The local paper for the Upper er East Side A DYING WISH OF DICKENS < THEATER, P. 14
WEEK OF APRIL
24 2014
NYPRESS.COM
OurTownEastSide @OurTownNYC
THE PURGATORY OF HOUSING
In Brief MAJOR DRUG BUST IN MANHATTAN
SENIORS Some seniors are stuck in limbo between affordable housing programs, waiting lists, and Social Security earnings BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS
UPPER EAST SIDE Ellen Ehrlich will be 87 years old next month. She receives $1,959 a month from Social Security, well short of the $2,100 she needs for her rent-stabilized apartment on East 95th Street. Her adult children pick up the slack, but for Ehrlich, that’s not a solution. She retired in 2011 and was told she makes too much to qualify for the Mitchell Lama affordable housing program. A Section 8 program at Yorkville Gardens put her on a years-long waitlist. “I need affordable housing, and I’m told I have a four- to five-year wait,” said Ehrlich. “When you’re 65, that’s doable. When you’re pushing 87 next month, it’s not so doable.” Ehrlich, and others like her, are stuck in limbo between making too much money in retirement to qualify for some of the city’s affordable housing programs, but not enough to afford living in the same neighborhoods where they once raised families. The programs they do qualify for have long lines of people ahead of them. “I have a really great support group, but that’s not the answer,” said Ehrlich, who noted that many elderly New Yorkers do not have family looking out for them. “The city and state of New York has no room for seniors, even though we built and financed the city...and now we’re being told there’s no space for us.” Carolyn Silver is the Chief Program Officer at Lenox Hill Neighborhood House, which connects mostly lower income residents on the East Side with health programs, legal advocacy, housing resources, educational opportunities and recreational activities. “It’s a huge problem,” said Silver, of those seniors who can’t afford rents CONTINUED ON PAGE 5
A funding shortage for arts teachers leaves some public school students without an arts education. Photo via cayoup/Flickr
PAYING FOR THE ARTS SCHOOLS A new report highlights severe shortfalls in city arts funding BY MARY NEWMAN
Emily Diamond has been the art teacher at P.S. 6 on the Upper East Side for the past 16 years. She knows she’s one of the lucky ones: the school, and its parents, have worked to ensure she has the supplies she needs. But, having worked at other schools around New York, she also knows that such support is no longer a guarantee. “Art supplies are expensive, let’s face it,” Diamond said. “When you’re a specialist, you are basically working alone. Lots of schools just don’t have the money, so many art teachers don’t feel supported.” A recent report from city Comptroller Scott Stringer shows the extent of the funding gap. Twentyeight percent of NYC schools are
without a full-time, certified arts teacher, the report states, and 30 percent are without any certified arts teacher at all, despite a state mandate that they be provided. Over the last seven years, there has been a 47 percent decline in funding to hire arts and cultural organizations to provide programming for students. Stringer, in an Our Town op-ed, notes that the arts funding shortfall hits lower-income neighborhoods particularly hard, with nearly half the schools without art teachers located in the South Bronx and Central Brooklyn. “You’d think that with a $25 billion budget, our Department of Education could afford to provide arts education and comply with state law,” Stringer wrote. “But New York City’s financial support for arts education has been shrinking dramatically.” The comptroller says bringing a full-time, state-certified art teacher to every school that does not have
one would cost the Department of Education $26 million, a drop in its annual budget. Diamond worked at a public school in Queens for a time before joining P.S. 6, and remembers being asked to take on many different roles in addition to art -- monitoring study halls, homerooms, and helping other teachers. That, she says, is common among art departments that have little to no funding. “What I really feel is that as an art teacher, you really have to love kids and love the chaos of the art room,” Diamond said. While the shortage of arts funding has been on teachers’ radars for years, the striking numbers in the Stringer report may finally bring the issue to a larger public debate. “Making sure that the arts are included in our schools at every age level is essential in providing a well rounded education,” said City Council Majority Leader Jimmy Van Bramer.
Authorities in New York arrested three suspects in a major drug bust last week. The Drug Enforcement Administration announced Wednesday that more than $12 million in heroin and crystal meth reportedly was confiscated in the arrests. The acting head of the DEA in New York, James Hunt, tells Newsday the seizure from a Washington Heights apartment building is a “significant hit.” Authorities say the drugs were intended for distribution in New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and other locations. They say there were enough drugs to fill 600,000 glassine bags sold at street level. The suspects were arraigned Tuesday in Manhattan on multiple counts of drug possession. Their lawyers could not be reached for comment.
PIER 26 TO BECOME EDUCATION CENTER Gov. Andrew Cuomo says Pier 26 in Manhattan will be home to an environmental and education center to promote scientific research of the Hudson River estuary and surrounding bodies of water. On Friday Cuomo said the state will solicit proposals from organizations to establish and operate the research and education center. The Hudson River Park Trust has already secured $10 million in funds to advance the construction with donations from the Port Authority, the Department of Environmental Conversation and the Department of State. The site’s footprint will allow for a 10,000 and 12,000 square foot facility and will feature a nonmotorized boathouse as well as a new restaurant in 2015. The Hudson River Estuary stretches from the upstate city of Troy to New York.