Residents of social homes in New York filed 60 thousand complaints about bugs and cockroaches in 2019

For two years, the number of complaints filed by residents of public housing in New York because of bugs and cockroaches amounted to about 200 thousand. This publication writes Daily News.

The New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) is a state development corporation that provides public housing in New York City. It was the first institution in the United States to provide housing for low- and middle-income people in five boroughs.

Over the past two years, NYCHA residents have filed about 200 complaints asking for assistance in controlling the bugs and cockroaches that have flooded their apartments.

In the first nine months of 2019, The Grant Houses in Harlem received the most such complaints - 1000, of which 894 complaints related to cockroaches.

Where in the city the most problems

During this period, the largest number of orders for work on the fight against bedbugs was received from residents of The Pomonok Houses in Queens - 156 calls. The Wagner Houses and Grant Houses were not far behind in the number of orders to eliminate bugs in each complex: 129 and 106 orders, respectively.

Tyrone Bell, President of the St. Nicholas Houses in Harlem said people did not complain about bed bugs to him. Although he was not surprised that his complex ranks 5th in the number of complaints, considering other issues - rats, mold and faulty elevators. “There are many problems,” he said. "It takes a lot of work."

The authorities' response

Judith Goldiner, a legal aid lawyer in charge of civil law reform, called the number of work orders with invasion “alarming”. Goldiner also called this another reason why she and others are urging Albany to provide $ 2 billion in additional funding for New York.

For the first nine months of last year at The Wagner Houses on First Ave. 129 cases of infection with bedbugs were recorded in Manhattan. Although, according to Goldiner, the bad news was not limited to insects.

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On average, it took NYCHA about nine days to fully address complaints. “This is a clear side effect of increasing field staff and resources,” she explained. "Now that the legislature is in session, we are again calling for more funding for public housing to address these and other problems that tenants face."

What they say at NYCHA

NYCHA spokeswoman Rochel Goldblatt pointed to a declining trend over the past two years, talking about complaints. She also noted that over the past year, 20 new insect fighters have been hired.

According to her, the number of complaints about insects decreased in this way: for bedbugs - from 12220 in 2018 to 10343 in 2019, for cockroaches - from 87400 in 2018 to 84516 last year. On average, the time spent dealing with bedbugs has dropped from 13,3 days in 2018 to 9,7 days in 2019.

“Our trends show an improvement in closed orders for bed bugs and cockroaches,” said Goldblatt. She added that the longer deadlines for cockroach control are due to NYCHA's new Integrated Pest Management System, which focuses on more than just pest control with patches. According to her, within the framework of this program, cockroaches are not only destroyed, but also spent time looking for their nests and then cleaning them.

She added that the above trend did not apply to bedbugs. “Because we treat them like an emergency and are trying to fix them as soon as possible,” Goldblatt explained. "This was updated in our system in July 2019, making rat and bedbug control a higher priority."

$ 30 billion to solve the problem

Lawyers' petition for additional public funds - at the start of this legislative session in Albany - is part of a broader push to increase NYCHA's funding. Tenant lawyers are also demanding a $ 1 billion increase in funding in the New York City budget and $ 6 billion at the federal level.

Fiscal hawks describe such spending as short-sighted, pointing to NYCHA's history of wasteful spending. “The New York Commission has not been radically reformed,” said E.J. EJ McMahon, Director of Research, Empire Center for Public Policy.

State Senator Zellnor Myrie (D-Brooklyn) agreed, but only partially. He said NYCHA deserves punishment for past fiscal irregularities, but added that this does not mean the government should continue to underfund. that $ 2 billion is just a fraction of the more than $ 30 billion that NYCHA needs now. “That wouldn't cover the entire deficit,” Mairi said.