It could be the city’s last resort.
Democratic mayoral candidate Eric Adams on Monday fleshed out his plan to attack New York’s housing crisis, outlining a blueprint that would convert distressed outer-borough hotels into some 25,000 rooms of supportive housing.
Adams said the proposal — a central plank in his platform — would take advantage of the city’s hollowed-out hospitality industry.
Standing outside the boarded-up Phoenix Hotel in Brooklyn’s Sunset Park neighborhood, he called it “one solution that solves a multitude of problems.”
“The combination of COVID-19, the economic downturn and the problems we’re having with housing is presenting us with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,” said Adams, currently the Brooklyn borough president.
As of the end of August, around 160 hotels across the city were closed, according to the Hotel Association of New York City. Vijay Dandapani, the president of the trade association, said his group estimates about 50 hotels have been permanently sunk in the pandemic.
Adams aims to finance the housing conversion project through municipal bonds and state and federal dollars, according to his campaign, and to pair the investments with streamlined zoning codes.
He said he’s focused on the outer boroughs because they are littered with hotels that once served homeless people, and because Manhattan hotels figure to bounce back faster from the coronavirus crisis.
Even as he laid out his housing plan for the city, Adams was again under the microscope over his own home.
The City news outlet reported Sunday that Adams, who owns property in Bedford-Stuyvesant and shares a co-op with his partner in Fort Lee, N.J., had not responded to an illegal conversion complaint from the Department of Buildings at his Brooklyn residence.
Tax documents released after the Democratic primary also indicated Adams reported living zero days at the home, according to The City.
Adams said Monday that his tax preparer had made an error on the documents, and that the accountant has struggled with homelessness. He said he was not “going to throw him away when he was down on his luck.”
Adams faced intense scrutiny about where he was living during the Democratic race.
He said he sleeps in a basement unit at the red-brick Brooklyn residence, but he’s acknowledged often staying overnight at his Brooklyn Borough Hall office. In June, he gave reporters a tour of the Bedford-Stuyvesant apartment to allay residency questions.
On Monday, he promised to contact the Department of Buildings about the reported complaint.
“I’m looking forward to resolving the issue,” he said. “That’s important for me to do.”