Advocacy

Right to a Roof:

Right to a Roof: Demands for an Integrated Housing Plan to End Homelessness and Promote Racial Equity

As New York City begins to envision its recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, and the movement for racial justice captures our national attention, never has the need for safe, healthy, and affordable housing for all New Yorkers been more dire.

Join us at a virtual rally calling for a bold new approach with policies and priorities that reject austerity, end homelessness, promote racial equity, and prioritize housing opportunities for those with the most need.

Our Stance: Black Lives Matter

Black Lives Matter. Period.

As we reckon with our collective failure, as a nation, to stand up for our communities, and more specifically the Black community, we must acknowledge that our actions or lack thereof are not innocuous. Our silence is not innocuous. Our failure to keep these concepts at the forefront of our commitment to our community, our clients, and as engines of meaningful social change in the restructuring of systemic wrongs has led us to this moment in time. Yet again.

The deaths of Ahmaud Marquez Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, Tony McDade  (just to name a few), as a consequence of police brutality and our country’s images of the inhumanity of Blackness is not new. Further, the recent spate of 4 Black Men found hanging dead from trees all being considered separate acts of suicide are remnants of an era not too long ago regarded as open acts of “justice.” Hangings of Black dead bodies like “strange fruit” is an act as old as this nation’s history.

Though nothing compares to the visceral reaction of watching a Black life taken…slowly, methodically and intentionally in front of our eyes, to pretend this is a new problem or concept in how our society regulates Black America would be disingenuous.

Being agents of social change, uplifting the community and “bending the moral arc of justice” are all things we strive to do…and as such, we must show up! As an organization we vow to show up! As we seek to unleash the potential of communities to thrive, no matter the odds, we will stay committed to showing up!

As a community we are united with you in thought, prayer, love, joy, hope, sadness and grief.

Our Stance: #StopAsianHate

The recent killing of 8 people in Atlanta, 6 of whom were Asian women, has revealed again our nation’s tragic reality of racial inequality. When combined with the senseless level of gun violence that is unique to America, we are confronted with heartbreaking scenes of loss and grief that should be unfathomable in a nation as developed as ours. It doesn’t have to be this way. Although we have seen movements like Black Lives Matter raise consciousness about racial inequality and justice, we must do more, especially when it comes to racially motivated violence. As we are seeing attempts to heal deep-rooted trauma and build connections across lines of race and ethnicity, hate has targeted the Asian community. We must be aware that the recent violence is nothing new; anti-Asian discrimination and hate crimes are deeply rooted in the history of America and have even been codified into law. Anti-Black racism, anti-Asian hate, and other forms of racial violence are the inevitable result of the systemic racism that affects us all.

Since the COVID-19 outbreak, anti-Asian hate crimes have expanded across the nation, with at least 3,800 reported cases. As an organization we must continue to acknowledge that our actions or lack thereof are not innocuous. Our silence is not innocuous. Our failure to keep these concepts at the forefront of our commitment to our community, our clients, and as engines of meaningful social change in the restructuring of systemic wrongs has led us to this moment in time. Violence and racism perpetuate because we allow them to.

As a sign of solidarity with our Asian communities, we have joined this sign-on letter drafted by our partners at the Chinese-American Planning Council. We are supporting a $19.5 million package in the FY21-22 State budget to address anti-Asian violence, promote relief and recovery, and ensure racial healing. This is a small step, but a signal that RiseBoro will continue to stand with and show up for Asian communities, and to look for ways to extend healing, prayer, and comfort to those impacted by racialized violence. We will also continue to look for ways that RiseBoro can support efforts to end the plague of gun violence that too often afflicts our country, most recently in Boulder, CO on Monday afternoon. Enough is enough.