Below are a series of summaries of Press Advisories we have written. We reach out to the press in order to inform them of our work and inspire them to cover our issues and activities. You can download the full advisories by clicking on the PDF files that are attached below the summaries. Advisories are listed in reverse chronological order.
Low-income residents of Yonkers and members of Community Voices Heard will March to City Hall to demand that the city include housing and jobs for low-income families in the plans for development in Getty’s Square, and that no more public housing will be demolished. We are marching because Southwest Yonkers is being rapidly developed and gentrified, displacing low-income people. Mulford Gardens, a public housing development, is set for demolition and the plan to rebuild it does not include enough low-income units for all former residents to return.
Tuesday, February 12th, 2008
6:30PM: March begins at Chicken Island, Yonkers
7:00PM: Press Conference at Yonkers City Hall, 40 South Broadway
This Saturday, January 26th, Community Voices Heard is organizing an action in order to target Obama and Clinton to move forward timely legislation and promote a low-income agenda. January 26th is the international day of action as part of the World and US Social Forums. Organizations from around the world will be doing actions for social justice on this day and CVH is holding this action in order to be a part of this momentous day.
This Thursday there will be a City Wide Public Housing Rally at City Hall Park. This rally is to demand that the City create a budget modification to supply $30 million in funding for public housing.
This upcoming Thursday, July 26th we are organizing a Constituency Tour of two Public Housing developments, Wagner in East Harlem and Drew Hamilton in West Harlem. We will be taking elected officials on both the State and the City levels around the developments to highlight the effects of disinvestment by the State and Federal government on NYCHA's buildings. There will be a photo gallery to represent all the problems that disinvestment has caused in Public Housing throughout the city.
Low-income residents of Yonkers who are also members of Community Voices Heard will guide State Senator Andrea Stewart Cousins on a day living in poverty this Thursday, July 12th. Residents will first take the Senator to the Yonkers Department of Social Services (DSS) office to offer her a glimpse of the service and treatment they receive there. Next they will go to a Public Housing development to show her some of the conditions they must endure and to stress the importance of saving and preserving low-income housing. This will be followed by a stop at Chicken Island, the proposed site of a large scale development project. Here residents will stress the importance of community input in the development process. Finally, residents will end the day with a meeting to propose solutions to the problems to which the Senator has been exposed.
Community Voices Heard (CVH) will release its new report, Failure to Comply: The Disconnect between Design and Implementation in HRA’s WeCARE Program
This report and briefing will highlight the results of a research project that explored the WeCARE program, a two-year old program in New York City that is supposed to provide specialized services and enhanced support to public assistance recipients with disabilities. The findings are based on conversations with over 700 WeCARE participants, in-depth focus groups, interviews and phone surveys with 100 of those participants.
New York City Public housing residents will deliver Governor-elect Eliot Spitzer the holiday gift of 3,000 postcards, signed by public housing residents who pledged to vote for Governor in the 2006 election. Each post card details an issue plaguing public housing residents. Because New York State has not given any money to New York City Public Housing since 1997, Community Voices Heard members request a meeting with the Governor to discuss how he can improve public housing in New York City (or request that Spitzer give them the gift of state funding to improve public housing).
Press conference with low-income New Yorkers testifying about personal experiences living in poverty in New York City. Speakers include welfare recipients and unemployed New Yorkers. Group will call on Mayor Bloomberg, Deputy Mayor Linda Gibbs, the Commission for Economic Opportunity (CEO) and City agencies to make a real commitment to addressing poverty and joblessness in the city by better coordinating the workforce development system, expanding paid transitional jobs programs, investing in career-ladder training programs, and talking directly to low-income New Yorkers. Group will sing its version of Frank Sinatra’s “New York, New York” highlighting the other side of New York and hand out information about the CEO to passersby.
