The city’s landmark building emissions law, Local Law 97, is set to go into effect next year, and the complex rule-making process has set off a frenzy of lobbying activity aimed at influencing and potentially weakening the statute aiming to help combat climate change.
Local Law 97, passed in 2019, is one of the most ambitious local climate laws in the world, requiring the owners of buildings greater than 25,000 square feet to meet strict regulations on carbon emissions starting next year, requiring many of them to retrofit their properties or face stiff penalties each year.
The law is set to go into effect in January, with the first compliance reports for affected property owners required by May 2025. Buildings must start to comply with the emissions standards next year, and future compliance periods in 2030 and beyond will require owners to meet even stricter carbon emission limits.
But before the law can be implemented, the city’s Department of Buildings (DOB) must finalize the complicated array of rules governing the vast program, which is not only turning out hundreds of New Yorkers to meetings but is also leading to the disbursement of big bucks in lobbying expenditures.
Some of the loudest voices seeking to weaken the statute are co-op and condo owners, who have packed raucous town halls across the city in recent months bemoaning what they say will be ruinous penalties for largely working and middle-class homeowners.
But while the co-op owners present themselves as having little sway and political influence, they do have some powerful friends.
Louder voices come forth
One group, Homeowners for a Stronger New York, which is an ally, presents itself as a grassroots collective of co-op and condo owners concerned by the high cost of complying with the law come next year.
It has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on television ads, digital ads, mailers, and lobbying expenses supporting a bill in Albany that would provide property tax breaks for…
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