HUD Passes the Buck At Town Hall Meeting
Wednesday October 14, 2009 | New York City
HUD (Housing and Urban Development) representatives blamed Congress,
local HUD offices, the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), and
even public housing residents for their own failing policies and lack
of communication with residents at a town hall meeting, this past Saturday.
Steering Committee members of NPA's Housing Justice Movement (HJM),
Community Voices Heard (CVH) and Good Old Lower East Side (GOLES)
organized the town hall meeting with public and subsidized housing
tenants of New York City to give public housing residents the
opportunity to engage HUD in a dialogue around some of their policies
that harm residents in New York and throughout the country.
Deputy
Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, Deborah Hernandez, a
holdover from the first Bush administration, represented HUD at the
town hall.
Leaders pressed Hernandez to work with them to
implement a one-year moratorium on the demolition of public housing,
and revise some of HUD’s regulations that criminalize public housing
residents. Unfortunately she refused all of the leader’s demands. From
the start of the meeting it was obvious that Hernandez was not there to
engage in any dialogue with residents, but rather shift responsibility
for HUD’s failing policies to Congress, the regional HUD office, NYCHA,
and residents.