City Agrees to Spend $2B More to Fix Public Housing Woes

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said that while the 400,000 New York City public housing residents will see improvements each year, to address the totality of the problems detailed in the consent decree “will take a long time and a huge amount of resources.”

NEW YORK CITY—New York City has agreed to spend an additional $2.2 billion on public housing to settle a federal complaint that alleges years of neglect and safety violations by the New York City Housing Authority, including the protection of children from lead-based paint at city public housing properties throughout the city.

The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District and a host of federal agencies filed the complaint on Monday and simultaneously announced a proposed settlement or Consent Decree with New York City that requires the city to spend approximately $2.2 billion over what it had originally budgeted over the next five years to address lead-based paint and other safety issues identified by the federal government in the complaint.