Citizens Budget Commission Hosts Breakfast Discussion with NYCHA CEO Lisa Bova-Hiatt and Board Chair Jamie Rubin

On the morning of Wednesday March 27, the Citizens Budget Commission (CBC) welcomed NYCHA CEO Lisa Bova-Hiatt and Board Chair Jamie Rubin as special guests for a trustees’ breakfast discussion event to hear about today’s NYCHA directly from its top leadership.

Led and moderated by CBC President Andrew Rein, the conversation with Ms. Bova-Hiatt and Mr. Rubin touched on a wide range of topics, including NYCHA’s current operations, its budget, its Capital Plan, and the benefits that monitorship has brought to the Authority, among many others.

“Thank you so much for inviting us,” Ms. Bova-Hiatt told Mr. Rein and the audience at the beginning of her remarks. “The more Jamie and I are ‘out there’ speaking about NYCHA, the more people really can get an inside view of what it’s like to run the biggest housing authority in the United States.”

Ms. Bova-Hiatt provided the CBC audience with a comprehensive overview of today’s NYCHA, as well as a wealth of detail on the challenges and opportunities she and Mr. Rubin lead the 12,000 employees of Team NYCHA in handling every day. Among the specific items Ms. Bova-Hiatt discussed: the PACT program; the Trust (which rehabilitates NYCHA properties but leaves their management to the Authority); the Comprehensive Modernization program; the vastness and variety of NYCHA’s housing portfolio – as well as the impracticality of any one-size-fits-all solution to the many challenges that necessarily arise within such a massive portfolio; questions of how to be most effective in the continuous improvement of staff training and culture; and many others.

“I am probably one of the most positive people in this room,” said Ms. Bova-Hiatt. “When you work as the CEO of NYCHA and you encounter all of the challenges that we deal with every day, you have to wake up every morning and say, ‘Today is going to be a great day, no matter what happens,’ she said. “I do that over and over.”

Many members of Team NYCHA, including Board Chair Jamie Rubin, believe that the positivity and creativity Ms. Bova-Hiatt brings to work every day have helped usher in a new era at the Authority.

“The difference between [NYCHA’s] old model and the model that Lisa has implemented with her senior team – some of whom are here today – is simply extraordinary,” Rubin said.

“We really are at a different place than we were when I arrived at NYCHA,” said Ms. Bova-Hiatt.

Lisa Bova-Hiatt was appointed CEO of NYCHA by Mayor Eric Adams on July 6, 2023, after serving as Interim CEO since September 2022. She brought more than 25 years of experience in the public sector to her role as CEO, prior to which she served as NYCHA’s General Counsel. 

Before his appointment as NYCHA Board Chair, Jamie Rubin worked across affordable housing, disaster recovery, major infrastructure projects, and clean energy in the public, private, and nonprofit sectors. He is currently the Chief Investment Officer of Aligned Climate Capital.

The Citizens Budget Commission is a nonpartisan, nonprofit civic organization whose mission is to achieve constructive change in the finances and services of New York City and New York State government.  According to its website, the CBC’s efforts are directed toward “serving the citizenry at large, rather than narrow special interests; preserving public resources, whether financial or human; and focusing on the well-being of future New Yorkers, the most underrepresented group in city and state government.”

For more information on NYCHA’s leadership, please visit: Leadership & Departments – NYCHA

For more information on the Citizens Budget Commission, please visit: www.cbcny.org