City Council Approves Inwood Rezoning

The City Council recently overwhelmingly approved a plan to rezone a large swath of Inwood. The proposal is part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s plan to rezone up to 15 neighborhoods across the city and create and preserve 300,000 units of low-income housing by 2026. Inwood became the fifth neighborhood to be rezoned under the plan.

The rezoning is intended to create and preserve 4,100 units of low-income housing, including 925 units on city-owned land and 675 units that will be established in market-rate buildings under housing rules that require developers to build low-income housing in projects made possible by rezoning.

Inwood, on the northern tip of Manhattan, is known for its parks and diversity. Half of the residents are foreign-born, and the neighborhood contains the highest concentration of Dominicans in the city. Whites, Asians, and blacks make up almost a quarter of the neighborhood. Nearly 80 percent of units there, which are in five- to eight-story tenements, are under some form of rent regulation.