Gabriela Sandoval Requena
Director of Policy and Communications
February 27, 2025
Thank you, Assembly Ways and Means Committee Chair Pretlow, Senate Finance Committee Chair Krueger, and Housing Committee Chairs, Assemblymember Rosenthal and Senator Kavanagh, for the opportunity to submit written testimony on Governor Hochul’s Fiscal Year 2025-26 Executive Budget Proposal.
ABOUT NEW DESTINY
Founded in 1994, New Destiny’s mission is to end the cycle of domestic violence and homelessness for low-income families and individuals by developing and connecting them to safe, permanent, affordable housing and services.
New Destiny is the only organization in New York City solely dedicated to the solution of permanent housing for survivors of domestic violence. We are the largest provider of supportive housing for survivors in New York and a leading advocate in the effort to increase housing resources for New Yorkers impacted by domestic violence.
We are also a co-convener of the Family Homelessness Coalition (FHC), a collective of mothers with lived experience of homelessness and organizations committed to tackling homelessness among families in our city. New Destiny is a member of the Supportive Housing Network of New York and the Human Services Council.
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AND HOMELESSNESS
Domestic violence and homelessness are fundamentally connected. As New Destiny documented in its report: A Crisis Compounded: The Dual Crises of Domestic Violence and Homelessness, more than 1 in 3 New Yorkers across the state will experience abuse by an intimate partner in their lifetime. New York has the highest demand for domestic violence services in the country, yet not all survivors are able to access resources and services, especially when it comes to permanent housing. In fact, most of the unmet requests from domestic violence survivors in New York State are housing related.
Without a safe place to rebuild their lives, survivors may be forced to remain in abusive situations, putting their lives at risk. In New York State, 1 out of every 6 homicides were domestic violence homicides, where the victim was either an intimate partner or a family member, according to the most recent data.
Survivors who can flee may spend years in shelter before securing appropriate housing and face a myriad of challenges to keep it. In New York City, where domestic violence has been the leading cause of family homelessness for years, survivors with children in Human Resources Administration (HRA) domestic violence shelter are nearly 8 times more likely to move to another shelter than to an apartment of their own upon reaching the state-mandated limit of 180 days.
Permanent affordable housing, coupled with support services, is critical for domestic violence survivors to rebuild their lives and thrive. Governor Hochul included additional protections for New Yorkers impacted by domestic violence, as well as increases for supportive housing programs and capital funding, in the Fiscal Year 2025-26 Executive Budget Proposal. While we are grateful for these investments, they do not meet the need to ensure the long-term housing stability of survivors and their families.
PROTECTING SURVIVORS IN SUPPORTIVE HOUSING
Supportive housing provides survivors of domestic violence, and other vulnerable populations who have experienced the trauma of homelessness, abuse, and loss, with a safe, affordable place to live alongside services to help them rebuild their lives. The New York State Supportive Housing Program (NYSSHP) has funded this housing since 1987, but at a rate that has barely changed since its inception.
We raise this important issue at this Housing Committee hearing because it relates to the Supportive Housing Preservation Program capital funding under the New York State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR). The Supportive Housing Preservation Program provides financing strategies for the preservation and improvement of our aging supportive housing stock. However, NYSSHP sites are struggling to access this funding, and therefore they are unable to make much-needed repairs and upgrades, many of which are decades, if not centuries, old. State housing agencies have invested hundreds of millions of dollars to develop these NYSSHP buildings, we are asking members of the Housing Committees to support fighting for the preservation of these units, which housed New York’s most vulnerable residents. Tenants and staff pay the price of leaky roofs, faulty elevators, and recurrent floodings. We must protect them and the State’s investment in supportive housing.
NYSSHP is administered by the state Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance (OTDA) to provide funding specifically for direct services tied to housing. More than 20,000 households across the state – all of whom are formerly homeless or at high risk – live in NYSSHP housing. Because of virtually flat funding for nearly 40 years, nonprofits are no longer able to pay their staff living wages and provide the level of security and services that our vulnerable families need to remain safe and stably housed. Since 2003, 33% of NYSSHP nonprofits have closed, left the program, or been absorbed by another agency.
New Destiny operates 5 NYSSHP buildings, with a total of 177 apartments where we house hundreds of children and adults impacted by domestic violence. The program is supposed to fund basic case management and security, but it falls tragically short.
NYSSHP provides annual service rates of $2,964 for single households and $3,900 for families, which average $91,697 per New Destiny building. Simply put, NYSSHP only pays for 1 case manager (with benefits) and 0 building security.
If New Destiny relied on NYSSHP only to provide 24-hour building security and maintain the generally accepted case management ratio of 15:1, with 3 case managers to support survivors and their children, our staff would earn $5.51 per hour, a third of the minimum wage.
Like the other NYSSHP nonprofits across the state, we are forced to constantly fundraise from private donors to try to offset the state’s disinvestment to pay staff a livable wage and benefits. Yet, it is impossible to make up the difference. New Destiny can provide some front-desk security and 1 case manager, with the supervision of a part-time program director. This means that our case managers must oversee a workload of about 56 households, nearly 4 times the recommended case management ratio (1:15).
This enormous shortfall leaves NYSSHP staff chronically underpaid and domestic violence survivors unsafe and without the services needed to recover from the trauma.
Survivors in NYSSHP buildings need 24-hour building security to be safe; they need social and mental health services to thrive. We are incredibly grateful that the Governor included an additional $17.8 million for NYSSHP in her budget proposal. However, that is not enough to ensure that our most vulnerable neighbors, including survivors of domestic violence, have a home to live safely and heal. We urge the Assembly and the Senate to increase NYSSHP funding by $32 million in their One House budget resolutions, and to pass the Supportive Housing Modernization Act (A2134/ S136).
INCREASE ESSHI FUNDING AND INDEX RATES TO INFLATION
The more recently created Empire State Supportive Housing Initiative (ESSHI) is the engine for new supportive housing across the State. Unlike NYSSHP, ESSHI provides both operating and service funding to support operating costs. While ESSHI rates are significantly higher than NYSSHP rates, ESSHI contracts deeply subsidize all the supportive housing apartments, which enables tenants to pay only 30% of their income in rent. Since the rate hasn’t changed since the program’s inception nearly a decade ago, we are now at a standstill being able to underwrite ESSHI buildings in New York City. This isn’t conjecture. New Destiny has been told by our government capital funder that they cannot finance our pipeline project at the current ESSHI rate.
In her Executive Budget Proposal, Governor Hochul increased the ESSHI annual per unit rate from $25,000 to $34,000 in New York City and $31,000 elsewhere in the state. New Destiny fully supports this increase. We ask the Assembly and the Senate to include this increase in their One House budget resolution, as well as indexing the rates to inflation to ensure the long-term sustainability of the program.
INCREASE HHAP FUNDING TO CREATE MORE SUPPORTIVE HOUSING
OTDA’s Homeless Housing Assistance Program (HHAP) has provided capital for supportive housing and other projects for over four decades. HHAP is a vital capital funding source for new construction and preservation, and the only one in many regions across the state.
In 2024, HHAP funding was depleted in less than 4 months. New Destiny was one of the many nonprofits who were not able to submit their completed proposals, which has consequentially stalled our new supportive housing developments for almost a year.
We are grateful that the Governor included an additional $25 million for HHAP in her budget proposal. However, this increase is not enough to meet the need. The supportive housing community is calling on the state to double funding for HHAP to $256 million.
PASS THE HOUSING ACCESS VOUCHER PROGRAM
Rental subsidies, such as Section 8, can be life-saving resources for survivors and for the millions of New Yorkers experiencing housing instability. Yet, only 1 in 4 eligible households receive Section 8. For noncitizen New Yorkers or those in mixed-status households, where at least one member of the family is not a U.S. citizen or eligible immigrant, it can be difficult – if not impossible – to access sufficient housing support. This includes countless immigrant survivors of domestic violence.
The Housing Access Voucher Program (HAVP) A1704/S72 would create a permanent, statewide Section 8-like rent subsidy available to all New Yorkers who meet the eligibility criteria, unhoused and on the brink of eviction. This affordable solution will provide up to 20,000 vouchers and help as many as 50,000 New Yorkers avoid the trauma of homelessness. HCR’s Housing Trust Fund Corporation would oversee HAVP and State and local public housing agencies would administer the program. Homeless New Yorkers and those at risk of losing their homes who meet the criteria, regardless of immigration status, will be able to access the vouchers.
We urge the Senate and the Assembly to include A1704/S72 in its One-house Budgets and fund HAVP at $250 million in FY 2025-26.
Thank you for your leadership and the opportunity to submit written testimony.
[…] In a similar vein, an update will likely be made to New York’s oldest supportive housing model, where funding rates have remained nearly unchanged since the program’s inception in 1987. The State Supportive Housing Program (NYSSHP) includes over 20,000 permanent units that have fallen into disrepair with “leaky roofs, faulty elevators, and recurrent floodings.” […]