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06/02/2020

This Fight Starts at Home: A letter from the Executive Director

Our streets have erupted with justified anger and frustration. The time has come for a radical reckoning. All of us have a role to play in ending the racialized terror and the institutionalized injustices that have led to the continued brutalization and oppression of Blacks. We at Chhaya are outraged by the murder of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and countless others.

What is Needed to Secure Our Homes Secure Our Place?

At Chhaya, we believe housing is a human right. Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, it is monumentally clear that everyone needs to have a safe home in order to mitigate our current public health emergency and any future ones. Being secure in one’s home is just as much an issue of public health and safety, as it is an issue of financial and economic necessity. We also recognize that many of our community members are commercial tenants, whose livelihoods are at risk because of the pandemic. The extraordinary housing needs at this time are broad and interconnected. With this interconnectivity in mind, Chhaya’s team has crafted a holistic set of principles with the aim of alleviating the rent, debt, and cost burdens of tenants, homeowners, and small businesses. Learn more about Chhaya’s “Secure Our Homes Principles”.

Modern-Day Redlining: The Burden of Underbanked and Excluded Communities in New York

On March 6th, 2020, Chhaya’s Annetta Seecharran was invited to testify before the Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Financial Institutions, U.S. House Committee on Financial Services to share our perspective on how “modern-redlining” plays out in the lives of everyday New Yorkers.