Dear Community Members of NY-14,
Happy Vijayadashami to all who celebrate! I hope this auspicious occasion brings joy and light to you, your family, and your community.
As our community continues to recover from Hurricane Ida, please note that there’s still time to apply for disaster assistance before the deadline on Monday, December 6th, 2021. I understand that for some the application process has been frustrating, and many of you received less than you’re owed. As such, you can find more information below about legal assistance and appeals processes for disaster relief. Please also note that our office is able to submit an inquiry about the status of your appeal, or inquire about any delays that you might be experiencing. So far, in Bronx and Queens Counties, 25,442 people have registered, $24 million has been approved in housing assistance, and $3 million has been approved in other assistance.
In other news, I visited Rikers to follow-up on reports of a humanitarian crisis taking place at the prison.We are utilizing all federal resources to assist the city and state in immediately reducing the population at Rikers, and strongly believe that we must close and decarcerate Rikers now. Read our full statement here.
I was also honored to welcome the First Lady of the United States, Dr. Jill Biden, to the PS 83 Annex School in the Bronx. Educators and support staff at the school, who are now in their third school year of teaching during a pandemic, discussed the challenges of transitioning back to in-person learning. We’re incredibly grateful for our educators and support staff who have been working extra hard to keep students connected to learning over the past year and a half.
Back in D.C., negotiations are in the works to pass the President’s Build Back Better Agenda. Progressives, including myself, will not vote for a bipartisan infrastructure deal unless we also pass critical pieces of the President’s Agenda — which contains funding for free community college, Medicare expansion, universal pre-K, climate action, and more. We discussed this during our joint town hall last week with Representative Jared Huffman. If you missed it, you can watch it in English (with ASL interpretation) here, or in Nepali, Bangla, or Mandarin.
Below, we’ve also included updates on the Child Tax Credit, the Congressional App Challenge, Service Academy Nominations, and updates from D.C. As always, please do not hesitate to contact our office if you have any questions or if we can be of any other assistance. We also encourage constituent feedback, and welcome any comments or concerns you may have. You can reach our office by sending a message HERE or by calling 718-662-5970.
In Service,
Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez