Richard Carranza, chancellor of the Department of Education (DOE).
Associated Press / Richard Drew, fi le
Caribbean Life, April 24-30, 2020 3
By Nelson A. King
Barbadian singing superstar
Rihanna says her Clara Lionel Foundation
(CLF) is expanding support for
the coronavirus (COVID-19) global
response.
On Tuesday, CLF, Twitter & Square
chief executive officer Jack Dorsey
and JAY-Z’s Shawn Carter Foundation
(SCF) released $6.2 million in grants
for COVID-19 rapid response efforts
in the US and abroad.
CLF said the grants, distributed
across eleven organizations, will support
efforts that include providing
shelter, food and healthcare services
to homeless youth in New Orleans, to
building virus testing capacity across
the Caribbean and to the set-up of
intensive care units (ICUs), hospital
beds and isolation units in sub-Saharan
Africa, among others.
In the United States and Puerto
Rico, CLF said the funds will, among
other things, give direct support of
cash transfers to low income families
in the mainland US, as well as in
Puerto Rico; and support the Mayor’s
Fund to Advance New York City to
support the Mayor’s Office to End
Domestic and Gender-Based Violence
(ENDGBV) “to support domestic violence
survivors who need a capital
injection to ensure their safety and
stability during COVID-19.”
CLF said micro grants will allow
the financing of immediate needs of
food, clothing, temporary housing
and more in New York City.
The grant will also aid Covenant
House New Orleans to support shelter,
food, clothing, counseling, and
medicine for homeless, at-risk and
trafficked youth, “many of whom are
jobless at the moment.”
By Nelson A. King
In light of the coronavirus (COVID-
19) pandemic, three top New York
City officials are urging Caribbean
and other immigrants to continue to
seek care without fear of their immigration
status.
Bitta Mostofi, Commissioner of the
Mayor’s Office of Immigrant affairs
(MOIA), Dr. Oxiris Barbot, Commissioner
of the Department of Health
and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH), and
Richard Carranza, chancellor of the
Department of Education (DOE)
made the appeal on Tuesday during
Community and Ethnic Media Virtual
Roundtable on COVID-19.
“All New Yorkers, regardless of
immigration status, or language spoken,
or financial need, are able to
seek care without fear,” said Mostofi.
“This is something that we care
deeply about as a city.
“We’re incredibly proud that we’ve
been able to close the gap in terms
of health care and insurance coverage
for immigrant New Yorkers over
the course of the last several years,”
she added. “However, we know that
in particular, just the last two years,
three years, have been challenging
for immigrant New Yorkers under the
Trump administration, and with the
proposal of the public charge rule.
“And we want to use this as an
opportunity to remind and to emphasize
to all of you and to the communities
that you serve that there is
no public charge test when a green
cardholder applies for citizenship,”
the commissioner continued. “That
in fact, somebody seeking emergency
care would not be impacted by public
charge. And, in fact, the immigration
service, the federal government
issued guidance that made it
very clear that care and treatment
in response to this pandemic, in
response to COVID-19, could not be
considered and would not be considered
as a part of a public charge
test.
“So, while we’ve heard as we have
over the course of the last several
years, as I’ve said, concerns about
the utilization of healthcare services,
because of immigration status,
or just in general, not understanding
what this complex policy change of
the federal level means, we want to
remind everybody that care, getting
treatment, getting testing for COVID-
19 will not and cannot be considered
as a part of the public charge test or
impact your immigration status in
any way,” Mostofi assured.
“And so, we encourage everyone to
please again seek care without fear,
and we want to remind all of you that
you can still share out,” she said. “We
pride ourselves as being this incredible
ultimate city of immigrants.”
Mostofi estimated that there are
about two million New Yorkers who
are on “these front lines” across
the health care, grocery, childcare
and other essential services at this
moment.
She said that while immigrant
New Yorkers make up only 44 percent
of the city’s workforce, they’re
well over 50 percent of the essential
workers “that are right now ensuring
that each and every one of us can
remain healthy, can remain safe and
can continue to live without some of
the great and securities around food,
care, transportation and others.”
Dr. Barbot acknowledged that “the
world we’re witnessing is ever changing,”
and that some of the unsung
heroes in this are “even more invisible
than others.”
In a large part, she said those
unsung heroes are “the immigrants,”
adding that “they are so essential to
our communities.”
She said DOHMH data show that
Latino and Black New Yorkers are
dying at twice the rate as White
New Yorkers from COVID-19, stating
that “this really a firm, longstanding
structural and racial disparities that
affect things like access to insurance
housing and much, much more.”
Additionally, Dr. Barbot lamented
that New Yorkers of Asian background
are “confronting the often
dangerous threat of discrimination
and harassment, based on ignorance,
fear and stigma.
“That is as dangerous as the virus,
and that we are all committed to
fighting against,” she said. “And so,
we, in our efforts of addressing the
COVID-19 pandemic, are insuring
that more at risk New Yorkers are
identified and served – that there is
no community that goes unserved.”
The DOHMH commissioner said
her agency is “bulking up our multilanguage
public awareness campaign,
partnering with elected officials,
community leaders to strengthen
safety, messaging community
cohesion and neighborhood capacity
building.”
Carranza said DOE has put out
guidance where it has asked teachers
to make contact with all of their students,
stating that the DOE has transitioned
to “an engagement attendance
process.”
He said he has been having virtual
town hall meetings with parents,
including immigrant parents, and
that DOE has been “rolling out quite
a bit of resources” in addressing the
trauma caused by COVID-19.
“So, we want to make sure that
parents and our educators have the
tools that they need to be able to
address those kinds of trunk traumatic
events,” Carrranza said.
Jay-Z and Rihanna ork City.
Kevin Mazur / Getty Images for
Clara Lionel Foundation
NYC officials urge Caribbean immigs
to seek care without fear
Rihanna’s
foundation
expands
COVID-19 aid