With a new mayor taking office in January, we’re embarking on an exciting time for our movements for social and housing justice. There will be ample opportunities for tenants to help shape an ambitious affordable housing agenda.

Take a breath and recognize the power of this moment. Now, make a plan for how YOU will you show up for housing and social justice in the next year. Will you get more involved in your building’s tenant association? (Or start one?) Make calls to your elected officials? Attend a rally? Make signs and banners at an art build? Go to an event at the Harriet Putterman Center on East 4th Street? Get more involved in one of our campaigns? Get on a bus to Albany to speak directly to our representatives? 

However you do it, we look forward to fighting for justice together with you in 2026. And hope you will make a tax-deductible donation at https://coopersquare.org/donate before December 31. 

Warmly,
Your friends at Cooper Square Committee
And now for some of the highlights of 2025!

The Community Opportunity to Purchase Act (COPA) is poised to be voted on by the City Council on December 18, 2025. Our staff and tenants played a lead role in public actions advancing this bill, including emceeing rallies, speaking at press conferences, and testifying at public hearings. This has been a multi-year campaign and we’re so proud to see it reaching the finish line.

The Freeze the Rent campaign became one of the most recognizable demands of the NYC mayoral primary, cementing rent-stabilized tenants as an undeniable force that every candidate had to address. Our organizers and tenants canvassed and collected signatures in support of the Rent Freeze campaign and turned out to rallies to bring public attention to the demand.

Several new lead safety laws were enacted this year which increased inspections, record-keeping, and remediation of lead based paint. Every NYC apartment should have been scanned for lead paint by Aug. 9th, 2025. To empower tenants to begin researching lead in their buildings, in October we released an online interactive map in partnership with BetaNYC.

We released Apartment Warehousing: Separating Myth from Fact, a report with case studies showing landlords have adequate funds to maintain their buildings and put warehoused homes back on the market.

Due to the hard work of 109 E 9th St tenants, DOB issued a stop work order in April against the building which prevented more harmful construction while the city investigated ongoing Certificate of No Harassment and HP Action cases. Hellgate published a deep dive on the tenants’ battle to stay in their homes. 

We worked with one of our most established multi-building coalitions, Tenants Taking Control (TTC), to navigate the foreclosure process on their landlord’s portfolio and organize for a preservation buyer. At the same time, we built up newer coalitions fighting landlords such as Sabet and Tran to write demand letters, hold press conferences, and win improvements in their buildings.

After years of organizing community support to build low-income housing on two city-owned parking lots, our affordable housing development team took big steps toward making our proposals a reality.

In August, we worked with This Land is Ours Community Land Trust (TLIO CLT), Housing Works and Spatial Equity Co. to submit a proposal to HPD to develop 132 units of senior housing at 324 E. 5th Street. HPD is reviewing submissions in order to select a development team. 

In mid-November, we partnered with TLIO CLT and Spatial Equity Co. to respond to a Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI) and proposed to develop 69 low income housing units at 640-644 East 6th Street with 2,800 SF of community facility space for NYCHA residents. We await a response from NYCHA.

In May and June, we produced “The Placeholders,” a vacant storefront activation featuring objects and stories from 19 storefronts located in HDFC coops. In connection with the installation, Cooper Square staff led a walking tour of local businesses and cultural spaces. We also hosted an online info session for commercial tenants thinking about opening a new business in one of the available spaces identified through our comprehensive storefront survey.

We continue to support the merchant-led East Village Independent Merchant Association (EVIMA) to grow its membership to over 125 members, host monthly coffee meet-ups, share information and resources, and plan events.

Cooper Square staff reached out to 35 low income coops to collect data on their energy use. We’re helping coops do financial assessments about how they can benefit from installing rooftop solar power. We hosted a rooftop solar tour of a local HDFC on June 30. 

The Actors Playground has launched a series of free performing arts classes at the Harriet Putterman Center in 3W of our office building. With Artistic Director Zainab Musa’s leadership, the Actors Playground continues the tradition of Studio One by engaging in radical storytelling and creative expression through an increase of community participation. Over 50 students consistently engage with the classes, drawn to nurturing space our teachers craft to allow artists to learn and grow.

Your participation and engagement with Cooper Square Committee’s work is important and valuable. If you have the means to do so, we invite you to make a year-end donation at https://coopersquare.org/donate. Even better, make a recurring donation and find out if your employer has a matching gift program to multiply your support!