New York City’s public housing authority has turned thousands of apartments over to private management. While PACT may currently be the most effective way to fund renovations quickly, many tenants are still not sold on the program, citing eviction threats and higher costs.
This story was originally published by the Centro de Periodismo Investigativo.
Lydia Díaz was living in a dilapidated New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) apartment in 2021 when she got the news. Her building, part of the Harlem River Houses, would be the latest handed to private developers as part of the Permanent Affordability Commitment Together (PACT) program. The conversion would bring millions of dollars for renovations, but also make her a Section 8 tenant of a new private landlord.
Upset that they were denied a voice in the decision to join PACT and worried they would lose rights in exchange for poor-quality repairs, Díaz and other tenants sued to stop it. But it was too late. The new companies took over, remodeled the buildings, and started managing them as they saw fit, all without the outside oversight that existed under full public control…