October 28, 2025
Affordable Housing Is at Stake in the NYC Election, but Advocates Can’t Agree on How
By Nic Wong
While half of the proposals on this year’s ballot deal with housing, elected officials and organizers in New York City are divided on their effectiveness.
When Astoria resident Kasey McNaughton broke her leg last summer, her immediate worry was the medical bills. “This is an emergency that I didn’t plan for,” said McNaughton. Because of the additional costs, she wasn’t sure if she would be able to pay her rent for the month. “My rent is going up. My neighbor’s rent is going up, and even modest increases or minimal increases are hurting people really bad,” said McNaughton, a tenant organizer for the Youth Alliance for Housing, which fights for “a world where housing is decommodified, houselessness does not exist, and everyone is guaranteed a safe, quality, and permanently affordable home.”
In New York City, rents are higher than ever, even as vacancy rates plummet. While housing insecurity extends citywide, students and youth are often at the forefront, as a record high of 154,000 students in New York City have experienced homelessness within the past school year. Almost 10 percent of all rental housing is considered overcrowded, and existing developments like NYCHA have suffered catastrophic damage from continued disrepair.
This November, the future of affordable housing is at stake in New York City—and not just in the mayoral race. (Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee with a double-digit lead, has made affordability and a rent freeze for stabilized tenants the focus of his campaign.) Of the six proposals on the ballot, half of them tackle affordable housing. If passed, Proposals 2, 3, and 4 would amend the state Constitution and city charter to fast-track applications for affordable housing developments, simplify review of housing projects, and establish an affordable housing appeals board.
But affordable housing advocates and elected officials across the city are divided on the effectiveness of the proposed amendments.
