The Rent Guidelines Board on May 7 approved preliminary increases of 2 percent on a one-year lease and 4 percent on a two-year lease for rent-stabilized apartments. The board also proposed a 5 percent surcharge on vacant units and a $15 "poor tax" on apartments renting for $400 a month or less.

The proposed increases were somewhat lower than last year’s, which at 5 and 7 percent for renewals, a 9 percent vacancy surcharge, and a $20 poor tax, were the highest in almost a decade. However, they were still "well in excess" of what they should have been according to the board’s guidelines for landlords’ costs, said tenant representative Kenneth Rosenfeld.

The preliminary guidelines were approved without debate from the board’s public members, all appointed by Mayor Giuliani. "They’re impervious to any of our arguments," comments Rosenfeld. The one anomaly was a proposal to allow 2 percent increases for rooming houses, even though no hotel owners testified in favor of an increase.

Unlike most years, when the RGB’s annual increase-setting process is the focus of tenant-landlord conflict in the city, this year’s meeting attracted little attention, far overshadowed by the battle in Albany over renewing the state’s rent laws. Tenants will face much higher increases than the RGB has ever approved if the Pataki Administration imposes vacancy decontrol or lets the rent laws expire June 15.

The RGB may draw more notice this month. The board’s June 16 and 19 public hearings and June 23 vote on the final guidelines will occur the week after the rent laws expire. If the Legislature follows the same pattern it did when the rent laws expired in 1993 or when the loft laws expired last year, tenant protections could be hanging by a 24 or 36-hour extension while the RGB meets.

It’s important for tenants to come, whether they’ll be expressing "outrage, joy, or frustration" said Rosenfeld. "Any indication that tenants are disinterested or losing strength will be bad."