Landlords want NYC to pay them for neighbors’ scaffolding that plagues sidewalks in endless ‘Whack-a-mole’
Scaffolding-sick landlords think they shouldn’t have to deal with negligent neighbors’ sidewalk sheds stretching onto their property — unless the city starts paying up.
Four Big Apple landlords slapped City Hall with a class-action suit that says their Fifth Amendment rights have been trampled on when scaffolding from neighboring buildings twists onto their property.
The Fifth Amendment says the government has to pay private property owners when their land is taken for public use — but the city doesn’t pay a cent to property owners put out by the ongoing scaffolding scourge.
“The City of New York systematically engages in a taking of property from thousands of New Yorkers,” the lawsuit alleges.
“Many thousands of blameless neighbors have experienced and continue to experience infringement of their property rights because of the City’s laws and rules and because of sidewalk sheds,” the lawsuit, filed on March 27 by Boies Schiller Flexner and Messing & Spector, read.
City law requires scaffolding sheds be erected over the sidewalk outside buildings where inspectors find flaws that are determined to be hazards for pedestrians below.
But safety requirements mean the sheds sometimes extend beyond the damaged property onto neighboring buildings — forcing some landlords to deal with sheds even though they haven’t received any violations.
“The intrusion lasts, on average, for well over a year, and many of these sheds remain in place for multiple years, partly because it is often cheaper for owners of at-risk properties to maintain sheds rather than to efficiently complete repairs that the City requires,” the lawsuit alleges.
The sheds are not only ugly — but they drive away tenants, block light and attract vermin, the landlords said.
Properties flagged in the lawsuit included several residential buildings that had had their stoops commandeered to extend scaffolding, and were left shrouded in darkness because of the work on neighboring sites.
The plaintiffs — who range from tenant landlords to private property owners — demand compensation for “the City’s past and ongoing takings,” which they allege has victimized countless New Yorkers since the modern scaffolding laws were imposed in 1980.
“Our clients are just the tip of the iceberg of the thousands of NYC property owners similarly affected, which is why we are seeking class action treatment so that the property rights of all are protected,” lead counsel Hamish Hume told The Post.
City Hall stood by its scaffolding safety laws when reached for comment by The Post and highlighted a series of recent bills passed by the City Council that would slash the shed-permit lifespan from one year to three months, increase fees to landlords that drag their feet finishing fa?ade repairs, and extend fa?ade inspection cycles from five years to between six and 12 depending on a building’s age.
“Sidewalk sheds play an important public safety role, protecting pedestrians from overhead hazards associated with construction sites and unsafe building facades,” a City Hall spokesperson said.
“Working with our partners in the City Council, the administration recently pushed for new legislation that would compel building owners to start repair projects sooner so that sheds only stay up to protect the public for as long as necessary.”
Mayor Eric Adams — who made scaffolding-reform a priority for his administration — is expected to sign the new bills into law, though it remains unclear when that will happen.
There are now more than 8,500 scaffolding sheds standing across the five boroughs — about 500 of which are on city-owned buildings, The Post previously reported.
Residents in some of the worst hit neighborhoods — like the Upper West Side — have expressed hope that reform will finally halt the endless game of “whack-a-mole” that sees sheds go ceaselessly up and down on their blocks.
