NYC Council wants to take Eric Adams to court in bitter feud over housing voucher reforms
The New York City Council wants to take a bitter feud with Mayor Eric Adams over housing vouchers to court — the latest clash in a volatile power struggle with Hizzoner.
Lawmakers asked Wednesday to join a class-action suit that’s looking to force the mayor to comply with controversial housing reforms that his administration has defiantly decided to ignore.
Adams “usurps the powers of the Council [as] as a co-equal branch of City government,” the council said in a motion to intervene in the lawsuit that was viewed by The Post.
At the center of the beef are changes to the program called CityFHEPS, which put people facing eviction on the fast track to get housing vouchers without first having to spend three months in the city shelter system.
If the council’s motion to intervene is granted, the council would join the lawsuit filed by the Legal Aid Society and four people who were allegedly prevented from getting city rental assistance despite the recent changes, the council said in a statement.
“The Council enacted the CityFHEPS reform laws to ensure housing vouchers are used to more effectively help prevent low-income New Yorkers from facing evictions and homelessness, and the mayor’s administration has a responsibility to implement local laws,” said Deputy Speaker Diana Ayala (D-UES).
“The administration’s failure to implement these laws has harmful consequences for New Yorkers who lack access to housing security and need more support,” she said.
“As our city faces a housing shortage, it is critical to protect low-income New Yorkers from losing their homes and being forced to join the ranks of those in similar economic circumstances searching for new homes,” the statement read.
The motion is the latest move in the months-long jockeying between Adams and the City Council over the controversial changes, which also raised the income cutoffs to qualify for aid and barred landlords from deducting utility costs from a voucher.
When Adams vetoed the changes back in June 2023, he argued that the bill’s $17 billion price tag was simply impossible due to the ongoing migrant crisis.
The council overrode the veto a month later, arguing that City Hall overshot the cost of the bill by $7 million.
Shortly before the laws went into effect on Jan. 9, Adams told lawmakers that he would not implement them — and that they were welcome to take him to court.
In a statement to The Post on Tuesday, a City Hall spokesperson claimed that the CityFHEPS reforms will “only make it harder for New Yorkers in shelter to move into permanent housing” due to the historic low in residential vacancies.
The Adams administration has already lifted the 90-day shelter requirement, expanded CityFHEPS eligibility, and even increased permanent housing placements by 17%, the spokesperson added – but the specifics of CityFHEPS policy “violates state law.”
In the new motion, the City Council scoffed at Adams’ implication that the new reforms are legally invalid — and suggested that if City Hall’s concerns were legitimate, they should have duked it out in court already.
“[Mayor Adams] had ample time — six months from the laws’ enactment — to do so,” the council argued.
“Instead, he unilaterally decided the Reform Laws were invalid and that he would not implement them, and in doing so, usurped the role of the judiciary. This cannot be the way that disputes between the political branches are addressed,” it added.
Council Speaker Adrienne Adams also previously sent a letter to Department of Social Services Commissioner Molly Wasow Park warning that the council would pursue legal action if the reforms were not implemented by Feb. 7, the statement noted.
Legal Aid did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for a comment on the City Council’s motion.
Last week, Legal Aid’s chief attorney of the civil practice, Adriene Holder, appeared on the steps of City Hall to demand “no more sleepless nights” for the body’s four clients.
