For those of us who take the subways
and see them sleeping stretched out across the seats, or who walk past
them laying on top of the grates on the sidewalk to keep warm, it is no
surprise that a record number of people in New York City are homeless.
In the year 2005, in one of the richest cities in the world, we now
have more homeless people than we did during the Great Depression. In
January, 36,600 adults and children were living in city shelters,
according to a report from the Coalition for the Homeless. As the
report points out, that is an 18 percent increase over January 2002,
when Mayor Michael Bloomberg and many other city officials took office.
The numbers are astounding. Last year there were 38,218 homeless
children in the city. Twenty-five percent of the homeless are Hispanic.
Sixty percent are African-American. We have homeless people huddled in
the shadow of luxury buildings in Manhattan where two-bedroom
apartments start at $1 million. It`s an election year, and housing is a
key issue. Two weeks ago more than 5,000 people gathered outside City
Hall to rally for affordable housing. There are people suggesting
solutions. A recent report from New York University said the city
should require developers to set aside 10 to 20 percent of their
housing units for lower-income residents in exchange for permission to
build bigger buildings than the city now allows. The Bloomberg
administration says this should be voluntary. Bloomberg has pledged to
build 12,000 housing units in the next five years, but the Coalition
for the Homeless says the city should build sooner. The city should use
surplus funds from the Battery Park City Authority to create housing
for homeless and low-income families and fix the problems with the
homeless rent subsidy program. [more]