POLICY MATTERS

 A monthly update on policy issues in the fight against homelessness in NYC.

Care for the Homeless is actively advocating, along with 56 other advocacy, provider and social justice organizations in the “House Our Future NY Campaign” seeking 30,000 stable and affordable housing units for New Yorkers currently experiencing homelessness, as part of the city’s effort to create or preserve 300,000 units of affordable housing over ten years. And now we need your help, by signing on to our petition here. The campaign wants at least 24,000 of those 30,000 units to be newly created and therefore immediately ready for move in apartments, which will allow 2,500 households now in shelter to transition to stable housing each year.

As our petition notes, this goal is perhaps ambitious, but totally feasible based on current progress in the city’s affordable housing plan. The petition notes: “…homeless housing production on the scale we recommend is achievable. More importantly, it is absolutely necessary to produce a meaningful and historic reduction in modern mass homelessness” in New York City.

Every income strata in New York City needs more affordable housing, but no plan can address New York’s “Tale of Two Cities” calamity without dealing effectively with those most in need. While the City’s program is already producing significant numbers of units for middle and moderate income New Yorkers, it has not begun to do that for extremely low-income households and those living in deep poverty, including people experiencing homelessness. The House Our Future NY campaign can do just that.

Please join our coalition for 30,000 stable housing units for people experiencing homelessness. When you sign on our petition here, you’ll be joining with Care for the Homeless, the Coalition for the Homelessness, many other advocacy organizations and hundreds and hundreds of citizen activists to fight homelessness in New York City. The campaign will collect all the signatures, and hopefully be able to deliver thousands of signatures to the Mayor endorsing this campaign.

We’ll be publicizing an event to deliver the signatures and rally for more stable housing for people struggling with homelessness. But please take the first step, now, by signing onto our campaign.

Click here to download the August 2018 Policy Matters Newsletter

CFH will resume our “First Monday” Policy Briefings in September (although it’ll be a second Monday briefing due to the Labor Day holiday!), with a presentation and discussion about “Source of Income Discrimination” by Landlords Who Refuse to Accept Rental Vouchers. This has been a very major problem for CFH clients and people experiencing homelessness in New York City, generally. It is illegal, but unfortunately very common, for anyone to discriminate against tenants based on their use of any legal source of funding for payment of rent – certainly including City LINC Vouchers, Section 8 vouchers, or any other government assistance or subsidy. Read more here.

Policy Briefing on Source of Income Discrimination and What to Do About It will be presented by Dyadra Saulsberry, a Community Outreach Associate in the city Department of Social Services Source of Income Discrimination Unit. The program will run from 5:30-to-6:30 p.m. on Monday, September 10th, at CFH’s conference room on the 5th floor at 30 E. 33rd Street, in Manhattan. In addition to the presentation the program will feature an open question-and-answer and comment discussion period. Read more here.

The First Monday Policy Briefing on October 1st will be on the advocacy campaign requesting 30,000 units of housing be included in the city’s Affordable Housing Plan specifically for people currently experiencing homelessness in New York City, including 2,500 newly created and immediately ready for move in units each year. This campaign, which Care for the Homeless is active in, can really make a significant impact in fighting homelessness in New York City. The presentation will feature Coalition for the Homeless Policy Director Giselle Routhier.

In November our First Monday Policy Briefing is a widely acclaimed program on New York City’s Homelessness: Where We Are and How We Got Here, presented by CFH’s Executive Director George Nashak, who as a longtime high-level government administrator and a nonprofit homeless services provider executive, had an “inside” view of many of the noteworthy homelessness policy events he’ll be talking about.

Our First Monday Policy Briefing is a program set up for our clients, staff, Directors and all interested people to get together to hear about and discuss important issues relating to fighting and ending homelessness in New York, in a friendly environment. Everyone is always welcome, and we especially appreciate it when interested providers, advocates and policymakers outside of our CFH family join us. RSVP for this event here.

Click here to download the August 2018 Policy Matters Newsletter

CFH Client Leaders Begin Annual Voter Registration Drive

Our CFH Client Leaders have just launched their 2018 annual voter registration drive, targeted to CFH client, with a goal of registering 200 new voters. CFH and our registration drive are nonpartisan, but we are committed to getting our clients involved in the community and facilitating every client who is eligible to register and get out and vote for the candidate of their choice.

The drive will include both on site voter registration drives at several CFH health centers, and personal outreach by individual CFH client leaders. We’re glad to register CFH staff or others, but the target is to engage unstably housed CFH consumers who aren’t currently registered to vote.

“Some people are surprised to find out they are eligible to vote,” CFH client leader and voter registration activist Garrett McMahan said, “because they may not realize that you don’t need a fixed address to register in New York.” McMahan said people sometimes think that a past criminal record precludes them from voting. “Actually in New York state people who have completed a sentence or are on probation are eligible to register and vote. And recently, by executive order, now most people who are on parole can also vote in New York.”

Important decisions are made about issues critical to every New Yorker by elected officials and policy makers at the national, state and local levels. Because these public policy choices have such a direct impact on all of us, everyone should register and vote for whatever candidate and party you choose.

This year’s elections will choose our representatives in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives, statewide offices including Governor, State Comptroller and Attorney General, and State Senators and members of the State Assembly running in local districts.  

The primary election for parties to nominate candidates for the U.S. Congress has already occurred, but there is a September 13, 2018, state primary election for parties to nominate statewide candidates and candidates for the New York state legislature. To vote in that primary election, voters must complete and have their registration forms turned in to their Election Bureau by August 19. The November general election will be held on Tuesday, November 6, 2018, with the registration deadline to participate in that election on October 12, 2018.

To register to vote in New York, you must be a U.S. citizen, and a resident of the locality you’re voting in at least 30 days prior to the election. You must also be 18 years old by the date of the election you are voting in, and not legally ruled as mentally incompetent. If you need assistance in registering to vote please contact a CFH client leader or call Jeff Foreman at 212-366-4459, extension 206. 

Click here to download the August 2018 Policy Matters Newsletter

Tue., Aug. 7th, Tenth Anniversary of the opening of CFH’s Susan’s Place Shelter for Women in the Bronx!

Sun. – Sat., Aug. 12th - 18th, National Community Health Center Week, recognizing the vital work healthcare providers, like those at Care for the Homeless, do every day! Find more information at healthcenterweek.org

Wed., Aug. 15th, All Day, Health Care for the Homeless Day, this day celebrates health centers that work to meet the basic health care needs of people without homes, eliminate health disparities, and end homelessness. Care for the Homeless and the NYC Providers of Health Care for the Homeless will honor a number of Health Care Heroes, including CFH’s Nurse Practitioner Steve Rodgers, and the work our health care providers do everyday.

Sat., Aug 18th, 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m., CFH Voter Registration Drive at St. John’s Bread and Life, 795 Lexington Ave., Brooklyn, NY 11221.

Wed., Aug. 22nd, 12:30 p.m. – 2:00 p.m., CFH Consumer Advisory Board Picnic, Riverbank State Park, exclusively for CAB Members.

Thur., Aug. 23rd, 11:00 a.m. - 2:00 p.m., CFH Voter Registration Drive at South Bronx Job Corporation Center, 1771 Andrews Ave S, Bronx, NY 10453.

Mon., Sept. 10th, 5:30 p.m., CFH “First Monday” Policy Briefing, CFH Conference Room, 30 E. 33rd Street, Manhattan, NY. RSVP here.

Click here to download the August 2018 Policy Matters Newsletter