Paterson Pays A Stabilized Rate of Rent

The governor of New York pays about $1,250 a month for a two-bedroom, rent-stabilized apartment in central Harlem, even while owning a home upstate in Guilderland and having unfettered access to the 40-room Governor's Mansion in Albany.

Governor Paterson and his wife, Michelle, made about $270,000 last year, according to their tax returns.

Mr. Paterson's city home is part of the Lenox Terrace apartment complex, a set of 16-story residential buildings spread across a six-block area in central Harlem. Built in 1958, Lenox Terrace's other well-known tenants include Rep. Charles Rangel, the district's congressman for more than 37 years.

According to the landlord's Web site, the governor's rent is less than half of the market rate of $2,600 a month or more for comparable apartments at Lenox Terrace, which features 24-hour doorman service. Critics of the city's rent laws say Mr. Paterson should not pay below-market rent while pulling in a six-figure income and owning other property.

The chairman of the Conservative Party, Michael Long, said yesterday that Mr. Paterson's living situation was "unconscionable," given the lack of housing for many poor New Yorkers.

"Why should a high official like the governor of the state of the New York live in a government-subsidized apartment?" Mr. Long said in an interview. "By any standard, Governor Paterson is a wealthy man with plenty of perks. He has a home he owns in Albany, and a mansion in which he could live."

The director of government affairs for the Rent Stabilization Association, Frank Ricci, said yesterday that high-income New Yorkers should not be eligible for rent protections.

"I'm not going to comment on the governor's personal situation, but our position is that people who have that kind of income — it doesn't matter what their rent is — should not have the benefit of rent stabilization," Mr. Ricci said. "People who make over $100,000 have plenty of choices where to live."

Mr. Paterson told a reporter for The New York Sun yesterday that his apartment's rent, which he estimated at $1,250 a month, was appropriate given the city's rent regulations. "It is within the spirit of the law," he added.

His apartment is modest compared with those of some other New York politicians. Mayor Bloomberg's Upper East Side townhouse, for example, is valued at about $17 million. Mr. Bloomberg also owns properties in London and Bermuda. Mr. Paterson's predecessor, Governor Spitzer, lives in the penthouse of a 25-story building on Fifth Avenue. Mr. Spitzer's apartment is subsidized well below market rates despite his $1.97 million income in 2007, albeit thanks to a private arrangement — his father, Bernard Spitzer, who owns the building, reportedly allows his son to live there rent-free.

The rent stabilization laws that govern Mr. Paterson's rent were enacted by the state Legislature in 1969 in response to rising rents. Under the laws, which govern about 1 million city apartments, rents can only be raised by an annual amount voted on by the Rent Guidelines Board, a committee consisting of mayoral-appointees who represent tenants, landlords, and the general public. Proponents of the law say it is necessary to keep middle-class and low-income New Yorkers from being priced out of the city in a booming real estate market.

While laws enacted in 1994 and updated in 1997 by the state government deregulate apartments and return them to market rates in certain cases, Mr. Paterson's income does not disqualify him from paying stabilized rent for some time. Under the laws, tenants who make more than $175,000 on average for two years must give up rent protections, but only if their rent is more than $2,000 a month, a threshold it likely will take years for Mr. Paterson's apartment to cross. Mr. Paterson has not weighed in on rent stabilization laws since assuming office as governor, but generally sided with tenants on housing issues when he was a state senator.

Yesterday, tenant advocacy groups and elected officials held a rally in the Bronx calling for laws that would make it more difficult for rent-stabilized apartments to be turned into free-market housing. Proponents of these laws have complained that landlords are artificially raising rents to over the $2,000 limit and harrassing tenants out of their homes in order to charge higher rents to wealthier customers. "The city's affordable housing stock is getting sold out from under our feet," state Senator Jose Serrano, who attended the event, said yesterday in a statement.