New York City Tenants Are Entitled to Heat. What About Air-Conditioning?

As New York City endures its third heat wave of the year, a city councilman plans to introduce a bill this week that would require landlords to buy, install and maintain air-conditioning units or cooling systems for tenants during the summer, with fines of up to $1,250 per day for noncompliance.

The idea behind the legislation, proposed by Councilman Lincoln Restler from Brooklyn, is to update the existing housing code so that building owners are just as responsible for keeping people cool in the summer as they are for keeping them warm in the winter. The bill would apply to high-rises, walk-ups and multifamily buildings, including those owned by the city.

“This will save lives as we reckon with the challenges of the climate crisis,” Mr. Restler said.

Every summer, about 350 New Yorkers die from heat-related illnesses, according to the city’s health department. Black New Yorkers are twice as likely to die from heat as white residents, and a lack of home air-conditioning is a major driver of heat-stress deaths. According to city data, 91 percent of households had air-conditioning as of 2017.

Property owners, some of whom are already working to comply with Local Law 97, which curbs carbon emissions from large buildings, have several concerns, especially about cost. If the new law passes, buildings would have four years to ensure compliance.

“Any proposal in this space must carefully balance the needs of New Yorkers, the diversity of the building stock, the added cost burdens on tenants and owners, and the ability of the electrical grid and distribution system to meet the added demand,” a spokesman for the Real Estate Board of New York, a trade group, said.

Jay Martin, the executive director of the Community Housing Improvement Program, which oversees rent-stabilized buildings in the city, said, “Financial penalties are already exacerbating a high-operating-cost environment we have in New York.”