NYU Furman Center Spring Policy Breakfast

Join the NYU Furman Center for a Policy Breakfast panel event:

Understanding How NYC’s City-Owned Land

Could Be Used to Develop More Housing 

Date: Wednesday, April 22, 2026

Time: 8:45 - 10:00 AM ET

NYU School of Law - Vanderbilt Hall

40 Washington Square South

New York, NY 10012

Doors open at 8:15 AM. Continental breakfast will be served.

New York City is the City’s largest landowner, and policymakers are increasingly seeking new methods to increase supply as the housing shortage continues to intensify. To address the issue, on January 1, 2026, Mayor Zohran Mamdani established the “Leveraging City-Owned Land to Accelerate Housing” or LIFT Task Force. The Task Force is actively reviewing sites owned and controlled by the City that could be used to develop at least 25,000 new housing units over the next ten years. 

At our Policy Breakfast, the NYU Furman Center will provide data on City-owned parcels and go over a series of new maps that will categorize and provide key data points for each parcel of New York City’s municipally owned land. During the presentation, we will also show example parcels and discuss both opportunities and constraints on housing development on those parcels.

Our panel of experts will offer their insights on what would be required to build housing on these parcels, including how to think about small or oddly shaped lots, environmental constraints, and infrastructure capacity challenges. Our panelists will also discuss how the City should balance the need for more housing against other demands to use City-owned land.

Panel
Ariel Aufgang, Architect, Principal of Aufgang Architects 
Leila Bozorg, Deputy Mayor for Housing and Planning, New York City
Lindsay Greene, Chief Executive Officer, Brooklyn Navy Yard 
Lorraine Grillo, Lorraine Grillo Consultants (Former First Deputy of the City of New York; Commissioner of the NYC Department of Design and Construction; President and Chief Executive Officer, NYC School Construction Authority)  

Moderator
Ingrid Gould Ellen, Paulette Goddard Professor of Urban Policy and Planning at NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and Faculty Director of the NYU Furman Center 

Register for in-person attendance using this link.

Register for the livestream using this link.