New York State Governor Andrew Cuomo: Beds for kids, not tax cuts for millionairers.

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¿Cuátos niños y jovenes dormiran en la calle esta noche?
How many kids and youth will sleep on the streets of NYC tonight?

Carl Siciliano, founder and executive director of the Ali Forney Center (AFC), organized a rally in Union Square to fight budget cuts for homeless youth. Jake Goodman, founding member of LGBT activist group Queer Rising, helped organize the event.

¿Cuátos niños y jovenes dormiran en la calle esta noche?
El gobernador de Nueva York, Andrew Cuomo recorto los fondos para los alberges de jovenes, sin embargo no quiere aumentar los taxes a la gente millonaria que vive en el estado. Prefiere que los adolescentes duerman en la calle y que los millonarios sean mas ricos cada vez.

En el 2008, un censo enfocado en jovenes sin casa en Nueva York encontro que cada noche casi 4 mil jovenes estan sin vivienda estable. La Ciudad de Nueva York y el Estado de Nueva York combinan fondos para menos de 200 camas en los refugios para jovenes. En el 2011, el gobernador Andrew Cuomo recorto fondos para jovenes sin vivienda en un 50%, y el Alcalde Bloomberg pidio recortar los fondos para estos jovenes en un 60%.

“In 2008, a census of homeless youth in NYC found that every night almost 4000 youth are without stable housing. However, New York City and New York State combine funds to support fewer than 200 youth shelter beds. In 2011 Governor Cuomo and the New York State Legislature cut funds for homeless youth by 50%, and Mayor Bloomberg sought to cut funds for homeless youth by 60%.”

Jake Goodman, says, “We’re making a demand that the New York governments—city and state—[jointly] provide an additional $3 million of funding every year for homeless youth services.” The increased funding, he says, will provide around 100 new beds for homeless youth each year.

Currently, there are fewer than 200 beds for the nearly 4,000 homeless youth currently estimated to be surviving day to day in New York. “It means kids are riding trains at night because they don’t have a place to sleep. It’s an atrocity.” Siciliano, explains.

According to Carl Siciliano, “There can be no denying that LGBT youth homelessness has become an epidemic. A report released by the Center for American Progress in 2010 indicated that over 100,000 LGBT youth are homeless on the streets of our nation. As much as 40 percent of the entire homeless youth population in our country is LGBT. Even in a place as liberal and accepting as New York City, an LGBT teen is eight times more likely to become homeless than is a straight teen.”