New HPD Commissioner Announced
Mayor Michael Bloomberg appointed Rafael Cestero as the new Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD). Cestero, the agency’s former deputy commissioner, will resume the post March 16 to fill the position vacated by Shaun Donovan, who was named President Barack Obama’s Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Donovan has had held the position since 2004, during which he led the largest public affordable housing program in the complicated real estate environment of New York City and led efforts to aid victims of subprime lending.
Cestero is currently senior vice president and chief program officer at Enterprise Community Partners, an investor in affordable housing projects.
Expectations run high for both men. Donovan inherits the job of cleaning up the national housing crisis and leading the HUD to play a more prominent role in the new administration. Cestero will face the challenge of running a City agency on an ever-tightening budget while at the same time managing issues such as failing elevators and other persistent maintenance problems in low-income projects.
Quinn Urges City to Look Beyond Finance
In her State of the City speech on Friday, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said the collapse of Wall Street should serve as a wake up call that the city needs to diversify.
“It’s as though we’re finally waking up from a long, Wall Street induced slumber,” Quinn said. “There was so much money coming in from the financial boom, we didn’t really have to look any farther. But now, we’re being forced to look closer at what we do have and find creative ways to make it go further.”
Quinn went on to suggest a variety of money-making possibilities, including boosting small business and tapping under utilized natural resources.
To make it easier for entrepreneurs to start up their businesses, Quinn said the City should consolidate the many permit applications and inspections into one.
To revive the local food manufacturing industry, Quinn suggested founding a shared kitchen for new manufacturers. That way, each manufacturer can reduce their startup costs.
Also on Quinn’s wish list is a biotech tax credit that would make it more attractive for biotech companies to settle in New York, setting up .nyc Web domains and selling them, and eliminating income taxes for families making less than $45,000 a year.
Instead, she hopes to increase taxes on families making over $300,000, an idea that received opposition from Mayor Bloomberg, who said that the increase would prompt wealthy people to relocate.
Council Approves Water Tank Inspections and More
Last week, the City Council passed a bill that will make public the results of mandatory water tank inspections. According to the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, the city’s 12,000 water-holding tanks are subject to annual inspection, but records are never made public. The new ordinance will require inspectors to submit inspection results to the City Council and the DOH, as well as to post notices of inspection on the tanks themselves.
In another vote, the Council made it mandatory for the city’s 40,000 for-hire cars to post a Passenger’s Bill of Rights in the backseat. Currently, only the yellow cabs are required to do so.
Lastly, in preparation for summer and fall street fairs, the City made it law for street fair vendors to recycle. While most already do, those who don’t will face fines up to $100 per day.
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