Mamdani Gives COPA Signature

14 minutes read

The Community Opportunity to Purchase Act is now law, after Mayor Zohran Mamdani gave his signature to the bill Tuesday, bringing a six-year legislative battle to its formal conclusion.

COPA, which was narrowed down from earlier versions, will allow certain nonprofits and joint ventures the first chance to place an offer for some multifamily buildings that go up for sale, including distressed properties with four or more units and buildings with 100 or fewer units that are subject to affordability agreements managed by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development. When the bill passed in the City Council last month, REBNY CEO Jim Whelan cited “constructive engagement” with Nurse and Speaker Julie Menin that produced a more “targeted and practical” final bill.

Despite the changes to the final version, industry groups have expressed concerns about the new timeline COPA establishes, which includes a 20-day initial period to notify owners and HPD of an intent to purchase, followed by 70 days to make a competitive offer, after which point the property can be listed on the open market if all offers are rejected or none are made.

This iteration of COPA, which sets a higher threshold for distress based on factors like average violation count or participation in the city’s Alternative Enforcement Program, applies to an estimated 3,400 buildings that could go up for sale, according to an HPD spokesperson.

“While many buyers are decent, careful stewards of the properties they buy, too many others treat their new assets only as something from which value exists to be extracted, the wellbeing of their tenants simply a secondary concern,” Mayor Mamdani said before signing COPA into law. The mayor has put his signature on just one other bill since he took office, which permitted year-round outdoor dining on city sidewalks, letting others that were passed lapse into law.

Deputy Mayor for Housing Leila Bozorg, HPD’s Dina Levy and Cea Weaver of the Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants stood alongside Council member and lead COPA sponsor Sandy Nurse at Chestnut Commons, where Mamdani signed the bill and held a press conference. A crowd chanted the word “COPA,” along with Nurse’s name, as she took the podium.

State Sen. Julia Salazar, the Democratic socialist lawmaker being floated as a potential next housing chair, also stood beside the podium with advocates from groups including the East New York Community Land Trust and Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation.

“In May, when we announced our landmark housing plan Block by Block, we made a promise to New Yorkers we would deliver some of the strongest tenant protections anywhere in the United States and that we would preserve 200,000 affordable homes over the next decade,” Mamdani said. “Within that promise was a commitment to expand opportunities to transfer ownership of many buildings to responsible stewards like community land trusts, nonprofits and even the tenants themselves.”

During the year lead-up to the bill taking effect, HPD will craft rules for the program, including certain eligibility criteria and the application process for participating nonprofits. The agency must identify and publish a list of approved organizations and build an online portal where property owners, prospective buyers and HPD can submit required notices.

‘Going to cost a fortune’

Giving nonprofit buyers first dibs to purchase a property doesn’t mean they’ll have the financing in place to close these deals. Nurse told The Real Deal that COPA-eligible buyers will still face financial obstacles to purchasing properties, acknowledging that “it’s going to cost a fortune.” But she hopes HPD can offer preservation deals to provide financing, allowing nonprofits and other groups to take on distressed buildings with adequate resources to properly maintain them.

One pre-COPA chance for a nonprofit to take ownership of a distressed portfolio hit a snag Tuesday, when a Mamdani-supported bid by Spatial Equity to buy Emerald Equities’ former portfolio in East Harlem fell through, allowing the properties to proceed to foreclosure sales for each of the 38 buildings.

“Signing COPA into law the same day banks push 850 bankrupt rent-stabilized units to auction rather than accept an offer from a tenant-approved affordable housing developer is tragically ironic,” New York Apartment Association CEO Kenny Burgos said in a statement. “The problem isn’t who can buy these buildings; it’s the rising expenses, two-year rent freeze, and tens of thousands of annual rent-stabilized vacancies driving properties toward financial collapse.”

At the press conference, Mamdani portrayed COPA as a way to level the playing field for housing nonprofits and tenants. “We’ve heard from a number of nonprofits over the years that they would have been able to purchase a property, were they able to have that kind of a window,” he said. “We do not tell ourselves that this, in and of itself, will solve the housing crisis at its root, but it is an important tool in ensuring that we can start to incentivize responsible stewardship of buildings.”