Volume 80, Number 24 | November 11 – 17, 2010
West and East Village, Chelsea, Soho, Noho, Little Italy, Chinatown and Lower East Side, Since 1933
Rent, and lives on the line
Eighteen protesters — including state Senator Tom Duane, standing and being handcuffed, above — were arrested Tuesday when 200 people held a die-in outside City Hall, urging Governor Paterson to support a bill to lower the rent cap for low-income New Yorkers living with H.I.V./AIDS. They said the governor must work with the Legislature to pass the bill before he leaves office at the end of the year, or 10,000 more New Yorkers will become homeless. The activists said Paterson previously pledged to sign the bill but broke his promise. Introduced by Duane and Assemblymember Deborah Glick, the legislation would ensure that low-income people enrolled in the H.I.V./AIDS Services Administration’s rental assistance program pay no more than 30 percent of their income toward their rent. The current policy punishes the permanently disabled, the activists charged, by requiring they pay upwards of 70 percent or more of their Social Security income toward their rent. Said Gina Quattrochi, C.E.O. of Bailey House, “Governor Paterson vetoed a bill that would have brought New York State into line with the federal standard of capping rent at 30 percent of income for those living under the poverty level. We cannot remain silent in the face of this unconscionable act.”
