When Myra Santana moved into the MetroNorth apartment complex in East Harlem more than a decade ago, she never wanted to leave. For years, Myra had struggled to find a place of her own. After being kicked out of her house as a teenager and living on the streets and in shelters, renting an apartment that she, her two children and three birds could call home was no small accomplishment.

Tenants association president Alicia Barksdale advocates for low-income residents. Photo courtesy of Alicia Barksdale

Santana, who receives welfare and Section 8 funding to subsidize her rent, claimed that since MetroNorth transitioned from the Mitchell-Lama program to private ownership under Urban American Management, home hasn’t been the same. She alleged that she was asked to pay rent she’s not responsible for and struggled to get repairs in her apartment, even going to housing court to demand improvements. According to Santana, this is harassment aimed at pushing Section 8 tenants out of MetroNorth, located on First Avenue between 101st and 102nd Streets.

Urban American Chief Operating Officer Douglas Eisenberg denied the allegations in a statement and said that the company is committed to affordable housing.

“While we are by no means perfect, we take all complaints seriously and we respond quickly and as efficiently as we can to our residents’ concerns,” he said.

Santana, however, described a vastly different situation.

“I have to beg for my home to be kept and maintained in good condition. Why should I have to go through that?” she said.

Tenants like Myra Santana, who use Section 8 vouchers to remain in former Mitchell-Lama buildings, are on the ground floor of an affordable housing upheaval. When private investors buy these buildings, new tenants move in and pay market rate rents on renovated units formerly preserved for low-to moderate-income tenants. Disparities in conditions between market rate and Section 8 units, and the alleged mistreatment of Section 8 tenants, have led to claims of harassment. Yet this is only one piece of the housing puzzle. As Mitchell-Lama buildings transition to private ownership, the long-term effects on affordable housing – and on residents like Santana – are unknown.

Mitchell-Lama Housing in East Harlem

MetroNorth, the Upper Park Avenue Community Association, or UPACA, buildings 1 and 2, and The Heritage, formerly Schomberg Plaza, are East Harlem complexes once part of Mitchell-Lama, a city program providing affordable housing to moderate-income families. According to Citizens Housing and Planning Council, a nonprofit research organization dedicated to improving housing conditions, when Mitchell-Lama began as co-operative housing in 1955, there was no incentive for private investors to enter into the program. To attract investors, the laws were re-jiggered a few years later to add rental units in addition to co-ops; landlords could eventually opt out of the program and turn a profit.

“You wouldn’t have had all this housing if they didn’t have incentives,” said Harold Shultz, a senior fellow from the housing and planning council.

The housing remained affordable under the Mitchell-Lama program until 2005, when developer Jerome Belson purchased the three East Harlem properties and two additional Mitchell-Lama buildings for $295 million, according to a 2007 report compiled by the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board and Tenants & Neighbors. Two years later, the five properties were sold to the Urban American Management Corporation for $918 million.

In 2005, rents increased to market rates, and many residents could no longer afford their housing. To prevent them from being displaced, the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development made tenants earning up to 95 percent of the area median income eligible for subsidies known as enhanced Section 8 vouchers.

The Section 8 Voucher Program is federally subsidized and supplements what tenants can afford to pay, thereby allowing them to live in privately owned rental housing of their choice. Tenants pay 30 percent of their income or what they paid under Mitchell-Lama; vouchers cover the rest.

Currently, HPD subsidizes 1,785 families within four of the five Urban American properties. The New York City Housing Authority also subsidizes an additional 943 households in East Harlem through the Section 8 Voucher Program, according to the agency’s research director, Anne-Marie Flately.

Yet Section 8 vouchers designed to prevent tenant displacement can’t guarantee security. According to Tenants & Neighbors, an organization dedicated to the preservation of affordable housing, Urban American indebted itself when it purchased the properties, putting tenants at risk.

“They’ve been severely overleveraged. That means the model calls for one or two things concurrently. One, to get in as many market rate tenants as possible, and two, to skimp on repairs. If you buy something where the cost can’t be covered by the rent, what are you going to do?” said Dave Powell, advocacy director at Tenants & Neighbors.

Eisenberg, the COO of Urban American, said in an email, “The suggestion that our finances are in bad shape is false. Our company is healthy, we never take on debt beyond our means and we are continuing to invest in these properties.”

Alleged Harassment

Residents at MetroNorth and 3333 Broadway, another Urban American property, alleged that getting anything fixed – from basic repairs to replacing deteriorating floors and cabinets – required continual prodding from tenants.

Alicia Barksdale, president of the 3333 Broadway Tenants Association and a longtime resident, cited discrepancies between renovated apartments rented at market value and Section 8 units – such as wood floors and new appliances compared with tile floors and older fixtures – as a form of discrimination.

“Because we’re Section 8, they feel we don’t deserve upgrades,” she said.

Barksdale also said that management put money toward improving the appearance of the buildings while ignoring issues within units.

According to Eisenberg, the changes went far beyond cosmetics. Urban American has made tens of millions of dollars in improvements to elevators, plumbing and security systems since it purchased the properties two years ago, and improved the quality of life for residents.

The City Council passed the Tenant Protection Act in 2008 to protect tenants from prolonged harassment. The legislation “creates a violation for harassment in and of itself, providing a new layer of protection for renters in New York City,” according to a March 2008 news release from the office of City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn. Yet according to Powell, the legislation’s effectiveness was mitigated by challenges to the statutes from landlords.

“The Tenant Protection Act’s potential has not been realized,” he said.

Affordable Housing Today: Losses and Gains

As affordable housing dwindles, many residents fear that losing their apartments will force them to leave their neighborhood.

More than 65,000 units of Mitchell-Lama housing were lost throughout the city, according to Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stinger’s Web site. New affordable housing is being created, but slowly. On Nov. 4, the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal announced that $7.75 million in federal stimulus funding is slated for the East Harlem Media, Entertainment and Cultural Center. The center will provide 49 units to low-income individuals and people with physical disabilities.

Around 2,000 vacant housing units are available in East Harlem based on 2007 American Community Survey data. MetroNorth contains 103 apartments available for rent, according to an annual report from the Mitchell-Lama Housing Corporation.

What is considered affordable and how many such units are available are often vaguely defined. “There’s no such thing as affordable housing, there’s housing affordable to people at specific incomes,” said Shultz.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Income Limits set the affordability benchmark. “Low income” is considered $61,450 per year for a family of four in Manhattan. Yet low-income housing is not monolithic. For a family of four, “very low income” slightly exceeds $38,000 a year. The median family income in East Harlem is $34,700, according to the 2007 American Community Survey. At $1,250 and $1,525 a month for MetroNorth studios and one-bedrooms, respectively, units are unattainable for many longtime residents.

Availability isn’t the only issue. While current tenants can stay where they’re at, buildings hesitate to accept new Section 8 tenants.

“The larger problem is that voucher goes with them and the unit becomes market rate,” said UPACA Tenants Association President Alvin Johnson.

Yet Shultz suggested that vouchers are a viable solution. Referring to Section 8 tenants, he said, “Despite claims of harassment, they are more protected than most tenants are and substantially less vulnerable.”

Solutions

“It’s time that we stop treating housing for low-income communities as a tradable commodity for the benefit of people who own and start treating it as a basic right,” said Diego Quinones, an advocate against gentrification in East Harlem.

Some advocates suggested returning the buildings retroactively to Mitchell-Lama. A proposed housing bill in the state Senate named for Democratic Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, whose district covers Greenburgh, Mount Pleasant and Yonkers, would put all former Mitchell-Lama buildings into rent stabilization.

Yet Shultz cautioned that if housing were made affordable indefinitely, the city could end up with less money and fewer units.

“Is that a trade-off you’re willing to make? I’m not even sure what the right answer is. If I predicted what New York City would need in housing today 30 years ago, I would’ve gotten it completely wrong.”

For now, Myra Santana remains in her apartment, where she hopes to stay.

The answer to the housing difficulties, according to the tenant association’s Barksdale is plain and simple.

“Fix the place. Treat us equally.”