War of Words Rages Over Affordable Housing in Westchester

Is Westchester County becoming the next Selma, Alabama? The battle over the affordable housing settlement is intensifying here and there have been fighting words from all quarters during the past few weeks. The Reverend Al Sharpton even visited White Plains and threatened that civil rights groups will get involved if the county fails to honor the agreement to build 750 units of affordable housing and dismantle exclusionary zoning laws.

In April, the Anti-Discrimination Center (ADC), which brought the original lawsuit against the county in 2006, issued a lengthy and angry report attacking Westchester County for non-compliance as well as HUD and Federal Monitor James Johnson for failing to enforce the terms of the agreement. The report, which is titled, "Cheating on Every Level: Anatomy of the Demise of a Civil Right Consent Decree," charges Westchester with failing to live up to the terms of the agreement and refusing to litigate to force local municipalities to amend restrictive zoning practices that bar multi-family housing in areas zoned for single-family homes. It claims that the affordable units that have been built are in "isolated and otherwise undesirable sites" and furthermore that the County Executive has "cheated" when counting these affordable units.

The report specifically singles out Scarsdale, which Johnson did not name as an exclusionary municipality, despite the report's claim that, "Scarsdale only has 0.26 percent of residential land zoned for multi-family use. The undeveloped land that is zoned multi- family is only 0 percent of the village's total acreage--there is no such land. Scarsdale's ability to meet future need for affordable housing is a total of zero units."

The ADC urged the court to hold Westchester in contempt and demand "full compliance." In response to the report, Judge Denise Cote, who is overseeing the settlement, called a conference on Friday May 2 and reaffirmed her confidence in Federal Monitor James Johnson, advising him to continue to work with the county to comply with the settlement.

HUD continues to punish the county for non-compliance and is now threatening to further their sanctions against Westchester by reallocating an additional $5.2 million in community development block grants (CDBG) from 2012 to punish Westchester for failing to issue an acceptable report on impediments to fair housing. This $5.2 million loss is in addition to the $7 million the county already lost in funds allocated in 2011.

In his State of the County message on May 1, County Executive Astorino proposed to replace the lost CDBG funds with $5 million in county funds for neighborhood revitalization, sidewalk improvement and affordable housing. Astorino claims that the program would cost each Westchester household only $1 a year. About the settlement, Astorino boasts that the "progress is phenomenal" on building 750 units of affordable housing. He says, "To date all 31 communities in the settlement have identified potential projects, 403 units have financing in place, 385 units have building permits, and 175 units are already occupied. Two facts are irrefutable. Westchester is ahead of schedule in meeting its obligations to have 750 units of affordable housing built in the settlement's 31 communities, and that progress would not be possible if the local zoning in those communities did not allow it."

The settlement has now become a key issue in the campaign for NYS Governor where Astorino is vying to unseat Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo. The Governor has produced television ads charging Astorino with "repeatedly violating federal anti-discrimination laws for years, saying Astorino " is the only county executive in the nation that refuses to comply... (losing) $10 million in penalties for civil rights violations." He too attempts to equate Westchester with the fight for equal rights in the South, saying, "Die hard resistance to civil rights didn't work out in the South half a century ago and it won't work out now." It ends by saying, "Rob Astorino, so far right, he's wrong."

Astorino fired back with his own video, in which he chides Cuomo for calling him "racist," and says, "How dare you throw out the race card when you know it doesn't apply. Have you no shame?" Referring to Cuomo's home in Chappaqua he says, "You live in one of the neighborhoods the federal government is attacking. If you knew this, why did you move there?"

Five years after the settlement was signed, parties appear to be moving farther apart rather than closer together on an agreement to comply with the terms. County Executive Rob Astorino has taken a defensive posture and is protecting local zoning laws, which some argue that neither he nor the County Board of Legislature has the power to change. On the other hand, the Anti-Discrimination Center contends that the affordable housing units that have already been built on the scarce available land in Westchester does not qualify with the terms of the agreement. They cite 46 units built in Larchmont for being too close to I-95 and to New Rochelle where there are already a high percentage of minorities. About 83 units in Cortlandt, they say they are too close to a Veterans Administration psychiatric and substance abuse facility, a major road and the railroad tracks. And in Rye, according to the ADC, the 18 units are too close to I-95 and I-287, separated from the city and abutting Port Chester which again is heavily populated by Latinos. It should be noted, that one of the terms of the settlement is that the housing be built near public transportation, yet the ADC is citing Westchester for building units too close to the railroad tracks.

The ADC is also complaining that the failure to enforce the decree has effects beyond the 750 units of housing. According to the report, "the units built were supposed to do more than provide housing for slightly more than 100 families a year. They were supposed to act as catalysts that would spur future development by private developers. The way that would have worked would have been for the units to be sited on parcels that required a town or village to relax a zoning barrier, including the barrier created by single-family zoning. Once the zoning barrier had been relaxed, two things would have occurred. First, existing residents would have learned that the sky did not fall: affordable housing can be placed in the midst of an existing single-family neighborhood and co-exist harmoniously. Second, the consent decree housing would have done the heavy lifting of removing a zoning barrier, so the private developers would have been able to follow along with the easier task of constructing affordable housing with desegregation potential under a reformed zoning regime."

It is puzzling why the ADC continues to lay the blame for the lack of affordable housing in Westchester on racial discrimination when it's clearly a matter of economics. Perhaps that's the reason that after multiple studies the County was not able to produce an acceptable analysis of impediments to fair housing. Where does the ADC expect units to be built at a cost of $68,000 each, even if local zoning codes were changed? There is little open space and what remains may be too close to roadways or the rails for their liking. It doesn't take a demographer to see that Southern Westchester County is already densely populated, overbuilt and very pricey.

Furthermore, the numbers show that Westchester does not need to be "desegregated." The county is racially and ethnically diverse and the ADC's own report says that Greenburgh, New Rochelle, Port Chester and White Plains are just a few of the many communities where the housing inventory includes options at all price levels resulting in economically diverse communities. In fact, the 2010 census showed that Westchester is the fourth most racially diverse county in the state, behind Brooklyn, Queens and the Bronx and tied with Manhattan.

How will this impasse end? It's difficult to predict. But with Astorino in the race for Governor of one of the most prominent states in the nation one thing is for sure... neither the issue nor the rhetoric is not going away anytime soon.