MOM's Agenda for Change

Last year, MOM members conducted a series of meetings over six months to develop criteria for choosing campaigns to work on and set priorities for 2000-2002. They chose four campaigns as top priorities: environmental justice, educational equity, quality housing and safe streets. Our specific campaign goals are as follows:

Educational Equity

Goal: Ensure equal access to quality public education for neighborhood children. Objectives: Produce a report detailing unequal access to quality education. Win complete restructuring of two local junior high schools to increase their effectiveness. Develop a specific proposal to increase the number of qualified teachers in local schools and increase the proportion of those teachers coming from the local community. Methods/Activities: Work with academic researchers to design report and conduct research. Undertake a community survey of at least 100 parents to include in the study. Create a team of parents who will develop specific proposals for restructuring of the junior high schools. Meet with local and city-wide decision-makers to win school restructuring and an official role for the parent team. Research teacher quality campaigns in other parts of the country.

Environmental Justice

Goal: Reduce the asthma rate in our community by reducing exposure to harmful emissions and triggering substances. Objectives: Force the Department of Health and the Department of Sanitation to inspect, clean and bait for rats at twenty neighborhood locations. Win a new policy of coordination among city agencies responsible for the local environment to increase the long-term effectiveness of their clean-up and anti-dumping programs. Increase regulation of polluting facilities and prevent the approval of new facilities. Methods/Activities: Regularly monitor neighborhood vacant lots and buildings. Collect community complaints of environmental problems. Research current policies and programs. Hold accountability sessions with city officials. Organize press actions and demonstrations to increase pressure on decision-makers.

Safe Streets

Goal: Increase safety for neighborhood residents by moving dangerous truck traffic permanently away from residential streets. Objectives: Win full implementation of the recommendations of our study of truck traffic, including alteration of the legal truck route, installation of two speed humps to slow traffic and construction of a beautified mall on Tiffany Street. Maintain current level of traffic law enforcement. Methods/Activities: Work with an architect to produce detailed plan for the proposed mall. Meet with local politicians to seek support for MOM proposal. Conduct follow-up negotiations with the Commissioner of the Department of Transportation. Meet with the Police Department if necessary to ensure continued enforcement of legal truck route.

Affordable Housing

Goal: Win full access to well-maintained, affordable housing for neighborhood residents. Objectives: Win necessary apartment repairs and replacement of damaged infrastructure in at least fifteen buildings. Force city and federal housing agencies to make building-wide repairs a condition of participation in landlord-subsidy programs. Leverage public and private resources to allow small-building owners to make repairs without raising rents in the gentrifying neighborhood of Port Morris. Force city agencies to enforce housing laws. Methods/Activities: Organize tenants' associations in at least fifteen neighborhood buildings. Document building conditions, including rents. Research ownership and building finances. Assist tenant leaders in developing appropriate strategies, including housing court actions and negotiations with owners. Research local participation in landlord-subsidy programs. Meet with city and federal agency decision-makers to win policy change. Hold demonstrations and press actions as needed to pressure decision-makers.