April 1990 New York's Community Affairs News Magazine

B I G M O N E Y , F E W J O B S 0 E A S T H A R L E M C O A L I T I O N
A B U S I N E S S A P P R O A C H T O H E L P I N G T H E H O M E L E S S
2 CITY LIMITS
CitJ/
Volume XV Number 4
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EDITORIAL
Changing Times?
Nearly three months after taking the oath of office, Mayor David Dinkins
has named his new housing commissioner-and he never even had to leave
home. Felice Michetti, the new commissioner, has worked for the city's
housing department since 1979 and been its first deputy commissioner for
the past four years. .
With Michetti's extensive experience comes strong ties to the Koch
administration's housing policies. One of the principle architects of the
city's 10-year housing plan, Michetti was promoted to first deputy by former
housing commissioner Paul Crotty, the manager of Koch's last campaign.
While many housing activists charge the 10-year plan fails to provide
enough assistance to the city's lowest income households, Michetti also has
a reputation as a strong backer of some community-based nonprofit housing
providers. The selection of Michetti appears to send a message that the
Dinkins administration does not want to alter the basic priorities of Koch's
housing plan. But given her relationship to some nonprofit developers and
housing activists, Michetti may be more open to negotiations than her
predecessor.
If Michetti wants to signal glasnost-if not perestroika-she can begin by
halting the city's appeal of a state Supreme Court judge's ruling that the 10-
year plan is subject to community review.

Speaking of the 10-year plan: During last year's mayoral primary, former
housing commissioner Abraham Biderman escorted reporters from the
city's dailies to see the Koch administration's handiwork in Harlem and the
South Bronx: whole blocks of derelict buildings under renovation in a
program known as Construction Management. The reporters came back duly
impressed, penning articles that echoed the administration's claim that this
renovation effort was akin to the building of the pyramids.
Some of the most fawning articles appeared in the New York Times. But
now the Times tells us the program is running some 50 percent over budget
and there was little management in the Construction Management Program.
What 's the surprise? The initial phase of the program literally' offered
developers a blank check. You build, the city pays-no matter how much
over budget.
Now, with Koch gone, and in the midst of the city's budget crunch, the
Times chooses to take a swack at the very same program-which just
happens to be the largest housing production program currently underway
for the poor. Makes you wonder about "objective" reporting. 0


1
INSIDE
FEATURES
Rebels With a Cause? 12
A challenging look at the squatter movement in New
York City.
Whose Job Is It, Anyway? 16
Don't expect many job placement or job-training
programs from companies that receive tax breaks and
city subsidies.
DEPARTMENTS
Editorial
Changing Times? ................................................... 2
Short Term Notes
Vacate Order .......................................................... 4
Archives Fight ...... ................................................. 4
Adult-Home Death ................................................ 5
Cross-Subsidy Progress ................................. ....... 5
Harlem Struggle .................................................. . 5
Reinspection Regs ................................................. 6
Neighborhood Notes ............. .................................... 7
Profile
Pride and Progress: The East Harlem
Community Coalition for Fair Banking .............. 8
Pipeline
For Some of the Homeless,
Membership Has Its Privileges .......................... 10
City View
Consider This: Housing Activists for Council 20
Letters ....................................................................... 22
April 1990 3
Membership/Page 10
Rebels/Page 12
Whose Job?/Page 16
4 CITY LIMITS
SHORT TERM NOTES
VACATE ORDER
Four families were recently
placed by city officials in the
Belleclaire Hotel on the Upper
West Side of Manhattan
because of hazardous
conditions within the three-
story brick building they
occupied in Borough Park,
Brooklyn. The building, run
by Benjamin Eisner, is one of
at least two ramshackle
properties he manages in the
neighborhood.
The city' s Department of
Housing Preservation and
Development (HPD) ordered
the families to vacate 5816
13th Avenue in late February.
The building has 20 housing
code violations, 10 classified
as immediately hazardous.
"The building was unfit for
living and there were a lot of
children involved," explains
Greg King, an HPD spokes-
person. "There was an illegal
subdivision of two apartments
into four, there was no
running water throughout the
building and sewage was all
over the cellar."
The building' s manager,
Benjamin Eisner, says that the
damage to 5816 13th Avenue
was intentionally done by the
residents, most of whom he
describes as illegal squatters
and drug users.
This contention was denied
by tenants contacted by City
Limits, as well as advocates
from the Council of Neighbor-
hood Organizations (CONO)
and a Human Resources
Administration (HRA) case-
worker, Antonio Valderrama.
Annette Chaparro, 25, is
one of the tenants who was
living at 5816 13th Avenue.
She says, "These accusations
are not true. He' s the one at
fault." Chaparro and her four
daughters-one of them a
newborn baby-had been
living in a cramped apartment
with a six-foot window without
a pane. On a recent visit to
the apartment, which still con-
tains the Chaparro's posses-
sions, three layers of heavy
plastic and a flowery bedsheet
were placed over the window
in an attempt to fend off the
cold.
Lourdes Chaparro,
Annette' s sister, was living on
another floor of the building
with three children in a one
and a half room apartment.
lot," says Correa.
King from HPD says
inspectors recently called for
an emergency oil delivery for
the building's boiler.
Wall-to-wall damages:
A young resident of J 028 39th Street in Borough Park, Brooklyn.
Conditions in the apartment
include a cracked window
and a portable shower
squeezed in the kitchen.
Nicholas, age 1 2, recalls,
"We had to heat up the water
to take a shower. You
couldn't sleep it was so cold
and there were big rats. My
sister has bad dreams about
that place."
Before the building was
vacated, HRA delivered 26
blankets to the residents to try
and keep them warm,
according to Valderrama.
A two-story wooden
building at 1028 39th Street is
another Eisner property. Hous-
ing department records indi -
cate the four-unit building has
69 housing code violations.
Elizabeth Correa, a
mother of three children under
the age of 10, was paying
$400 a month for her
apartment until she went on
rent strike recently. The
building has a broken window
in the front, no lock on the
front door and the hallways
and bathrooms have foot-long
holes and cracks. Tenants say
they have barely received heat
through the winter. "If we had
heat for two days it was a
In a telephone interview,
Eisner counters that leaks,
holes and broken windows in
both buildings were caused by
tenants. "Squatters and even
regular tenants' sometimes
don' t know how to behave,"
he says. "A lot of tenants
break things so they don' t
have to pay the rent."
After extensive negotia-
tions, some improvements may
be underway. At a March 14
meeting, Eisner made an oral
commitment to make repairs
on both buildings, among
other agreements, according
to CONO's Terri Cinar. D
Lisa Glazer
ARCHIVES FIGHT
Community groups in
Greenwich Village are
battling the developer of the
Archives Building, claiming
the developer is reneging on a
promise to provide low-cost
space to local nonprofits.
Located at 154 Christopher
Street, the Archives Building is
controlled by Rockrose
Development Corporation.
Rockrose acquired the
building from the T eitlebaum
Group, which paid $10 to
lease the publicly owned
building. A Board of Estimate
resolution gave the developer
the right to convert the
structure into luxury housing
and commercial real estate-
as long as a significant
portion of the space was
allocated to community groups
at a below-market rate.
The Archives Building was
converted to luxury housing a
year ago and is now more
than 90 percent occupied. Yet
only three of the 10 nonprofit
organizations selected by the
community board to use the
community space have signed
leases. The groups that
haven't signed their leases say
the space they have been
allocated has not been
renovated adequately for their
use, and they are unable to
foot the bill for setting up
office space. Although they
s ~ y the basic rental price is
affordable, they are disputing
additional maintenance costs
and the developer's refusal to
provide renewable leases.
The nonprofit groups are
expected to move into the
basement of the building. On
a recent visit, the cavernous
space-nearly as large as a
city block-had exposed
wiring and plumbing, few
lights and was not divided into
separate offices.
"We had hoped that the
Archive would be the answer
to our prayers. Now it
doesn' t seem to be, " says
Janet Weinberg, executive
director of The Community
Cares, a social service agency
for senior citizens. Weinberg
s ~ y s her organization cannot
afford to upgrade the base-
ment space they were
allocated.
Other community groups
still negotiating with the
developer include Village
Visiting Neighbors, the Asian
American Arts Center and the
Federation to Preserve the
Greenwich Village Waterfront
and Great Port.
John West, director of
planning for Rockrose, argues
that the building is "com-
pletely renovated." He denies
that Rockrose has any
obligation to provide parti-
tions, to install duct work for
ventilation, or to put in drop
ceilings to hide pipework. He
adds that maintenance fees
are not frozen because
inflation may lead to rising
costs.
Community Board 2 and
the nonprofit groups involved
have organized several
meetings over the past year to
try and reach an agreement
with the developer. Edward
Gold, chairman of Community
Board 2, is concerned that if
an agreement is not reached
soon, the opportunity to use
the space as a community
resource may be lost. Accord-
ing to the Board of Estimate
resolution, if the space is
unoccupied for three years
after renovation, it may be
turned over for commercial or
residential use. 0 Daniel
Zaleski
ADULT-HOME
DEATH
On the morning of March
14, a resident of Leben Home
for Adults in Elmhurst plunged
to his death from the facility's
roof, according to pol ice. "He
either fell or jumped," says
Lieutenant Michael McAuliffe,
of the 11 Oth Precinct in
Queens. McAuliffe says this
was the third Leben Home
death in the past year.
Israel Gombo, administra-
tor of the adult home, says he
is filing a report regarding the
recent death with tile state
Department of Social Serv-
ices-the agency that admini -
sters the home-and would
not comment further on the
death.
George Gitlitz, an advo-
cate from the Coalition of
Institutionalized Aged and
Disabled (ClAD), says,
"Residents have complained
that safety in the homes is a
big problem. ClAD believes
that their fears are justified
and that the homes and
government have to do more
to ensure that residents are
protected, whether it be from
themselves or the outside
environment."
City officials are increas-
ingly using adult homes to
shelter the homeless. Leben
Home was highlighted in a
recent City Limits article, "No
place Like Home" (March
1990), which raised questions
about conditions within adult
homes in New York City. The
article i ncluded information
from state investigators who
expressed concern for the
condition of many Leben
Home residents.
Adult homes provide board
and housing to some 30,000
frail elderly and deinstitution-
alized mentally-ill residents in
447 adult homes statewide.
The city has 9,000 adult home
residents in 58 facilities. The
industry has been the subject
of four investigations in the
last 13 years regarding
allegations of abuse of
residents' rights, decrepit
buildings and poor mental
health and medical care. 0
Marguerite Holloway
CROSS-SUBSIDY
PROGRESS
Two and a half years after
the city's housing department
and Community Board 3 in
Manhattan reached an
agreement to go forward with
the cross-subsidy plan to fund
affordable housing in the
Lower East Side, the program
is about to move forward.
Construction on the first 66
units of housing within the
plan is scheduled to begin in
June or July.
"It's terrific to get some-
thing concrete out of this, "
says Lisa Kaplan, a member
of Community Board 3 who
has been advocating for the
cross-subsidy plan tor the past
six years. "We're gratified
that the ground is literally
breaking-but we' ve still got a
long way to go."
The intent of the cross-
subsidy program is to use the
proceeds from the sale of
vacant city-owned buildings
April 1990 5
Policy pushers:
At 0 City Holl press conference, the NYC Ad Hoc Housing Coolition
coiled for substontive chonges in the city's housing progrom. From
left, Horry DeRienzo, from the Consumer-Former Foundotion ond
Council Member Miriom Friedlonder.
for market-rate housing to
subsidize the construction of
lower income units. If the
program succeeds, eventually
1 ,000 units of subsidized
housing will be built, for
1,000 market-rate units.
The Department of Housing
Preservation and Development
(HPD) and Community Board
3 are working to complete the
first phase of the program,
which aims to build 192 lower
income units, subsidized by
an equal number of market-
rate units. The community
board has established a
mutual housing association to
own and operate the lower
income housing. Currently
being run by the board, the
association will have resi-
dents, community members
and others on its board of
directors.
Catie Marshall , a former
spokesperson for HPD who
now works for the mayor, says
three sites have been selected
and put out to bid for market-
rate housing and only one has
been awarded-for 66 units.
The other two are being rebid,
one because no high enough
bids were received, the other
because the winning bidder
withdrew from the process.
The sale of the properties must
go through the city's lengthy
land use approval process
before they are transferred to
the winning bidders.
Marshall says the design
for the low and moderate
income buildings is almost
complete. The contractors for
these units will be chosen
jointly by HPD and the mutual
housing association; Marshall
says the requests for bids is
currently being prepared and
will go out "as soon as
possible."
In addition to the proceeds
from the market-rate housing,
HPD has set aside another $5
million for the lower income
units. 0 Jennifer Stern
HARLEM
STRUGGLE
Child welfare workers
recently took a six-month-old
baby from her mother
because of the dangerous
conditions in a derelict city-
owned bui ldi ng in Harlem.
Government agencies are
footing the bill for foster care
until tile city' s Department of
Housi ng Preservation and
Development (HPD) makes
repairs.
The mother, who requested
anonymity, lives in one of
three adjacent buildings-
3601 , 3603 and 3605
Broadway-that have long
been a local eyesore. Little
more than shells, the buildings
have been inhabited by 35
residents, some of them
squatters. Conditions within
6 CITY LIMITS
the buildings included no
running water, exposed wiring
and holes in ceilings and
walls, according to advocates.
But after extensive organiz-
ing efforts, some improve-
ments are now in the pipeline.
The city is promising leases for
some of the tenants, the
buildings are in a special
program for accelerated
repairs and some of the
tenants are working together
to eventually gain control of
the buildi ngs.
The Riverside-Edgecombe
Neighborhood Association
(RENA) helped organize the
buildi ngs along with ProBase,
a social service agency that
aims to prevent the break-up
of families. Jeanie Dubnau, a
RENA advocate, says, "We
fought very hard. There are
lots of other buildings owned
by HPD that are just as bad,
we just got attention because
of the constant pressure we
put on them."
Now that some of the
tenants have been promised
leases, they hope to be
accepted into the city' s Tenant
Interim Lease program so they
can eventually buy their
bui lding.
The main battle between
the tenants and the city has
been over leases. According
to Annie Rakovic, a social
worker from ProBase, the city
agreed to provide leases for
some of the 35 tenants after
more than two years of
negotiations.
Last year, the buildings
were nearly sold to a private
landlord. The city was ready
to sell all three buildings to
Artha Management for $1
even though Abram Gin, the
owner of Artha management,
had a growing reputation for
housing code violations,
shoddy repairs and question-
able rent increases. After a
series of protests by the Artha
Management Coalition, HPD
reversed its decision to sell to
Artha and announced that the
HPD inspector general would
be investigating the company
for fraudulent tax abatement
filings (see City Limits,
August/September 1989).
Now the city has placed
the buildings in the "crisis
management" program within
the Division of Property
Management of the housing
department. The boiler and
the roof are expected to be
repaired this year and
improvements for individual
apartments are in the pipeline.
Diana Concannon, a spokes-
person for HPD, says the city
is still hiring contractors to do
apartment repairs so those
improvements will not even
begin for "a couple of months
at best." The tenants and their
advocates say priority should
be placed on these repairs.
As Rakovic emphasizes, the
mother of the six-month old
baby cannot have her chi ld
returned until her apartment is
habitable. D Cory Johnson
REINSPECTION
REGS
The city' s Department of
Housi ng Preservation and
Development (HPD) is
planning a new program that
would guarantee reinspection
reports for building owners at
the same time that the number
of housing code inspectors i s
declining.
The Dismissal Request
Program, which was discussed
at a public hearing last month,
provides a mechanism of
violation dismissal for building
owners who have failed to get
official certification that their
violations would be removed.
The reinspection i s done
within 45 days of the owner' s
request and costs $135.
Housing officials say that
the Dismissal Reql!est Program
will not affect staffi ng of HPD
inspections, or the budget,
since the $135 fee covers
costs involved. They say
inspection of tenants' com-
plai nts wi ll remain higher
pri ori ty than owner-reguested
reinspections. Still , budget cuts
have already lowered the
number of housing i nspection
teams, from 226 to 215,
accordi ng to the most recent
Mayor' s Management Report,
and further staffing cuts are
expected.
Under current procedure,
owners file certification forms
to claim that a violation has
been corrected. Under the
1972 state Housing Court Act,
according to HPD spokesper-
son Greg King, violations are
supposed to be deemed
corrected within 70 days of
certification. Sixty days later,
the violations are removed.
But because of allegedly
inefficient record-keeping,
"Corrected violations simply
stayed on the record," says
Dan Margulies, executive
director of the Community
Housing Improvement
Association (CHIP), an owner
lobbying group. "Very few
owners bothered to certify."
Especially in a building
involving a sale, refinancing
or loan, where official
building records play an
important role, owners who
failed to certify, or certified
without getting a new report,
would otten request a
reinspection.
But " it was up to the
discretion of the borough chief
to decide when he has staff to
do it," says another HPD
spokesperson. "The new
regulations provide a mecha-
nism for a more orderly
reinspection."
Under the new regulations,
the certification process would
continue. But owners would
also have the option to fill out
the Dismissal Request, under
which HPD would refund the
$135 if it fails to issue an
inspection report within 45
days.
But some tenant organizers
charge that the program
addresses the wrong problem.
"The problem is not inaccurate
records," says Tom DeMott of
the West Harlem Coalition. " It
is enforcement. Most of the
time, violations remain on
record because they remain in
the bui lding, inspection after
inspection." D Laird
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NEIGHBOR
NOTES
Bronx
Last year, City Limits interviewed
a number of families who moved
from the city' s welfare hotels into
permanent housing in the South
Bronx. Although they were pleased
to be settled, most families expressed
dire fear for their children's safety in
crime-saturated neighborhoods.
Hope for change came from a prom-
ise that a new police academy would
be built on a 10-acre site at 153rd
Street and Park Avenue. Now there's
a budget crisis and the Dinkins
administration is considering put-
ting the police academy on hold. So
much for hopeful promises ....
Genevieve Brooks, head of the
Mid-Bronx Desperadoes housing
group, was recently appointed dep-
uty borough president. Although
the Desperadoes started off building
low income housing they now do a
mixture oflow, moderate and middle
income housing development. (They
did the final work on Charlotte Gar-
dens, the South Bronx's suburban-
style homes.) Brooks is co-chair of
the housing task force of the Bronx
Development Council , which has
been promoting mostly middle in-
come housing for the borough.
Brooklyn
The feisty A TURA coalition is
continuing its battle against Rose
Associates' Atlantic Terminal proj-
ect, highlighting the massive gov-
ernment subsidy the project is slated
to receive in this era of supposed
fiscal prudence. According to a re-
cent fact sheet from the coalition,
subsidies amount to a whopping
$161.1 million. All this for a project
that coalition members say will lead
to the displacement of local resi-
dents. The subsidies are coming
from the city's budget , the Munici-
pal Assistance Corporation and the
federal housing department , among
other sources.
Manhattan
Despite deep rifts between com-
munity activists, squatters and yup-
pie residents, the various Lower East
Side factions united-briefly-for a
protest outside Peter Kalikow's New
York Post recentl y. Organized by the
Joint Planning Council , the action
focused attention on the large num-
ber of em pty, warehoused a partmen ts
in buildings owned by Peter's rela-
tive, Richard Kalikow, on the Lower
East Side. According to JPC, Ka-
likow buildings in the Lower East
Side include approximately 30 empty
but habitable apartments that are not
being rented. Peter's own City &
Suburban complex uptown contains
650 warehoused units ...
Just a few months in office and
Manhattan Borough President Ruth
Messinger has already voted in favor
of a major development effort-in
her old Upper West Side neighbor-
hood, no less! The Manhattan West
project will bring almost 1,000 new
luxury units to the already crowded
neighborhood, but Messinger and
every other Board of Estimate mem-
ber voted in favor of developer Dan
Brodsky's project. How come?
Mostly because the proposal that was
approved was a compromise-not as
small as the community board
wanted, but significantly scaled
down from the original proposal.
Still, some local advocates are not
exactly mollified. Ron Millican, co-
chairman of Community Board 7's
Penn West committee, resigned in
protest after the Board of Estimate
decision. He says that the Depart-
ment of City Planning inserted speci-
fications for a road that is going to
help pave the way for progress on the
Trump City site, which is across from
the Manhattan West site.
Queens
Borough President Claire Shulman
and the state's Urban Development
Corporation are racing ahead with
the controversial Hunters Point
waterfront plan, attempting to grease
the wheels of the massive, $1.5 bil-
lion development project before the
Board of Estimate is disbanded.
They're moving so fast, in fact, that
at one point the amenities the local
community board is calling for were
overlooked in the rush. Council
Member Walter McCaffrey, former
chairman of the local board, is rais-
ing the issue loud and clear. In a
recent interview, he says, "I have
seen no commitment made by city,
state or port authority officials to
meet the needs of this community."
He continues,"They have tur:led their
backs on the people of Hunters Point
and western Queens. All they're
doing is providing lipservice on the
issues." 0
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8 CITY LIMITS
PROFILE
Pride and Progress: The East Harlem
Community Coalition for Fair Banking
BY ERROL T. LOUIS
EAST HARLEM HAS ALWAYS
been a neighborhood full of pride.
Other New Yorkers knew it long ago,
when a fier y politician named
LaGuardia represented the district
with both fists swinging-and, as
mayor, chose to keep living there
instead of moving downtown.
Today, East Harlem is African-
American and Latino and "the
neighborhood"-El Barrio-is
still a place that people are proud
of. Yes, there's widespread de-
cay, but street life is active on
the main boulevards, with stores
blaring salsa and merengue; men
hunched over games of domi-
noes; and children racing, shout-
ing and climbing everywhere.
Now El Barrio's got something
new to boast about. In the last
three years, the East Harlem
Community Coalition for Fair
Banking has accomplished
something no other neighbor-
hood group in New York City
has managed to do: pressure a
major commercial bank into
keeping open a branch that it
had already decided to close.
In the winter of 1 987, at a time
when working-class neighbor-
hoods all over New York City
ing its 118th Street branch. After the
double whammy announcements a
series of community meetings led to
the creation of the Coalition for Fair
Banking.
Vaughn, a Baptist minister, had
recently come from a year at River-
side Church, where he worked on
had already seen dozens of bank
branches close their doors , Chase
Manhattan announced it would
Jasmine Hopper and Madelaine Marquez:
be shutting down its branch on
Empowering community-based organizations with
information about credit.
the corner of 106th Street and
Second Avenue. The site is on one of
East Harlem's main commercial
strips, and directl y across the street
from two large public housing proj-
ects.
"It was really going to leave us
without a commercial bank in East
Harlem south of 115th Street, " re-
calls Rev. John Vaughn, the execu-
tive director of East Harlem Inter-
faith, a consortium of 40 churches
and religious organizations that is
half a block from the Chase branch.
Shortly after the Chase announce-
ment, East Harlem residents received
another blow: Chemical Bank noti-
fied customers that it would be clos-
social issues ranging from apartheid
to the status of gays and lesbians in
Christianity. His new assignment-
directing East Harlem Interfaith and
chairing the coalition-was in keep-
ing with the same brand of activism.
The 28-year-old Vaughn insists his
commitment is simply an expres-
sion of his religious beliefs: "I never
really consider myself a traditional
social action person, " he says. "I
consider myself a person of faith
first. "
For longtime East Harlem residents
like Michael Morrell, an insurance
worker, the potential impact of
branch closings concerned neither
politics nor religion, but an all too
familiar reality. In the mid-1980s,
Manufacturers Hanover Trust had
pulled out of El Barrio, leaving Mor-
rell unable to cash his disability
checks during a period of illness.
"I had nowhere to cash the checks,"
he recalls. "When I would go to a
branch on 86th Street, they
would send me to a machine.
And if I was having this prob-
lem as a working person, I could
see what the problem would be
for retired people, people who
are on a fixed income, even the
food stamp services-we were
really being underserved in the
community."
The banking coalition's first
order of business was to try and
get a meeting with bank offi-
cials-real bankers with clout,
not the community affairs staff.
East Harlemites marched in front
of their local Chase branch and
they ventured downtown to
demonstrate at Chemical's glit-
tering Park A venue headquar-
ters. A local hearing on the
subject drew hundreds of resi-
dents. But the closing dates for
the Chemical and Chase
branches kept getting closer,
with no breakthrough.
Finally, somebody came up
with the phone number of the
pri vate line to the president of
Chase, Willard Butcher. A man
in charge of a multi-billion-dol-
lar financial empire suddenly
began getting messages from neigh-
borhood people wanting to talk about
a tiny office in El Barrio. Eventually,
the coalition got the meetings it
wanted, negotiating directly with
Therese Molloy, Chase' s New York
City regional executive.
"I wanted to close the bank be-
cause it made business sense," re-
calls Molloy, now retired. "But the
bank is a community business and
the community voices that were
raised made me rethink."
With Chemical as well as Chase,
the coalition expanded their discus-
sions to include a wide range ofrein-
vestment issues. In the course of
studying the economics of bank dis-
investment, coalition members had
discovered the advantages of neigh-
borhood-controlled financial insti-
tutions, such as community devel-
opment credit unions and commu-
nity revolving loan funds. Now, in
negotiations, the banks were pressed
to provide support for such institu-
tions.
In the end, the banks agreed to
help fund several community rein-
vestment projects. Union Settlement
Federal Credit Union got equipment
and a $36, 000 grant. Hope Commu-
nity-which had been fighting
Chemical Bank for years, tying to get
financing for housing-was prom-
ised $2 million worth ofloans. Funds
were also provided to launch a
community revolving loan fund, and
to hire a finance professional to as-
sist local businesses and neighbor-
hood groups prepare loan applica-
tions. Chemical did close its East
Harlem branch, but Chase agreed to
delay closing-a delay that eventu-
ally led to an agreement to stay open.
How was Molloy persuaded to
change her mind by a group of East
Harlem activists? "They were hard
working, sincere and knowledge-
able," declares the veteran banker.
"They did their homework and they
certainly won my respect. When you
have a community where there are
coalitions being formed and leaders
such as Rev. Vaughn-people who
are rather selfless in their dedica-
tion-then you have a good show of
preserving and improving the com-
munity. "
These are exactly the goals that
the coalition continues to strive
towards. "We are trying to empower
community-based organizations, and
to make credit available within the
community," says Madelaine Mar-
quez, a former loan officer from
Chemical Bank who now works for
the coalition and helps neighborhood
people with the nuts and bolts of
spreadsheets and business projec-
tions. Marquez has vivid memories
of requests for loans from African-
American and Latino communities
being routinely turned down when
she started in banking. Now she of-
ten turns up in neighborhood rein-
vestment meetings with an armful of
tables showing how banks have red-
lined East Harlem.
For the moment , the coalition has
traded phone-ins and street demon-
strations for the every day tasks of
community-building. Jasmine Hop-
per, the coalition' s program director,
has plans to build membership for
ongoing education on reinvestment
issues. The coalition is positioning
April 1990 9
itself as a place to link community
groups and small businesses with
the financial lifeline of credit.
"Someone has to be in the middle.
Someone has to help get the folks
who need the funding to the banks,
in such a way that the banks can't
turn them down. " says Morrell , who
is a vice-chair of the coalition. "A
small merchant may not need a mil-
lion dollars. But they may need 30 ,
40 or 50,000 dollars. And sometimes
that's hard to get in this commu-
nity."
A truly progressive movement,
they say, transforms people as it trans-
forms society. By that test, the East
Harlem Community Coalition for Fair
Banking has already passed with
flying colors. A former banker has
become a community advocate; a
citizen has been turned into an activ-
ist; and an activist minister is be-
coming a seasoned community
leader. The kind of people that make
EI Barrio proud. "I live here, I want
to see my community do well," says
Morrell. "Folks like myself really
have no other place to go." 0
Errol T. Louis, a frequent contributor
to City Limits, is National Program
Officer of the National Federation of
Community Development Credit
Unions.
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10 CITY LIMITS
PIPELINE
For Some of the Homeless,
Membership Has Its Privileges
BY MARGO SCHNEIDMAN
TWO YEARS AGO BUSINESS REP-
resentatives from the area surround-
ing Grand Central Station decided it
was time to tackle the homeless
problem in their midst. The Grand
Central Partnership was born, com-
plete with heavy hitting board
members from Trump Associates,
Olympia & York and other real estate
concerns. Now the organization has
established a center with support
services, and they' re borrowing the
buzz words of the corporate world to
help the homeless ... hel p themsel ves.
All that personal transformation
requires is "upward mobility ,"
"incentive" and a realization that
"membership has its privileges."
This "motivational " approach to
helping the homeless is drawing
criticism from advocates who charge
the center is not easily accessible
and is not helping the frail and vul-
nerable homeless most in need of
services.
Funded with $1 million from the
city's Human Resources Administra-
tion and $500,000 from the local
business consortium, the Grand
Central Partnership Multi-Service
Center is taking a uniquely business-
like approach to the homeless. Lo-
cated in what was formerly the St.
Agnes High School for Boys at 15
East 44th Street, the center is open to
the homeless on a membership-only
basis and has created a highly struc-
tured program for those who are able
to use it.
The partnership's program con-
sists of four tiers, which clients pass
through by making use ofthe center's
social services and job resources, and
by attending required meetings. Once
clients make it to the fourth tier ,
according to the center's director,
Dr. Ronald Steward, they are placed
in YMCA's and single-room-occu-
pancy (SRO) housing and are rela-
tively self-sufficient.
"Our goal is to get the homeless
interested in upward mobility," says
Jeff Grunberg, vice president for
social services for the Grand Central
Partnership, who designed the pro-
gram. "Homeless people have be-
come so passive, they are almost
taught not to think for themselves."
Evidence of Success
According to Steward, the pro-
gram has had success. Since open-
ing in September 1989, it has placed
80 once-homeless people in YMCA
and SRO housing and has found
jobs-both within the center and
outside it-for 30 clients. Using the
partnership's connection with the
business community, the center
hopes to start placing people in en-
try-level corporate jobs. One job
possibility is a slot in the mailroom
at Forbes magazine.
The program gives a ' client two
months to pass through each tier, in
other words, six months to become
independent. If clients take longer
U Our goal is to
get the homeless
interested in
upward mobility, "
says Grunberg.
than the allotted time, says Steward,
they should be in another program.
"If it takes longer than two months
[to pass through a tier] then that
client really doesn't want to move
up ... has no self motivation."
The reaction of homeless people
to the program is mixed. Steven
Moss, formerly homeless and now
living in his own apartment and on
staff at the center, praises its meth-
ods. "If I didn't go through the pro-
gram I'd probably still be out there
on the street," says Moss.
Others are less enthusiastic. Tra-
nie Hall, currently a member, is criti-
cal of the pressure of the program.
"You can't expect people to get their
Ii ves together in a few months," he
says. "It's not like that. I've had to
deal with the problem of homeless-
ness for 23 years."
Although partnership officials
describe their space as a multi-serv-
ice center, their program receives
funding from the city as a drop-in
center. Traditionally, drop-in cen-
ters have been an undemanding
sanctuary for the homeless, where
they can drop in at any hour of the
day or night and stay for as many
days as they like, recei ving hot meals,
clothing, showers and social serv-
ices in an unstructured setting. Also
at these centers they can board nightly
buses that take them to beds in ch urch
and synagogue shelters provided by
the Partnership for the Homeless.
Homeless people who want to join
the Grand Central Partnership's pro-
gram must wait until membership
enrollment, held on the first day of
every month at 4 p.m. Even after
enrolling, however, they must wait
one or two weeks until the next ori-
entation meeting to be able to use the
center's most basic services, includ-
ing the bus to the shelters. While
waiting to become part ofthe center,
they can receive food and shelter in
the center's downstairs gym any eve-
ning after 7:30 p.m., when the Coali-
tion for the Homeless provides sand-
wiches and fruit to some 450 of the
area's homeless. Here, anyone is free
to spend the night-sitting upright
in metal chairs.
"Membership has its privileges,"
says Steward. "Every day we get
people coming here who are eager to
join. Membership becomes an in-
centive for them." Steward says that
by waiting until the first ofthe month
clients show that they are aggres-
sively trying to get out of their situ-
ation. According to Frank Schiazza,
the center's housing director, about
40 percent of those who sign up on
membership day end up dropping
out.
But even for those determined to
join the program, the wait is discour-
aging. One middle-aged homeless
woman who signed up for member-
ship but has to wait until orientation
to board a bus to acquire shelter in a

April 1990 11
they too become helpless. In fact, he
criticizes the drop-in centers where
people come and "do absolutely
nothing." "To me," he says, "that's
warehousing. "
HRA officials recently admitted
they were unaware of the member-
ship requirements at the part-
nership'S center. When informed of
these policies, HRA spokesperson
John Beckman said, "We were aware
that they were attempting to deliver
services in some sort of organized
fashion, but we are not entirely clear
wha,t precisely they are doing. " HRA,
he says, now has some questions
about the program and is going to be
talking with the center's staff "to
make sure they are delivering the
services we contracted them to de-
Hard reality:
_...&. _____ .-.;...;:a .... liver in a proper fashion."
Homeless people who do not belong to the Grand Central Partnership program
spend the night on chairs in the St. Agnes gym.
church or synagogue, says , clearly
dismayed, "I thought last night would
be my last night sleeping in a chair in
this gym, but I guess not. "
A Restrictive Approach?
With some 400 active members,
the partnership sees its program as
going a long way to help the home-
less of Grand Central Station, but
some advocates disagree. According
to Peter Smith, president ofthe Part-
nership for the Homeless, drop-in
centers have traditionally been the
city's front line service for the home-
less, making contact and then draw-
ing them into the mainstream of social
services. In his opinion, "There
certainl y is some question as to
whether the way the Grand Central
Partnership is operating their center
is in keeping with the principal
mission of drop-in centers. " It is
unreasonable, he adds, to expect
people who have been living on the
streets or the subways for years to
mold themselves to a structured
program overnight. "You must take
the homeless population as you find
them and work with them according
to their needs ," says Smith.
Most of the city' s seven HRA-
funded centers are geared specifi-
call y to a certain segment of the more
vulnerable homeless population-
the elderly, women or the mentall y
ill. According to a state Department
of Health definition of drop-in cen-
ters, their objective should be to
"identify and engage persons who
may choose not to partici pate in more
structured programs or who might
not otherwise avail themselves of
mental health services ... these pro-
grams are low-demand, flexible and
relatively unstructured, and respon-
sible to individual need and circum-
stance. "
It is precisely this mandate, says
one drop-in center director, who
declined to be identified, that the
partnership program is not fulfill-
ing. "Their mandate was to clear out
Grand Central Station and help as
many people as possible," he says.
"But the center has failed to dif-
ferentiate the segment of the home-
less population which is frail and
vulnerable, and as a result these are
the people that remain in the sta-
tion."
According to this advocate, lim-
ited resources are not being directed
toward those most in need because
the frail homeless are intimidated by
the young, aggressive homeless the
partnership' s center attracts.
But the center's operators make
no apologies for the way their pro-
gram is run or for the fact that most of
their clients are motivated, able-
bodied adults who have been home-
less for less than a year, rather than
chronicall y homeless or mentally ill.
"These people," says Steward, "are
not asking for a hand out, but a hand
up. " And, like the mentally ill and
frail, they deserve assistance before
Some Benefit, Other Wary
On a recent evening, members of
the program were in the upstairs
lounge. Some were reading, others
watching TV, and still others sleep-
ing on standard-issue metal chairs.
Victor Smith, a recovering alcoholic
and one of the first to join the pro-
gram, says he has benefitted from its
self-help approach. "It's not the
program, it's the person," he explains.
"The program is here but I've got to
utilize what they have."
When a staff member announces
that the buses for the shelters have
arrived, most in the room rush out to
board them. Downstairs , however,
the gym is packed with several
hundred homeless people, nonmem-
bers who have come to receive food
from the Coalition for the Homeless
and to spend the night on chairs.
Some were once members of the
center but dropped out because it
didn' t work for them. Others like
William Andrew Card, a middle- aged
homeless man, are skeptical of the
center and want no part of it. "Busi-
nessmen are interested in business,
not the homeless, " he says.
But Ray Novella, who has been
coming to the food line regularly,
says he has made up his mind to join
the program. Still, Novella adds, "I
wish membership was every day
because it is rough for me to sit up in
a chair until next month. But I have
no other choice." 0
Margo Schneidman is a freelance
writer living in New York City.
12 CITY LIMITS
FEATURE
Rebels With A Cause?
The city is renovating thousands of apartments for homeless
and poor New Yorkers. So why do squatters keep taking buildings?
BY DOUG TURETSKY
P
olice sirens pierce the warm August afternoon. A
phalanx of uniformed officers, joined by plain-
clothes cops, surround a decrepit city-owned build-
ing. Officers escort two squatters from the build-
ing. Television news cameras roll as a crowd of local
residents shout their support for the two squatters now
under arrest.
Another day of
confrontation at
Tompkins Square
Park on the Lower
East Side? Hardly.
Welcome to East
New York, Brook-
lyn, circa 1985,
where a determined
group of squatters
squared off against
the city-and even-
tually won control
ofthe buildings they
seized as well as
many others.
Squatting-in the
simplest terms, the
act of illegally oc-
cupying an other-
wise vacant apart-
ment or building-
occurs in neighbor-
hoods all across the
city. No one knows how many New York apartments are
occupied by squatters. But it is likely that the Lower East
Side has more buildings occupied by squatters than any-
where else in the city. And in the wake of the protests
stemming from Tompkins Square last summer, and the
more recent confrontation over the occupation of P.S.
104 this past winter, the Lower East Side's band oficono-
clastic squatters have become representative of squat-
ting in the public mind.
But squatters on the Lower East Side are as diverse as
anywhere else in the city. For some, the decision to squat
stems plainly from a desperate need for housing. Others
use squatting as a tool to prod city officials into dealing
with the lack of affordable housing in their community.
And for others, it's a chance for youthful rebellion, an
alternative lifestyle or an attempt at practicing anarchist
ideology.
Confrontation and Compromise
With such different approaches come a variety of
results. While some squats may remain mired in con-
frontation, others, like the East New Yorkers', now
known as the Mutual Housing Association of New York,
have gained legal title to the buildings they occupied-
and $2.7 million in city funding. And some function for
years but are never fully equipped with basic necessities
like heat and running water.
When the Banana Kelly Community Improvement
Association seized three South Bronx buildings in the
1970s, they were
hailed as a good
government group.
Nobody . else
seemed to care
much about the
city's abandoned
real estate. Today,
with the city's own
plans for renovat-
ing these long-dere-
lict buildings mov-
ing ahead, the situ-
ation is not quite so
simple.
There's an
enormous amount
of bitterness and
distrust among
community-based
housing groups, the
city's housing de-
partment and the
squatters. In the
Lower East Side,
longtime commJnity activists who have battled the city
for years have reached a tenuous agreement for commu-
nity development-but local squatters have branded it a
sell out. Behind the rhetoric is naked self-interest: some
of the sites for housing are now occupied by the same
squatters who are protesting the plan.
These squatters, who consider governments and bu-
reaucracy untrustworthy by nature, are reluctant to even
negotiate with local and city leaders. Their actions may
be in keeping with anarchist ideology, but they are re-
jecting the will of a broad-based local coalition that
includes minority, tenant and labor groups that back the
community development plan. And while many of these
squatters may chant a robust "No Housing, No Peace,"
they've done little more than carve out rudimentary
shelter. It's the coalition that's created some 3,000 apart-
ments in the area.
But it's a mistake to judge all squatters-and their
motivations-by looking at only the most vociferous.
They represent just one segment of those who make the
decision to illegally seize a building.
Foundation for Action
For some squatters, occu-
pying a building may involve
little more than pushing aside
the rubble in a few apart-
ments, pirating electricity
from a neighboring structure
and declaring the space
home. But for the folks who
seized more than 30 build-
ings in East New York, the
foundation for their action
started three years before they
pried away the wood sealing
the buildings' entrances.
Home bodies:
April 1990 13
of their neighbors, state
Senator Thomas Bartos-
ciewicz not only backed the
squatters but was arrested
with them. And while then-
mayor Edward Koch branded
them criminals, Carol Bel-
lamy ,locked in a Democratic
primary campaign against
Koch, voiced her support for
the squatters. Even the staid
New York Times lent its edi-
torial support, urging the....
Koch administration to give
the East New Yorkers a
chance.
Under the auspices of
ACORN (Association of Com-
munity Organizations for
Reform Now), East New York
residents pushed city offi-
cials to renovate the approxi-
mately 2,000 abandoned,
city-owned buildings in the
devastated community. The
issue was safety as much as
the community's desperate
need for affordable housing.
The vacant buildings were a
haven for junkies, drug deal-
ers and muggers. Largely
because of this, ACORN's
initial base of support came
from local homeowners, says
Fran Streich, who led the or-
ganizing effort.
East New Yorkers seizing a city-owned building in J985.
Ron Shiffman, executive
director of the Pratt Institute
Center, stepped into the
middle of the fray and helped
convince Felice Michetti,
now the commissioner of the
Department of Housing Pres-
ervation and Development
(HPD), togotoEastNewYork
and meet with the squatters.
From that meeting the Mu-
tual Housing Association of
New York was soon born (city
officials still refused to ne-
gotiate with ACORN) and
about a year and a half later
the Board of Estimate turned
58 city-owned buildings over
Dissatisfied with the city's response to their pleas to
fix-up-or demolish-the vacant buildings, ACORN
members decided to try to force the Koch administration
into action. Members willing to squat in the buildings-
and face arrest-were recruited and meetings held with
local block associations. To develop a strong foundation
of community support, the squatters would only occupy
buildings on blocks where they had the backing of
neighbors. They also had architects from the Pratt Insti-
tute Center come and check that the buildings they
planned to enter were structurally sound.
With this groundwork complete, the squatters began
to seize the buildings in the summer of 1985. From the
outset the ACORN squatters goal was different than that
of many others who illegally occupy a building or apart-
ment: The East New Yorkers sought city assistance. "We
went in hoping we'd be able to negotiate with the city,"
says Avril Walters, a Mutual Housing Association of
New York (MHANY) board member who was one of
those arrested. "But it was quite the opposite," Walters
recalls.
Headlines
The confrontations and arrests became headline sto-
ries-much like the more recent ones on the Lower East
Side. But there was one major difference: an outpouring
of public support. The East New Yorkers had done their
organizing work well. In addition to the support of many
to the housing association.
Squatters no more, the city gave them legal status as
homesteaders.
"At first the city wouldn't talk to us. Then the city was
arresting us," recalls Gene Wright, a MHANY board
member who lives in Boulevard Houses, an East New
York public housing project, and was one of those
arrested during the confrontations. Now city officials do
more than just talk with them-HPD is currently negoti-
ating the final details to turn more abandoned city-
owned buildings in the area over to MHANY. "I think
that's quite an improvement," marvels Wright.
No Deal in the Bronx
The two banners hanging from the side of the build-
ings at 1724-8 Crotona Park Easttroclaim to the streets
below: "Power to the People" an "Self-Help Housing."
As a flurry of construction activity on a recent Saturday
suggests, this message is more than idle rhetoric. For-
merly homeless occupants of the buildings haul sheets
of plywood six flights up a decrepit stairwell. Plans are
discussed for fixing the buildings' electrical system
while some occupants patch a hole in the roof from a
recent fire.
Despite such diligence, the buildings are barely hab-
itable. It's been two and a half years since the group
known as Inner City Press/Community on the Move
began the renovation work and the buildings still have
no heat, running water in only a handful of units and
14 CITY LIMITS
some apartments remain rubble filled, with gaping holes
in floors and ceilings.
But for the 12 families, several with young children,
who live there and the others who come to work on the
weekends , this housing is the best they can do, better
than the streets, the shelters or their overcrowded apart-
ments. Among the homesteaders, as they call them-
selves, are a substantial number of Latin American
immigrants and families doubled-up in nearby public
housing.
Beyond their dire need for shelter, the reclamation of
these formerl y abandoned city-owned buildings is an
expression of their ability to provide for themselves.
"It's as much howyou do the unit as doing the unit, " says
Matthew Lee, the charismatic leader of the Bronx group.
In the vast majority of city-sponsored programs, the
tenants have little stake or control in the housing being
created. Here, Lee says, "low income people are swing-
ing their hammers and building homes."
Fritz Jean Jacques moved from City Hall Park to the
Crotona Park East buildings. To him, the most important
factor in the renovation effort is that it was sparked by
the people themselves. He is unimpressed by the spiffy
renovation work by the city in a still unoccupied build-
ing across the way. "The families are here, " he pro-
claims. "What's missing?"
No Rights
According to city officials, what's missing is
the group's legal title to the building. In Decem-
ber 1988, HPD designated the site for its Spe-
cial Initiatives Program (SIP), which renovates
city-owned buildings for the homeless from
welfare hotels and shelters and other low in-
come families. Catie Marshall, a former HPD
official who is now a spokesperson for Mayor
David Dinkins, argues that if it weren't for the
Community on the Move group, 40 units of
housing for the poor would be nearing comple-
tion. "As it is, we now have a half-gutted build-
ing, " says Marshall.
Even though these Bronxites may be as poor
and housing needy as those the city plans to
house under its SIP program, officials don' t
believe that means Lee's group should retain
control. "Just taking a building doesn't guaran-
tee your right to ownership," says Marshall.
She likens the seizure of a building or an apart-
ment to someone who cuts ahead of the line in
a supermarket : everyone may be hungry and
eager to get their groceries home but someone
gets out more quickly because they muscle
their way to the cashier.
is large enough for a variety of rehab efforts. From the
buildings'rooftop he gazes at the Bronx skyline, and
sweeping his arm across the panorama, says, "There are
a whole lot of buildings here to fix up."
While a strong dose of pragmatism may be missing
from many squats, Lee, for one, recognizes that to com-
plete their project the Bronxites will most likely need
city assistance. There's only so far you can go with
recycled and donated materials, and the $45 a month
dues paid by each household will never afford them the
new heating system the buildings need.
Even as work inches forward here, Inner City Press/
Community on the Move has started a third project-but
this time they're going" straight." They are seeking the
support of Catholic Charities and plan to appl y for state
Housing Trust Fund money to rehab a building on 146th
Street.
Rubble and Rebels
On East 13th Street in the Lower East Side, a forbid-
ding black metal door opens into a tidy basement hall-
way. Construction materials are stacked and well-organ-
ized. Notes on a bulletin board remind occupants to
sweep the hallways and recycle newspapers, bottles and
cans.
Six years ago, says Rolando, who was among the
building' S original group of squatters, the structure was
a rubble-filled shoot-
ing gallery for junk-
ies. Now, much ofthe
buildings ' systems
have been replaced
by dint of the squat-
ters sweat and the
investment of their
own money.
In a neighbor-
hood where upscale
condos stand toe-to-
toe with dere li ct
buildings, one would
think the efforts of
squatters like Ro-
lando would be
roundl y supported
by community resi-
dents . But in the
Lower East Side ,
which could be con-
sidered the capital of
the city' s squatting
movement , the rela-
tionship between the
This argument neglects an important point:
not all of the housing needy are accepted onto
the city's waiting line. Those who are doubled-
up or refuse to enter the city's notorious shelter
Hammers and hope:
....... _-"" ____ --J< squatters and most of
the rest of the com-
munity is highly con-
Talcing maHer. into their own hands in the Bronx.
system aren't eligible for the units under renovation for
the homeless.
Lee also notes that when his group took over the
buildings, they weren' t in the SIP program. He acknowl-
edges the city's growing role as a housing rehabilitator,
but says the supply of abandoned buildings in the Bronx
frontational.
Nowhere in the city is the situation as compl ex as in
the Lower East Side. The squatters themselves run the
gamut, from those who seek to join city-sponsored reno-
vation programs to those who' ve showered urine on
cops and protested the construction of housing for sen-
ior citizens. Many of the squatters are also mired in a
bitter dispute with
the neighborhood' s
longtime low income
housing activists ,
who negotiated the
the community' s
cross-subsidy plan
with the city. These
disputes are as much
about turf as politics.
MOHhew Lee (Ioreground):
April 1990 1 5
Committee has been fighting for low income
housing in the area for more than 20 years,
charge that many squatters are more interested
in a rebellious lifestyle than in creating perma-
nent housing. Orselli calls many of the neigh-
borhood squatters "anarchists in style, not in
ideology."
This appears to be true for a hard-core con-
tingent. But other squatters are clearly bran-
dishing more than rhetoric. After four years of
working on his squat , one East Third Street
squatter says the once-derelict city-owned
bUilding has been cleared of rubble, rotted
beams replaced and crumbled walls rebuilt
with sheetrock. "In the same time, in those four
years, how many of the [neighborhood's] 200
[vacant, city-owned buildings] have been reno-
vated?" he argues. "We' re here creating hous-
~ ing now."
~ No Choice
The confrontation
over the occupation
of P.S. 104, an aban-
doned public school
on East Fourth Street,
is only the most re-
cent example of the
extreme polarization
between some of the
squatters and other
area residents. Amid
rhetoric and arrests,
the occupants of the
school ignored a key
point: the building
had already been
approved as a site for
"There ore 0 whole lot 01 buildings here to lix up."
To Ronaldo Casanova, who led the Tent
City encampment at the United Nations and
now is president ofthe New York branch of the
Union of the Homeless, the neighborhood's
squatting movement is the only alternative for
those who reject the city's shelter system. "My
transitional housing for homeless senior citizens. Even
many of the homeless from Tompkins Square Park quit
the squat when they learned of the planned use for P .S.
104. That the squatters disregarded t h i ~ came as no
surprise to some: one "radical" squatter once commented
that there's no need to build housing f the elderl y
because they' re just going to die soon.
Father George S. Kuhn of st. Brigid's Church defends
the most radical squatters and echoes their distrust of
the city's plans. Kuhn says that government officials are
trying to marginalize those who present the strongest po-
litical and economic questions about the city' s housing
crisis. "It's part of the conspiracy of the power structure
to isolate those who are raising the deepest questions,"
he says.
Double-Crossed?
At the heart of the neighborhood dispute lies the
cross-subsidy plan negotiated between the longtime
activists operating under the banner of the Joint Plan-
ning Council and city officials. In the most straightfor-
ward terms, the plan aims to sell some city-owned
buildings for market-rate housing units as a way to
subsidize an equal number of low income units.
An extremely vocal contingent of local squatters dis-
miss the plan as a sell-out because all of the city-owned
property isn 't being used for low income housing. They
ignore the fact that the plan is a hard-won compromise,
a significant improvement over the Koch administration's
desire to sell nearl y all ofthe city-owned property in the
community to pri vate developers.
Behind the charge of sell-out lies a more pertinent
fact: as the cross-subsidy plan proceeds it will eventu-
ally run smack into the squats , which are in the very
buildings that the plan covers (see Short Term Notes).
Local activists like Val Orselli, whose Cooper Square
whole crew is squatting," says Casanova. "We have no
other choice or we're out on the streets."
Despite disagreements fueled by the competition for
resources, there is much common ground between the
squatters and other neighborhood activists. Both groups
share a strong sense of grassroots activism and are
resolutely opposed to the gentrification of the neighbor-
hood. In the Lower East Side, squatters and other activ-
ists recently marched together to protest landlord Rich-
ard Kalikow's warehousing of apartments around Tomp-
kins Square Park.
The neighborhood's squatter movement will not be
easily displaced, and as past events have shown, evic-
tion attempts only heighten the confrontational climate.
Phillip Thompson, director of housing under Deputy
Mayor Barbara Fife, recognizes that some sort of accom-
modation will need to be worked out. He talks about
options like expanding the city' s urban homesteading
program to include some of the squats. But the radical-
ism that fuels many of the squatter groups will not be
easily harnessed into a city program.
Joel Meyers , a 15-year resident of the Lower East Side
and vociferous squatter supporter, says any "normaliza-
tion" proposals will simply be used as a device to drive
a wedge between the different squats. These divisions,
he postulates, will then be used to rationalize the evic-
tion of all the neighborhood's squatters.
But for those committed to squatting as a means to
rebuild housing, some compromise will be necessary.
As the squatters in East New York proved, official
intransigence can be reversed. And while squatting is
hardly an ideal way to build housing, there are innumer-
able New Yorkers who have no better option. No advo-
cate can offer a stronger response to the city's housing
crisis than needy New Yorkers who pick up hammers
and take matters into their own hands. 0
16 CITY LIMITS
FEATURE
Whose Job Is It, Anyway?
What do we get in return for the tax breaks and subsidies
handed out to business and industry? When it comes to much-needed
job programs for minorities and youth, the answer is precious little.
BY MARY KEEFE
T
hanks to millions of dollars in
public subsidies, there's a
snazzy new 19-story office
building on Pierrepont Street in
Brooklyn Heights. The lobby is solid
marble in an elegant shade of grey-
but the promises city agencies made
to tie job programs to the develop-
ment apparently were not engraved
in stone.
One Pierrepont Plaza was built
with a financial-aid package that
helped lure the investment firms
Morgan Stanley and Goldman, Sachs
as the primary tenants. The public
subsidies included a $5 million fed-
eral grant, $12.4 million from the
city budget and Munici pal Assistance
Corporation, a 22-year package of
tax breaks and a 30 percent reduc-
tion in energy costs. The deal was
signed in May 1986 and the building
completed in 1988.
In its 1988 annual report, the city's
Financial Services Corporation (FSC)
hails the employment office negoti-
ated as part of the subsidy deal for
One Pierrepont Plaza. The office, to
be set up by the Private Industry
Council (PIC), a federally funded
employment and training program,
would ..... provide access to employ-
ment opportunities to those most in
need of jobs," according to FSC's
report. But the project fizzled and no
one ever got a job. Antonio Young,
who heads PIC's business develop-
ment, explains that the employment
office was only an experiment.
Still, there was nothing experi -
mental about the public funding
being handed out with few strings
attached. Although city economic
development agencies say they con-
nect employment programs to pub-
licly subsidized development , there
are no employment or job training
agreements with businesses or in-
dustries as a condition for getting
city funds or tax breaks. The pro-
grams that are in place are small and
Hard at work?:
last year the Financial Services Corporation placed a grand total of 166 workers in iobs with
companies that received subsidies.
under- funded and almost all of them
fail to help the city's long-term un-
employed.
Young and Jobless
In New York City, thousands of
people want to work but don't have
the skills for the available jobs.
Samuel Ehrenhalt , who heads the
regional office of the federal Bureau
of Labor Statistics , describes "the
work experience deficit of young
people" as one of the most critical
issues for the future of the city's
workforce. Even during the city' s eco-
nomic boom times ofthe 1980s, only
25 percent of New Yorkers age 15-24
were in the labor market. Nationally,
55 percent of people in this age group
hold jobs. New York's rate is signifi-
cantly lower than other major metro-
politan areas.
Young people unable to find jobs
lose hope for the future and never
gain much understanding of the de-
mands of the workplace. They even-
tually join a growing pool of adults
who have a low level of basic skills
and little work experience. And they
face an increasingly crowded job
market, bloated by workers displaced
by new technology or company shut-
downs and repeated waves of immi-
grant laborers.
At the same time, ever more com-
plex technology raises the lev,el of
skill needed for many entry-level
jobs, and the large number of rela-
tively unskilled "burger-flipping"
jobs pay extremely low wages. The
result: So many people have stopped
looking for work in New York that to
lift the job participation rate to the
national average, more than 400,000
residents would have to find work
over night, says Ehrenhalt.
Some critics also point to the fed-
eral Job Training Partnership Act
OTPA), authored by then-Sen. Dan
Quayle, as a source of additional
pressure on unskilled workers. JTP A,
which replaced the Comprehensive
Employment and Training Act, has
been criticized for "creaming" the
most easily employed and quickl y
placing them in jobs but ignoring the
needs of a large pool of less skilled
workers.
It's almost become a cliche that
education and training for the work
force is critical to the future of the
city's business climate. In spite of
that, linkages between economic
development and job training are
minimal and seemingly done as an
afterthought. Al Miller, who heads
Federation Employment and Guid-
ance Service, a New York-based
social service and job-training or-
ganization, says, "Nobody should get
economic development money with-
out a training component being built
in."
No Questions Asked
The prevailing attitude in the Koch
administration was a refusal to ask
anything of businesses in exchange
for subsidies. These subsidies flow
to developers and businesses from
several often-intersecting streams.
The Financial Services Corporation
acts as the city's business financier.
In Fiscal Year 1988 FSC assisted 241
projects with a variety of loan, grant
and incentive programs as well as
Industrial Development Bonds that
tallied more than $159 million dol-
lars.
The Public Development Corpo-
ration (PDC), created 22 years ago to
help plug the hemorrhaging of manu-
facturing jobs, the traditional source
of employment for semi - or unskilled
workers, has become the city's own
land baron, independently wheeling
and dealing city-owned land. The
high-profile mayoral agency has a
hand in most of the city's major
proje,cts, including MetroTech and
the Atlantic Terminal projects in
Brooklyn, 42nd Street redevelopment
in Manhattan and the Citicorp build-
ing in Queens-all of which have or
will receive multi-million dollar
subsidy packages PDC helps arrange.
Another PDC purview is the de-
velopment and maintenance of six
In-Place Industrial Parks (IPIPs)-
two each in the Bronx, Brooklyn and
Queens. The IPIPs are home to 2,440
small and medium-sized companies
employing 103 ,000 workers. But
according to a study done by state
Sen. Franz Leichter, "The budget for
this program has been decimated and
staff resources have not been com-
April 1990 17
Money for nothing?:
One Pierrepont PlclZa received millions in taJ( breaks and subsidies. The single job placement
program fizzled out.
mitted." Instead, PDC's investment
in high-profile commercial projects
has increased, the study charges.
Perhaps the biggest public give-
away flows from the city's Industrial
and Commercial Incentive Program,
administered by the finance depart-
ment. Tax breaks are given "as of
right" to any business construction
or renovation projects located above
96th Street in Manhattan or anywhere
in the other four boroughs (see City
Limits , April 1986). Leichter has
estimated that between 1988 and
2000, $750 million in taxes will be
forgiven under this program.
Of course, city officials have often
argued that their hands are tied be-
cause other localities offer similar
tax breaks and subsidies and if we
don' t want to see all our jobs-and
tax base-flee to New Jersey or the
Sun Belt , New York must match these
deals. But what do New York City
taxpayers get for their multi-million
dollar investments? When it comes
to jobs, city economic development
success is measured by often-dis-
puted figures-computed by FSC and
PDC-of jobs created and retained
(see City Limits, April 1988).
Rhetoric and Reality
As well as job creation and reten-
tion, both FSC and PDC see the crea-
tion of job programs as part of their
purpose and they trumpet impres-
sive-sounding efforts in their annual
)
18 CITY LIMITS
employment reports. FSC
says it "markets jobs to dis-
advantaged people" and is a
"one-stop resource " for a
range of employment serv-
ices. According to PDC's
report, they have set-up
"special training programs ...
designed for a large number
of companies. "
Warren Abrams:
nities." She wants to develop
another legislative proposal
that could be introduced to
the council and backed by
the mayor.
Rosemary Kuropat, chief
of staff to Hernandez-Pinero,
says, "What you will find
early in the administration
will be a comprehensive plan
for employment and training
programs that responds as
full y to the needs of business
as those of workers. "Kuropat
continues, "I doubt very
much that the deputy mayor
would create a statutory re-
quirement [for businesses
that get city money] to hire.
~ But there may well be a
~ memorandum of understand-
ing between companies and
the training programs, and it
won't be so loose that any-
But the job placement re-
sponsibilities really fall on
the Private Industry Coun-
cil, which is generally called
in after the other agencies
complete their deals. A grand
total of four people in three
city agencies are responsible
for trying to place workers
screened by PIC. So what did
they accomplish recently? In
Fiscal Year 1988 (the most
recent period for which fig-
ures are currently available),
FSC placed just 166 workers
in jobs at companies receiv-
ing public subsidies. Last
Finding jabs lor roo people a month-but the retention rate is
Nhorrible. "
body can walk in and out of
it."
year, PDC found job placements for
77 workers and the city's Office of
Business Development added an-
other 66.
Even these jobs come with an-
other carrot for the companies-
subsidies tied to the federal On-the-
Job Training Program (OJT). While
some people get jobs who need them,
it's the proverbial drop in a very
large bucket. PIC says it screens four
or five applicants for every person
placed in an OJT job, and there's no
training for those who are not "work
ready."
While multi-million dollar city
agencies struggle to place a few
hundred workers in a year, Warren
Abrams of the Southwest Brookl yn
Industrial Development Corporation,
which contracts with PDC to manage
the local in-place industrial park, is
able to find jobs for 100 people a
month. But Abrams is the first to
admit that many job seekers are
turned away and among those who
do get jobs the retention rate is
"horrible. "
Southwest Brooklyn park director
Brandon Stewart says many job seek-
ers need extensive work skills train-
ing. But there's little money to de-
velop such programs. PDC continues
to slash the park's budget , cutting its
funding to the in-place industrial
park by 25 percent between fiscal
years 1986 and 1989. Under such
constraints, efforts to offer job train-
ing and placement run smack into
sanitation, security and other park
needs.
First Source
Two years ago, a coalition called
Jobs 2000 lobbied for "first source"
legislation that was introduced by
then-Council Member Ruth Messin-
ger. The bill, modeled after legi sla-
tion in other municipalities, would
have required that companies bene-
fitting from city development and
business subsidies sign an agreement
to make a "good faith" effort to hire
city residents and certain percent-
ages of minority, women and low
income workers.
The bill didn't get far , and somp, of
its most vociferous opponents were
the heads of the city's economic
development agencies. Then-Man-
hattan Borough President David
Dinkins supported the legislation,
but Sall y Hernandez-Pinero, who he
pi cked as his deputy mayor for eco-
nomi c development , opposed the
measure.
Messinger, now the borough presi-
dent of Manhattan, says she is "in
favor of any kind of effective linkage
program that increases the require-
ments for those doing business with
the city to help open up job opportu-
As City Limits goes to
press, FSC and Hernandez-Pinero are
planning to announce another ex-
perimental job-training program, ac-
cording to Kuropat. This one would
retrain older displaced workers to
do airline reservation work. But the
need for job training clearly extends
beyond such pilot programs.
Miller of Federation Employment
and Guidance Service says that train-
ing programs must be built around
the actual needs of companies. Then
people who complete the training
have a serious shot at a job. Such
training must be more than rudimen-
tary-it often "requires almost six
months of training to be able to get
[people ready for] the entry-level
jobs," says Miller.
In the broadest sense, job training
is one of the most tangible ways to
help people turn their lives around-
and when this happens, the benefits
reach beyond the individual, to their
employer, their community and the
city. But a real turnaround rarely
occurs unless there's meaningful job
training. As Miller says, corporations
have to look beyond adopting a school
and sponsoring T-shirts. The re-
quirement is nothing less than a
substantive, long-term commitment
to the city and its residents. D
Mary Keefe is a freelance writer
focusing on community issues.
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Core curriculum consists of: Community Economic Develop-
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20 CITY LIMITS
CITY VIEW
Consider This: Housing
Activists for City Council
With elections scheduled for 1991,
and then again in 1993, the time to
start thinking about this possibility
is now. The redistricting commis-
sion that draws the new lines is being
appointed now. Potential candidates
need to monitor that process, begin
raising money and meeting voters
and activists soon; they can not wait
until next year when the lines are an-
BY FRANK LLEWELLYN
THE MOVEMENT FOR AFFORD-
able housing is one of the most po-
litical in our city. That is because po-
litical decisions in Washington,
Albany and here in New York have
an enormous impact on the housing
that is constructed and the condi-
tions in which its inhabitants live.
The housing movement has lobbied
legislators and worked to elect can-
didates with good positions on a range
of issues.
Of course no candidate seems to
be against affordable housing. Every
aspiring politician points to the ten-
ants they have represented. Even tax
breaks to developers of luxury hous-
ing are sometimes justified because
they're linked to additional low in-
come housing. No one wants to create
homelessness yet the streets of New
York are filled with the homeless to
a degree that appears to equal or
surpass the levels of the Great De-
pression. At one point, the majority
of New York's City Council members
were co-sponsors of anti-warehous-
ing legislation, yet it never got out of
committee. Clearly, there is in our
city a gap between rhetoric and ac-
complishment.
It is no wonder, then, that some in
this movement have a certain cyni-
cism about the elected leadership of
our city, state and country. Yet
housing is affected by these politi-
cians to an extraordinary degree. It
is not just a question of allocating
resources or setting rent rates; it is
also a question of political leader-
ship.
Unique Opportunity
There is a unique opportunity to
introduce new leadership to New
York City in the next few years. The
City Charter-mandated expansion of
the City Council means that 16 new
council members will be elected in
1991. Where is it written in stone
that all 16 must be leaders produced
City View is a forum for opinion
and does not necessarily reflect
the views of City Limits.
by the regular or reform clubhouses?
Why can't one or even two be leaders
of the movement for affordable hous-
ing or some other social movement,
or even, God forbid , a leader of a un-
ion?
I am not advocating
some third party effort
with a housing spin; a
campaign only makes
sense in the Democrati c ~
primaries because of the
city's overwhelmingly
Democratic registration.
And not every housing
activist is a fit candidate.
A successful candidate
will have to satisfy voters
on a number of issues and
will have to be prepared
to deal with all of the prob-
lems of constituent serv-
ice. With 16 open seats and new,
smaller districts for all ofthe incum-
bents there is a sense in which things
are up for grabs. Certainly there will
be multi-candidate primaries in dis-
tricts without incumbents where a
victory could be obtained with a third
of the vote or less. A candidate
coming out of the housing move-
ment could have a leg up because its
activists are in touch with their
communities and the question of
affordable housing is a central con-
cern across the city.
nounced. There are al-
ready several groups of
political activists, trade
unions and good govern-
ment organizations focus-
ing on this opportunity
for change; the movement
for affordable housing
should be a part of that
process. It can provide
potential candidates who
can bring perspecti ve and
an agenda beyond per-
sonal power to the City
Council. It is precisely
this kind of person we
need in elected office.
Housing movement activists
should not let a healthy skepticism
about the limitations of electoral
politics prevent them from seeking
positions of visible leadership in our
city. Of course simply winning an
election for City Council can't by it-
self change the sources of political
power in our city. But the promotion
of articulate spokespersons, who
bring a housing agenda to City Hall
every day, can move us closer to
realizing our goals. 0
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LETTERS
Charter Changes
To the Editor:
There were several misstatements
about the new City Charter in your
article, "A User' s Guide to Charter
Process ," February, 1990. I would
like to clarify a few points.
Under the new charter, the City
Planning Commission will issue
regulations determining "lead
agency" status. The lead agency will
determine whether an environmental
review is necessary with the assis-
tance of the new Office of Environ-
mental Coordination.
At the scoping session for an En-
vironmental Impact Statement (the
meeting between the applicant and
the environmental reviewers). one
representative from the community
board and one from the borough
president of the pertinent borough
are invited to attend. The purpose of
the meeting is to determine the
"scope," or outline, of the environ-
mental impact statement .
The closing of a city facility is
not subject to ULURP.
197 A plans are not subject to
ULURP, but to a different procedure,
which, although somewhat like
ULURP, does not have the same
timetble requirements.
City Planning will be respon-
sible for preparing the en vironmental
review for 197 A plans initiated by
community boards, but not for those
submitted by a borough president.
I hope these corrections will be
useful to your readers.
Martha Ritter
NYC Department of City Planning
Editor's Note: The planning depart-
ment's clarifications are most wel-
come, and are also illustrative of the
complexity of some of the changes.
Even the Charter Revision Com-
mission's own summary of its pro-
posals says, for example, "Borough
Presidents and community board
representatives would be invited to
'scoping' sessions."
Green Horizons
To the Editor:
Earth Day-April 22, 1990-will
officiall y usher in the 1990s as the
Decade of the En vironment. On this
day millions of people all around the
world will make a personal affirma-
tion of their environmental concern
and commitment. Here in our city
Earth Day will succeed in educating
thousands of New Yorkers about how
they can help create a more livable
city.
April 1990 21
New York's primary landfill, Fresh
Kills on Staten Island, receives 24,000
tons of garbage each day and will
soon be full. What should we be
doing with our garbage? Recycling is
the most environmentally sound
proposal.
Last year a mandatory recycling
program was adopted with a modest
goal-25 percent of all garbage to be
recycled by 1994. It is being intro-
duced one neighborhood at a time
and will be coming to Southern
Brooklyn this spring. We will be
required to separate out our trash,
bottles , cans and newspapers . A
mammoth education campaign will
be undertaken to explain why and
how we must prepare and put out
our campaign. Efforts will be made
to reach every individual because
this program can not succeed with-
out universal participation.
We all need to alter our habits and
begin to recycle. We have no choice-
our future depends on it.
Adele Cohen
Brooklyn
Editor's note: City Limits wel-
comes letters from our readers.
But we ask that you try to keep
your letters to 300 words in
length.
Competitively Priced Insurance
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have been providing low-cost insurance programs and quality service
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NEW YORK, NY. 10001
(212) 279-8300
Ask for: Baja Ramanathan
I- II f' J' S S 1 ., I.. It R t: (' '.' f' II \"
Barry K. Mallin
Attorney At Law
A decade of service representing
community development organizations
and low income cooperatives.
56 Thomas Street
New York, N.Y. 1001 3
Telephone 212/ 61 9-6800
DEBRA BECHTEL - Attorney
Concentrating in Real Estate & Non-Profit Law
Title and loan closings 0 All city housing programs
Mutual housing associations 0 Coopertive conversions
Advice to low income co-op boards of directors
100 Remsen Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201, (718) 624-6850
architectural/engineering serllices for nonprofit dellelopers
o Building Evaluation and Inspection
o Feasibility Studies 0 Construction Supervision
o Preliminary Design/Scope of Work Studies
o Complete Construction Drawings & Specifications
Call John Harris RA. for an evaluation of your project's needs
458 BERGEN STREET, BROOKLYN, NY 11217 (718) 398-1440
BERNARD CARR ASSOCIATES
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1740 Vi"lur Slr ... I. IJrullx. NY '1' .. 1. (212)824-5044
PDS ASSOCIATES
Design and Development Assistance for
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Full Range of Architectural Services, Feasibility Studies, Bid
Preparation & Construction Management, Land Use Planning/
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Residential Revitalization
Tel. 71B/B55-5045 Fax. 718/197-5384
TURF COMPANIES
Building Management/Consultants
Specializing in management & development
services to low income housing cooperatives,
community organizations and co-op
boards of directors
329 Flatbush Avenue
Brooklyn, N.Y. 11217
Rebecca Reich
718/857-0468
LAWRENCE H. McGAUGHEY
Atton1t'y at Law
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New yo,k. NY 10007
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ARCHITECTURAL & PLANNING OIVISI,ON
Urban Homesteading Assistance Board
Specialists In Nonprofit Housing
and Community Facilities
FULL ARCHITECTURAL SERVICES
Zoning Analyses' Design Through Construction Documents
Inspection, Evaluation & Feasibility Reports
Contact Betsy Calhoun or Paul Castrucci , RA 212/226-4119
40 Prince Street, New York. NY 10012
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Abeles Phillips Preiss & Shapiro, Inc.
Planning and Development Consultants
Zoning
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Market Studies
434 Sixth Ave., New York NY 10011
307 N. Main St. , Highstown NJ 08520
212-475-3030
609-448-4753
Himmelstein & McConnell
Attorneys at Law
Residential and commercial tenant representation
in individual and group cases; cooperative and condo-
minium conversions and cooperative board represen-
tation; real estate; closings, general civil practice.
325 Broadway, Suite 402
New York, NY 10007
(212) 349-3000
WORKSHOP
ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANTS/HUMAN RIGHTS. Prestigious interna-
tional research & grantmaking organization, dedicated to the
betterment of the human condition, seeks indivs to assist pro-
gram directors w/grant applications & research proposals, an-
swer inquiries, contact w/i nt'l scholars, attend seminars & ar-
range meetings. Diverse/i nteresting positions. Good typing.
Excellent bnfts incld 4 wks vac, tuition refund & all med/dental.
Salary $28-$32,000. Call Ms. Cohan. 212/661 -3520.
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR. For Capitol Hill Improvement Corporation,
a community design center in Albany, NY, providing real estate
development , housing counseling, repair program, planning
services, architectural design, advocacy & education svcs to
nonprofit organizations & low/mod income persons. Applicant
should have min 5yrs exp in real estate dev & cmmty dev,
fundraising, financing, planning, not-for-profit & housing expo
Resume: CHIC, 260 Lark Street, Albany, NY 12210. EOE.
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR/COMMUNITY ORGANIZER. Prove yourself in
neighborhood organization in Newark's South Ward. The Donald
Jackson Neighborhood Corporation (DJNC) of Newark, NJ, seeks
a person to fill the position of Executive Director. The position will
involve both community organizing & administrative work. Salary
in $30's + bnfts. Resume/ Refs: DJNC, 15 Van Ness Place,
Newark, NJ 07108. Reply by April 20th. DJNC is an EOE.
COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR. The National Housing Institute (NHI),
a nonprofit publication & research center, seeks an individual
dedicated to social change to serve as the communications
director to develop and implement short/long range communica-
tions strategy. Responsibilities include encouraging journalists &
scholars to develop research & organizing projects sponsored by
NHI , developing other NHI programs & fundraising. Exp in media
relations or publication, nonprofit admin, and fundraising is help-
ful. Send resume, cover letter & refs to: David Steinglass, NHI,
439 Main St., Orange, NJ 07050. People of color & women en-
couraged to apply. For further info call 201/678-3-110.
"COMMITMENT"
April 1990 23
LEGALADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT. Growing law office specializing
in nonprofit housing development seeks assistant to work closely
w/supervising attorney to manage office. General office duties
incldg billing, coordinating production & management of docu-
ments. Self-starter w/good verbal & written abilities. Office mgmt,
clerical & word processing skills reqd. Salary: hi teens to mid 20's
based on expo Resume: Dellapa & Lewis, 150 Nassau St., Suite
1630, NYC 10038. 212/732-2700.
June 4 - 9, 1990
Lincoln Filene Center
Tufts University
Medford, MA 02155
(617) 381-3549
The Institute offers over 40 intensive one- and two-
day courses for those involved with community
organizations and non-profit groups.
Come and learn new skills and meet your peers in
community development.
Since 1980 HEAT has provided low cost home heating oil . burner and boiler repair services.
and energy management and conservation services to largely minority low and middle income
neighborhoods in the Bronx. Brooklyn. Manhattan and Queens.
As a proponent of economic empowerment for revitalization of the city's communities. HEAT is
committed to assisting newly emerging managers and owners of buildings with the reduction of
energy costs (long recognized as the single most expensive area of building management) .
HEAT has presented tangible opportunities for tenant associations. housing coops. churches.
community organizations. homeowners and small businesses to gain substantial savings and
lower the costs of building operations.
Working collaboratively with other community service organizations with similar goals. and
working to establish its viability as a business entity. HEAT has committed its revenue gener-
ating capacity and potential to providing services that work for. and lead to. stable. productive
communities.
Throulh the primary servk:e of providing low cost home heating oil, various heating
pa.nt services and energy maNigement services, HEAT members have collectively
saved over $5.1 million.
HOUSING ENERGY ALLIANCE FOR TENANTS COOP CORP.
853 BROADWAY. SUITE 414. NEW YORK. N.Y. 10003 12121505-0286
If you are interested in !uming more about HEAT,
or if you are interested in becoming a HEAT member,
call or write the HEAT office.
A Workathon for Community
Services in New York and Medical
Aid in Central America April 21, 1990
Here's your chance to support community service projects in NewYorkANDhealth care
in Central America! Join us on Saturday, April 21st to workwith a team of volunteers at
a local community service program for six hours.
The programs where we'll work provide badly needed services in the areas of housing,
community-based health care, AIDS, battered women, homelessness and others.
The community service groups are requesting many different kinds of work including
construction, clean-up, painting, mailings, literature distribution, and office work. Skills are
welcome, but we mainly need enthusiasm.
ASKYOURFRIENDS ANDCO-WORKERS TO SPONSOR YOUFOR APLEDGE OF MONEYFOR
EACHHOUR OF WORKTHATYOU'LLDO ONAPRIL21ST. The donations will be used to
benefit three health care projects in Central America.
PLEASE REGISTER INADVANCEBYCALLING(212) 496-6945 or by returning the coupon to:
Working as Neighbors, c/o MEDICA. 577 Columbus Avenue, NewYork, NY10024
Endorsers: (list information . affiliation listedfor identification only)
Assn. for Neighborhood &Housing Dev. Banana KellyCommunity Improvement Assn . Elizabeth Benson, Settlement Health and Medical Services". Bronx Coalition for Peace
and Justice in Central America. Brooklyn Sister City ProJect Brooklyn Womens Martial Arts s Catholic worker e CISPES Camm. for Nonintervention in C.A. CRECEN
Center for Community Action to Prevent AIDS. Center for Immigrants Rights Centro de Educaci6n de Trabajadores Chelsea Sisler City Project > Citizen Soldter e DC37
Central America and Caribbean Committee. Ted Glick. ATURACoalition. Health Workers inSupport ofCentral America (Columbia/Presbyterian) Health Workers inSupport
ofCentral America (SLLukes/Roosevelt) Health Action Resource Center. HousingJustice Campaign. Intercommunity Center forJusUce and Peace. Julio Cortazar Hospital
Fund. LEMPA/Lower East Side Sister City Pro]. Local 1199 Lower East Side Catholic Area Conference. MADRE. MEDICA. MenofAll Colors Together/NY. Mobilization
for Survival. Fr. Roberto Morales. St. Ann's Church" Morningside Friends (Quaker) Meeting" NCAHRN" NYNicaragua Solidarity Network" Nan. Lawyers Guild-NYC Chapt.
Nan. Congress for Puerto Rican Rights. Neighbor-to-Neighbor. Nicaraguan Philanthropic Cmte. North Bronx Social Action Cmte. Bill Nuchow. Secretary-Treasurer. Local
840 I~ Organzation ofAsian Women. Park Slope Safe Homes Project Park Slope United Methodist Church. Patrice Lumumba Coaltuon Pax Christi Metro NewYor-ke
Marion Porro. Pres.. Local 1930 AFSCME*. Prenatal Care Steering Cmte. Riverside Church Social Action Ministry AlfonsoRoman. United Church of Chrtet'".Marie Runyon.
Harlem Restoration Pro]. TecNICA Emily Thomas. Peace and Justice Ministry. NYCPresbytery" Miriam Thompson. Local 259 UAW* U.S. Peace Council. United
Tradeswomen. Urban Homesteading Assistance Board. Venlana Veterans of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Adam Veneski. Peoples Firehouse"
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
________________________________________________________ Phone
Name
Address
o YES!I want to work as a volunteer on April 21st. Type(s) of work I would like to do: _
D I can't participate but here's my donation of $ _
Make checks payable to Workathon/MEDICA. Donations of $25 or more can be tax-deductible by making
checks payable to Workathon/NCAHRN .
~ 1