Social service agencies protest lost funding

John Santa

Supporters of Nassau County’s social service agencies staged a rally on the steps of the Theodore Roosevelt Executive and Legislative Building in Mineola last Friday after the community-service coalition’s members lost their funding 24 hours earlier.

Nearly 500 activists, parents and children from across Nassau who were effected by the cuts took part in the rally, which came after the county Legislature last month failed to come to terms on an agreement to provide $8 million in funding to save the social-service agencies from shutting down.

Of the county agencies to lose funding, 40 were youth social service programs, while 13 were mental health and chemical dependency coalitions.

“I think for many people it’s just the fact that it’s children,” said president of the Long Island Hispanic Coalition Maria Elisa Cuadra, who spoke at the rally. “There’s just something about that that feels very wrong because children are the future of this county. It took 30 years to create these network of services.”

Funding for the 40 youth service agencies was previously made available through revenue from the county’s red-light cameras, said Cuadra, who is also CEO of Great Neck-based community service organization COPAY Inc.

Nassau County Executive Edward Mangano said last month that the youth service agencies would lose their funding if the county Legislature did not approve the borrowing of $41 million to pay for Nassau’s property tax refunds for 2011.

“To cut youth services was a policy decision made by the county executive,” Cuadra said. “This is what is making everyone upset. Policy decisions can be made in many ways.”

For any borrowing to be approved, the 19-member Legislature must support the proposal by a two-thirds majority.

With Republicans holding a 10-9 majority, that would mean at least three members of the Democratic caucus would have to cross party lines for any borrowing approval.

Democrats in the Legislature have previously indicated they would not support any further borrowing to pay for property tax refunds until an agreement is made with Republicans on the redistricting plans for county legislators.

“(Democrats) are more concerned about redistricting and the county becoming a one party system,” Cuadra said. “Different sides are saying different things to all the providers of services. The services to the children are caught in the middle.”

As of press time on Wednesday, the members of the county Legislature had failed to come to an agreement on the $41 million in bonding for property tax refunds or the restoration of the county’s social services contracts.

Negotiations between the county Legislature’s Democratic caucus and the county executive’s office are on-going.

“Until there is an agreement, or if ever there is an agreement, to do bonding that’s necessary to (pay property tax refunds), this is the situation that we have,” Presiding Officer Peter Schmitt (R-Massapequa) said during Monday’s county Legislature meeting. “We have 10 votes ready … to do the bonding. We need 13.”

County Legislator Judy Jacobs (D-Woodbury) said the process has been “very difficult” for everyone involved.

“There are meetings going on as we speak right now,” Jacobs said on Monday. “There is always that hope that cooler heads will prevail and that we will be able to reach an agreement, which will enable your moneys to be restored.”

With the loss of funding, 35,000 children are now without services in Nassau County, said Jamie Bogenshutz, who is the executive director of the YES Community Counseling Center in Massapequa, following last week’s rally.

“People are angry,” Bogenshutz said. “People are demanding that services be restored. This is not okay. This is a time when kids are vulnerable. Where kids are out there, they’re drinking, they’re drugging, they’re in trouble. This is the time when doors need to be wide open.”

Jeff Reynolds, the executive director with the Long Island Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in Mineola, also attended last week’s rally. He said his agency alone brought 12 people to the rally to support the county’s social service agencies.

“It’s a major problem,” Reynolds said. “I’ve been in public health for 25 years. I’ve never seen a health care crisis like we have here on Long Island, never. Our cases are up 400 percent over two years ago.”

“What happens now that all these agencies are closed?” he added. “The numbers are going to get higher and higher and higher. Look, at the end of the day we are going to pay for this in one way or another.”

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