Freeze Your Rent through the Disability Rent Increase Exemption Program

By Lynette Morrow, Volunteer Attorney, Mobilization for Justice (formerly MFY Legal Services) 

One Way for The City to Try to Prevent Homelessness and Institutionalization

Rents in New York are high. It is one of the problems that many people with disabilities face in trying to stay in their communities. However, there is potential relief. The Disability Rent Increase Exemption (DRIE, also known as the NYC Rent Freeze Program) program provides an exemption from future rent increases for some people with disabilities. People with disabilities who live in rent-controlled, rent-stabilized, Mitchell-Lama, or other eligible apartments are eligible for a DRIE if they meet certain eligibility requirements. 

In 1970, New York City (NYC) began the Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE) program. The SCRIE program offers qualifying senior citizens an exemption from future rent increases. In 2005, NYC created the DRIE program to offer the same benefit for qualifying tenants with disabilities. NYC did this to help senior citizens and people with disabilities living on fixed incomes maintain their current apartments at an affordable rate and remain in the community. 

Who is Eligible for a DRIE?
To qualify for a DRIE, you have to be at least 18 years of old and meet four eligibility requirements. First, you must be named on the lease or the rent order or have been granted succession rights in a rent controlled, rent stabilized, or rent regulated hotel apartment, or in a Mitchell-Lama development. If you live in a New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) apartment, an apartment that is partially or fully paid by a Section 8 voucher, or in a non-rent regulated apartment (such as apartments in private homes and private cooperative buildings that are not subject to rent regulation), you are not eligible. Additionally, if you live in a sublet apartment (even if the apartment is rent-regulated), you are not eligible. 

Second, you must receive either Supplemental Security Income (SSI) or Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), or a disability pension or compensation from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. You can also qualify if you receive disability-related Medicaid. 

Third, you must have a combined household income that is $50,000 or less. The DRIE program uses taxable and non-taxable income to determine eligibility. Gifts and inheritances are not included as income. Federal, State and local taxes as well as Social Security taxes are allowed as deductions in calculating income for the program. Medical expenses, Medicare premiums and capital or business losses are not allowed as deductions in calculating income. If you don’t file taxes, you can submit any documentation you have showing how you and your household members receive income such as Social Security statements, pension statements, IRA/Annuity statements (including earning statements), IRS forms 1099 and/or W2. 

Fourth, you must spend more than one-third of your monthly household income on rent. 

How does the DRIE Program Work?
DRIE is a tax credit program. NYC provides landlords with a dollar-for-dollar property tax abatement credit (TAC) that makes up the difference between the amount of rent paid by the DRIE participant and the actual legal rental amount. The Department of Finance (DOF) authorizes the TAC and transfers the credit to the building owner’s property tax account. 

How do You Apply for a DRIE?
You can download the initial application packet from the NYC website at http://www1.nyc.gov/site/rentfreeze/tools/drie-forms.page. You can also obtain the packet at the NYC DOF SCRIE/DRIE Walk-In Center at 66 John Street, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10038. The packet is also available at the NYC DOF business centers (see here for locations: http://www1.nyc.gov/site/finance/about/contact-us-by-visit.page). 
For rent stabilized tenants, you will need to provide a copy of your prior and current leases signed by you and your landlord. If you live in rent controlled housing, you must provide a Notice of Maximum Collectible Rent and the owner’s report and Certification of Fuel Cost Adjustments for the prior and current year. If you are a Mitchell-Lama resident, you must provide a copy of the Housing Preservation and Development or Division of Housing and Community Renewal Commissioner’s Orders, Capital Assessment documents and Affidavit of Household Income for the prior year. Additionally, Mitchell-Lama residents must provide a rent printout or letter from the management office specifying the start date and the amount of the most recent rent increase. 

Once you apply for a DRIE, you will receive a letter within 45 days indicating the status of your application. If your application is approved, you will receive a letter from the DOF detailing the rate of your frozen rent and the monthly amount that the DOF will credit the landlord, as well as the beginning and end date of your benefits. The DOF may request more documentation to make a decision. If your application is denied, you will be notified as to why and you have the right to appeal. If it takes a few months to approve your application, you will receive retroactive benefits from the 1st of the month in the month after your application was received. 

You should automatically receive a renewal application from the DOF approximately 60 days before your benefits end. However, you are responsible for ensuring you renew your application. In order to renew, you must submit income documents for all household members for the prior year, as well as a copy of your renewal lease signed by you and the landlord. If you do not renew timely, your landlord will continue to receive credits through the grace period (six months). If your application is not renewed, you will be responsible for paying your landlord back for the difference between the frozen rent amount and the legal rent. 

DRIE is transferable to another apartment. If you are still eligible to receive a DRIE at your new apartment, the amount of your tax abatement credit amount will transfer with you. 

DRIE is a great benefit to those who qualify. Helping people stay in their homes is one of the most cost effective and humane ways to prevent homelessness. The DRIE program allows New Yorkers who have disabilities to avoid homelessness or institutionalization in the stability and dignity of their own homes. 

Note: If you have any questions or problems with your DRIE benefits, please contact Mobilization for Justice’s Mental Health Law Project. The intake line is open Monday, Tuesday and Thursday from 10 a.m.—5 p.m. The number is 212-417-3830. You can also email the Mental Health Law Project at mhlpinfo@mfjlegal.org. 

How Much Will Government Do to Shelter the Homeless?

How Much Will Government Do to Shelter the Homeless?
By Ted Walner, Peer Advocate, Baltic Street AEH, Inc.
Plan in Discussion to Step-Up Housing Relief
Approximately 20-25% of the homeless population suffer from some form of mental illness. One can see the homeless trying to survive on the streets of New York. We pass them and feel very sad to see human beings in this condition.
There are several reasons why the mentally ill become homeless. Many of them have difficulty taking care of themselves and managing household responsibilities. They also push away friends and family that might be able to help them. Half of the mentally ill also suffer from substance abuse. They try to self-medicate and become addicted to drugs and alcohol. Their situation makes it difficult to find employment which would lead to residential stability.
Supportive housing is an effective way of combating homelessness among the mentally ill. It costs the state more than $40,000 per person in ER stays, psychiatric hospitals, shelters, and prison, whereas it costs about $17,277 per person to provide supportive housing. With housing, mental health treatment, physical care, employment, and peer support are provided. This support system helps people stay in their homes.
The government has provided a lot of programs for the homeless mentally ill. In February 2009, Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. This includes 1.5 billion dollars for homeless prevention and re-housing. In 1990, former Mayor David Dinkins and former Governor Cuomo signed the NY/NY I agreement to provide housing. Later, in 1999 and 2005, NY/NY II and III agreements were established. These programs have provided housing and social services to single adults and families.
Governor Cuomo discussed his plans to spend $20 billion over the next five years on 100,000 permanent housing units. He said that within New York state, thousands of additional units would be created that provide social services as well.
Mayor de Blasio also discussed his plans for the Fiscal Year 2017. His budget includes funding for 15,000 units of supportive housing over the next fifteen years. He is allocating funds for shelter repairs, and adding additional beds for homeless youth. He is also expanding domestic violence shelters and providing services for homeless veterans as well.
We are making progress, but there is a lot more work to be done. Hopefully, we will continue providing cost-effective solutions that are both moral and humanitarian. If we continue to provide support, perhaps one day this homelessness problem will end.

Op-Ed: Olmstead and Community Re-Integration

Op-Ed: Olmstead and Community Re-Integration

By Jeffrey V. Perry, CPRP

The Importance of Home and Community

In 2009, the Civil Rights Division launched an aggressive effort to enforce the Supreme Court's decision in Olmstead v. L.C., a ruling that requires states to eliminate unnecessary segregation of persons with disabilities and to ensure that persons with disabilities receive services in the most integrated setting appropriate to their needs. President Obama issued a proclamation launching the "Year of Community Living," and has directed the Administration to redouble enforcement efforts. The Division has responded by working with state and local government officials, disability rights groups and attorneys around the country, along with representatives of the Department of Health and Human Services, to fashion an effective nationwide program to enforce the integration mandate of the Department's regulation implementing title II of the ADA (Americans with Disabilities Act).

Just how beneficial is it for people with disabilities to return to the community in which they may have lived whether growing up, working nearby, or visiting relatives? What is the intrinsic social value? We have often heard the phrase, “You cannot go back home.” We live in a society in which individuals may return to familiar, or move into unfamiliar communities, seeking a place to call home. Despite the real estate crunch with its fluctuating rents, anyone evaluating a place to live needs to know something about the character of that particular neighborhood.

Reintegrating people with disabilities back into familiar areas is at least as important as our value of economic development or redevelopment in many cases. It is our personal connection to a place that influences our social-makeup, bearing on our behavioral and overall well-being.

Where one grew up is where they began, the place in consciousness we commonly call “home.” Home can be a nurturing and familiar place, as well as a traumatizing one. Somehow, still, we cling to our adverse experiences as if they were golden. Oftentimes, trauma is difficult to recognize, because we excuse those episodes since they represent our only valuation of “home.” But what are some of the values of returning to a familiar or biographic area? We might encounter friends, people, and places we have known before. We may rekindle old friendships and bond with former schoolmates. We will recall places that used to stand that might have fallen into disrepair or been replaced. And we will remember those who lived there and have passed on.

We share history with people, experiences, places and moments in time. No matter how traumatic or negative those memories, they mold our identity. It is this identity that drives us as human beings. Even our worst experiences, because they are familiar, we internalize as “home.” Returning to a familiar neighborhood and community may in many cases offer us a sense of safety and security, if only as a psychological effect. If you have ever been in a foreign country and someone comes up to you who speaks English, you almost feel that you have met your long lost brother. Psychologically speaking, we humans identify with what is familiar in our lives. Recalling these experiences, over time, and with therapeutic intervention, may lead us to healing, growth, progress and acceptance.

On the contrary, we may have outgrown our past, and what no longer serves us. Perhaps, we have grown unattached to our old neighborhood. Our memories, and past traumatic experiences are intimate, personal and familiar, and yet we may be naturally repelled from returning to a place. We can change our future by understanding that we do not need to return, unless for a moment of peacemaking. We can speak out to someone who will listen, reach out to our support system. Personal healing begins with understanding our past and facing our fears. It is equally important to have a good working support system that meets our medical, psychological and residential needs.

Community re-integration is always a new beginning that can best be successful when done on terms that respect a person from where they are, and meet the challenges they are open to, in order to thrive and create. Home is the place we deserve to feel safe, secure, and express ourselves freely. And, you don’t always have to “go back home” to start your life anew.

Note: Look for books by searching “Jeffrey V Perry” at www.lulu.com and at online bookstores, like Amazon.com and www.barnesandnoble.com.

Pullout: “Community re-integration is always a new beginning that can best be successful when done on terms that respect a person from where they are, and meet the challenges they are open to, in order to thrive and create.”

The Campaign for New York/New York Housing

The Campaign for New York/New York Housing
By Nora MClaughlin and Carla Rabinowitz, Community Access, Inc.
Hundreds March for Housing for New York's Most Vulnerable
Tourists and businessmen alike could not help but tune their ears to choruses of: “Governor Cuomo hear our cries! Supportive housing saves lives!” and “What do we need?” “Housing!” “When do we need it?” “Now!”
At 11:00 a.m. on Friday, June 12, 2015, over 300 individuals gathered to march outside Governor Cuomo’s Midtown office to demand 35,000 more units of supportive housing be built throughout the state of New York over the next ten years.
The Campaign for New York/New York Housing is the fourth of its kind and aims to provide permanent housing combined with support services for mental health recipients, people who are homeless and vulnerable populations of New York (e.g. domestic violence survivors, those with HIV/AIDS and at-risk youth).
Passionate members of the community attended the rally, adorned with appropriately-decorated t-shirts and posters, to peacefully motivate change throughout New York.
Along with saving the lives of thousands of New Yorkers, the implementation of the Campaign for New York/New York’s platform would also enhance property values and save tax dollars. Based on evidence from similar initiatives in the past, it is clear that real estate values increase for properties surrounding supportive housing developments. Additionally, for each new unit of supportive housing, $10,100 in taxpayer dollars is saved yearly. “Supportive housing solves homelessness, improves neighborhoods, and saves tax dollars.”
With such documented success, supportive housing seems like a clear replacement for more traditional and expensive methods of institutionalization and/or imprisonment. However, Governor Cuomo’s proposal addressing this issue calls only for 5,000 additional units of supportive housing, in comparison to the 35,000 units the campaign demands. The governor’s proposal is not nearly sufficient in a state where currently only one in every five eligible applicants can be awarded supportive housing, and where homelessness is only on the rise.
The campaign has support from a multitude of high-profile organizations. This year’s organizer, Patrick Markee of the Coalition for the Homeless, attracted representatives from his own company to attend the event, as well as individuals from Community Access, VOCAL-NY, Housing Works, and more.
Hundreds of residents of the local homeless shelters and city supportive housing units stood with the Campaign for New York/New York Housing in an effort to improve quality of life for their own communities. There is nobody more qualified to demand change than those experiencing its absence firsthand.
At around 11:30 the rally concluded with a march across the street to a public piece of sidewalk.  Participants gathered and promised to continue to fight for the passage of the Campaign for New York/New York’s platform for supportive housing. As the crowd dispersed, a sense of hope lingered.

MFY Legal Services, Inc. and Center for Court Innovation Partner to Preserve Affordable Housing in East Harlem

MFY Legal Services, Inc. and Center for Court Innovation Partner to Preserve Affordable Housing in East Harlem

By Shafaq Khan, Staff Attorney, MFY Legal Services, Inc.

MFY Legal Services, Inc.’s Mental Health Law Project provides free legal services to people with mental illness who live in New York City, including advice, brief service and full representation on a variety of civil legal issues. The project’s focus is to help people with mental illness continue to live and thrive in their communities. As a result, MFY attorneys are part of the battle to preserve affordable housing for all low-income New Yorkers.
In a recent pilot program, MFY has partnered with the Center for Court Innovation to establish a legal clinic for people with mental illness at the Harlem Community Justice Center community court in East Harlem (“HCJC”). Unlike other housing courts, HCJC is a community court aimed at preserving and empowering the East Harlem community. The court acts as a family court and housing court. It also provides community programs to reduce youth crime and improve school attendance, amongst other things.

East Harlem is undergoing rapid gentrification. Construction of market-rate housing is underway and some East Harlem landlords are targeting rent-regulated apartments. Once emptied, the landlords can rent the apartment at a higher rent. As a result, many landlords bring baseless lawsuits with the hope that tenants do not show up to court and then get default judgments of eviction against them, or pressure unrepresented tenants who do appear in court into unfavorable settlements.

Additionally, the New York City Housing Authority (“NYCHA”) has a number of East Harlem public housing projects and is in housing court as a landlord, bringing nonpayment of rent cases, often based on incorrect rent calculations. The housing court’s docket also has a number of repairs cases brought by tenants against NYCHA. For example, tenants file repairs cases if NYCHA fails to address bedbug infestations, or paints over mold rather than treat the underlying condition. These cases are important because substandard apartment conditions can exacerbate psychiatric symptoms and/or cause physical illness.

The HCJC provides targeted eviction prevention assistance through its Help Center (the “HCJC Help Center” or “Center”). All New York City housing courts have help centers for tenants. However, the HCJC Help Center is operated by the Center for Court Innovation and is slightly different from other help centers. It is staffed by a dedicated team of professionals to provide tenants with additional assistance. This additional assistance includes a center coordinator who meets with tenants and makes referrals to appropriate agencies. The Center also has a Human Resources Administration (“HRA”) representative to help eligible tenants with arrears assistance.

The idea for the legal clinic came from a realization that there was an unmet need to assist unrepresented tenants with mental illness. Some of these tenants receive services from an agency called Adult Protective Services (“APS”). APS provides social services to senior citizens and people with disabilities. When a case is referred to APS in housing court, the tenant is evaluated by APS to determine eligibility. APS sometimes recommends a guardian ad litem (“GAL”) when the tenant cannot adequately defend or protect her rights. The GAL reviews settlement agreements, appears in court, negotiates with landlords’ attorneys, and applies for grants to pay arrears.

However, the HCJC Help Center noticed that many tenants with mental illness were never referred to APS. If they were referred, they were found ineligible to receive services and the assistance of a GAL. Even for those who were eligible, a GAL is not the same thing as having an attorney. The staff at HCJC Help Center identified this gap and therefore established a legal clinic staffed by MFY attorneys.

An MFY attorney meets with tenants in the East Harlem housing court twice a month. The initiative has helped ease the stress of housing court cases on low-income tenants with disabilities by providing immediate and easy access to an attorney. A court-based attorney makes it easier for tenants to stay in communication with the attorney. A tenant can make an appointment or come by after her court date when the details are still fresh in her mind. Clients can tell family members, caseworkers or home health aides to drop off documents for MFY at the Center because it is a short walk from their home. Additionally, the MFY attorney can track landlords that target rent-regulated tenants, make NYCHA tenants aware of recent lawsuits that affect their rights, and build relationships with court personnel.

Following is a typical example of the types of cases we see. A notorious landlord brought a nonpayment of rent proceeding against Ms. N. Ms. N was struggling with depressive symptoms and never showed up to court. The landlord got a judgment and evicted her family. She requested emergency relief from the court and got a two-week extension to pay the arrears in order to be restored to the apartment, during which time the landlord was prohibited from renting out Ms. N’s apartment. The short timeframe was overwhelming, especially since Ms. N and her three children were in a shelter and it would be difficult for her to negotiate the various bureaucracies necessary to obtain the back rent. She was terrified she would not regain the apartment her family had lived in for twenty years.

Ms. N, a NYCHA Section 8 recipient, had tried to apply for a grant from HRA to pay the arrears. To qualify, she had to show she could afford the rent. The problem was that she received a NYCHA termination notice because she had not renewed her Section 8 voucher. HRA told Ms. N that they would not give her a grant because she could not afford the rent without a valid Section 8 voucher.

MFY took the case and reviewed Ms. N’s notices from NYCHA. Her Section 8 voucher was still valid because of a grace period. We provided proof of the valid voucher and her income and applied for an HRA grant. With our advocacy, HRA processed and approved her grant in one business day. We also helped Ms. N renew her Section 8 voucher. Ms. N and her family safely returned to their home.

As the initiative progresses, MFY will continue to represent tenants with mental illness to maintain their housing, get repairs in their apartments, provide community trainings about relevant issues and work with the HCJC Help Center to empower tenants with mental illness so they may remain in their community.

Note: The MFY legal clinic is for tenants with a mental illness who have housing court cases in Harlem Community Justice Center. This housing court serves tenants who reside in apartments located in 10035 and 10037, all tenants from NYCHA Projects located in 10029, and tenants from NYCHA's rehab projects located in 10026. The Help Center should be able to schedule appointments for legal clinic or the tenant can drop by the Help Center in the courthouse to set up an appointment. The Help Center phone number is 212-360-8752.

Pullout: “The initiative has helped...by providing immediate and easy access to an attorney...[who] can track landlords that target rent-regulated tenants, make NYCHA tenants aware of recent lawsuits that affect their rights, and build relationships with court personnel.”