NYCHA needs to be saved (photo: Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office)

The New York City Housing Authority is putting forward a promising new plan to preserve each public housing unit in its portfolio. Mayor Bill de Blasio, and previous mayors, have put forward multiple plans intended to save NYCHA, but this one bears attention and support because with sufficient community input and political support, it has a real chance of success. 

For more than half-a-million renters in New York City — a city within the city — public housing has provided

Mayor de Blasio at a NYCHA announcement (photo: Demetrius Freeman/Mayor's Office)

"If we were to lose public housing," warns City Council Member Ritchie Torres, "we might have a shelter system overflowing with hundreds of thousands of people."

With more than 400,000 residents, the New York City Housing Authority, or NYCHA, is the largest public housing system in the country. Never far from the headlines due to ongoing problems, NYCHA is under even more scrutiny courtesy of a series of audits