Letters to the Editor
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
‘Bianca Jagger’s Rent’
Re: “Bianca Jagger ‘s Rent” [Editorial, October 23, 2007]: You report that three judges ruled I was not entitled to a rent-stabilized apartment on Park Avenue. I should like to point out that this decision will be appealed. The argument presented by my landlord is totally inaccurate.
Since 1988, my only home was 530 Park Avenue, until I was constructively evicted from there. A toxic mould infestation made the apartment uninhabitable and made me seriously ill. The main reason given for the judges’ ruling is that I held a B1, B2 visa while holding primary residence in Great Britain. That, too, is inaccurate.
“Why the hell,” you quote from New York magazine, “does someone like Bianca Jagger get to have a rent-stabilized apartment, anyway?” To answer that question, allow me to explain my circumstances. In December 1979, I obtained a parsimonious divorce settlement, and I was left with no home, no child support, and an eight-year-old daughter to raise alone. My work in the areas of human rights, social and economic justice, climate change, and the death penalty has been almost entirely pro bono.
For 25 years, I have travelled the world, campaigning without remuneration for the rights of the underprivileged. Are you aware that there is an earnings cap on eligibility for rent-stabilized apartments? I have never earned anything close since I moved into 530 Park Avenue. Calling me a “wealthy” and “prosperous” woman is simply absurd. Contrary to reports, I have been paying $4,600 into an escrow account at the New York Department of Finance for the last four years. Paying two rents has put a terrible financial burden on me.
You ask why I should be permitted a rent of “just” $4,600. When I first rented this apartment in 1988 at $4,000 a month, this was no paltry sum. The real privileges in the real estate system are bestowed upon landlords. They are a powerful lobbying force, and have been able to manipulate and corrupt the rent stabilization laws, in many cases forcing tenants to declare that their homes are not their primary residences, thus enabling landlords to set higher rents. My own landlord put me through a spurious trial in an attempt to prove that 530 Park Avenue was not my primary residence, in order to increase the rent to $4,000 when I moved in.
There are hundreds of thousands of toxic mold sufferers in America whose health has been destroyed — and who have been brought to bankruptcy in daring to challenge their landlords. Their lives have been ruined. There is no protective or punitive legislation at either state or federal level to protect occupiers of rental property from the toxic mold, which infested my apartment and amounted to constructive eviction. Surely it is abused and exploited tenants throughout the United States who need legal protection and not their unscrupulous landlords.
BIANCA JAGGER
New York, N.Y.
Please address letters intended for publication to the Editor of The New York Sun. Letters may be sent by e-mail to editor@nysun.com, by facsimile to 212-608-7348, or post to 105 Chambers Street, New York City 10007. Please include a return address and daytime telephone number. Letters may be edited.
