The Housing Crisis Forces Change on a Low-Rise Pocket of Brooklyn

Change doesn’t always come easily in Brooklyn’s liberal strongholds.

But New York’s push to build more housing in every corner of the city — even in places that have sometimes been skeptical of new development — is set to clear a significant hurdle on Wednesday, when a key City Council committee is expected to approve a zoning change that will clear the way for new apartment towers on the border between Park Slope and Windsor Terrace.

Two 10-story buildings are planned for the site of an industrial laundry business, Arrow Linen. Forty percent of the 250 units will rent below market rate.

The so-called Arrow Linen proposal had all the makings of the sort of fight that has become familiar in middle-class parts of the city with enough political influence to alter or defeat unpopular projects. It was subject to more than a year of contentious debate.

Yet the conclusion demonstrates just how much the politics around development have started to morph as the housing crunch has become one of the city’s most pressing crises.

That dynamic is playing out beyond New York, too, as leaders in liberal communities across the country are confronting housing shortages so profound that some of their once-reliable voters have begun to drift rightward, expressing skepticism about Democrats’ ability to tackle affordability issues.

Progressive politicians who are often sharply critical of real estate developers when running for office have become increasingly supportive of new construction once they are elected.