Mayor de Blasio and New York City Housing Authority officials are racing to meet a Jan. 31 deadline to produce plans to tackle the agency’s $40 billion, 10-year to-do list. Meanwhile, NYCHA’s ongoing failure to keep up with its daily chores shows just why those plans are needed.
As The Post reported Wednesday, the agency this month promised federal Judge William Pauley that it would remediate 2,800 potentially lead-paint-tainted apartments where young kids live by the end of February. Yet as of Dec. 11, work had been completed for only 190 of the units.
To meet the deadline, the agency would have to make repairs in 49 apartments every single workday from now to February.
A NYCHA spokesman insists workers are “on track” to meet their goal. Anyone care to bet they’ll make it?
Then there’s NYCHA’s never-ending failure to fix broken door locks. The importance of that was highlighted on Christmas (Christmas!) when a robber waltzed into a NYCHA building with a broken lock and beat an 88-year-old woman.
Nor can NYCHA reliably supply even essentials like heat and water. Over Thanksgiving, a 4,200-resident Harlem complex lost heat for 28 hours. This month, tenants in The Bronx had to collect water from a fire hydrant, after a pump system failed.
De Blasio notes that NYCHA’s woes can’t be fixed overnight, which is not only true but a gross understatement. In fact, we’ve questioned, as has Pauley, whether city officials are even capable of drafting and executing an acceptable plan. But clearly something major needs to be done — fast. Residents shouldn’t have to live like this.
This story was originally published by NY Post
via USAHint.com
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