Governor Signs My Long Island Workforce Housing Act 

In our current economic state, the dream of homeownership is simply out of reach for Long Island’s middle-class and younger working families.

That’s why I sponsored legislation to significantly expand the amount of affordable housing for Nassau and Suffolk Counties.

The Long Island Workforce Housing Act (S.6823-A) provides that when a developer applies to a local government to build five or more residential units in Nassau or Suffolk counties, the local government must require the developer to do one of the following:

1. reserve 10% of the new units for “affordable workforce housing”
2. construct these affordable units on other land within the same municipality
or another participating municipality in the same county or
3. pay a fee for each affordable unit that would be used by the Long Island Housing Partnership to build affordable housing and fund a down payment assistance program that provides a $3 in matching funds for every $1 provided by a participating employer.

This bill was signed into law by Governor Paterson.