NYC Covid Rent Relief Laws Shove Risk Onto Landlords, Suit Says

Rent relief laws enacted by the New York City Council to protect tenants from “threatening” landlords during the pandemic have unconstitutionally passed the financial burdens of the economic fallout onto property owners, according to a lawsuit filed in the Southern District of New York on Friday.

If landlords can’t generate enough revenue to pay their tax bills in July and December, the city “will be starved of an enormous revenue stream that, among other things, funds salaries for teachers and firefighters, trash collection, and the City’s public hospitals,” property owners Marcia Melendez and Ling Yang warned in their complaint. ...