Today is Friday, Dec. 19, the 353rd day of 2025. There are 12 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On Dec. 19, 2008, citing imminent danger to the national economy, President George W. Bush ordered a $17.4 billion emergency bailout of the U.S. auto industry.

Also on this date:

In 1777, during the American Revolutionary War, Gen. George Washington led his army of more than 12,000 soldiers to Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, to camp for the winter.

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In 1907, 239 workers died in an explosion at the Darr coal mine near Van Meter, Pennsylvania.

In 1960, fire broke out on the hangar deck of the nearly completed aircraft carrier USS Constellation at the New York Naval Shipyard, killing 50 civilian workers.

In 1972, Apollo 17 splashed down in the Pacific, concluding the Apollo program of crewed lunar landings.

In 1998, President Bill Clinton was impeached by the U.S. House of Representatives for perjury and obstruction of justice. (He was subsequently acquitted by the Senate.)

In 2011, North Korea announced the death two days earlier of leader Kim Jong Il; North Koreans marched by the thousands to mourn while state media proclaimed his youngest son, Kim Jong Un, as the nation’s new leader.

In 2016, a truck rammed into a crowded Christmas market in central Berlin, killing 12 people in an attack claimed by the Islamic State. (The suspected attacker was killed in a police shootout four days later.)

In 2023, a strong earthquake rocked a mountainous region of northwestern China, killing 131 people, reducing homes to rubble and leaving residents outside in below-freezing winter weather.

Today’s Birthdays:

Actor Tim Reid is 81.
Singer Janie Fricke is 78.
Actor Jennifer Beals is 62.
Basketball Hall of Famer Arvydas Sabonis is 61.
Olympic skiing gold medalist Alberto Tomba is 59.
Actor Kristy Swanson is 56.
Model Tyson Beckford is 55.
Actor Alyssa Milano is 53.
Football Hall of Famer Warren Sapp is 53.
Actor Jake Gyllenhaal (JIH’-lihn-hahl) is 45.
Actor Annie Murphy is 39.
Journalist Ronan Farrow is 38.

“As Washington commits to callous austerity, Mayor-elect Mamdani must devote himself to strengthening New York’s safety nets and prioritizing domestic violence survivors in all housing and homelessness response plans, who are often left out.”

One of New Destiny Housing’s buildings. (Photo by Zeny Gatdula)

On a historic election day, New Yorkers turned out in droves to choose a new leader for our city—Zohran Mamdani will take office on Jan. 1 after running a campaign that was laser-focused on addressing the affordability and housing crisis that has plagued New York City for years. For domestic violence survivors like me, these issues are especially urgent.

Domestic violence is the number one reason for family homelessness in New York City, and financial abuse, where our credit is ruined or access to income is blocked by our abusers, often leaves us at a terrible disadvantage when trying to find a safe home that we can escape to quickly and then afford.

With the sudden disinvestment of proven, life-saving housing assistance programs by the federal government, and the very real threat of further cuts, many of us may be left without the means to pay our rent. As Washington commits to callous austerity, Mayor-elect Mamdani must devote himself to strengthening New York’s safety nets and prioritizing domestic violence survivors in all housing and homelessness response plans, who are often left out.

The first and most crucial step Mamdani must take as mayor is fixing and investing in CityFHEPS, the city’s rental subsidy program. Any cuts from Washington will fall squarely on federal rental assistance programs, as they’ve already done with the Emergency Housing Vouchers (EHV), which were abruptly defunded by the federal government earlier this year and could cause nearly 8,000 New Yorkers to lose their housing.

The New York City Housing Authority has found a solution to help a number of these households, but thousands of New Yorkers continue to face this frightening countdown to the end of their rental assistance. This is not something that we can allow—I personally know many survivors who have only been able to find a permanent home thanks to an EHV. If families lose access to this funding, many survivors will be forced back to shelter, onto the street, or even back with our abusers, further deepening the homelessness crisis in our city and putting survivors in harm’s way.

CityFHEPS offers a promising solution to this impending problem, but only if it is fixed. The City Council has long realized this, having voted to allow people living outside of shelters to access CityFHEPS vouchers and overriding Mayor Adams’ veto to protect program participants from rent increases. Mayor-elect Mamdani now has a prime opportunity to reverse Adams’ policy and usher in a voucher program that better works for New Yorkers.

By removing eligibility hurdles, keeping unit-hold incentives, and extending shopping letter duration, which routinely cut survivors off from housing, frustrate landlords holding apartments, and hold New Yorkers in shelter months longer than necessary, the future mayor can demonstrate his commitment to ensuring that every New Yorker has a safe home.

But CityFHEPS isn’t the only way to help survivors find housing. New York also needs to increase the supply of supportive housing. While Mamdani committed to building more housing and making it more affordable, he did not have plans specifically focused on supportive housing, which provides services alongside affordable housing to New Yorkers in need of additional support to find stability. This is an incredibly effective tool that has helped many survivors—including me—get back on their feet.

Last year, Mayor Adams expanded New York City’s supportive housing program, NYC 15/15, to include domestic violence survivors with children. It was a long overdue first step to join the state in recognizing that some survivors need long-term support for themselves and their children to recover from the trauma. But that expansion didn’t cover survivors without kids. I urge the mayor-elect to commit to expanding NYC 15/15 supportive housing for single survivors too, and continue to expand investment in supportive housing overall to better meet the needs of the most vulnerable New Yorkers.

In a country where nearly one in three women, and one in 10 men, have experienced some form of domestic violence, we are a constituency that cannot be ignored. As Washington shirks its duties to domestic violence survivors and everyone else that benefits from housing assistance programs, Mayor-elect Mamdani has a chance to be a true housing champion and a lifesaver for the thousands of domestic violence survivors who need to escape but can’t find an affordable place to live.

Now is the time for him to demonstrate he truly cares about survivors—supporting safe homes for us is the way to do it.

Nicole Campbell is a domestic violence survivor, supportive housing tenant, and a member of New Destiny Housing’s Survivor Voices Project.

The post Opinion: Protecting Domestic Violence Survivors Means Investing in Their Housing appeared first on City Limits.

When you’re locked in a defensive battle, sometimes the simplest play in hockey is to send a big body to the net, hard.

Joel Eriksson Ek did just that, making a classic “crash the net” play in the latter half of the third period for the eventual game-winner as the Minnesota Wild made it six victories in a row, winning 5-2 against the Blue Jackets in Columbus, Ohio.

Goals by Ryan Hartman and Vladimir Tarasenko helped the Wild overcome an early deficit and a slow start to the second period. They got 26 saves from rookie goalie Jesper Wallstedt, who improved to 10-1-2.

Zach Werenski had his second consecutive two-goal game for the Blue Jackets, but Kirill Kaprizov and Matt Boldy added late empty-net goals for the Wild.

The win came with a number of minor leaguers in key roles, as Minnesota is missing seven regulars due to injury.

Minnesota’s top offensive unit — with Kaprizov, Boldy and Eriksson Ek at forward, Brock Faber and Quinn Hughes on defense — had a dominating shift in the Columbus offensive zone, only to see the Blue Jackets turn the tables for the opening period’s only goal. A turnover by the Wild at the offensive blue line sprung Columbus on an odd-man rush the other way, which ended when Werenski zipped a glove-side wrist shot past Wallstedt.

The Wild had a sluggish start to the middle frame, with Wallstedt keeping the deficit manageable as Columbus outshot Minnesota 12-1 through the first half of the period. But the Wild’s first power play of the night was productive, with Kaprizov feeding Hartman down low for a quick redirect and a 1-all tie.

Minnesota’s all-Russian line clicked to give the visitors a lead via Tarasenko’s third goal in the past two games, set up by linemates Yakov Trenin and Danila Yurov. But Columbus had an answer almost immediately, when Werenski hopped on another Wild turnover and made it 2-all after two periods.

Jet Greaves finished with 22 saves for Columbus, which split its season series with the Wild by spoiling Minnesota’s home opener back in October, winning 7-4 in St. Paul.

With their pre-Christmas road schedule complete, the Wild return to St. Paul for the next three in a row, beginning on Saturday afternoon when they host Edmonton in a 2 p.m. start at Grand Casino Arena.

Briefly

At the team’s morning skate in Columbus, Wild coach John Hynes gave an update on the team’s lengthy injury roster. Defensemen Jonas Brodin and Jake Middleton, and forwards Mats Zuccarello and Vinni Hinostroza have all resumed skating, and the coach is hopeful that at least a few of them could potentially return for one or both of the Wild’s back-to-back home games on Saturday and Sunday. Defenseman Zach Bogosian and forward Marcus Johansson have not yet begun skating. Hynes commented that it has been “injury after injury” for the most part in his two years as head coach, but he does not recall missing seven regulars at any one time before.

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Five years after it was introduced, the City Council passed a revised version of the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act, or COPA, which supporters say will give mission-driven groups a leg up when affordable and distressed buildings come up for sale. Critics say it’s government overreach.

COPA supporters at a rally for the bill in November. (Gerardo Romo / NYC Council Media Unit.)

Five years after it was introduced, the City Council on Thursday passed a revised version of the Community Opportunity to Purchase Act, or COPA, which will give certain nonprofits—and for-profits, if they team up with a nonprofit—an early shot to bid on certain residential properties that go up for sale, before they hit the wider market.

Landlord and real estate groups have criticized the legislation as government overreach. But supporters say COPA will give mission-driven groups, including community land trusts, a leg up against deep-pocketed real estate speculators in the city’s competitive housing market.

Modeled after a similar bill in San Francisco, it specifically targets buildings with poor conditions or where an affordability provision is expiring. In those situations, lawmakers said, COPA can serve as a preservation tool, allowing a “qualified entity” to come in and, with the help of other city programs, right the ship—making repairs, maintaining affordable rents—ideally in coordination with the tenants who live there.

“We want to try to keep those units affordable. This is an opportunity to do that,” Councilmember Sandy Nurse, who sponsored the latest version of the legislation, said in a press conference Thursday. Without COPA, she said, “we potentially lose those affordable units.”

The bill passed by lawmakers underwent a number of revisions since COPA was originally introduced in 2020, a response to concerns raised by both property owner groups and the city’s Department of Housing, Preservation and Development (HPD) that it would delay sales too dramatically and could burden small landlords.

The revamped version narrowed the types of buildings covered by the legislation, and exempts small properties. It also created more specific criteria for what kind of nonprofits would qualify to make an early bid, and shortened the window of time they’d have to make an offer.

“What we have before us is a bill that achieves as much consensus from as many stakeholders as possible,” Nurse said ahead of the vote Thursday, which marked the Council’s final meeting of the year and its last chance to pass legislation this session.

But real estate groups have maintained their opposition to COPA, questioning its efficiency and saying it unfairly favors nonprofits at the expense of private property owners. Ahead of the Council vote, the bill’s opponents parked a truck with a digital billboard near City Hall. “COPA makes housing more expensive,” the screen read in bright pink letters. “Corruption. Socialism. Rent Hikes.”

A digital billboard with an anti-COPA message near City Hall
Thursday. (Photo by Todd Baker)

“The amended proposal would still give nonprofits and for-profits leverage, advantages and privileged access through an exclusive months-long window that no ordinary buyer is afforded,” Ann Korchak, board president of the Small Property Owners of New York (SPONY) and Robert Lee, a SPONY member and building owner in Bushwick, said in a joint statement shared with City Limits. “For a small owner in distress trying to sell quickly to avoid liens and foreclosure, the amended scheme still creates serious timing risk that would artificially devalue property.”

How it will work

The revised version of COPA covers a smaller breadth of buildings than originally proposed, rolled out in phases. Properties with fewer than four apartments are exempt, as are owner-occupied buildings with five or fewer units, and vacant lots.

For the first year, impacted properties will include those that have been involved in one of several city initiatives that target very poor building conditions (like the Alternative Enforcement or Certificate of No Harassment programs) for at least a year—what Nurse described as “an extremely targeted universe of properties that we already spend a lot of time and money on trying to make safer.” For the second year, it would expand to buildings in less severe, but still bad shape (at least one open hazardous or immediately hazardous housing violation per apartment).

Also covered: buildings with affordability restrictions set to expire within two years, what officials say could help ensure properties transition to new ownership that will prioritize keeping rents affordable for existing tenants.

Should the owner of one of these types of buildings wish to sell, they’d be required to notify the city and a list of “qualified entities,” to be established by HPD. The law sets a number of benchmarks these groups must meet: they must be nonprofits (or for-profits partnering with a nonprofit), and have demonstrated experience in managing residential properties and preserving affordable housing, among other criteria.

Once these groups are notified of a covered building owner’s plan to sell, they have 25 days to notify the owner and HPD of their interest to purchase, and then 80 days to make an offer, according to the New Economy Project, an advocacy group that’s been campaigning for the bill.

If no qualified groups express interest in those first 25 days, or if the landlord rejects all the qualified buyers’ offers after the 80-day window, the property can go up for sale on the wider market. The first qualified buyer who made an offer, however, has 15 days to exercise a “right of first refusal” and match the terms of any open market offer the landlord is weighing.

The debate

In addition to accusations of government overreach, COPA critics question if shepherding distressed buildings to nonprofit buyers will mean improvements for the people living there.

“COPA does not bring the necessary resources to the table for non-profits to cover their necessary capacity building and upfront costs, let alone funding for acquisition and repairs,” Erica F. Buckley, a real estate attorney and partner at Nixon Peabody LLP, wrote in an op-ed published in City Limits last week.

Three buildings on 3rd Street in the East Village that are a part of the Cooper Square Community Land Trust. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

But supporters say COPA can work in conjunction with existing city programs to address those needs, like Neighborhood Pillars, which provides low-interest loans and tax exemptions for nonprofits and community groups that buy and renovate rent stabilized housing.

They point to previous examples of tenant groups that transitioned their buildings to community ownership models, like the East New York and Cooper Square Community Land Trusts.

The bill offers “an opportunity for nonprofits that we trust, that we fund, that we have a relationship with, that we are holding accountable all the time,” Nurse said.

“Instead of that building being sold to some company with people and investors from all over the world that we have no relationship to, and we have no relationship of accountability to.”

To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

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The post NYC Passes Bill Giving Nonprofits First Chance to Buy Certain Buildings appeared first on City Limits.