ULURP, the Uniform Land Use Review Procedure
The Uniform Land Use Review Procedure, the clock that Michael Stern’s subject of entitlements runs on whenever a project needs the city’s discretion, is a creature of the charter rather than of the zoning text. The Wikipedia summary of the procedure dates it to the 1975 charter revision and describes its aim as drawing local stakeholders, one phase at a time, into decisions that had been concentrated in the hands of officials such as Robert Moses; it adds that as of right projects never enter it, and that it begins only when a change in zoning or another listed action is required.9 Its history and its stages are taken in turn below, room by room.
Where the rule came from
The procedure replaced a table. THE CITY’s profile of the borough presidencies recalls that when borough presidents sat on the Board of Estimate they had direct sway over the budget, land use and contracts, and that their charter role has since been whittled to advice, with formal recommendations on the land use actions that pass through the procedure as the largest part of what remains.4 City Limits’ investigation of the Planning Commission records the later turn: when the Board of Estimate was eliminated in 1989 the City Council gained the final say on land use, and former commissioners interviewed there argue the change made the Commission read more like a branch of the executive than an independent technical body.3
Certification starts the clock
Nothing counts until the Department of City Planning has certified the file as complete. Urbanity New York’s plain walk through the procedure describes the months of pre application work with the department that precede it, the notice that since 2020 must reach the board and the borough president at least 30 days before certification, and the environmental finding, a negative declaration or a completed draft impact statement, that must exist before the clock can start; certification itself sends the file to the board, the borough president and the Council within nine days.6 New York YIMBY’s report on the East Midtown certification shows the moment in practice: the Commission’s vote to certify a 78 block rezoning opened seven months of approvals, with the local Council member holding what the report called the final vote.2
Days allowed at each stop
days
The community board’s 60 days
The first room is advisory and local. The board has 60 days to hear the public and adopt a written recommendation, and if it fails to act in time it is deemed to have waived its turn, Urbanity explains; nothing it decides binds anyone, but it is the only stage at which the people nearest the site speak as a body.6 CityLand’s write up of the 2005 West Chelsea rezoning shows what the stage can do even when it loses: Community Board 4 disapproved the plan in a 22 page recommendation, and the bonus for below market housing written into the adopted text for medium density lots traced back to demands first raised at that hearing.7
The borough president’s 30 days
The second room is advisory too, with half the time. The borough president has 30 days to issue a recommendation, and THE CITY notes that although the opinion does not factor into any final vote, it can arm the Council in its negotiation with an applicant, for instance over how many apartments are set below market.4 The Department of City Planning’s record of the voids text of 2019 shows the stages overlapping on the calendar, with the community board resolutions and the recommendation of the borough president for Manhattan both dated to the same week in March.10
The Commission’s 60 days
The third room is the first with power to end the matter. City Limits describes the thirteen commissioners, seven named by the mayor, one by each of the five borough presidents and one by the public advocate, each serving a staggered five year term and removable only for misconduct, and its review of contested votes found mayoral appointees voting for every mayoral proposal examined.3 Urbanity sets the mechanics: a mandatory hearing within 60 days, a simple majority of seven to approve, a supermajority of nine in certain site selection cases, and a disapproval that is usually final unless the action is one the Council must review.6
One amendment's passage through the clock
- January 28The Commission finds the application complete; the review begins.
- March 7Community boards in the Bronx, Manhattan and Queens adopt resolutions; the borough president for Manhattan recommends.
- March 13The City Planning Commission holds its public hearing.
- April 10The Commission votes to approve a modified text.
- April 16The City Council holds its hearing.
- May 29The Council adopts the amendment with its own modification, and the text takes effect.
The Council’s 50 days and the mayor’s five
The fourth room is where the vote is political. Urbanity divides the Council’s jurisdiction three ways: mandatory review of map changes, text changes and urban renewal plans; discretionary call ups of special permits and other actions; and the triple no, where a board and a borough president both disapproved and the president objects to the Commission’s approval. The Council has 50 days, any modification goes back to the Commission for 15 days while the clock pauses, and silence counts as approval; the mayor then has five days to veto, and the Council ten to override.6 6sqft’s dispatch on the East Midtown vote records how the last room usually ends, with a 42 to 0 vote after five years of planning, and with the Council’s own additions folded into the adopted text.1
The clock in practice, and the move to shorten it
Seven months is the usual figure. amNewYork’s coverage of the Pier 40 air rights transfer describes a certification date triggering seven months of procedure through board, borough president, Commission and Council, running alongside a separate public process the park trust was required to hold, and notes that the price of the rights could not be set until the Council had voted.5 The Citizens Budget Commission’s testimony to the 2025 charter commission describes the proposed alternative, an expedited procedure for modest density increases with a 30 day notice period and 60 days of review, and argues it will deliver little unless the certifications, authorizations and special permits that travel with most applications can take the shorter route too.8 While the clock runs, the procedure forecloses the one thing the automatic route offers, which is certainty; the relief it can grant is described in As of Right, Special Permits and Variances, and the citywide housing text that recently ran through it in City of Yes.
