The importance of the Emergency
Eviction and Foreclosure Prevention Act
Vaccine effort underway for transit workers
COURIER LIFE, JANUARY 22-28, 2021 21
BY SARAH E. FEINBERG
While most of us are eager
to leave 2020 behind, this past
year will never be far from my
mind. Turning a new page on
the calendar can’t erase what
we have been through: losing
friends and colleagues, surviving
illness, and our city
changing forever.
I took over as interim president
of New York City Transit
just as the COVID-19 pandemic
gripped New York and
we have been battling it ever
since. But the men and women
of New York City Transit have
been a relentless source of inspiration
through it all.
When so much of normal
life disappeared, the Transit
workforce stood strong. They
came to work and did their
jobs day after day, putting
their own fears aside to serve
essential workers and other
New Yorkers.
And as if that wasn’t
enough, they also delivered
on a truly impressive slate
of projects against all odds –
from adapting our system to
the realities of COVID to refi
ning countless schedules to
fi nishing 11 ADA accessible
stations, the list of accomplishments
is long and varied.
I couldn’t be prouder.
And I know New Yorkers
are proud too. Our year-end
customer surveys showed an
incredible 7-point increase
in overall satisfaction with
subway service compared
to the year before, with an
overwhelming 76 percent of
respondents saying our unparalleled
cleaning and disinfecting
efforts make them feel
safe when using mass transit.
I have no doubt Transit
will continue to step up in
2021. We’re starting this year
off with a massive campaign
to vaccinate our workforce,
who last week became eligible
for inoculation under Phase
1b of the State’s distribution
plan. It is our goal to ensure
that every employee who’s
willing and able can get the
COVID vaccine in the coming
weeks, starting with those on
the front lines.
The MTA is working hard
to set up on-site vaccination
centers where workers can
receive their shots, similar to
our nation-leading diagnostic
testing program.
But for this to make a difference,
we need everyone to
get vaccinated. Simply put, it’s
the best way we can protect
ourselves and our families going
forward.
Ensuring the safety of our
workforce and the safety of
our system has been my highest
priority since taking the
helm of Transit almost one
year ago. In addition to the
vaccine rollout, most recently
these efforts have focused on
securing additional NYPD
presence in our system following
a string of disturbing
attacks on workers and customers.
I’ve also asked the
city to do more in response
to the mental health crisis
that’s playing out across the
fi ve boroughs, and by extension,
our transit system.
There will always be more
that we can do to improve security,
and I promise to do everything
I can in 2021 to create
a more positive environment
underground and on our
buses. New Yorkers deserve
nothing less.
Sarah E. Feinberg is interim
president of MTA New
York City Transit.
OP-ED
ANDREW GOUNARDES &
JUSTIN BRANNAN
From the very beginning of
the pandemic-induced fi nancial
crisis, calls came fl ooding
into our offi ces every day, all
saying the same thing:
“I lost my job.”
“I haven’t gotten my unemployment
check yet.”
And then: “I can’t pay rent
this month.” “How am I going
to pay my mortgage?”
Oftentimes this was said
with frustration and even
shame. People who had never
missed a rent or mortgage payment
were suddenly thrust into
housing insecurity.
A few months later, there
were new calls: “I have tenants
who lost their job and haven’t
paid rent for a few months. How
can I pay the property tax bill
due this month?”
We live in an incredibly fragile
housing ecosystem — one
which depends on a symbiotic
relationship between tenant
and owner to keep balance and
where far too many people are
a few missed payments away
from housing insecurity.
As the pandemic wears on,
more and more people are unable
to pay their rent or their
mortgage, and the distress on
the housing ecosystem continues
to grow and teeters ever
more on the precipice of collapse.
In the absence of any meaningful
relief from the federal
government over the last nine
months, we’ve been left trying
to hold the system in place with
stopgap measures, executive orders,
and a lot of good will. Tenants
and landlords trying to
work out alternative arrangements
to help pay a little rent at
a time; enactment of the Emergency
Rental Relief Assistance
Act and the Tenant Safe Harbor
Act by the state legislature over
the summer to help keep people
in their homes; and a patchwork
of moratoria on evictions extended
month-by-month to keep
people out of housing court..
These measures, while helpful,
did not provide the durable
stability that our housing ecosystem
needs to keep people
safe during this crisis.
That is why earlier this
month the legislature passed
the COVID-19 Emergency Eviction
and Foreclosure Prevention
Act, a bill to prevent New
Yorkers struggling due to the
pandemic from losing the roof
over their heads. This is a necessary
action to prevent a disastrous
wave of evictions and
foreclosures.
This legislation, the strongest
in the nation, prevents
evictions and foreclosures/tax
lien sales until May 1, 2021 (including
for small property owners)
by allowing tenants and homeowners
to fi le a standardized
hardship declaration form that
attests, under penalty of law,
that they can’t pay their rent
or mortgage because they lost
income due to the pandemic. It
also implements a total moratorium
on evictions and foreclosures
for two months so
New Yorkers have time to fi le.
The bill also prohibits negative
credit reporting against homeowners
for using the law’s protections.
Crucially, this legislation
is only the fi rst step needed to
nurse our housing system back
to health. By preventing waves
evictions or foreclosures, we
can now turn our focus to help
New Yorkers in housing distress
have a path back from the
brink. This means fi nding a
way to help those who have declared
a fi nancial hardship to
pay back rent, ensuring they
get back on the right path.
But the truth is, we will
need more help from the federal
government to get through
this and make everyone whole.
Last week, the President fi nally
signed a $908 billion stimulus
package that extended unemployment
benefi ts and provided
$1.3 billion for New York State
for rental assistance. This, combined
with $100 million of funding
from the CARES Act which
seeded the Emergency Rental
Relief Assistance, will go a long
way to helping pay down the
nearly $2.7 billion in back rent
owed across the state.
But not everyone can access
unemployment benefi ts or qualify
for the fi rst round of rental
assistance. Even with expanded
eligibility, excluded workers include
immigrants without documentation
who worked long
hours at a job in the hard-hit
restaurant industry, in social
services or in cleaning services,
or individuals who may
have earned above the rental
assistance income threshold
before the pandemic hit.
Without decisive action by
the next Congress and President,
hundreds of thousands of
New Yorkers could lose their
homes — deepening the twin
crises of poverty and homelessness,
and plunging our city’s recovery
into doubt.
If this pandemic has taught
us anything, it’s that we are really
each other’s keepers. We
all cohabitate in a fragile ecosystem
that depends on each of
us to do our part to help each
other. When you wear a mask
and keep social distance, you
keep others around you safe
from harm, just as one person’s
missed rental payment is
another person’s missed mortgage
payment or late property
tax payment.
We are all in this together,
and only by protecting New
Yorkers from eviction or foreclosure
can we can start to help
rebuild our city, the home that
we all share.
State Senator Andrew Gounardes
and City Councilman
Justin Brannan serve the neighborhoods
of Bay Ridge, Dyker
Heights, and Bath Beach,
among others in southern
Brooklyn.