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Bronx Apartment Building Tenants Invoke Stuyvesant Town Decision For Rent Strike
Residents of a Bronx apartment building located at 1600 Sedgwick Avenue are justifying their refusal to pay rent on the recent Stuyvesant Town decision. Tenants in 80 of the 383 units claim that they were illegally taken out of an affordable housing program since February, 2009. According to the Division of Community and Housing renewal, state rent regulations apply to any post-1973 building taken out of a federal housing program. 1600 Sedgwick was built in 1973.
This would lead one to conclude that the DHCR does not have authority since the building was built before the applicable time.
According to the Stuyvesant Town decision, though, the DHCR’s rulings are not binding upon the courts.
It appears that the owner’s attorneys anticipate this problem. They argue that the ownership entity was formed under Article 5 of the state’s Private Housing Finance Law. As a result, the building does not fall under DHCR’s jurisdiction, but rather, the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development. This distinction, they argue, exempts the building from state rent regulations.
Based on the tenuous legal argument of the majority in the Court of Appeals decision, it is extremely unlikely that it would side with the owner — assuming it were to ever get that far.
This decision will prove to be a windfall for attorneys who represent tenants.
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Check out what others are saying about this post...[...] had been accused of illegally raising rents at the 383-unit, rent stabilized building located at 1600 Sedgwick Ave. and attempting to evict tenants for non-payment of the higher rents. [...]