NYCHA Doesn't Owe Section 8 Payments for Tenants with Terminated Benefits

Landlord sued NYCHA to recover Section 8 payments for two tenants. NYCHA asked the court to dismiss the case without a trial. The court ruled against NYCHA. NYCHA appealed and won. NYCHA showed that it notified landlord in February 2000 that one tenant's apartment had failed inspection based on certain conditions and that the subsidy would be terminated as of March 1, 2000, unless the conditions were corrected, inspected, and approved. Landlord didn't show that the conditions were corrected or approved. The other tenant's lease expired in March 2002, and landlord then started a holdover eviction case against her. However, tenant left her belongings in the apartment until December 2002, and landlord claimed Section 8 payments through this date. Under the terms of landlord's Section 8 assistance contract, NYCHA must pay benefits only for the period when the apartment was leased and occupied. By December 2002, tenant's apartment wasn't leased and occupied by tenant within the meaning of the Section 8 contract.

Cooper v. NYCHA: NYLJ, 10/18/06, p. 42, col. 4 (App. T. 2 Dept.; Pesce, PJ, Weston Patterson, Belen, JJ)