No One in NYC Should Be Forced to Make These Choices Posted on May 18, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in The Huffington Post Among the many “broken windows” cases we get at The Bronx Defenders, I’ve always found arrests for turnstile jumping particularly outrageous and counterproductive. According to the 2010 U.S. Census, the South Bronx is the poorest congressional district i ..Read More
City Plans Legal Action Against Seven Brooklyn, Bronx Slumlords Whose Decrepit Properties House Many Homeless New Yorkers Posted on May 18, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in New York Daily News The city is taking legal action against seven slumlords whose rat-infested Bronx and Brooklyn properties house dozens of homeless families, as well as hundreds of New Yorkers too poor to move into better buildings. Mayor de Blasio will announce the court actio ..Read More
City Has a Tool to Police Section 8 Discrimination Posted on May 16, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in City Limits Often it seems like everyone loves Section 8. Some landlord lobbyists like the program because it protects the poor without reaching into the pockets of property owners. Homeless advocates yearn for more Section 8 because, unlike city-funded transitional progr ..Read More
NYC Section 8 Residents Talk About the Horrors of Affordable Housing, Fears of Being Forced Out by Money-Hungry Landlords Posted on May 16, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in New York Daily News Facing pressure to move by money-hungry landlords, Gloria Nieves and her neighbors resemble extras in a horror film as they shuffle through their Queens apartment building. “I see all the people — walking zombies,” said Nieves, 57, who has lived in her p ..Read More
One More Way the Courts Aren’t Working for the Poor Posted on May 16, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in The Nation Americans are famous for filing lawsuits left and right, but for litigants living in poverty, justice can be harder to find. When facing civil litigation, a massive gap in legal-aid services reflects and reproduces the very injustices that often drive poor lit ..Read More
Over 2.5 Million People Applied for Just 2,600 Available Affordable Housing Units This Year Posted on May 11, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in New York Daily News A whopping 2.5 million applicants have lined up for 2,600 affordable apartments the city has offered up since last summer, Mayor de Blasio’s housing commissioner said Wednesday. While demand for housing is sky high, Department of Housing Preservation and Dev ..Read More
Here Are City’s Top 15 Gentrifying Neighborhoods Posted on May 9, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in DNAinfo Whether it’s a new glass tower going up or a beloved mom-and-pop shop closing down, locals often blame gentrification for unwanted changes in their neighborhoods. But what actually defines gentrification? NYU’s Furman Center, in a report released Monda ..Read More
Albany’s Unfinished Business Posted on May 9, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in New York Slant Gov. Andrew Cuomo and the state lawmakers are back in Albany to finish off this year’s legislative session. Kudos to the governor for charting a course to eventually increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour in many parts of the state – it will make a meani ..Read More
The Mentally Ill Need Supportive Affordable Housing Posted on May 9, 2016 by Jacquelyn Simone in The New York Times A small number of individuals with serious mental illnesses need long-term hospital care, but no one should need this level of care forever. In the 1990s, I worked as a social worker in a state-run mental health hospital of this kind in New York City; the pati ..Read More
