Bloomberg screwed up city housing; De Blasio hasn’t fixed it yet

The New York City Housing Authority repeatedly fixed the numbers in the their backlog of repair requests instead of actually fixing the problems, according to an audit by New York City Controller Scott Stringer.

The City Housing Authority (NYCHA) has been a disaster for years. Bloomberg had twelve years to get it right but neglected to even try. Now, City Controller Scott Stringer has revealed that Mayor De Blasio isn’t doing any better.

Read the Daily News article: NYCHA misreporting repair numbers: Scott Stringer’s audit – NY Daily News

The Executive Summary

The Comptroller’s Audit Report

Previous posts at Biteme.Me

Don’t ya love the Free Market? — Floridians forced to sell their homes at huge losses

In Florida, home of the rabid we-hate-gummint crowd, developers can seize your condo and pay you cents on the dollar. Don’t like it? Move to some pinko place like New York or LA.

Watch: Floridians forced to sell their homes at huge losses http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/america-tonight/articles/2015/2/6/florida-condo-law.html via DuckDuckGo for Android

California just moves its homeless around

The state of California and the city of San Jose have evicted the residents of a tent city. The results were predictable:

Residents of the neighborhood in Central San Jose that abutted the Jungle were glad to see the encampment go. But dismantling the Jungle is already creating new problems. Just days after the Jungle was torn apart, San Jose police and other city departments began fielding calls from people in different neighborhoods complaining of former Jungle residents setting up camps near them. Some ended up in a Walmart parking lot before being booted. Others were congregating near the airport, also under threat of eviction. At least one hospital reported an upsurge of emergency room visits from former residents of the Jungle, sick from weathering the elements, having misplaced medications in the eviction.

I don’t have an good solution to the problem of homelessness, but it seems obvious that evicting people will only destabilize their lives and move the problem to someone else’s neighborhood. It sounds a lot like externalization to me.

via ‘Some sort of hell’: How one of the wealthiest cities in America treats its homeless.

AirBNB drives up evictions; activists fight back

Here’s the Warning Sign Activists Stick On Illegally Converted Airbnbs.

San Francisco landlords are illegally evicting tenants so they can get the higher rents afforded by AirBNB customers. In response, protesters from a medley of organizations are posting signs outside the doors of so-called vacation rentals.

See also Damning Analysis Shows Airbnb’s Impact on San Francisco Housing

Rent regulated tenants banned at Upper West Side indoor pool

In a story that is becoming increasingly familiar, the below market-rate tenants of a NYC building are denied access to the building’s new pool.

Public Advocate Letitia James, Council Member Mark Levine and Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal have been working on legislation that would prohibit such disparities. Not so Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer, who is enthusiastic about the gentrification of her borough.

At least the regulated tenants don’t have to use a separate entrance.

EXCLUSIVE: Outsiders welcomed, rent stabilized tenants banned at Upper West Side indoor pool – NY Daily News.

Department of Justice does zilch against mortgage fraud, then fakes its statistics

Adapted from Above the Law:

A few months ago, the FBI had quietly admitted that its primary function was no longer law enforcement but rather “national security.” Instead the FBI is putting a huge part of its budget towards “counterterrorism” while its efforts to take down white collar crime is dropping significantly.

This is confirmed by new report from the Justice Department’s Inspector General. It notes that, despite President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder promising that cracking down on mortgage fraud was a top priority, the FBI has actually put it near the bottom of the list of actual priorities.

The DOJ then pretended that it had been fighting mortgage fraud and put on a whole presentation about its success — based on totally faulty numbers. Numbers that it was pretty sure were faulty — and then took nearly a year to admit that their claims of success were based on bogus stats.

via Despite Promises To Fight Mortgage Fraud, DOJ Basically Ignored It, Then Claimed Success With Faulty Stats « Above the Law: A Legal Web Site – News, Commentary, and Opinions on Law Firms, Lawyers, Law Schools, Law Suits, Judges and Courts + Career Resources.

Cuomo in tough housing crackdown targets tenants, not landlords

According to Governor Cuomo, about one hundredth of one percent of regulated tenants cheat by applying for School Tax Relief that they’re not entitled to. At about $700 per head, that amounts to a whopping $109,200 per year. On the other hand, Cuomo has raked in over $2 million from landlords, so it kind of evens out.

Gov. Cuomo’s office is targeting tenants who use the STAR exemption and live in rent-regulated housing – NY Daily News.

Gigantic private equity firms are growing slumlord menace

“It’s just a slumlord,” [tenant] Culpepper said of Colony American. “A huge, billion-dollar slumlord.”

“Most rental houses in the U.S. are owned by individuals, or small, local businesses.Culpepper’s landlord is part of a new breed: a Wall Street-backed investment company with billions of dollars at its disposal. Over the past two years, Colony American and its two biggest competitors, Invitation Homes and American Homes 4 Rent, have spent more than $12 billion buying and renovating at least 75,000 homes in order to rent them out.”

Here’s What Happens When Wall Street Builds A Rental Empire.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg says shortage of affordable housing is a “good sign”

‘On the topic of those struggling to find affordable housing in his city, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is quick to find the silver lining.

‘ “Somebody said that there’s not enough housing. That’s a good sign,” he argued during his weekly Friday morning radio sit-down with WOR’s John Gambling.

‘Mr. Bloomberg, a billionaire who lives in a multi-million-dollar townhouse on the Upper East Side, said the high demand means the city is on the right track.’

And somewhere Joe Lhota is wondering why he didn’t think of it first.

via Mayor Michael Bloomberg Touts Housing Crunch | Politicker.

Oppressed landlords are finally taking a stand against discrimination

David Edenblock is trying to form a landlord liberation front (hey, I oughta register that domain!). His mission: “To change legislation in order to finally give property owners and managers the rights we deserve!”

Well, goody for him. If you’d like to join up, drop a note to change@landlordmovement.com

www.landlordmovement.com.

[7/26/2014 update: The landlordmovement.com domain has been abandoned. Presumably the landlords have given up on their efforts to portray themselves as victims and gone back to harassing tenants.]