Tonight is the debate between mayoral candidates Joe Ferris (Democrat) and Lloyd Koedding (Republican and "Harmony Party"), which takes place at 6:30 p.m. in the Hudson High School auditorium, 215 Harry Howard Avenue. The debate will be moderated by Register-Star editor Mary Dempsey. The event will be livestreamed and can be viewed remotely by clicking here.
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| Photo: Shawn Ness | Register-Star |
Meanwhile, the Register-Star reports that Johnson testified yesterday at a public hearing held by the New York State Assembly's Housing Committee in support of the Rent Emergency Stabilization for Tenants (REST) Act: "Hudson Mayor Johnson testifies for rent control before state Assembly committee."
The article indicates Johnson was invited to testify by the committee's leaders. (The committee is chaired by Linda Rosenthal, who represents the 67th Assembly District, which is the Upper West Side of Manhattan.) The following is quoted from the article:
Passage of the [REST Act] would allow Hudson's government to create a committee to regulate rents. Without its passage, it would be nearly impossible because of the current vacancy rate and unit minimum restrictions, Johnson said Tuesday. A vacancy study by the city would be expensive, and even if completed the city may not meet all the requirements to opt in to the state's rent control program, he added.
However, he said if the act does pass, rent control in Hudson could become a reality.
In May, the Hudson Common Council passed a resolution in support of the REST Act. The resolution passed with nine affirmative votes. Margaret Morris (First Ward) and Rich Volo (Fourth Ward) abstained.
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Private property rights remain dominant in America.
ReplyDeleteOnly in a few blue cities like New York and San Francisco do rent controls persist, constantly challenged in court and visibly failing in practice, even if allowed.
Those cities are textbook cases of broken housing markets: low supply, high prices, and chronic underinvestment.
The prescribed cure (coercing private owners) harms the patient (apartment seeking renters).
You cannot coerce private owners forever. "Emergencies" cannot be used forever as an excuse. Attempts to do so drive capital away and breed resentment.
Rent control is a denial of economics and history.
It often forces landlords to lease at a loss, or at rate that limits capital improvements, and locks up space inefficiently, like grandmothers holding onto four-bedroom flats long after their families move out. See Hudson's subsidized housing.
This is one of the reasons why Kamal, Quintin Cross, and Claire Cousins found themselves pushed out of the more pragmatic wing of the local Democratic Party.
Kamal, rather than trying to legislate your way into a cheaper apartment on Union Street, just get a real job.
The U.S. economy is booming, unemployment is among the lowest in the world, and work delivers dignity, respect, and independence.
In the end, private investment capital will simply flee to markets where it can earn the highest return.
If we want more affordable housing we should attract all developers, cut red tape, and stop vilifying anyone that was not born in Columbia Memorial Hospital.
Attracting developers to convert our parks and greenspace into crummy, low end apartments that will be filled with people imported from Albany or Newburg isn't going to do anything to lower the inflated cost of Hudson rents. The result will be the degradation of the local environment with more people, traffic and cars. The sanctity of private property argument also doesn't hold much water, no one really owns anything here, you rent the privilege from the City with your taxes, stop paying them and see what happens. Greed is the motivator behind the inflated housing costs and no one will lower rents voluntarily. Rent regulation is what's needed, including mandatory price caps and reductions. Maybe some of these investors and landlords sucking the life blood out of workers like leeches are the ones who need to get a real job.
DeleteWho said anything about turning "greenspace and parks" into apartments?
DeleteLast we checked Kamal tried to flip the park next to Mill Street into a subsidized housing building for non-residents.
re: "no one really owns anything here, you rent the privilege from the City with your taxes, stop paying them and see what happens. "
Welcome to the classical liberal and lower the taxes team. ;-)
re: "Maybe some of these investors and landlords sucking the life blood out of workers like leeches are the ones who need to get a real job."
How do you think the owners earned the money to buy the property in the first place? Are you calling 1/3 of the common council and the supervisors and our county judge a leech?
On the point of government controlling private markets and coercing private residents... how about this:
Would you want the government (let's say non art expert government employees) to decide what you can charge for your art?
After all... doesn't everyone "deserve" nice art from SlowArt? Isn't Art a human right?
Regardless of your material costs and time input... why don't you price all your art at the same price and sell them to people regardless of their utilization and preference for the art?
Or how about this... do you think your building on Warren St was built by the government? Would it still exist today if the City of Hudson government mandated the exact rent a 100 years ago.
More crudely... why don't you book a flight right now to North Korea, or Venezuela or Cuba ... And see for yourself what happens when government sets the price of goods and services and not the market.
Tim, housing prices in Hudson aren’t inflated. They are the market rate for housing in a seriously small municipal footprint. Supply. Demand. You’ve heard of them, right?
DeleteIf there are fewer apartments available in Hudson, at ever increasing asks, at least some of that is due to the spectacularly ill-advised Good Cause Eviction Law the city council so stupidly passed a number of years ago. Government’s track record when it injects its “expertise” in to markets is universally bad. Look at NYC. Look at Moscow. Look at Hudson.
If you and the mayor believe rent control is going to solve anything then you both need to take remedial economics 101 (macro economics). And you both need to stay as far from government as possible for your own and everyone else’s sakes. Not to mention the city’s property tax base.