Challenges to Achieving New York City’s Affordable Housing Goals: Reconciling Mandatory Inclusionary Housing, Community Preference Requirements, and Fair Housing Laws
By Professor Andrea McArdle I. Introduction Under the mayoral administration of Bill de Blasio, New York City has embarked on an ambitious affordable housing initiative mandating that real estate developers include below-market-rate units in rezoned areas of the city. Although approved by the New York City Council, the policy faces continuing community opposition, the expiration […]
Shut Out of Airbnb: A Proposal for Remedying Housing Discrimination in the Modern Sharing Economy
By Jamila Jefferson-Jones* Introduction The modern sharing economy[1] is a diverse marketplace made up of various types of organizations and structures, including shared housing.[2] What ties these various components together is that they “generally facilitate community ownership, localized production, sharing, cooperation, [and] small scale enterprise.”[3] The housing segment of the sharing economy is also a part […]
Ghomeshi Acquitted on All Charges: The Legal System’s Failure to Address Rape Trauma Syndrome
By Kate Ross Last month, Canadian radio celebrity Jian Ghomeshi was acquitted of rape and assault, after three women who came forward faced antagonistic cross-examination on their memory lapses, delays in reporting the abuse, and failure to mention subsequent interactions with Ghomeshi.[1] The complainants offered evidence that these gaps were irrelevant to the assaults or […]
Another SAT Overhaul May Fail NYC Minority Students
The following post is a winning submission for the 2016 Jason Libou Online Writing Competition. Competitors were prompted to write a blog post on a topic of their choice relating to urban law and policy. By Immanuel Kim The College Board implemented a new version of the Standardized Admissions Test early this year, purportedly to even the […]
How States Are Dealing with Unconstitutional Life Sentences for Juvenile Offenders
By Claire Glass In its 2012 ruling in Miller v. Alabama, the Supreme Court of the United States found mandatory life without parole sentences for juveniles violate the 8th Amendment, unfairly subjecting juveniles to the same sentences as their adult counterparts without giving judges an opportunity to consider the defendant’s age and individual circumstances as […]
Scalia’s Legacy in Land Use Law
By Herbert Rosen After Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia’s passing, much has been and will continue to be written about his landmark opinions, originalist/textualist methods of interpretation, and his words which inspired some and angered others. However, Scalia should also be recognized for his significant contributions to land use law.
Cruel and Unusual: The Practice of Shackling Pregnant Incarcerated Women
By Claire Glass In 2009, New York State banned the longstanding practice of shackling of pregnant incarcerated women during childbirth, but a 2015 report by the Correctional Association (CA), a non-profit with authority to enter and inspect the state’s correctional facilities, reveals that New York State and county institutions routinely break this law. The vast […]
Bike Wars: How NYC has dealt with litigation in the advent of the Citi Bike
By Vinh Hua While policies that promote bicycle usage in urban environments are becoming more common, they remain a divisive issue among urban planners and city managers. Support for such policies is evidenced by the creation of bike lanes to the usage of bike-share programs like Citi Bike, while the governmental support or ambivalence to […]
Legal Battles in the Bay: Litigation over Gentrification in San Francisco
By Vinh Hua San Francisco is currently the site of a number of major battles over gentrification, as residents, developers, tech companies, tech professionals, and landlords fight for their interests in both the court of law and public opinion. San Francisco has become the most expensive city to live in the United States, even beating […]
The Campaign for Safe Injections Facilities in New York City
By Claire Glass On September 30, activists gathered for a town hall and to launch SIFNYC, a coalition of criminal justice and drug policy advocates campaigning to bring Safe Injection Facilities(SIFs) to New York City. SIFs in Europe, Canada, and Australia already provide clean needles, health services, and a police-free place to use intravenous drugs to users […]