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Process
By Which the Rent Guidelines Board
Determines The Guidelines
How
To Communicate Your Views
Meetings
Hearings
Voting Meetings
How to Obtain Meetings/Hearings
Schedule
Final Orders and Explanatory Statements
Each
year, the NYC Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) establishes the lease guidelines
for rent stabilized apartments and hotels. The RGB typically votes on the guidelines each June (See Meetings page for exact date). Those guidelines then apply to leases with effective dates between October 1 of that year and September 30 of the following year. The Rent Stabilization Law (RSL) sets
forth the factors that must be considered by the Board prior to the adoption of rent guidelines. These include:
- the economic
condition of the residential real estate industry in N.Y.C. including such
factors as the prevailing and projected (i) real estate taxes and sewer
and water rates, (ii) gross operating maintenance costs (including insurance
rates, governmental fees, cost of fuel and labor costs), (iii) costs and
availability of financing (including effective rates of interest), (iv)
over-all supply of housing accommodations and over-all vacancy rates,
- relevant data
from the current and projected cost of living indices for the affected
area, and
- such other
data as may be made available to it.
How
To Communicate Your Views
Members
of the public are invited to attend meetings and hearings held by the RGB.
Those wishing to do so may communicate their views to the RGB via two methods:
- Testify at
Hearings (details below)(Please note, however,
that the public cannot address the Board at meetings.)
- Submit written
testimony: You may submit your views in writing by addressing
them to the Chair, or any Board member, c/o NYC Rent Guidelines Board,
1 Centre St., Suite 2210, New York, NY 10007 or by email: chair@nycrgb.org
The
following is a summary of the annual procedures by which the RGB determines
lease renewal guidelines for rent stabilized apartments and hotels:
Meetings
The Board typically
holds eight to ten meetings per year to discuss its research agenda, review
staff reports and to hear testimony from invited guests including public
officials, housing experts and industry and tenant representatives. In accordance
with the Open Meetings Law every meeting of the Board must be open to the
public, except when circumstances warrant executive sessions. While the public
may attend any public meetings, they are not allowed to address the Board
unless invited.
Public notice
of any meeting scheduled at least one week in advance must be provided to
the press and conspicuously posted in a public location at least 72 hours
before the meeting. Notice of meetings scheduled less than one week in advance
must be given, to the extent practicable, to the press, and publicly posted
at a reasonable time before the meeting. The schedule of Board meetings is
usually discussed and resolved in the early spring and is published in the
City Record. (See Meetings page for dates.)
Hearings
The
Rent Stabilization Law and City Charter mandates at least one annual hearing prior to
the adoption of rent guidelines. Notice of the hearings is provided in the City Record
for eight days and at least once in a newspaper of general circulation at
least eight days before the hearing. The hearings are usually held in mid-June
just prior to the Board's July 1st deadline for promulgating new guidelines. (See Meetings page for dates.)
Any
person who wishes to testify has a legal right to do so, and the Board has
traditionally allowed three minutes for each speaker, alternating between
owner and tenant representatives. Speakers have also been permitted to register
in advance of the hearing and pre-registered speakers are given priority
in the order of speakers. The hearing usually begin with testimony from
public officials invited by the Board. Details on how to speak at the
hearing can be found in the Public
Notice, which will be released a few weeks prior to the hearing.
Voting
Meetings
Two
meetings are held each year for a vote on rent adjustments: the meeting to
adopt proposed guidelines, and the meeting to adopt the final
guidelines. (See Meetings page for dates.) At voting meetings, the public may attend and listen to proceedings,
but may not address the Board. While the Chair and the Board establish the
order of business, a typical voting meeting will proceed as follows:
- Board members
attention will be called to drafts of the apartment (and loft) orders in
their folders. At the meeting on the proposed guidelines, these drafts
will consist of the prior year's order with blank spaces where rent adjustments
will be entered. Approving this "boilerplate" language will usually be
the first order of business. At the meeting to consider the "final" guidelines,
members will have copies of the proposed orders. The first order of business
will typically be to adopt the language of the proposed orders except insofar
as they are amended at that meeting.
- The floor will
be opened to proposals on apartment (and loft) guidelines for one and two year leases.
Other elements of rent adjustments such as supplemental increases for low
rent apartments or a vacancy factor for sublets may be "packaged" with
the apartment guidelines. Votes are taken on each proposal in accordance
with Roberts Rules, until at least five votes can be mustered for an apartment
order.
- The Board will
also consider the "special guideline" for units coming out of rent control.
- Board members
attention will then be called to the hotel orders and a process
of boilerplate approval will occur.
- The next order
of business is usually the "hotel" orders. There are five groups of hotel
stabilized units: Class A and Class B hotels, rooming houses, SRO's and
lodging houses. These groups may be addressed separately or together. Voting
proceeds in the same fashion as for apartments.
- Any special
or new items of business may be introduced at any time, but any material
change in the order of business will require a majority vote.
- Once all business
has concluded at the final meeting, the Chair will ask the Board to approve
staff preparation of explanatory statements reflecting the information
presented to the Board and the major findings of the year (i.e., price index,
income and expense data, witness testimony etc.). These will be circulated
to Board members prior to publication.
- A motion to
adjourn will be taken.
How
To Obtain Meetings/Hearings Schedule
The meetings/hearings
schedule for the year is usually determined by the middle of February. However,
meetings are subject to change, following the procedures described above.
Members of the public may obtain the schedule of meetings/hearings by:
Final
Orders and Explanatory Statements
Usually
about one week after the final vote, the Board's orders and related Explanatory
Statements are filed with the City Clerk and published in the City Record.
The Rent Stabilization Law directs that the filing of the Board's orders
and its findings--i.e., the Explanatory Statements--must be completed not
later than July 1st of each year.
Once
the language of the orders is reviewed and approved by Corporation Counsel,
the orders and explanatory statements should be published in the City Record
as soon as is practicable. The final orders and Explanatory Statements should
be forwarded to City Council for its information and published at least 30
days (by August 31st) before the first effective date of the orders (October
1st).
The
guidelines themselves go into effect for leases being renewed and vacancies
occurring on or after October 1st of the same year, and on or before September
30th of the following year. Most hotel/SRO tenants do not have leases and
pay the new rent immediately upon the effective date of the hotel guidelines--which
is also October 1st. The orders of the Board are final unless found to be
unlawful by a court of competent jurisdiction. A 1991 court ruling indicates
that any legal challenge to the Board's orders must be initiated within four
months.
After
they are filed with the City Clerk, the
public may view and/or download Orders and Explanatory Statements
in the Rent Guidelines
section of our website: Apartments/Lofts and Hotels.
Page Updated 10/30/2015
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