In celebrating the creation of nearly 15,000 affordable units and the preservation of more than 10,000 during the last fiscal year, Mayor Adams’ administration made it clear that this would not have been possible without the often-maligned 421a tax abatement program, with more than 40% of new units in buildings using 421a. It was terrible for the Legislature to ever let it expire. No one knows if the replacement program, called 485x, will be able to replicate the incentives that private builders say they need.
There are some public policy areas where we have more opportunity to seek to perfect the approach and potentially fail the first or second time something is tried. If the city rolls out subway gun scanners that don’t work , they just get taken down eventually. But when it comes to housing, we do not have the luxury of time, nor the benefit of trial and error.
That doesn’t mean that experimentation and innovation isn’t a good thing, but we must do what works now, because we’re already racing against the clock. Sure, the tax breaks might be just a carve-out from a poorly-built property tax system that should itself be overhauled, and we understand grumbling about them being a giveaway to developers that, despite the folksy small-landlord presentation from some of their advocacy groups, are just as often giant and very profitable corporations. None of that changes the fact that 421a is responsible for creating thousands of affordable units, and the people in thos.