> At one time, there were many affordable places where a single person like Hasegawa could live in New York City. Many hotels offered accommodations consisting of a single bed in a cubicle, or a private room with a shared kitchen and bathroom.
> In the mid-20th century there were close to 200,000 units designated as SROs — single room occupancy. But by the 1970s, they had gained a reputation as hotbeds for criminal activity and the city began to shut them down.
So it was common at that time for hotels to offer long-term apartment rentals, but no longer.
It's kind of maddening that cities cracked down on SROs because of crime and then complain about all the homeless people and crime they have on the streets. What did they think was going to happen? That residents were going to move into proper apartments? They probably would have already if they could, so now the problems are worse as a result.
puts em on the street and now they're someone else's problem. a lot of them would then filter out to other areas, generally warmer ones, or areas that were easy to police.
these measures are, on a long scale, what drove a lot of homeless and almost-homeless to the south and west. NYC winters will kill you, but it's not hard to scrounge up a bus ticket to SC
“For several decades, various cities and towns in the United States have adopted relocation programs offering homeless people one-way tickets to move elsewhere. Also referred to as "Greyhound therapy", "bus ticket therapy" and "homeless dumping", the practice was historically associated with small towns and rural counties, which had no shelters or other services, sending homeless individuals tickets to the nearest large city. More recently, a nationwide investigation by The Guardian in 2017 found that many homeless relocation programs are offered by cities with high median incomes, helping people move to places with cheaper housing and a lower cost of living, but also fewer economic opportunities. While some individuals welcome assistance to help them relocate, others say that they have felt "targeted" and forced to move, under the threat of arrest by police.”
“New York appears to have been the first major city to begin a relocation program for homeless people, back in 1987. After the current iteration of the program was relaunched during the tenure of mayor Michael Bloomberg, it ballooned, and its relocation scheme is now far larger than any other in the nation. The city homelessness department budgets $500,000 for it annually.
Almost half the approximately 34,000 journeys analyzed by the Guardian originate from New York. In contrast with other relocation initiatives, New York is notable for moving large numbers of families, like the Ortizes.”
The article briefly mentions the definition, but not in detail. They're part of Single Room Occupancy (SRO) programs for affordable housing in big cities. SROs have fallen out of favor with no good alternative, but they've been a lifeline for friends of mine.
A little known fact is that hotels constructed in New York City "before July 1, 1969 which cost less than $88 per week or $350 per month on May 31, 1968" are subject to a law that states that guests are entitled to become a permanent tenant by requesting a lease of six months or more, and hotels are generally barred from preventing such people from doing such that.
There's someone who has been trying to claim ownership through this mechanism of the New Yorker hotel across from Penn Station, with surprising amounts of success:
Well, and I see the owner of that hotel is the Unification Church (a.k.a. "The Moonies"). Now that's another wild read if you have some time to kill.
One son of the founder is the owner of Kahr Arms (the arms manufacturer), and cofounded with his brother the "Rod of Iron Ministries", a weird gun centered church where they do AR-15 rituals and stuff...
Both churches are involved in heavy lgtb hate, anti communism (although seems like they sent some money to North Korea in the 90s) and some other stuff...
NYC used to have a lot of Single Room Occupancy (SRO) residential hotels that functioned more like cheap apartments. Rent stabilization applies to buildings built before 1974 and kicks in for residents once they’ve been in a place for 6 months. Years ago the city changed the zoning laws to restrict SROs so there aren’t nearly as many as there were in the 80’s but a few have stuck around.
Everyone has kinda answered your question about these old practices carrying over. We're seeing the end of the last surviving hotel residents - recently NYT covered the eviction of an 82-year-old, who took over a contract from his aunt https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/08/nyregion/stewart-hotel-lo...
Nikola Tesla famously died in his residential room at the New Yorker Hotel, and I recently learned that after his presidency, Herbert Hoover lived at the Waldolf Astoria for 30 years.
> Rent stabilization sets maximum rates for annual rent increases and, as with rent control, entitles tenants to receive required services from their landlords along with lease renewals. The rent guidelines board meets every year to determine how much the landlord can charge. Violations may cause a tenant's rent to be lowered.
> I did find this wiki page on rent regulation in NY, it mentions something about rent control and living continuously in a place since a certain cutoff date:
That's rent control, not rent stabilization. There is no cutoff date for rent stabilization. Different units became stabilized for a variety of different reasons over the years.
For what it's worth, I had never heard of a rent-stabilized hotel room either. (American) From some other comments here, it sounds like the accommodations were more of an apartment than a hotel room.
