Eric Adams on how to end America’s housing crisis

GROWING UP in New York City, I carried a trash bag to school filled with my clothes because my mother worried that the locks on our home would be changed and we’d be forced onto the streets without warning. Housing insecurity is a global crisis that transcends national wealth or geography. Today, millions of children and families face housing insecurity, just like I did. Research shows that stable housing is crucial to health, education, employment and intergenerational prosperity.

Housing insecurity isn’t just a big-city problem. America has a housing shortage of at least 3.8m units, which has sent rents and purchase prices soaring, far outstripping wage growth. This housing crisis affects us all—from people experiencing homelessness, to young adults who can’t afford to move out of their parents’ homes, to families crowding into too-small apartments.

Although many factors contribute to the problem, at its core we have a housing crisis because we are not building enough housing. The reason for that is simple: for generations, well-housed people across the country have fought efforts to build more homes in their neighbourhoods. It is time to shift the narrative—and say “yes” to new housing instead. That starts with first acknowledging how we got here.

Racism made us say no. Redlining housing policies discriminated against black and brown families, in effect excluding them from a pathway to prosperity. Practices like density caps, and bureaucratic and regulatory barriers, prevented the construction of high-density housing in suburban and urban neighbourhoods, and are part of that legacy of classism and racism.

Bureaucracy and inertia made us say no. In New York City, the process for changing our zoning rules has devolved into a byzantine ordeal that can take years to complete and adds millions in costs to new developments.

Finally, political and cultural rhetoric made us say no. Small but vocal groups block any new construction, saying “not in my backyard” (NIMBY) each time someone proposes a new investment that would benefit those in need. There are some—on both sides of the political spectrum—who choose politics over people.

In New York City, we recently saw a small group of homeowners try to block a relatively modest plan to build 350 apartments in the Bronx, including affordable homes for pensioners and veterans. Community meetings turned into shouting matches full of racially charged language. Threats were made against local elected officials.

In May 2022, a plan to build more than 900 new apartments in Harlem was withdrawn after local opposition meant there were not enough votes to approve a required zoning change. Instead of providing affordable homes for hundreds of families, the site is now slated to be converted into a truck depot.

Since I took office, we have been charting a new course. We’re becoming a City of Yes—yes in my backyard (YIMBY), yes on my block, yes in my neighbourhood.

We’re proposing dozens of alterations to our citywide zoning rules to make it easier to build new homes that will support families of different economic means and right the racist wrongs of the past. We’re using new technologies and innovative processes to speed approvals of new development by government agencies. And we’re trying to amend the political process by which bigger projects are approved so that the entire city, and not just a small number of anti-development residents, has a voice in the decisions that determine whether a large swathe of New Yorkers can continue to live in the city they call home.

We’re bolstering those changes with $22bn of public investment in housing over the next decade—the largest in city history. And we’re accelerating construction of housing for individuals and families experiencing homelessness.

We’re not alone. In Boston, Mayor Michelle Wu recently signed an executive order speeding up the construction of new housing. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom and the state legislature now require every county in the state to take responsibility for more housing production. And we’re looking forward to working with our state legislature to spur more construction across our region.

But these efforts will only work if we all stand together. Voices saying no have always been the loudest—and they need to be answered with a chorus of yes, so we can overcome NIMBYism with YIMBYism. The housing crisis affects us all. We must work together to solve it.■