Senator Brouk Passes Important Housing Protections in Historic Extraordinary Session

ALBANY, NY - Senator Samra G. Brouk announced passage of a number of important legislative wins for the people of New York State during a historic extraordinary session of the Legislature, including the expansion of housing protections to keep families in their homes through January 2022.

“The Delta variant continues to pose significant risk to New York’s families, which is why we came back to a special session to keep people safe; we know that keeping people housed and out of shelters has saved lives,” said Senator Brouk. “Now, residents across Monroe County will benefit from the protections of the eviction moratorium and both tenants and property owners may apply for emergency rent relief funds. I’m especially glad that we were able to add an additional $150 million into the Hardship Fund that may be directly accessed by property owners in need.”

The housing legislation enacted today extends both the residential and commercial eviction moratoria and the Tenant Safe Harbor Act (TSHA) through January 15, 2022, and expands the COVID-19 Emergency Rental Assistance Program (CERAP). Additional protections have been added for landlords, including the addition of a nuisance standard for eviction and a due process mechanism for challenging Hardship Declarations in court. The legislation also increases the Federal CERAP appropriation from $2.35 billion to $2.6 billion and amends the appropriation to allow these funds to be used in places like Monroe County, which has opted-out of the statewide program. $150 million has been added to the Hardship Fund to support small landlords with tenants who do not qualify for CERAP.

The Senate also acted to increase the safety and accessibility to meetings of public bodies (state and local governments, state agencies, school districts and more) by allowing them to proceed remotely via conference call or similar service, and confirmed Tremaine Wright to serve as Chair of the Cannabis Control Commission and Chris Alexander to serve as Executive Director of the Office of Cannabis Management.