some rent when they can collect it anyway and not report it if illegal.

Legalized basement is dumb. There's a reason why folks have illegal basements - cheaper rent and owners don't want to report the income. Legalizing basements negates these benefits to owners. Why bother collecting legal rent from basement if you subject to additional x rules. Might as well keep it illegal

On the other hand, if you give tax benefits & funding to add additional floor to a house/building contrary to allowed zoning in area and make that new unit subject to rent regulation for x years- that is way more appealing to owners vs spend a ton of money to make a basement legally habitable and rent regulated.

The estimated cost from city to bring a basement to code for legalization ranges from $275,000 to $375,000 each. Would argue given that cost, better to use that money to raise the roof or even subsidize the renovations of unlivable vacant RS units to be rented back to market at pre-renovated RS unit rent price with conditions it stay RS until meets requirement to be deregulated or 15 yrs...which ever longest.

Since grand jury proceedings are suppose to be confidential, someone at DA office/courts who is disgusted by what happen is leaking info.

Go ahead find the money...if if was so easy to come up with it we wouldn't be talking about it. We simply do not have the funds and yet no one has come up with a proposal that reachable in time to fund it. No reasonable ideas achievable in given time frame. but do tell me how rich and easy to fund it. Btw, our education budget is absurd by world standards.

Fund through DOE? Magically increase the DOE budget by another 1B from where??? which btw is already bloated and consider absurd by most city budget standards. NYPD budget is in line portion wise to what other alpha cities spend and at least we can claim we have very low crime unlike the abysmal performance of our DOE.

ya that will pass quickly. BdB would could have done it 5+ yrs ago during his term when program was conceived to fund it if he thought it was possible. Obviously that idea was not possible then and just as bleak now.

Also its LVT you should be arguing for

Did so well but didn't have a plan to pay for it. What could go wrong. If we blaming Adams for this, BdB deserves some of it as well.

City has no money, a budget deficit and predecessor didn't properly plan to finance UPK program once grants runs out. Only way to solve it is to find 700M-1B+ somewhere and no one wants to hike taxes or do more budget cuts. Simple as that.

Bragg continues to pay dividends to GOP

Judge can only rule based on presented info and facts which the DA team didn't provide any in this case

They were prob maintained to the code 60 yrs ago or whenever tenant signed original lease that's reflective in the rent. Most of the modern codes and required updates don't go into effect until you do renovations. Till then, its only repair as needed if violate something not replace.

Still a lot of uncertainty and career tradeoffs ...can easily see why ppl don't see PSLF that compelling.

If you dead set on being a public defender or working for employer that qualifies for 10 yr go ahead. Not many be willing to work with that limitation.

Fine didn't notice the 25 yr calculations from that calculator. Regardless wont be 200-250 a month as you state. Using avg public defender salary in nyc of 80k and your 220k debt in this calculator.

https://www.studentloanplanner.com/public-service-loan-forgiveness-pslf-calculator/

So to save 225k -still a lot of checks you have to meet and what ifs to successfully last the entire 10 yrs for loan to be forgiven. Congress can easily can program if they want during budget negotiations. Which did came up during last tax cut debate. You want to hinge all that uncertainty by working at a job that offer less pay, limited networking, limited options of switching jobs and career opportunity for 10 yrs?

Especially the early years of career that will define your earning potential for rest of career. Factor all that, saving that 225k not worth it for many.

IBR wont be that low unless they doing min wage job and expecting no wage increase entire 10 yrs. Use this calculator. Say 60k job with some growth single with 220k student loan. Look how under IBR the balance paid in the 10 yrs already exceeds the principle.

https://studentloanhero.com/calculators/student-loan-income-based-repayment-calculator/

Recently pushed laws by progressives and dems do suck imo. Good intention but horrible execution, ill thought out and plenty of unforeseen consequences.

Add to your above examples- right to speedy trial by x days but do nothing to address staffing of DA offices that are already backlog to make deadlines set by speedy trial reform possible or properly account for unforeseen catastrophic delays like a pandemic.

2019 rent reforms that limit amount of repairs/updates costs that can be recoup by owners is another.

Ban on background checks in employment that lead to higher employment requirements & higher rejections of minorities to avoid asking about criminal past

Good cause eviction proposal - leads to more housing discrimination especially for families and minorities plus , higher requirements for renting. Also will drive market to create smaller housing options bc no reason to build 2BR/3RB over a studio/1BR bc the faster the tenant moves out the faster they can raise rent under proposal. The larger the unit, more likely tenant with families stay longer limiting rent increase potential.

Proposal ban on background checks for renting - see how well ban on background check working out great in the workplace.

Universal pre-k - sounds great but no plans to fund program outside of expiring grants.

Would like to add electrification of heating and gas ban- which will lead to the cost and liability of heating pass to tenants, higher cost to maintain existing gas equipment which leads to phasing out but cost be pass onto tenants once again.

List goes on.ppl that create/propose these laws don't look beyond the few trees and fail to see the forest.

Most ppl on PLSF end up not getting remaining balance forgiven after 10 yrs due to wrong loan, wrong payment plan, job not qualify, etc...and govt at whim can cancel program at anytime. Look at the number of actual loans forgiven by PLSF each year...its minuscular.

Also PLSF at best save you from paying the interest on the loan and some of the principle that you already would have paid off a good amount even on the income based payments for a lot of work and hopefulness it works successfully vs. get a high paying job in private law practice that pays off loan in a few yrs

Or work in private sector and pay off loan faster. After 10 yrs making income based payments and if paperwork goes through successfully- you practically paid off or near the principle by then anyway

Should raise the millionaire tax to start at 2M properties and make it easier to refinance without tax for loans under 2M. 1M properties are actually avg units in most markets here.