Hell’s Kitchen tenants rally for a chance to buy their distressed buildings
- Two bills—one at the state level and one in NYC—would give tenants and nonprofits first crack at buying their buildings
- State Assembly member Marcela Mitaynes said she was 'optimistically hopeful' about passing the state bill this session
Tenants of 438 and 440 West 45th St. spoke in support of two bills that would give tenants, nonprofits, and community land trusts a shot at running their own buildings.
Brick Underground/Celia Young
Tenants of two Hell’s Kitchen buildings say they’d do a better job of running the properties than their landlord at a Saturday rally in support of a New York state bill that would let them do just that.
Elected officials, housing advocates, and tenants gathered outside 438 West 45th St. on Saturday to support the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA)—a bill that would give tenant organizations in New York the right to make an offer on their apartment building when it’s up for sale.
“We are seeing our gentrifying communities being sold to the highest bidder,” said State Assembly member Marcela Mitaynes, who sponsored TOPA in the assembly, at the Saturday protest. “We are taking our power back.”
Four years ago, the two buildings at 438 and 440 West 45th St. were owned by Daniel Ohebshalom—an infamous landlord who was sent to Rikers Island last year for failing to make repairs at two different Washington Heights properties.
The Hell’s Kitchen tenants said Ohebshalom let their buildings fall into disrepair too, and argued that they could better renovate, rent out, and run their buildings. They also called on the New York City Council to pass the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act—a similar bill that would give qualified nonprofits and community land trusts the first offer on buildings for sale within NYC.
Elected officials “don’t realize that we are ready. We are already running the building,” said Red Young, a tenant activist who grew up at 438 West 45th St.
Mitaynes said she was “optimistically hopeful” about getting the bill passed into law this session, and hoped the mayoral election would help spur interest in the bills.
One mayoral candidate is certainly interested. State Senator Zellnor Myrie, who sponsored TOPA in the Senate, spoke out in support of TOPA—though Myrie was briefly shouted down by tenants calling for a rent freeze. (Myrie has not committed to freezing rents at rent-stabilized apartments, if elected.)
“I grew up in a rent-stabilized apartment,” Myrie said on Saturday. “My mother will never have a path to ownership under our current laws.”
Even if TOPA passes this year, that path to ownership could remain difficult. Mitaynes and other attendees did not expect to secure funding for TOPA this year—money that would be used to help repair aging buildings and support purchases.
“We need funding,” said Blaire MacKenzie, who has lived at 438 West 45th St. for decades. (He met his now-husband in the hallway, he added.) “Without it, their law’s a little toothless.”
