By Rich Bockmann
More than 10,000 homeless families — including 22,000 children — will get a helping hand to land back on their feet now that the state has agreed to free up money for a city rent-assistance program, City Councilman Ruben Wills (D-Jamaica) said.
“Now what we have to do is we have to devise a plan that the state will go along with in the scope and in the requirements of the plan to make sure we come up with something that’s sustainable and measurable,” said Wills, who authored a resolution asking Albany to remove language from its budget preventing the city from using state funds to help the homeless with rent.
When the state cut funding in 2011 forcing the Bloomberg administration to end its Advantage program, lawmakers added language that prohibited the city from using state funds to provide rental assistance to the homeless.
After the Council’s General Welfare Committee held a hearing last week on Wills’ resolution, the councilman and homeless advocates worked with Albany lawmakers — including state Assemblywomen Vivian Cook (D-Jamaica) and Social Services Committee Chairwoman Michele Titus (D-Far Rockaway) — to lobby legislative leaders to adopt the change.
The budget passed Monday has dropped the language, and Wills said the next step is for city and state agencies to work together to roll out a program that will focus on families with children.
The push to gain Albany’s support came down to the wire. Gov. Andrew Cuomo, apparently unclear on the city’s request, said it was too late in the budget process to add a rent-subsidy program and at least one newspaper reported Mayor Bill de Blasio’s office had requested a meeting on the issue through a text message.
Wills said the Council and the mayor’s office worked independently on the issue but with the same end-goal in mind.
“Everybody worked with the same end-of-day motive,” he said.
Reach reporter Rich Bockmann by e-mail at rbockmann@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4574.
