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 the 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.

Even though Hernandez didn’t agree to most of the leader’s demands, people still left feeling very positive.

This is just the first in a series of town hall meetings the Housing Justice Movement is organizing throughout the country with high-level HUD officials. The Housing Justice Movement will continue to keep up the pressure and demand that HUD review and revise all of their policies that adversely affect public and subsidized housing residents.

News coverage from the event:

Housing headache: HUD honcho a no-show as critical tenants deluge stand-in with complaints (NY Daily News, Oct 14)

LES Residents Discuss Concerns with HUD Official (The Lo-Down, Oct 13)

The next town hall will take place on Thursday October 29th in Los Angeles, CA. Stay tuned!

For more information about the Housing Justice Movement, contact DeAngelo Bester ( This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it ).