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PUBLIC TESTIMONY
Testimony by Natalia Aristizabal, Deputy Director of Make the Road New York
4:15:11
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Natalia Aristizabal, Deputy Director of Make the Road New York, testifies on behalf of the organization's 28,000 members, highlighting their critical work in supporting immigrant communities and requesting increased funding for various programs and initiatives in the face of budget cuts and anti-immigrant attacks.
- Emphasizes the need for expanded funding for legal services, adult literacy programs, worker protection enforcement, and health initiatives.
- Calls for the reversal of the mayor's policies that undermine immigrant protection laws and allow federal immigration enforcement in the city.
- Requests specific funding allocations for youth and education programs, including restorative justice, community schools, and mental health services.
Natalia Aristizabal
4:15:11
Thank you.
4:15:11
Good afternoon, and thank you to chair Abiles for the pleasure hearing today.
4:15:15
My name is Natalia Aristisaval.
4:15:17
I am the deputy director of Make Their Own New York, And I'm here to testify on behalf of our 28,000 members and staff.
4:15:24
We thank you for this opportunity.
4:15:26
In the face of anti immigrant attacks, transphobic attacks, budget cuts, and other assaults on working people, Make The Road is working around the clock to defend ourselves and to meet the search and needs for services.
4:15:38
Here are some of the services and the critical work that we're doing right now.
4:15:42
We're providing immigration legal services to reunite families who have been separated by ICE.
4:15:46
We're doing Know Your Rights trainings for thousands of New Yorkers so families know how to handle interactions with enforcement agencies.
4:15:54
And on that point, the city needs to spend resources making sure that we are educating as many community members in as many languages as possible.
4:16:01
We're connecting uninsured families to desperately needed health care and vaccines for kids, organizing with vibrant trans Latinx communities in Queens to win policies that improve safety and well-being.
4:16:12
We're providing the highest quality college access support to low income high school students who are the first generation college goers.
4:16:21
We need the council's support more than ever.
4:16:23
We ask the council to use every available tool to reverse the mayor's attack on immigrants.
4:16:29
Federal immigration enforcement must not be allowed to come into our city and terrorize our people, especially when the mayor wants to undermine the laws that this chamber has passed protecting immigrant New Yorkers.
4:16:40
The services that the organization like us provides are essential.
4:16:43
We need expanded funding for the Rapid Response Legal Collaborative, which provides high quality legal representation to individuals on the fear of being deported by creating a $25,000,000 rapid response fund.
4:16:59
The city should also make sure that there is enough money for legal screening so people know if they have any risk.
4:17:05
Allocate additional $5,000,000 to the Department of Consumer and Worker Protections to ensure strong enforcement of paid sick leave and new minimum pay rule for delivery workers, double baseline funding for adult literacy programs funded through DYCD from $12,000,000 to $24,000,000 protect New Yorkers' health by expanding overall funding to the Access Health Initiative to 4,000,000 Allocate $2,360,000 in funding for the MCCAP initiative and maintain the fiscal levels funding this year for the ending epidemic and immigrant health initiatives.
4:17:39
And lastly, restore a baseline funding for youth and education, dollars 12,000,000 for restorative justice, dollars 14,000,000 for community schools, dollars 3,300,000.0 for student success centers, and $5,000,000 for the mental health continuum.
4:17:51
Thank you.