Mayor Zohran Mamdani announced the settlement agreement Friday at one of A&E’s buildings at 35-64 84th Street in Jackson Heights.
As part of the agreement with the city, Douglas Eisenberg’s A&E must correct more than 4,000 building code violations at 14 properties, mostly in Queens. The company pays $150,000 per building. That amount will increase if the landlord does not make the payment or harasses tenants.
“For years, A&E has acted with callous disregard for those living in its properties,” Mamdani told reporters. “This is not just a failure to serve those to whom it has an obligation. It is open cruelty to tens of thousands of New Yorkers.”
The settlement stems from complaints filed last year by the Adams administration. According to court documents, the agreement between A&E and the Department of Housing Preservation and Development was signed on December 31, the last day of the previous administration. A Housing Court judge signed the agreement this week.
A spokesperson for A&E indicated that the company inherited violations on its properties and has made it its “mission to work with the city to improve this building and others that were in deep disrepair when we took ownership.”
“In every building we have acquired, we have invested in replacing boilers, rehabilitating elevators and resolving tens of thousands of long-standing violations,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “We are pleased that we have resolved all legal issues with the city and that we have agreed with the housing authority on a repair plan that we are already implementing.”
The landlord has between 14 and 90 days to correct outstanding violations, depending on their severity.
The settlement announcement came around the time a court on Friday confirmed Summit Properties as the buyer of more than 5,000 rent-stabilized units from Pinnacle Group after Mamdani’s government tried unsuccessfully to block the sale.
The mayor said the settlement is the largest in the history of HPD’s Anti-Harassment Unit, founded in 2019. However, the unit has won larger numbers judgements against landlords.
Meanwhile, elected officials and tenant advocates plan to gather at another A&E property to discuss the property’s cooking gas shutdown. The mayor indicated on Friday that he is “aware of issues across A&E’s portfolio,” adding that the government will continue to monitor their behavior.
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