New York, NY – Officials Look to Turn Up Heat on Landlords

New York, NY – Elected officials plan this week to redouble efforts to toughen penalties on landlords who violate city heat laws, breaking the economic incentive for building owners to withhold heat and hot water from tenants.

Officials confirmed Tuesday that the measure—targeting repeat and long-time offenders—has the backing of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, giving the chances of passage a boost.

More than 114,000 New Yorkers filed complaints with the city about a lack of heat or hot water during the fiscal year that ended June 30. Such complaints have fluctuated between about 111,000 and 128,000 in recent years.

Those numbers, based on data provided by the city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development, are conservative because the agency records complaints by building. Heat and hot-water complaint calls to 311, which logs every call as an individual complaint, are much higher, totaling upwards of 175,000 a year.

The complaints generally come from the poorer areas of New York City. This past year, for example, residents who live in the area represented by Bronx Community Board 7, covering the Fordham, Bedford Park and Norwood neighborhoods, filed 5,405 complaints, the most of any swath of the city.

“That we have over 100,000 incidences where heat and hot water was not provided to New Yorkers is unacceptable,” Public Advocate Bill de Blasio said.

“There no excuse for a landlord not providing heat, and there’s particularly no excuse when it’s being done for economic reasons,” he said.

Fifteen council members joined Mr. de Blasio, the lead sponsor, in backing a bill that would increase penalties against landlords who are repeat offenders.

Currently, the law allows for a maximum fine of $500 per day for a first violation and a maximum fine of $1,000 per day for subsequent violations at the same location within the same calendar year.

The legislation aims to extend the period during which subsequent violations are subject to the higher fine to two years, rather than one year stipulated in current law.

In 2004, Mr. Bloomberg signed legislation increasing penalties, the first such increase in more than 20 years.

“If it costs you more to violate the law, hopefully that will be a motivating factor to resolve problems sooner rather than later,” said state Sen. Liz Krueger, a Manhattan Democrat, who is also examining possible changes to state law to address the problem.

“We’re not talking about landlords where a building hits a real problem and they are doing all within their power to fix the problem,” Ms. Krueger said. “This is basically about landlords who feel that as a business model it’s to their advantage not to worry about having functional heat and hot water.”

Jesenia Oquendo, a 29-year-old cook who lives with her three children on East 163rd St. in the Bronx, said she has been complaining about the lack of heat in her apartment for years. Her children are sleeping under four blankets and they’re still cold, she said.

“It’s ridiculous that anybody has to live in the conditions I’m living in,” Ms. Oquendo said. “Last year, the whole winter my kids were sick in and out. It’s because of the apartment.”

A representative from Ms. Oquendo’s landlord, Knickerbocker Management, did not return a request for comment.

Heat and hot water complaints were highest in Brooklyn and the Bronx, with the number of complaints in Brooklyn nearly doubling those in Manhattan.

Council Member Brad Lander, a Brooklyn Democrat and co-sponsor of the bill, said landlords who repeatedly violate the law “should be required to pay higher fines, regardless of whether their repeat offenses are in December or January.”

Judith Goldiner, a supervising attorney at the Legal Aid Society, a not-for-profit, said she would prefer the legislation increased fines further because landlords, she said, respond to “money issues more than anything else.”

“I always want things to be stiffer because we always want it to be more likely that a landlord will provide heat,” she said.

According to city law, between Oct. 1 and May 31, the period designated as the “heat season,” building owners are required to keep an indoor temperature of at least 68 degrees Fahrenheit between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. when the outdoor temperature falls below 55 degrees. Between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m. owners must maintain an indoor temperature of 55 degrees when the outside temperature falls below 40 degrees.

The number of heat and hot water violations issued by the city has ranged from about 9,800 to nearly 16,000 per year. In some cases, where the landlord fails to make an immediate repair, the city may use in-house staff and private contractors to make the necessary repairs. Last year, for example, the city spent nearly $5.4 million on these repairs.