East NY, Brownsville NYCHA Sites See Outage Spike, Data Shows

BROOKLYN, NY — Brownsville and East New York public housing tenants went without heat, hot water and water more days in 2020 and 2021 than the year before, even as the total number of outages across the city's NYCHA complexes went down, according to new data.

New outage data revealed by the Legal Aid Society shows that the neighborhoods' nearly two dozen public housing complexes suffered a total of 221 heat, hot water and water outages in the 2020-2021 heating season, which lasts from October to May.

That number is a 10-percent increase from the year before, when 200 outages plagued the sites, according to the data.

The local spike comes despite the fact that New York City Housing Authority buildings across the five boroughs saw less overall utility outages in 2020-21 than the season before, though Legal Aid notes the 2,903 outages citywide were only a slight improvement from the 3,014 seen in 2019-20.

“While NYCHA has made some improvements to mitigate utility outages, residents still suffer lapses in service on a daily basis,” Legal Aid Society's Lucy Newman said. “Our neighbors in public housing should not have to continue to suffer these conditions, especially in the dead of winter.”

The Legal Aid Society obtained data for the 2019-20 and 2020-21 seasons from NYCHA through a Freedom of Information Law request. NYCHA is required by law to provide hot water and water at all times of day and to provide heat between Oct. 1 and May 31 when temperatures fall below a certain degrees, the organization notes.

In Brownsville and East New York, the complex with the most outages last season was by far the Van Dyke Houses, which are found between Mother Gaston Boulevard and Powell Street, according to the data.

The 24-building complex had 10 heat outages, 34 hot water outages and 2 water outages between 2020 and 2021, data shows.

East New York's Pink Houses also saw a good portion of the outages with 5 heat, 29 hot water and one water outage throughout the season, data shows.

But perhaps even more egregious was Tapscott Street Rehab, which despite having only one-tenth of the apartments of the Van Dyke Houses, saw only 10 less outages throughout the season. The complex had 16 heat outages, 16 hot water outages and one water outage in 2020-21, data shows.

The Legal Aid Society said the continued utility problems prove more help is needed to make public housing repairs.

"This moment demands greater attention from Washington, Albany, and City Hall, and we call on President Biden, Governor Hochul and Mayor Adams to allocate significant funding to address NYCHA’s capital needs, which is now tens of billions of dollars," Newman said.

For their part, NYCHA agreed that "deteriorating infrastructure" and a lack of investment is a "critical issue" contributing to the outages, but said they have improved over the years.

"NYCHA has demonstrated significant progress since 2019 in addressing service outages at its developments through improvements to heating and hot water operations and response, including increased staffing, roving teams, mobile boilers, planned preventative maintenance and a 24-hour heat desk," a spokesperson told Patch.