TESTIMONY
Ninibeth Rivas, from Venezuela, on the Poor Living Conditions and Lack of Support at a NYC Homeless Shelter Hotel
0:23:53
·
4 min
Ninbeth Rivas, an immigrant from Venezuela, testify about the poor living conditions and lack of support at a NYC homeless shelter hotel they were transferred to.
- She describes unlivable conditions like bugs, sickness, and being treated like criminals with invasive searches
- Her children face long commutes to school and she cannot work since kids cannot be left unattended
- She feels completely lost with no case manager assigned to assist with paperwork and immigration issues
- She was told the hotel transfer would improve her situation, but it has not
Joslyn Carter
0:23:53
When I started.
UNKNOWN
0:24:05
Good afternoon.
0:24:06
My name is Ninebeth Rivas.
0:24:07
I'm from Venezuela.
0:24:09
And I have 2 children, and I'm here with my my 2 children and my mom.
Joslyn Carter
0:24:24
And best wins.
UNKNOWN
0:24:50
I was also one of the families that was transferred from Wind Shelter in South Park Slope.
0:24:58
And does it's been very difficult for for for us the conditions at the hotel are are really bad.
0:25:11
And okay.
0:25:16
She sent out her mom is is sick, and there are bad conditions in the hotel room are are just horrible.
0:25:26
There are bugs.
Joslyn Carter
0:25:39
Solar,
UNKNOWN
0:25:58
So I have a lot of difficulties also from my kids commuting to school now that they were a lot far away from from from the school.
0:26:10
I'm not able to work because they will not allow me to leave my children by themselves in the in the in the hotel room Rental, they are 16 13 years old.
0:26:31
So I can't work.
0:26:32
They will not allow me they they can't stay by themselves.
0:26:42
Oh, they treat us like like, basically, like, we're criminals.
0:26:46
They they search us we everything every time we come into the room, they they search our belongings.
0:26:53
They They just treat us as we were criminals.
0:27:17
We just wanna be able to thrive, to be independent.
0:27:22
Again, we don't we don't came here to to get anything free from from from anybody.
0:27:31
We just wanna be able to work and provide the best for our children.
Angela Serda
0:27:39
Mhmm.
Joslyn Carter
0:27:43
So low.
0:27:43
So so low.
UNKNOWN
0:28:14
So we just wanna have stability.
0:28:17
And, again, back in wind wind shelter, they told us that things were gonna actually be better for us when once we were transferred to the hotel, that things were gonna improve for us, but it's not true.
0:28:30
We have not even been assigned a case manager there.
0:28:32
We have nobody to ask questions with regards of anything you know, with anything that has to do with our our case, our paperworks immigration, paperworks, anything.
0:28:46
We are we feel completely lost.
0:28:47
There.
0:28:52
Thank you.
