The first ripples were felt at Manhattan Park, in the private sector, where the managers in 2000 sought to keep pace with New York's overheated housing market.

To me, it was an outrage that they would even suggest $90. -Audrey Berman

Next up are Westview and Island House, which operate under the rules of New York State's middle-income housing program known as Mitchell-Lama.  Whereas tenants at Manhattan Park were confronted in some cases with rent increase demands of 25 percent, the managers of Westview and Island House opened their bidding at an even more aggressive level.

Westview's rent, under the proposal submitted to the State last fall, would rise 31 percent, and Island House would go up more than 33 percent.  The current per-room rates are $300.55 at Westview, $273.54 at Island House.  Neither building receives any direct government subsidies.  The proposed increases amounted to more than $90 per month per room, a figure that Audrey Berman, who chairs the Island House Task Force, called "ridiculous" – ten times more than what some tenants consider to be a reasonable request.

At Eastwood, where there are subsidies, the Roosevelt Island Housing Management Corporation has proposed increases ranging from $77 for a studio apartment to $193 for a four-bedroom over two years.  Those increases are generally in a range of 12.5 percent to 15.5 percent over two years.

Some longtime residents describe the proposed increases, particularly those at Westview and Island House, as alarming – something that could force lower-income people to leave.  One-bedroom apartments, for example, now priced from $909 to $1077 at Westview, would go up by as much as $317 a month.

Opher Pail (pronounced pah-EEL), a ten-year resident who heads the Westview Task Force, said people in his building were angry, both at the size of the rent proposal and with what he described

I think that most of the residents who have been involved in the process already understand that it is a process. -Doryne Isley

as conditions of disrepair.  He became a Westview activist last year in an effort to assure fairness in this round of negotiations.  Two years ago, he said, Westview rents went up 10 percent, more than in Island House, because of a lack of preparedness.  He doesn't want to make that mistake again, and some of his associates are even considering chartering a bus to take residents to the DHCR meeting on February 8.

Berman said, "To me, it was an outrage that they would even suggest $90."  In a flier seeking to mobilize resident opposition, Island House organizers said it was OK to tell the State that "such an increase would force me and my family out of our apartment."  But Berman and other veterans of these negotiations have told the tenants not to be too shocked at what they described as the equivalent of a used-car sticker price, and she said there really isn't a feeling of fear or panic among the residents.  Rents for Mitchell-Lama housing are set by the State Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR), and the tenant groups have been working for several months to knock down the proposed increases.

The tenant groups at all three buildings are being assisted by Resnick and Co., an accounting firm in Valley Stream, N.Y.  Jeffrey Resnick is analyzing the housing company and State figures in preparation for rent determination conferences to be

Related report on Eastwood

held February 8 at the downtown DHCR office at 25 Beaver Street.  The Westview meeting will be at 10 a.m., with Island House at 2 p.m.  A conference date has yet to be scheduled for Eastwood.

DHCR has countered the housing company's initial proposal for Island House with a $20.48 per room increase.  Resnick's associate, Andrew R. Martin, noted that under the DHCR proposal, the increase, if done in equal steps, would be $13.65 this April and $13.65 the following year.  Under the housing company's budget, the steps would be $59.40 each year.

The comparable figures for Westview are $13.80 per room per year under the State's budget calculations, and $61.20 under the company's.  The State's one-step basis there is $20.70.

Resnick told about 40 Island House residents at a meeting last week that "the dance has already begun" between the company and the State, in terms of differing cost projections.  He said that "these buildings are 'net zero' buildings," meaning that the properties are supposed to break even, not make a profit.

Doryne Isley, the general manager of Roosevelt Island Management Corp., said, "I think that most of the residents who have been involved in the process already understand that it is a process." Under the process, Jerome Belson & Associates, the management company for all three buildings, presents its two-year estimates of expenses, and the DHCR staff goes over the numbers in order to determine the income needed to pay the bills.

Arriving at the bottom line is fairly clear.  In the case of Island House, the company projects expenses of $7.8 million per year, producing a deficit of $1.72 million.  Divide the deficit by 12 and by the number of rooms in Island House (1,832), and one can see clearly enough where the increase is coming from, subject to several State adjustment factors.

The State recomputed the same set of expenses and projected an Island House deficit of $359,700 in the first year and $434,000 in the second.  The difference came, in part, from much

"...not a sudden spike but a sudden desperation." Doryne Isley

lower DHCR cost estimates for gas, electricity, and debt service.  Resnick indicated that the company has already taken the third step in this waltz by responding to the State's workup.  Neither Belson nor the State would disclose the working numbers at this stage.  The figures should come into clearer focus by the time of the rent conference.

Berman made it clear, however, that Island House would not be satisfied simply with the State's estimates.  "We're a little more alarmed by this $20 per room than the $90, in a way, because that indicates what DHCR and the State's thinking is, and we are hoping that it could be $9 or $10," she said.  And beyond the question of finances, the biennial meeting serves as a forum to present the tenants' concerns about a wider range of issues to a powerful audience that includes top management, State officials, and representatives of elected officials from the City Council, Borough President's Office, and Legislature.

Pail, too, sees this as an opportunity to press for changes.  He led an expedition last fall through all 19 floors of Westview to document damage in its hallways and other public areas (43 defective doorknobs, 19 leaks, etc.), and has pushed Housing Management to make repairs.  "It's gotten to the point that even management itself defines some areas of the building as war zones," he said.  "It's your home, it's not just a dormitory."  Pail argues that there is no incentive for the company to improve its efficiency under the present system, and criticizes what he sees as instances of waste, such as the use of antiquated lighting fixtures.

On a larger scale, Task Force members and other residents in both buildings agree that one of their biggest added expenses stems from the heating and air conditioning system, which is not individually metered to the apartments.  A common complaint is that some tenants treat electricity as though it were free because it's included in the rent.  But everybody in the building pays for lights and electric heaters that are left on continuously.

Berman said energy inefficiency extends to single-pane windows and poorly-insulated apartments.  In certain sections of Island House, people complain of freezing, she said, and keep their ovens on for heat.  Rooms on the south side of the building, on the other hand, can be solar-heated on some days.

Another issue that has come up for discussion is the company's plan to rehabilitate the Island House swimming pool, which has been shut down for about 17 years.  A $300,000 budget item for repairs is included in the second-year budget, chargeable to a reserve fund.  Another $10,000 is budgeted for pool maintenance – an item accepted by the State.  Isley said it was "a very lovely pool at one point," and that some residents were looking forward to the day they might get it back.

Berman said other residents would prefer that the money be spent on other improvements.  She recounted a long battle to upgrade the laundry rooms, for example – work that Isley said is being completed.

It's a matter of priorities, Isley said, pointing out that roof, elevator and plumbing repairs have been done.  Carpet replacement is also in the budget, along with kitchen appliances and cabinets.

The budget, in a sense, is a snapshot of Roosevelt Island.  Island House's vacancy rate is projected at 1.1 percent for the next two years.  This is in line with Isley's observation that she has only one or two vacancies per month in Westview and Island House, buildings with a total of 761 apartments.  She said the waiting list to get in is a minimum of two years.  Many of those who move originally settled in Manhattan Park.

"...only nine percent of Island House tenants, and five percent of Westview's, are paying surcharges." -DHCR Spokeswoman

Isley was asked whether the Manhattan Park increases had created a sudden spike of new applications.  She commented that it was "not a sudden spike but a sudden desperation."  But the migration of Manhattan Park tenants has been steady over the years.

That's because the Mitchell-Lama program still represents a bargain for many New York apartment-hunters.  The median rents posted on the City's Rent Guidelines Board website for all "core Manhattan" apartments, market and rent-stabilized taken together, are $1,653 for a one-bedroom, $2,505 for a two-bedroom.  Roosevelt Island, part of Manhattan, could be considered part of the core.  The City's figures, although based on a survey that is surely out of date by now, nevertheless illustrate the fact that, even if Belson could impose its $90-per-room increase at will, Island House residents who occupy two-bedroom units would still be getting one of their bedrooms "free," compared with the rent being paid by many people who live on the west side of the river.

Pail, Berman and the other Task Force members undoubtedly appreciate the savings.  But they argue that there are two sides to the Mitchell-Lama bargain, and that it's more than a matter of personal advantage for a certain class of people.  The State program generated 269 projects and 105,000 apartments in its formative years.  Berman said the provision of affordable housing for the middle class – people who work in government, in education, and in other middle-income occupations – has helped revitalize previously unattractive sections of the city.  Mitchell-Lama brought community-builders to places like Tribeca and parts of the Upper West Side, she said, and to Roosevelt Island, helping to create new markets and opportunities for everyone.

Berman said the ideals of the Mitchell-Lama program are worth fighting for, and that's one of the reasons she's working to assure a strong presence at the Island House rent hearing.

Pail said that as the rent moves up, "We feel at the current point that Roosevelt Island is actually going to be composed of two kinds of people: Type A, the transients, doctors and students who are going be to be here only one or two years, and those on subsidies, those on welfare.  ...  In the process, we are destroying the current island, and in fact a lot of people are moving out."

Thus far, the Island's standard-issue Mitchell-Lama rentals – Island House and Westview – appear to have retained their character as middle-income developments.  But the middle class that Pail and Berman talk about may be a moving target.

Mitchell-Lama has an income cutoff for admission: seven times the annual rent for a family of three or fewer, eight times the rent for a family of four or more, according to the DHCR.  Tenants are required to file income affidavits with the management company, which the state checks against their tax returns.  Families whose income exceeds the multiples are supposed to be assessed surcharges of up to 50 percent of their rent.

The level of surcharges should be a rough measure of an apartment complex's conformity with the goals of Mitchell-Lama, and Island residents say that Isley is enforcing the rules.  At Westview, it appears that a family of three in a two-bedroom apartment could have an adjusted income of nearly $114,000 before having to think about surcharges.  This is double the "HUD-Adjusted Median Family Income" of $56,200 listed by the DHCR for the New York metropolitan area.

Island House residents paid $93,714 in surcharges for 1999, a tiny fraction of the building's total rental income, which is estimated at $6 million in the current budget.  And a DHCR spokeswoman said this week that only 9 percent of Island House tenants, and 5 percent of Westview's, are paying surcharges.

The effect of rent increases on this aspect of the system is a matter of conjecture.  But it would appear that raising the rent could open the buildings to higher-earning tenants and possibly mitigate some of the surcharges being paid by the 50 or so Island House and Westview tenants whose income has risen above the admission standard.