‘We can’t even buy food’: New Yorkers protest proposed rent increases

theguardian.com:

At 64, Chen Renping has lived in New York City’s Chinatown neighborhood for more than 20 years.

But after a back injury forced him to retire from construction work in 2018, Renping can only afford rent if he works multiple part-time jobs – and that’s with his unit being rent stabilized.

“Once I pay the rent, life is very hard,” Renping said, through a translator.

Recently proposed rent increases of up to 9% prompted Renping to join a coalition protesters calling on New York City’s mayor, Eric Adams, to roll back rising rent.

“A lot of us can’t pay the rent and we can’t even buy food,” Renping said at a rally organized by the Rent Justice Coalition group at New York’s city hall park on Thursday.

For the millions of New Yorkers living in rent stabilized buildings, many of whom are still financially recovering from disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, recently proposed rent hikes are stoking panic and widespread pushback throughout the city.

New York’s Rent Guidelines Board (RGB), a nine-person, mayor-appointed board, votes annually on how much landlords can raise the rent of the city’s more than 900,000 rent stabilized units.

For the past five years, the RGB has voted – at most – for a rent increase of 1.5% for one-year leases and 2% for two-year contracts, increases that New Yorkers say have already put added pressure on tight-squeezed paychecks.

But, staff of this year’s RGB, with three new members appointed by Adams, have proposed hikes of 4.5% for one-year leases and up to 9% for two-year leases. Elected officials and tenants argue the added costs will displace a staggering number of residents.

“Is the mayor’s goal to have hundreds of thousands of homeless people? Because if that’s his goal, he’s heading in the right