By:  Serach Nissim

Plans are underway for 1,200 housing units at the upcoming tower at 5 World Trade Center.  A major point of controversy remains how many of those units will be dedicated as affordable housing.  As reported by Crain’s NY, Empire State Development and the Port Authority of NY and NJ recently agreed on a plan to set aside 30 percent, or about 360 units, as affordable.  This would be available for households earning between 60% and 110% of the area median income (which is now between $76,260 and $139,810 for a family of three). The previous proposal had promised to set aside just 25% of the units as affordable, for households earning between 40% and 80% of the area median income (which comes to between $50,840 to $101,680 for a family of three).  The new plans will need to be approved at the upcoming pivotal vote, likely later in June, by the state’s Public Authorities Control Board.

Despite the increased percentage of affordable units, some groups along with several politicians, are still pushing for even more to be added before the vote.  A group named the “Coalition for a 100% Affordable 5WTC”, is among those currently advocating for the project to add more affordable units.   While the control board’s vote is the last approval needed, more affordable units can still be added to the project later if more funding is secured for it.  “On one hand, to me, it’s tremendously important, because it’s sort of the last piece of this,” said Mariama James, co-founder of the group, regarding the vote.  “On the other hand, I feel like it’s just an extension of the same way the Port Authority vote was and the ESD vote was.”  She acknowledged the board would likely to approve the project with the 30% affordable units, but said they would still continue to fight for more.

Per Crains, the upcoming control board vote requires board members to vote not just based on if they want more affordable housing, but rather only if they believe that setting aside those units is feasible financially.  As such, most of the advocates for increasing the percentage of affordable units are focusing on finding more ways to fund them.   “The 5WTC site is publicly owned land, and our government entities have a duty to ensure there are greater levels of affordability at this site than would be expected elsewhere,” said Rep. Dan Goldman, a Democrat who represents the 10th District in Congress. “We need our local, state and federal government partners to work with the developers to identify additional sources of funding to provide for greater levels of affordability for this project.”

Councilman Christopher Marte, a Democrat who represents the area in the City Council, Fitim Shabani, chief of staff for Assemblyman, and Assistant Majority Leader Charles Fall,  are among the politicians advocating to up the percentage of affordable units at the tower.  “If they’re not going to give them 100%, let’s find a fair in-between where they can obviously be happy and satisfied and the developers can walk away with a win as well,” said Shabani characterizing 30% as unfair for the neighborhood.