New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio

New York City plans to invest more than $150 million over the next 11 years to help meet the housing needs of seniors under a slate of new affordable housing programs, Mayor Bill de Blasio recently announced.

The Seniors First projects will serve 30,000 older adults — more than 25,000 than currently served by the city — by 2026, he said.

“The federal government has gotten out of the business of building senior housing, so New York City is jumping into it in a big way,” de Blasio said in a statement. “We won’t let seniors be pushed out of the neighborhoods they helped build.”

The number of seniors living in the New York City is projected to increase 40% by 2040, according to city officials. The mayor said the Seniors First program will:

  • Spend $150 million to make 15,000 homes more accessible to older adults and people with disabilities over the next eight years. The NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development will assess apartments that it preserves with residents who are 62 or more years old and make updates such as installing lever door handles and shower bars and widening doors to make bathrooms and kitchens wheelchair-friendly.
  • Build new, 100% affordable housing developments with a total of 4,000 apartments on underused NYC Housing Authority land and public and private sites. Approximately 1,000 apartments will be constructed soon on underused NYCHA land in addition to the existing 10,000 affordable apartments already planned through another NYCHA 100% affordable housing program.
  • Preserve the 6,000 aging senior housing apartments in buildings constructed as part of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Section 202 Supportive Housing for the Elderly program. The city said it will target the privately owned properties most in need of protection, making repairs and providing long-term financing in exchange for continued affordability.