NEIGHBORHOODS: Little-noticed cuts may hurt neighborhoods
Governor Andrew Cuomo's state budget proposal for 2012-2013 eliminates a pair of programs that directly impact urban neighborhoods.
Cuomo's plan cuts funding for the state's Rural and Neighborhood Preservation Programs grants, which partially fund neighborhood groups like the South Wedge Planning Committee, Group 14621, North East Area Development, and South East Area Coalition. The budget also creates a new Foreclosure Relief Unit within the Department of Financial Services, seemingly at the expense of foreclosure legal assistance programs.
The new unit would provide counseling and mediation services to help homeowners stay in their homes, say budget materials. David Newstadt, a spokesperson for the Department of Financial Services, says the program is still in the planning stages.
The state's Foreclosure Prevention Services Program provided grants to legal aid groups and housing organizations to assist homeowners facing foreclosure. The program's out of money, however, and Cuomo's proposal doesn't include new funding.
Subsequently, the legal aid group Empire Justice Center has dismissed two paralegals, says Becky Case, supervising attorney of the organization's Foreclosure Prevention Unit. One paralegal worked cases, she says, while the other handled client intake and supported the attorneys.
"We're accepting very few clients from now on," Case says.
Foreclosures are often the result of financial problems, which also means that the homeowner might not be able to afford legal assistance, Case says. If homeowners can't afford attorneys, she says, they are at a disadvantage right from the start of proceedings.
The cuts to the Rural and Neighborhood Preservation Programs will set back grassroots community improvement efforts, says Joan Roby-Davison, who served as executive director of Group 14621 for more than a decade. The city has 11 neighborhood preservation corporations, as they're called.
"This is going to leave neighborhoods in Rochester really without staff to support their efforts," says Roby-Davison, now the executive director of Sector 4 Community Development Corporation, which does not receive Neighborhood Preservation Program funding.
Roby-Davison says the programs have been cut before and then restored, and that there will be a lobbying effort to get the funding back
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