Ken Fisher discusses New York City’s approach to real estate development in relation to the housing crisis in THE CITY. Mayor Eric Adams has convened a Charter Revision Commission to refine the city’s land use processes, aiming to ease the lengthy review process that can increase construction costs significantly. The commission is tasked with producing proposals for voters to consider on Election Day and will host public hearings and explore ways to speed up housing development. This work aligns with Adams’ City of Yes rezoning agenda, which also seeks to facilitate housing construction.

Many believe that amending the charter to target the land use process will not make a difference in the rate of housing approvals. Ken noted that it can take one to three years for the Department of City Planning to deem a land use application complete, which must happen before the public review period begins and requires navigating multiple agencies. “No single change to the charter is going to completely eliminate the bottlenecks, but most of the bottlenecks are a function of the will of the administration and the amount of resources that the administration is prepared to put into the process, and the willingness of City Hall to push the agencies, which all suffered devastating blows during COVID,” Ken said. “They’re still struggling to fill all the vacancies.”

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