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Brooklyn Borough Hall rally protests Trump’s HUD budget cuts

‘Families will have no place to live’

April 3, 2017 By Mary Frost Brooklyn Daily Eagle
Protesters gathered at Brooklyn Borough Hall Plaza on Sunday to speak out against President Trump's proposed cuts to the HUD budget, which they say will increase homelessness in NYC. Photos courtesy of Ellen Freudenheim
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Melissa Del Valle Ortiz, 47, lives with her two adult children in a 40-building, Section 8 development on Sixth Avenue in Sunset Park, which houses roughly 400 families. Her son has autism and her daughter, who she calls a “creative spirit,” is struggling to find a job.

If President Donald Trump’s proposal to slash the budget of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) goes through, she says, she might have to move in with her mom.

“I’m laughing just to keep from crying,” she told the Brooklyn Eagle on Monday.

The budget cuts would affect, among other items, operational funds responsible for repairs. “At the point when the building doesn’t pass inspection, the owner can lose the subsidy,” she said. In rapidly-gentrifying Sunset Park, tenants already have enormous insecurity about their housing, Ortiz said.

“If the development’s owners think there’s a risk of the program being defunded, they’ll drop out of the program and families will have no place to live,” she said. “You have senior citizens aging in place here. What’s going to happen to them? Where will they go?”

 Doris Williams, 81, lives in the Joseph Yancy Senior Housing project in upper Manhattan. The building, part of the Section 202 program, provides low-income elderly with supportive services that allows them to live independently.

“I’m very concerned,” she told the Brooklyn Eagle. “They’re already saying there’s not enough money for the things we need. We used to have 24-hour security. Now there’s no security between the hours of 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.”

Williams says the doors to the building are so heavy that many of the residents, especially those in wheelchairs or walkers, can’t get in without help. For more than a year now, those who can’t open the doors have to wait outside until someone else comes in or out.

Ortiz and Williams were just two of dozens of protesters at Brooklyn Borough Hall Plaza on Sunday speaking out against the proposed cuts, which amount to $6 billion, or 13 percent of HUD’s budget.

In New York City, Trump’s budget will cut $550 million from two agencies: the NYC Housing Authority (NYCHA) and NYC Department of Housing Preservation & Development (HPD).

Officials said that Trump’s budget, if approved, would directly hurt 500,000 of New York City’s poorest families and cause a surge in homelessness.

U.S. Rep. Nydia Velázquez

“The national budget is a roadmap of our national priorities,” U.S. Rep. Nydia Velázquez told the crowd. “How could you say to the people of this country that cutting funding for [NYCHA] is a national value?”

Velázquez said the budget cuts will also slash grants that provide money to go after unscrupulous landlords, along with funding for shelters and Meals on Wheels.

“You are going to tell me Mr. Trump and Mr. [Ben] Carson, that taking food away from seniors represents our values. Shame on you!” Velazquez said.

Public housing is already stressed in New York City, officials, said. Deputy Borough President Diana Reyna said that HUD started cutting back on funding for NYCHA back in 2001.

Carmen Quinones, president of the Douglass Houses Tenants Association, said that Trump’s cuts are deplorable, “but this is a problem that’s been ongoing. It’s just getting real right now. Your house is up for sale, do you get it? Your grandkids ain’t gonna have nowhere to live.”

Numerous advocacy groups organized the rally, including GetOrganizedBK, Community Voices Heard, Mutual Housing Association of New York, New York Communities for Change, NYS Tenants & Neighbors and others.

A protester holds a parody sign of President Trump bearing the words, “I need to subsidize my vacations with HUD funding!!!” Photos courtesy of Ellen Freudenheim

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