NYC NOW - Midday News: AG James Proposes Age Verification for Social Media, MTA Expands Bus Lane Camera Enforcement, and City Doubles Incentives to Fill Empty Apartments

Episode Date: September 15, 2025

New York Attorney General Letitia James is proposing new regulations that would require social media users to prove their age with photo or video verification. It's part of an effort to curb the effect of addictive feeds on minors. Meanwhile, the MTA is expanding its bus lane camera program in Queens and the Bronx to keep lanes clear and improve service. Plus, despite Mayor Adams’ cash incentives, landlords have not reopened any warehoused rent-stabilized apartments. WNYC’s David Brand explains why the city is now doubling the payout in hopes of bringing units back on the market.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Monday, September 15th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. Social media users in New York State may one day have to prove their age by uploading a photo or video of themselves. That's according to a new set of proposed regulations from New York Attorney General Tish James. It's all part of a New York law that would prohibit major social media platforms. such as TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook from subjecting kids to addictive algorithm-based feeds. The H.E.'s office suggests the platforms could also verify a user's age by cross-checking their

email address or a phone number against other records. The H.E.'s office will accept comments on the proposals through December 1st. From there, the office has a year to finalize any of those rules. New York's use of bus cameras is expanding again, starting today. WMIC's Catalina Gronilla has the story. The MTA will begin issuing warnings to drivers blocking bus lanes or stops along four more bus routes, the Q6 in Queens, and the BX20, BX3, and BX7 in the Bronx. It's called the ACE program, or automated camera enforcement, which will issue summonses after a 60-day grace period, starting at $50,

and then going up for repeat violations. The program is part of the MTA's efforts to clear up bus routes and speed up bus service. The MTA says the cameras are already in use on 39 bus lines citywide. The expansion brings a total to over 1,200 buses using the system across all five boroughs. Going to be a warm day. We're at 77 now. It's sunshine air, mostly sunny, and a high near 80 today with a light wind. Cool tonight down to low 60s, then tomorrow partly sun.

mid-70s with shower chances and cool at night. Stay close. There's more after the break. On WNYC, I'm David First. New York City has a serious affordable housing shortage, but thousands of low-cost units are sitting empty. It's called warehousing, and it gets people's blood-boiling. In 2023, Mayor Adams stepped in with a solution. The city would pay property owners up to $25,000,

to put the rent-stabilized apartments back on the market. But two and a half years later, no one has taken the offer. Now the city is doubling the payment amount. WNYC housing reporter David Brand joins us to discuss why landlords are passing on the free cash. Start us off with the basics here. Why are landlords keeping these apartments off the market? Landlords say it's just basic math. They keep empty rent-stabilized apartments off the market because they say they can't

make enough in rent to cover the cost of renovations or keep up with normal operating expenses. When this happens, it tends to be after a long time tenant moves out and owners have to bring the unit up to code before getting a new renter in there. That can be pretty costly, so sometimes they just don't bother. But this issue drives people nuts because New York City is in a housing crisis and there are these units just sitting there empty. Yeah, so the city created this program in 2023 to help owners cover the cost of repairs. You reported that only one person has applied and then they dropped out. So why isn't anyone using it? Yeah, no one is taking the money here. And I spoke with a number of landlords to get their view about why that is. Humberto Lopes runs a property

management company and he owns about 200 rent-stabilized apartments. He says most landlords just don't want the city breathing down their necks. Getting money from the city is one of the worst things. You're rather go to the mob and get the money from the mob because at least you know you're paying, you pay the interest and you're gone. So there are a few caveats to this program. To qualify, landlords have to have empty units with pretty low legal rents. It's $1,200 for a one-bedroom and a maximum $1,400 for a three-bed. Landlords are also required to lease the unit to a tenant who uses a housing voucher

in exchange for receiving the reimbursement. A number of owners just don't want to do that, even though it's a steady source of income. and there's a number of reasons. You know, there's discrimination against the low-income people who use the vouchers. Or the owners say they just don't want to rely on the city bureaucracy to get paid each month. There's also some uncertainty that tenants will be able to hold on to their voucher after Trump budget cuts or because the city is spending so much on its own voucher program and maybe the future mayor cuts it. And then there's the upfront cost of the work.

A landlord has to do the work and then try to get reimbursed. and it can be pretty difficult to get money back from the city, and it can also take a long time. Owners say it would be better if the city paid contractors directly rather than making them pay for the work and then get reimbursed at some later date. But the city is trying to sweet in the deal here. They've increased the payment amount from $25,000 to $50K. Right. And, David, this is an issue, as you say, that resonates with a lot of New Yorkers, especially tenants who can point to empty apartments in their own buildings. How many, though, how many of these warehouse units are actually out there?

Yeah, this is a tough one. Nobody really knows the answer to that. There's this figure from the city's independent budget office based on this analysis they did of city housing data, where they found there were about 13,000 of these empty rent-stabilized apartments last year. The city's housing agency, the Department of Housing Preservation and Development, says, of those less than 2,000 have rents below $1,000 a month. And when you think about it, that's a really tiny fraction of the city's roughly 1 million rent-stabilized apartments. But it isn't some people's political interest to cite a higher number here.

Landlord groups, for example, say that there are actually like tens of thousands of apartments like this, and that owners could bring them back to the market immediately if the state relaxed or repealed the laws that limit rent increase. Then there are people who are opposed to new development, and they cite warehousing to say, we don't need more housing to get built. We just need to open up the empty housing we already have. But a lot of housing experts, and I mentioned city officials, argue that this problem is actually way overstated and isn't as common as people might think. Well, are there any other proposals for bringing these empty apartments back to the rental market?

So some tenant groups have proposed a vacancy tax where they would actually tax landlords who keep these apartments empty, but a lot of lawyers and legal experts say that that's probably unconstitutional. And then property owners say, well, if we can't raise rents, we should be able to lower other costs like property taxes or insurance. And both of those are really on the rise in recent years. So far, though, the state has done very little to get property insurance rates under control. And policymakers have been talking about property tax reform to lower the amount that apartment owners pay for years. And no one has mustered the political will to actually do that. WNYC housing reporter David Brandt. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from

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