Co-op boards, Hochul's housing plan, and Fox News
Gov. Kathy Hochul talks about the budget and her New York Housing Compact, at the YMCA in Patchogue, on March 2. Credit: Newsday/Steve Pfost
Check co-op boards for discrimination
As Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration has approved a set of contracts to continue anti-discrimination investigations in real estate housing practices, the State Legislature needs to look at co-op boards [“Fair housing tests OKd,” News, Feb. 25].
Realtors have been fighting against this tacitly accepted discrimination for over 20 years. We applaud the local transparency laws in Suffolk (signed in 2009) and Nassau (2019) counties and others. It amazes me that both houses in Albany continue to ignore this important fair-housing issue.
As president of the Long Island Board of Realtors in 2011, I addressed many Nassau County attorneys about the unlimited scope of co-op boards to discriminate unchecked. One privately told me, “Realtors have no business in civil rights.”
— Liz English, West Islip
Hochul should heed smart housing ideas
I appreciate the March 5 editorial’s nuanced, practical and fair approach to Gov. Kathy Hochul’s housing plan [“Gov must retool housing plan,” Opinion]. It enumerated what’s right about it and analyzed its glaring problems. The suggestions for emphasizing incentives rather than punishments, for community-specific housing targets rather than a broad-brush statewide growth number, and for grandfathering communities that have recently built significant housing are spot on.
I hope the governor pays heed. This is a critical issue, and the editorial suggests a workable way forward.
— Barbara Selvin, Port Washington
It’s amazing to see how low Fox will go
I would love to see a class-action lawsuit initiated against Fox News for amplifying the division in our country [“Fox using GOP video to amplify Jan. 6 lies,” News, March 8]. It is sickening to learn how low its hosts will go for high ratings.
Freedom of speech is one thing. Publicly expressing falsehoods is quite another.
— Robert Biancardi, Rockville Centre
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