Sunday, November 2, 2008

SEMINAR: Preventing Abuse of Our Elders



















Dear Friends, Neighbors, Seniors, Community Workers and Educators,

You are invited to a very important Seminar that will have a huge impact on the quality of our lives. The topic is Preventing Elder Abuse and healing the underlying fears that prevent us from understanding when there is abuse and how to get help and report the abuse without fearing a backlash.

A huge antidote to this fear is INFORMATION ... if you know your rights and understand how you are being victimized, then you are empowered to assert your rights and win.

Come and learn how to protect yourself, meet other seniors who have experienced abuse and will share their stories of healing and how they survived, get information to take back to your families.

RSVP: (212) 283-7011

E-mail: harlemseniors@aol.com

Bill Named in Honor of Florence Rice






By Herb Boyd
Managing Editor, The Black World Today

Nov. 26, 2004 -- New York -- Prompted by the furor surrounding the eviction of a local senior citizen, Councilmembers Charles Barron and Latisha James have introduced a bill that addresses the unwarranted evictions of the elderly.

The bill, named in honor of veteran activist Florence Rice, whose battle with landlords sparked a recent series of rallies and demonstrations, is slated to amend the administrative code of the city of New York as it pertains to eviction of elderly tenants.

“With this bill, landlords will no longer be allowed to evict our senior citizens without recourse,” Barron told a group of supporters gathered at the steps of City Hall Tuesday afternoon. “Landlords now must go through the Housing Preservation and Development Department before any action can be taken.”

Among the bills’ stipulations are a notification requirement; provision of tenant assistance for eligible heads of households; reporting of action by the commission on human rights; and fines for anyone who violates the law. “This law is named in tribute to Florence Rice who has been unfazed by the most daunting challenges from Con-Ed and New York Telephone,” reads the proclamation given to Rice, and which will be officially conducted in early December in Council Chambers, said Paul Washington, Barron’s chief of staff.

Union leader Brenda Stokely and labor activist James Haughton were among those at the event to congratulate Rice. “Years ago, when they kicked Florence out of the garment union, she told them to drop dead,” recalled Haughton. “Legislation and bills are fine, but what we need is a revolution.”

“This is an important piece of legislation,” Stokely said, “and it comes at a time when they are disregarding working people. “I applaud the courage of the councilmembers for introducing this bill.”

Councilwoman James’ remarks occurred just as Mayor Bloomberg was entering City Hall. “Move this bill, Mr. Mayor, move this bill!” she called to him. The mayor came over and without committing himself one way or the other, offered a few words of praise for Ms. Rice.

“I am glad all of this happened to me,” Rice said, standing next to Beverly Griggsby, who has been battling so tirelessly on her behalf in court and elsewhere. “If it hadn’t happened to me we wouldn’t be standing here today. Landlords are saying they don’t need us anymore, so they can throw seniors into the streets whenever they want to. But we must join together and fight back. It’s not about money or color, it’s about education.”

There are several steps before the bill becomes law, Washington explained, but he was optimistic that it will pass and eventually provide protection for the elderly who at the moment have little recourse but to wage one-sided battles against landlords in courts where many of Rice’s supporters believe are no-win situations.




Paul Washington, chief of staff for Councilman Charles Barron (next to him), reads a Council Proclamation in tribute to Florence Rice (next to Barron) on the steps of City Hall in Manhattan. Photo by Herb Boyd

For Activist, the Battle Comes Home






By ALAN FEUER
The New York TImes

November 7, 2004 -- New York -- It is decidedly not typical behavior to enjoy a court fight with your landlord. Then again, Florence M. Rice is not a typical woman.
For the last five decades, Ms. Rice has been something of a one-woman consumer dynamo in Harlem, fighting utility companies, credit agencies, even furniture stores and banks on behalf of the poor. At 85, she still wears pins reading, ''Economic Racism.'' She is known uptown as the Ralph Nader of Harlem.

Now, Ms. Rice is fighting her own fight.
On Nov. 16, she will go on trial in the city's Housing Court, accused by her landlord, 536-540 West 158th Street L.L.C., of not paying her full rent. She, in turn, has accused the landlord of destroying her apartment, under the guise of renovating it, and forcing her out.

''I'm really glad it happened to me,'' Ms. Rice said the other day in the cafeteria of the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building on 125th Street.

''I knew I could get support to expose this sort of problem. If it hadn't happened to me, it would have happened to someone else my age who might have ended up in a hospital or a nursing home.''

Ms. Rice's troubles have attracted the attention of elected officials and ordinary people alike. A woman who once produced the graphics for her protest signs has agreed to testify on her behalf, and politicians, like State Senator David A. Paterson and State Assemblyman Herman D. Farrell Jr., have written letters of support to the court.

''Her activism, especially in the energy department, goes way back,'' Mr. Farrell said. ''She was bringing fights against Con Ed years ago.''

''She's very tenacious,'' he added. ''When Florence came out against you, you knew you were in trouble -- no matter how big the utility or the battle.''
Ms. Rice's problems began in April when she discovered that her landlord had served her with eviction papers, claiming that, for almost three years, she had underpaid her rent by nearly $200 a month. Her legal guardian, Beverly Griggsby, said the landlord had illegally raised Ms. Rice's rent from $291 a month to $458 and, moreover, failed to inform her of the change.

Jesse Baker, a lawyer for the landlord, was on vacation and could not be reached last week. Another lawyer at the landlord's firm -- Guttman, Mintz, Baker & Sonnenfelt -- did not return telephone calls on Thursday and Friday.

In August, after a protracted court scuffle, the landlord agreed in a legal stipulation to repair Ms. Rice's apartment one room at a time so that she could remain while the renovations were being made. According to the stipulation, the landlord agreed to correct several housing violations in the apartment, ''starting in the kitchen and the dining room, then bathroom, then first bedroom, then hallway, then master bedroom, then living room.''

However, when the workmen arrived at Ms. Rice's apartment on Sept. 1, they immediately gutted it, Ms. Griggsby said. They stuffed Ms. Rice's belongings into plastic bags, she said, and tore down the walls so thoroughly that one could stand at the front door and look through an empty apartment at a toilet.

''When I opened the door,'' Ms. Griggsby said, ''there were no walls in the bedroom. Not only were there no walls in the bedroom, there was no bedroom. There was no closet. No sink. No bathtub. Everything was gone.''

Ms. Griggsby contends that the landlord planned to refurbish the apartment and force Ms. Rice to leave so it could be rented at a higher rate. She claims the apartment was segmented into three separate bedrooms, each with its own lock, suggesting that at least three separate tenants were planning to move in.

Ms. Griggsby acknowledged that the landlord had offered Ms. Rice another apartment in the building, but Ms. Griggsby refused to allow her to take it because it was on the fifth floor and Ms. Rice, she said, could not climb stairs.

For the last two months, Ms. Rice has been dividing her time among her family and friends, moving from place to place. She is bowed but clearly undefeated.
''They'll be sorry they ever messed with me,'' she said.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

Tenants Protected in Big Bailout






Big Bailout Includes Tenant Protections
Organizers secured help for NYC renters.
By Dina Levy and The Partnership to Preserve Affordable Housing

There has been little reported about how the housing and credit crises are impacting affordable rental housing, particularly in NYC where speculative landlords and overzealous banks have placed unsupportable debt burdens on rent regulated and formerly subsidized housing.

Despite mixed feelings about the financial rescue package, a coalition of NYC housing advocates worked diligently to educate public officials about the need for renter protections as a result of this practice. The 1,200-unit rent-regulated Riverton Apartments in Harlem was the first multi-family deal to publicly unravel due to over-leveraging, but it won’t be the last. To date, the Partnership to Preserve Affordable Housing has tracked more than 500 buildings serving tens of thousands of renters which may be at risk.

When the enormous debt obligations behind these assets go bad, low and moderate income tenants will be left to suffer the consequences. The Partnership takes the position that any financial rescue package for Wall Street – which got us into this mess – must also provide protections for renters, who are innocent bystanders.

Thanks to the leadership of Senator Charles Schumer and Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, two of the three policy recommendations advocated by the Partnership made it into the final bill. The first is a protection for tenants who have existing subsidies and/or rent protections, such as rent stabilization, ensuring that they will not be preempted by any federal action resulting from this legislation. The second is a requirement that loan modifications must ensure that a building’s finances can support decent, safe and sanitary living conditions based on existing rent levels. A third provision giving units of local government a first right of refusal in acquiring any buildings sold or transferred by the federal government was cut out of the bill during late-inning negotiations.

As important as these protections are, they represent a modest victory considering the scope and magnitude of this historic legislation. In terms of protecting New York City’s affordable housing stock, there is plenty more work to be done. Looking ahead the Partnership and our national allies will turn our attention to winning the kind of banking regulation overhaul that could have prevented this crisis in the first place.

Dina Levy is director of policy and organizing at UHAB, the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board. UHAB is a member of the Partnership to Preserve Affordable Housing, a coalition that includes the Community Service Society, Legal Aid Society, Pratt Area Community Council, South Brooklyn Legal Services and Tenants & Neighbors.

Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Harlem Connects Prepares Seniors for Digital Transition

On Sept. 17, 2008 the Harlem Consumer Education Council and the Senior Tenants and Landlords Reconciliation Project hosted an educational conference to prepare Harlem’s Seniors for the digital television transition in 2009. Studies show that seniors are most likely to be left behind on February 17th, 2009, when all analog TV signals cease.





















Speakers from different organizations came out to answer Seniors' questions about the digital conversion. Ms. Florence M. Rice, Chair of Harlem Consumer Education Council (center); Joshua Breitbart, Policy Director of People's Production House (far left); Karen Maria Beverly, Consumer and Industry Affairs Specialist of the FCC (center left); Dennis Lane, Harlem Connects Facilitator and Harlem Consumer Education Council Board Member (top center); Joel Kelsey, Policy Advocate for Consumers Union (right center); and Francine Jefferson, Consumer Education Manager for U.S. Department of Commerce.

























Marjorie W. Moore, Director of Senior Tenants and Landlords Reconciliation Project, pictured with Evette Zayas, Chief-of-Staff for Assemblyman Adam C. Powell IV - 68th District.

























Ms. Florence M. Rice, Chair of Harlem Consumer Education Council pictured with The Friends of Thirteen - WNET New York Dorothy Pacella, Executive Director (left); Daniel Allen (center); and Gloria Park, Publicist (right).





















Upton Kimani Watson, left, and Kirsy Grullon, right, both Managers of Radio Shack helped Seniors fill out their coupon applications and explained how the converter box work.





















Hosts Ms. Florence M. Rice, Chair of Harlem Consumer Education Council, and Marjorie W. Moore, Director of Senior Tenants & Landlords Reconciliation Project make introductions and explain the implications of the digital transition to Harlem Seniors.


























Dennis Lane, Harlem Consumer Education Council Board Member, facilitates event and introduces guest speakers.






















Karen Maria Beverly, Consumer and Industry Affairs Specialist with the FCC explains the coupon application and process.





















Tappy Phillips of Eyewitness News 7 interviews participants at Harlem Connects event.

Thursday, September 4, 2008

HCEC presents Harlem Connects


























DATE: Wednesday, Sept. 17, 2008


TIME: 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM


PLACE: Harlem State Office Building, 163 West 125th Street, New York, NY 10027 -- just east of Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard (Seventh Avenue)



SPECIAL GUEST:

Florence M. Rice, Chair, Harlem Consumer Education Council
Joel Kelsey, Policy Analyst, Consumer Union
Other Speakers TBA:
FCC — Federal Communications Commission
NTIA — National Telecommunications & Information Administration
MNN — Manhattan Neighborhood Network Television


· Learn More About Digital Television (DTV)
· Learn about Connecting Your Digital Television Converters
· Come Swap your Coupons for a Digital Converter
· Learn about The Role of Harlem in the Digital Future
· Sign up for your Government Coupon toward the purchase of a Digital Television Converter
· Come Learn, Become Informed and Take Local Action


RSVP: Senior Tenants & Landlord’s Reconciliation Project (212) 283-7011 or harlemseniors@aol.com.





Harlem Seniors Discuss Transition to Digital

On July 24, 2008, Harlem Consumer Education Council, Inc. and the Senior Tenants and Landlords Reconciliation Project hosted an urgent meeting to discuss the theft of our right to control the air waves and the much publicized transition to digital which is scheduled to take place on February 17, 2009.


















Ms. Florence M. Rice, Chair of Harlem Consumer Education Council (HCEC) listening intently to the community discussion of the upcoming transition to digital.


















Ms. Florence M. Rice, Chair of HCEC, and Glen Ford from the Black Agenda Report address questions and concerns from the community.


















The Senior Community expresses their concerns about the transition to digital and how that will affect themselves and the community.


















Gina Cushion, Volunteer Program Assistant, always offering a smile and a helping hand was a key component to organizing the Transition to Digital seminar.