The administration’s Rental Ripoff report does not send all 23 recommendations through the City Council. Instead, it calls for a mix of executive and agency action, formal rulemaking, legislation and legal action, with some measures scheduled to begin this fall and others expected to take several years.

Housing and Preservation Development (HPD) Commissioner Dina Levy said Thursday that the agency has already begun preparing for some of the operational changes. Over the previous two weeks, Levy said, she visited four local HPD offices and held an “all-hands-on-deck meeting” with code and lead inspectors about changes involving heat complaints, lead complaints, and fire prevention.

“The report outlines a series of changes in the way we will be doing business,” Levy said.

She also highlighted the planned Fix the City initiative, which would target chronically and willfully negligent landlords, and Enforcement Days, through which HPD and the Department of Buildings (DOB) would conduct roof-to-cellar inspections across housing portfolios based on referrals from organized resident associations.

HPD plans to launch Fix the City by the end of 2026 and conduct comprehensive investigations of at least 10 housing portfolios with concentrations of long-standing, egregious violations. The report says the administration added staff and funding in the fiscal 2027 executive budget for code enforcement, emergency repairs and housing litigation.

Enforcement Days would allow HPD and DOB to address systemic noncompliance “more quickly and more aggressively,” Levy said.

DOB Commissioner Ahmed Tigani described the report as a “blueprint” for repairing enforcement protocols and addressing gaps in city law.

Tigani said the administration would work with other city agencies, the City Council and partners in Albany, pointing to better elevator service and enforcement against owners who fail to meet their legal obligations.

“We will go wherever we have to go to deliver for tenants in this city,” Tigani said. “We’re excited to have the blueprint, and now, we’re excited to get to work.”

Some recommendations can begin without new legislation. Starting in October, HPD plans to require inspectors to attempt an inspection at every apartment associated with a non-anonymous heat complaint, rather than treating complaints from different units in the same building as duplicates. Multiple complaints from the same apartment and certain anonymous complaints may still be treated as duplicates.

The administration also plans to launch Enforcement Days in the Bronx this fall, with the goal of expanding the program citywide. Its proposal to formally recognize tenant unions, meanwhile, would proceed through rulemaking pursued by the Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants and HPD.

Mamdani said the administration has already begun speaking with Council members “around the aspects of this report that require legislative action,” while other parts can begin immediately.

Cea Weaver, executive director of the Mayor’s Office to Protect Tenants, said the administration has begun “productive conversations” with Council Member Pierina Sanchez, chair of the Housing and Buildings Committee.

“We expect that we’ll be able to start meeting soon with the Council to be able to get some of these things drafted and then move through the legislative process,” Weaver said.

Sanchez confirmed the discussions to amNewYork and said she intends to participate in the MOPT Legislative Task Force.

While continuing to review the report, Sanchez identified modernizing property registration, strengthening enforcement programs for chronically distressed buildings and advancing her SAFER Homes legislation, Int. 657, as priorities.

“Accountability and preservation must go hand in hand,” Sanchez said. “We should impose meaningful consequences on landlords who neglect their buildings or endanger their tenants, while recognizing that some rent-stabilized buildings face genuine financial distress.”

Sanchez said responsible owners who maintain their buildings should have access to effective preservation tools, including the local reauthorization of the J-51 tax-abatement program.

She said she would work with the administration, her Council colleagues, tenants, advocates and responsible owners to determine which recommendations require legislation or hearings and how quickly they can move forward.

Asked Thursday whether funding was in place to increase HPD or DOB inspector headcount as the report is implemented, Mamdani answered, “Yes,” but did not provide additional details.

Landlord groups warn Mamdani’s rent reforms would make things worse

Landlord organizations, meanwhile, argued that the report focuses heavily on enforcement without adequately addressing the financial condition of rent-stabilized housing.

Ann Korchak, board president of Small Property Owners of New York, called the Rental Ripoff Hearings “a rigged political show designed to attack small owners” and said City Hall had ignored the concerns of small property owners.

New York Apartment Association CEO Kenny Burgos argued that the administration had misdiagnosed the cause of deteriorating conditions in some buildings, saying frozen revenue, rather than insufficient enforcement, was driving financial distress.

“You cannot fine a building into good repair,” Burgos said.

NYAA also criticized proposals involving tenant unions, rental-applicant credit screening and expanded penalties and liens, and urged the city to focus instead on reducing operating costs and returning vacant rent-stabilized apartments to the market.

Tenant advocates offered a different assessment. Met Council on Housing welcomed recommendations addressing heat, pests, mold, elevators, inspections and tenant organizing, but cautioned that their effectiveness would depend on implementation and the infrastructure needed to carry them out.

“At the same time, this report is only the beginning,” said Darius Khalil Gordon, the group’s executive director.

The Mamdani administration says stronger enforcement is only one part of its housing agenda.

Responding to a question about financially strained property owners, Mamdani said there are “many good landlords” and pointed to a planned $100 million city-backed insurance fund intended to offer a lower-cost option to owners of affordable and rent-stabilized housing.

The insurance program is expected to launch in 2027 with approximately 20,000 regulated homes and expand to 100,000 homes by 2030.

Deputy Mayor for Housing and Planning Leila Bozorg pointed to the administration’s separate Block by Block housing plan, which includes other initiatives intended to reduce building operating costs, including the Targeted Owner Options for Long-term Stability, or TOOLS, program.

The insurance program is expected to launch in 2027 with approximately 20,000 regulated apartments and expand to 100,000 by 2030. The housing plan says annual insurance premiums in city-financed buildings rose from about $600 per apartment in 2018 to about $1,800 in 2025.

The broader plan also calls for expanded water assistance, changes intended to reduce façade-inspection costs, J-51 benefits, property-tax changes and additional preservation financing. Eligibility varies, and several of the measures are aimed specifically at regulated or affordable housing.

Thursday’s report itself proposes tying the Alternative Enforcement Program more closely to HPD’s preservation-loan programs. Owners who accept a preservation loan and accompanying regulatory agreement to address AEP conditions would be discharged from the enforcement program.

The Rental Ripoff report says implementation will unfold over three years. Some initiatives will begin this year, while others will not launch until 2027 or will start as pilots before potentially expanding citywide.