Gov. Cuomo last week signaled that he’ll happily let construction of new apartments in New York City grind to a halt.
At issue is the now-expired 421a tax break, passed back in the 1970s after sky-high rates had stalled apartment-building. Cuomo blew up last year’s deal to renew the credit, and now he’s vowing to stick to his guns.
“This hand will never sign [a] bill” that allows an “open shop” (i.e., nonunion workers or wages) meant to “break the back of the construction unions,” the gov said Thursday.
Union members have plenty of work in public projects, from the Second Avenue Subway to the new Tappan Zee Bridge. But residential construction has become overwhelmingly nonunion in recent decades: Unless you’re putting up luxury units, you just can’t afford union wages, benefits and work rules.
One small example: Installing refrigerators on a union site requires union steamfitters; at a nonunion site, the builder can let the vendor install them at no added cost.
But Cuomo nonetheless opted to give the building trades a veto over 421a: If developers can’t offer the unions enough concessions, the break stays dead. And the unions lose nothing by killing it — again, their members have plenty of work.
As we noted Sunday, this means disaster for Mayor de Blasio’s affordable-housing goals. But it harms all New Yorkers — the city needs more housing for the middle class as well as the poor, yet the only such buildings going up now are ones that qualified for 421a before Cuomo killed it.
Fight with the mayor if you must, governor. But don’t maim the city in your war.