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Mayor Bill de Blasio was exposed for having lied about defunding the NYPD by $1 billion, which could have been one source of possible funding for NYCHA

Mayor Bill de Blasio said he would use $1 billion in cuts to the NYPD budget to advance social justice. He lied. Now, NBC News has caught him increasing the NYPD budget by $200 million.

Mayor Bill de Blasio (WFP-New York City) was busted by NBC News in an investigation one year after the “defund the police” movement led to his promise to cut $1 billion from the budget of the New York Police Department and to use that funding stream, instead, to make “some transformative changes at the department,” in the words of Mayor de Blasio’s chief enabler, Council Speaker Corey Johnson (D-Chelsea).

Not only did the $1 billion cut made in June 2020 never materialise, but an additional $200 million was added to the NYPD budget in June 2021, according to NBC News.

Last year, outgoing Mayor Bill de Blasio and the city council moved to cut roughly $1 billion from the police’s $6 billion budget and invest it in youth and social services. De Blasio wrote in a tweet then that “Our young people need to be reached, not policed.” But just a year later, officials adopted the city’s largest budget ever, at $98.7 billion, for fiscal year 2022, which included a $200 million increase for police spending.

Mayor de Blasio has given lip service to the promise to promote racial and social justice.

In New York City, the #DefundTheNYPD movement, like respective movements across the nation, grew out of the George Floyd anti-racism protests in 2020. Mayor de Blasio promised to use the money to help youths and other social service programs. As Mayor de Blasio’s term in office comes to an end, nobody knows what happened to his broken promises for funding racial and social justice.

Mayor de Blasio has been accused of using his bi-racial family to co-opt the language of social movements and as a political cover to defend or expand race-based policing — even as he has rejected calls to hold the NYPD accountable for homicides and other acts of brutality committed by the police. As NBC News noted, Mayor de Blasio said, “Our young people need to be reached, not policed.” But that turned out to be another one of his lies. In a review of Mayor de Blasio’s two terms in office, the New York Daily News reported that Mayor de Blasio leaves behind a legacy of corruption and neglect on housing issues.

Fight For NYCHA have long argued that sources of Government funding could be found to fully-fund NYCHA. For decades, the racist divestment of public housing led to a gargantuan deficit in NYCHA’s capital repairs budget. Our funding ideas were workshopped and packaged as a People’s Budget that has been updated over time. One of the items in our People’s Budget was to defund the NYPD by $2 billion and to use that money to bond the capital repairs at NYCHA.

Duplicitous politicians and nonprofit groups continue to say they care about NYCHA, but then they corruptly take advantage of the lack of funding to benefit their donors. As Mayor de Blasio begins to reportedly wage a campaign for New York governor, he has awarded the RAD/PACT conversion at Fulton Houses and Elliott-Chelsea to the Trump billionaire backer and Hudson Yards developer, Stephen Ross.

Anonymous Message to NYCHA Residents

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Fight For NYCHA’s protest march accuses LGBTQ electeds of pinkwashing racism and austerity

LGBTQ politicians came to power based on their experience of discrimination, but they have done nothing to end discrimination for all oppressed people.

Austerity leads to racism

There is a convergence in the betrayal of public housing with the Coronavirus pandemic. Hospital closings led to disparities in healthcare outcomes, as we have seen during the Coronavirus outbreak. The refrigerator trucks are a sign that austerity leads to racism. Now, NYCHA residents are being used as guinea pigs for testing and contact tracing in order for politicians to dangerously fast-track the reopening of the economy.

Fight For NYCHA targeting some politicians, who claim to experience oppression, but who have done nothing to end racism or austerity. We visited the apartment houses of : Christine Quinn, Corey Johnson, Deborah Glick, and Brad Hoylman — each of whom had a role in the closing and luxury condo conversion of the old St. Vincent’s Hospital. They thought nothing of taking away a safety net hospital from us, and they have done nothing to fight austerity or racism, as evidenced by how public housing has been neglected on their watch — and in their own district.

Contact Tracing poses risks to NYCHA tenants. Fight For NYCHA demands HRA Rent Vouchers for All.

The political and media fallout : “Willful ignorance,” silence, and distraction

Quinn, Johnson, and Glick chose to ignore our protest, with Quinn’s doorman videotaping our protest outside her million-dollar luxury condo. Quinn gets paid $500,000 a year as the ringleader of a poverty nonprofit that skims money off of homeless shelters. A kind of a new age, “transformational” Madame Thénardier.

For his part, Hoylman addressed Albany red tape on hospital closes but refused to address the pinkwashing by the LGBTQ White CIS power establishment of racism. But we made him nervous, and he took to Twitter that very same night and, for the first time in his career, tweeted the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter.

Pinkwashing means that the LGBTQ politicians in Chelsea and the West Village have exploited their experience of discrimination for political power without uplifting POC.

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Join us on May 30 for a March Against Racism and Austerity from Chelsea to Greenwich Village

Poverty is barbarity !

Our march route has been finalised !

We are visiting the apartment houses of politicians, who had a role in the closing of St. Vincent’s Hospital, a situation that has wrecked the healthcare outcomes of low-income communities and POC. We are demanding that politicians stop #PinkWashing racism and austerity ! Join us as we protest :

  • Christine Quinn, former City Council Speaker ;
  • Corey Johnson, current City Council Speaker ;
  • Deborah Glick, Assemblymember ; and
  • Brad Hoylman, State Senator.

They enabled gentrification of New York City and never championed the full-funding of NYCHA. These politicians claim to know oppression. But what have they done to end racism and austerity ?

None of these politicians said one word to stand up against Mayor Bill de Blasio’s dangerous scheme to sell-out NYCHA to RAD landlords. It’s time that politicians, who claim that they are allies of POC, start acting as allies.

Please join us :

When : Sat., May 30, at 1 pm
Where : Meet at 9th Ave. and West 27th Street
RSVP : March Against Racism and Austerity [Facebook]

Stop ”pinkwashing” racism and austerity !

An LGBTQ activist is taking the lead in the planning of this protest march, so this is not an attack on identity, but, rather, criticism on how politicians have used the experience of oppression for personal political gain — only to countenance the oppression of others.

Watch our Facebook Live

Please start watching at about 5 minutes in, due to technical issues.

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Protest Corey Johnson to save Fulton Houses

We demand that Speaker Johnson allocate $168 million needed to save Fulton Houses.

Join us for a protest at the apartment house of New York City Council Speaker Corey Johnson (D-Chelsea). To stop the plan by Mayor Bill de Blasio (D-New York City) to demolish two buildings and to put public housing into the hands of private landlords, all we need is $168 million, but Council Speaker Johnson refuses to save Fulton Houses from the wrecking ball.

Date : Monday, July 15, 2019

Time : 6:30 – 7:30 pm

Place : 220 West 15th Street, Manhattan

RSVP : Protest Corey Johnson to save Fulton Houses [Facebook]

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First protest set to #FindTheMoneyNow to #KeepPublicHousingPublic

May 29 rally at New York City Hall

Tenants of Fulton Houses approved a rally at New York City Hall to demand that New York City Council reäppropriate the $10 billion from the capital budget for new jails and instead redirect those monies to the New York City Housing Authority, or NYCHA.

Tenants are also calling for the New York City Council to hold hearing to establish a corporate income tax for corporations of a certain size that operate in New York City.

R.S.V.P.

Since NYCHA is comprised of 90% Black and Latinx families, this means that the politicians are making a political calculation that they can exploit the very visible minorities, who are public housing tenants.

Politicians supporting the plans announced by Mayor de Blasio to demolish public housing apartment buildings and to put public housing into the hands of private landlords, are keeping quiet about the racial implications of their actions or support. This is wrong.

A corporation tax would be progressive way to fund public housing.

New York City is the financial capital of the world. There is so much money here, and yet the largest Corporations pay very little in taxes, if any at all. Amazon made $11 billion in 2018, but it paid $0 in U.S. Federal Income Taxes. Other major Corporations keep profits overseas so they don’t have to report cash as profits to the Government. As of two years ago, Apple was keeping over $200 billion in cash overseas to evade U.S. taxes. Last year, Google had about $60 billion in cash it was keeping overseas to evade U.S. taxes.

New York City already collects a Business Corporation Tax that ranges from about 4 per cent. to 10 per cent. However, New York City caps the tax at $10 million. This means that the most wealthiest of Corporations are not paying their fair share. This violates the principle that people making the most money — at the tippy, tippy tops — need to pay more money in taxes the more money that they make. This is what is called a progressive income tax. New York City can raise the money NYCHA needs by extending the idea of a progressive income tax to Corporations.

The need to pressure City officials stems from AOC’s controversial decision to turn her back on NYCHA.

The need to pressure the Mayor and the City Council for the money to preserve and expand public housing follows the controversial decision by the office of U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY 14) to reject a request to sponsor a budget resolution this year for all $32 billion that NYCHA needs. Randy Abreu is a policy advisor on staff to U.S. Rep. Ocasio-Cortez.