Living in coronavirusworld 168 : It continues to shape our lives

9/15

a gathering of turtles

 The biggest issue facing the Interfaith Assembly on Homelessness and. Housing right now is the ongoing controversy over people who were homeless taken from covid dangerous overcrowded shelters and placed in unused boutique hotels in the traditionally liberal elite Upper West Side. Aggressive backlash from entitled neighbors, even when countered by good hearted groups like Open Heart UWS, bolstered by hiring a former deputy mayor as their attack dog attorney, was enough to push a lame duck vanishing mayor into declaring their removal. This unfortunately meant setting off a domino effect, forcing people with disabilities from housing specially designed for them and then scattering them throughout the boroughs disrupting others’ lives. Thankfully, the Legal Aid Society stepped in. The exodus was halted. To date, 40 persons have been removed for the Lucerne Hotel and 240 still remain. Even though homeless advocates have raised owe $200000 to provide services for the hotel residents, the city will be spending over $100000 to litigate to get them out. This is happening when there was a record nearly 70000 homeless persons in New York City. And now there are already 14000 pending evictions in the system with another flood to come in 4-5 months. Yet another crisis brought on by the virus. We’ve got to try and rally a scattered faith community to try and bring more support for the hotel residents and their advocates over against those who just want then out. Sometimes in a crisis, in this city, we don’t take care of each other. 

New York City Presbytery, the governing body for Presbyterians in the city, is wrestling with the pressure for churches to reopen. To allow those renters to reenter because so many depend on the rental income for survival. Presbytery only has 40% of the income it did a year ago, Staff cuts would seem to be imminent, but those who would be most likely to be terminated are the BIPOC (Black Indigenous People of Color) employees. Personnel committee recommends status quo, even without sufficient funds. The next Presbytery meeting is set to be all virtual. All on ZOOM. But the Black Presbyterian Caucus maintains this will disenfranchise people of color and low income persons who are less likely to be computer owners or tach savvy. That makes for the longest debate of the evening, We know from experience that phones just don't provide an adequate participatory experience , voting is not possible in ZOOM with a dial in phone. So many issues and conflict of values to sort this one out. Eventually, we decide that we  will seek to secure smart phones for those without computers and teach them how to use them. Easier said than done. 

 Taco Tuesday. The owner of Cantina tells me already 10 percent of restaurants have permanently closed. Even with limited capacity reopening scheduled for September 29, it still looks like 40% of our owners will go out of business. Two exhausting ZOOM meetings and even my dinner, all controlled or impacted by the virus. It continues to shape our lives.We step towards normal, but it’s way beyond what we can see.