Governor Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) recently gave his State of the State address and released his FY2020 Executive Budget, outlining his priorities for the current legislative session. New York State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR) was reappropriated $2.9 billion and allocated $174 million in new funding in the capital budget. The proposed budget also reappropriates $450 million previously allocated to the New York City Housing Authority for critical capital repairs. In his speech, Cuomo mentioned protecting labor unions by subjecting construction projects with public subsidies to prevailing wages. Cuomo also proposed:
- amending Human Rights Law to add lawful source of income as a protected class and to prohibit housing discrimination on the basis of lawful source of income.
- regulations prohibiting state-funded housing operators from automatically turning away applicants with poor credit or histories of bankruptcy. Instead, the State will require that all potential tenants and homeowners be holistically evaluated to determine the circumstances behind their credit history and their ability to pay rent on a forward-looking basis.
- requiring state-funded developers of rental housing to offer tenants the option to have their rent payments reported to credit bureaus at no cost to the tenant.
