TESTIMONY
Jake Greenberg on Advocating for Fair Wages and Improved Conditions for Supportive Housing Service Workers
3:25:34
·
91 sec
Jake Greenberg discusses the impacts of low wages on service providers in supportive housing and the resulting effects on homelessness in New York City.
- Greenberg, a case manager at the Center for Urban Community Services, provides services to people in supportive housing, including essential connections to various social services.
- He emphasizes the high turnover among workers due to low wages, which detrimentally affects the quality of service and client relationships.
- The testimony highlights the critical role of these workers in the fight against homelessness and the need for fair compensation to ensure effective service delivery.
- Greenberg calls for an increase to the Department of Social Services budget to support higher wages and maintain essential homelessness services.
Jake Greenberg
3:25:34
Good afternoon.
3:25:35
My name is Jake Greenberg.
3:25:36
I'm a case manager with the Center for Urban Community Services.
3:25:39
Where I provide services to people living in supportive housing.
3:25:42
This involves connecting tenants to everything from food stamps to social security to medical and site care.
3:25:47
In addition to building relationships with people often facing severe isolation.
3:25:51
Across CUCS, my coworkers show up every day for people who are currently homeless.
3:25:55
And those living in support of housing still dealing with extreme poverty.
3:25:59
We are here as DC 37 members and are currently in the process of negotiating our 1st union contract.
3:26:05
We are city contractor workers facing chronic low wages.
3:26:08
Our work is hard and often overwhelming, and I can say that every case manager and social worker I worked with is here because they care.
3:26:15
Across our 20 plus programs, we lose caring workers all the time because of our low wages.
3:26:20
Our clients feel the brunt of this turnover.
3:26:22
Our work is only as valuable as the connections we form with the people we serve, and these relationships are severed every time we lose another worker due to low pay.
3:26:31
Our jobs are designed to be a part of the solution to homelessness in New York City.
3:26:35
Homelessness is created by poverty.
3:26:37
There can be no progress made towards reducing homelessness in the city.
3:26:40
If thousands of workers across dozens of contact contracted agencies are left vulnerable to the same housing insecurity that our clients are trying to escape.
3:26:49
We need higher wages to do the work that we love and the city needs us to do.
3:26:54
We are committed to our work in United in the fight for fair compensation and dignity in our city contracts.
3:26:59
We ask for an increase to the DSS budget to keep the city's homeless services running.
3:27:04
Thanks for your time.
