Categories: New York City
01.23.2017
Honored at the 2014 annual Network Awards Gala as our Government Partner of the Year.
Vicki Been, Commissioner of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, will step down by January 31, 2017 to return to New York University as faculty director of the Furman Center.
Network Chair William Traylor said, "For all of her terrific quant and analytical skills, Vicki's greatest legacy will be reorienting HPD's focus to the impacts that affordable housing has on communities and within the lives of the families and individuals that call the housing and these communities home." Been was honored at the 2014 annual Network Awards Gala as our Government Partner of the Year.
Maria Torres-Springer, President and CEO of the New York City Economic Development Corporation, will replace Been. Torres-Springer formerly served as Mayor de Blasio's first Small Business Services commissioner.
Laura Mascuch, the Network’s Executive Director, said, “Vicki has been a steadfast champion of supportive housing throughout her career and we have been very lucky to have her heading up HPD for these last three years. Her contributions to the Mayor's ten year housing plan will mean that thousands of the most vulnerable New Yorkers will have homes in the coming years. She has been a terrific partner to the Network and our members -- her ability to work at the micro and macro level has been invaluable. She will be greatly missed at HPD but we very much hope to continue working with her in her new role.”
Mayor de Blasio, in a statement, said, "With her signature brand of grit and grace, Vicki created and implemented our ambitious affordable housing plan. She is a brilliant public servant and law professor, and her students are lucky to have her back."
Under Commissioner Been’s guidance, HPD closed financing on 41,652 new apartments and preserved another 20,854 over three years, putting Mayor de Blasio ahead of schedule for his goal of building and preserving 200,000 apartments for low- to moderate-income tenants. Been played a key role during the Mayor’s initiative to require more below-market-rate housing from developers benefiting from city re-zonings. This regulatory change, termed Mandatory Inclusionary Housing, joined an ambitious rewriting of NYC’s 1961-era zoning code to eliminate roadblocks to residential development. The City Council voted to in favor of both of these changes in March 2016.
Brenda Rosen, President and CEO of Breaking Ground said, “It's impossible for me to express how invaluable Vicki's support has been to Breaking Ground, our programs and clients during her tenure as HPD Commissioner. I could always count on Vicki's thoughtful, patient counsel to help my colleagues at Breaking Ground realize complex affordable housing developments for our community's most vulnerable and we've time and again seen her give the same counsel to many other peer nonprofits in the supportive housing industry. Countless thousands of New Yorkers are living secure, productive lives in the five boroughs as a direct result her outstanding leadership. We cannot thank her enough for this commitment to New Yorkers in need and to New York City.”