Six Questions On City Of Yes

This week, the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity (COYHO) inched closer to becoming fully approved and inscribed into NYC's zoning text. NYC Department of City Planning (DCP) Director Dan Garodnick called the plan "one of the most momentous projects in the history of city planning." The plan's steady advances are significant for NYC multifamily investors because the plan contains initiatives that will enable faster, denser, and more profitable developments, boosting the overall housing supply of NYC, which currently has a 1.41% vacancy rate (source: NYC DCP).

1. Federal prosecutors indicted Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday, the same day the NYC Planning Commission voted on COYHO. Will this impact the prospects of COYHO making it into the zoning resolution and becoming law?

   The indictment will not impact the plan's forward momentum. Here's why it won't:

   1. There is broad support for the plan. The City Planning Commission (CPC) approved the plan on Wednesday, albeit with modifications. But the headline is Greenlight!

   2. It is a good plan. Neighborhood rezonings are effective levers to unlock more housing development, but they trigger people and communities, and things get thorny. People like inertia and don't want change. This plan to "build a little bit more housing everywhere" avoids the usual friction associated with neighborhood rezonings because it creates more modest changes at scale.

   3. Director Garodnick is leading the charge for COYHO, not the mayor. He presents the plan at every opportunity, answers questions, and takes a vital leadership role in pushing the initiative. Mayor Adams championed and pioneered the City of Yes initiative for business, climate, and housing reform, but he has also delegated much of the work to Garodnick and other advocates. The initiative to deeply update the city's zoning framework is much more than the mayor's pet project.

2. Where will the R11 and R12 districts with recently approved Floor Area Ratios (FAR) of 12.5 and 15.0 be created in NYC?

   I don't know at all.

3. What are the implications of COYHO's shared housing propoal?

   I have yet to hear much discussion on the topic, which surprised me. DCP wants to enable shared housing to create more beds and put more people in them. Instead of requiring that all apartments have kitchens and bathrooms, shared housing would allow developers to centralize these use areas and dedicate more residential floor area for apartments. Eliminating the need for kitchens and bathrooms, which are low-use areas, would allow for more efficient development. The idea is incredibly intuitive and could yield significant benefits for the following groups:

   1. Homeless populations: this use case is easy to see.

   2. Low-Income Residents: lower rent for less space.

   3. Senior New Yorkers: having shared use areas for seniors could be desirable under the right circumstances if done right.

   4. High income and mobile young people: co-living to meet others and pay for experiences.

4. What are the steps required to pass COYHO?

   CPC conditionally approved the plan on Wednesday, with ten commissioners voting in favor and three against. The conditions CPC requires for approval are here.

   Next, the proposal will go to the City Council, which has 50 days to review the document. Because of the scale of COYHO, the City Council must weigh in on it. If City Council members vote to approve the plan with significant modifications, they will refer it back to the CPC.

   CPC has 15 days to determine if the requested modification requires additional environmental review. If the changes are significant, like studying the additional infrastructure needs that ADUs and shared living might require, the process stops there. No COYHO this year.

   If no additional review is needed, the Council will adopt the COYHO plan if a simple majority rules in favor. 65 days from when CPC conditionally approved the plan takes us right up to mid-December 2024.

   It's interesting to note that for neighborhood rezonings, it is customary for council members to vote in deference to the council member governing the district. Since this is a city-wide rezoning, it's unclear to me who or what council members will look to to inform their voting decisions. For more information on the procedural elements of approving the new zoning changes, see here.

5. Which policy in COYHO are developers most interested in seeing pass?

   Developers are most interested in eliminating mandatory parking requirements city-wide in new developments.

6. What are elected officials pushing back the most on?

   Elected officials are pushing back the most on eliminating mandatory parking requirements city-wide in new developments.

   In many ways, the City Council COYHO vote will highlight the mixed views NYers have over the role that cars should play in the city. I'm not saying this vote will come down to people choosing cars over housing. But the fact that congestion pricing never made it out the gate this summer is telling, and much of the sentiment that led to that still exists. Concerns over whether Mayor Adams' indictment will impact COYHO are reasonable but exaggerated. The real unknown for COYHO is whether the policy passes with or without the elimination of parking requirements.

Sources: City of Yes for Housing Opportunity (COYHO), ULURP Process in NYC