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MFY’s model of equal access to justice through community-based legal representation has inspired the founding of many other legal services programs across the nation in both urban and rural areas.
--Stephen D. Hoffman, President (1999), New York County Lawyers’ Association

NEIGHBORHOOD PRESERVATION PROJECT


 

After a Manhattan landlord realized that two of his East Village properties were fully tenanted rooming houses, he attempted to evict each and every one of the long-term rent stabilized tenants. Most of these tenants were elderly and/or disabled, without resources.

MFY East Side SRO Law Project attorneys represented the tenants and forced the landlord to drop all eviction cases. In what has become a familiar scenario, the landlord then tried to force tenants out, using threats, disinformation campaigns, deprivation of essential services and refusal to make repairs. With MFY’s help, the tenants held together despite continual harassment.

Finally, confronted with the threat of contempt findings and possible incarceration, the landlord made substantial repairs and the tenants no longer live in constant fear of losing their home.
 

When MFY opened the doors to its first storefront office in 1963, the apartment buildings, tenements and Single Room Occupancy (SRO) hotels of Manhattan’s east side provided affordable housing to tens of thousands of low-income families. After three decades of runaway gentrification, those earning the median income can scarcely afford a rent-stabilized apartment, with market rate housing completely out of reach. For low-income New Yorkers, the situation is desperate.

The Neighborhood Preservation Project works on many fronts to preserve housing in MFY’s traditional neighborhoods, including Chinatown, the Lower East Side, and East Harlem—organizing tenants, legal support for local housing groups, administrative advocacy, technical drafting, and legislative lobbying, and affirmative and defensive litigation. Each year we help hundreds of households maintain affordable housing by providing advice, counsel and full representation at administrative and court hearings.

MFY also works to preserve traditional housing models for low-income and marginalized populations. Our East Side SRO Law Project has defended the rights of residents of single room occupancy housing for 20 years by representing tenants in eviction proceedings, preventing the illegal conversion of SRO units, helping tenants to stabilize their income and benefits, and assisting city agencies in monitoring SRO compliance with existing law.

Without our help, thousands of SRO residents would have become homeless. Click here to read about some of the people we help.


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