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Donovan Richards Gives State of Borough Address

Prerecords address from Museum of Moving Images

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As COVID safety measures still preclude large gatherings, Queens Borough President, Donovan Richards embraced technology by filming his first State of Borough Address at the renowned media museum, the Museum of Moving Images located in Astoria.

The first two moments of the presentation captured Richards exploring through the museum’s points of interest with clips of neighboring Kaufman Astoria Studios. MTA Police Explorers provided a presentation of colors, with a recorded singing of the National Anthem by students of Frank Sinatra School of the Arts High School.

Richards began by recognizing the obvious difference in the presentation of former QBPs, stating his regret for lack of audience and instead presenting his address via recording. Richards recalled the state of the borough this time last year, noting that all were “woefully unprepared for the coming virus.”

Although Richards took time to praise workers in particular fields of healthcare, transit, education, and food service, he took aim at the lack of healthcare available for Queens residents.

The QBP explained Queens was at the “epicenter of the epicenter”, and the experience “exposed systemic inequalities” citing only 9 hospitals, which provide 1.72 hospital beds per 1,000 people available for Queens residents – the lowest amount of beds available in the city.

Richards resolved to fight for access to healthcare, clinics, preventative medicine, and keeping non-emergencies out of crowded emergency rooms for communities long who for “too long felt the sting of inequality.”

Turning his attention to the financial crisis economic caused by the pandemic, Richards reported, brought nine months of double-digit unemployment in Queens peaking at 21% last summer.

In an effort to support small businesses, Richards described the $17.5 million grant program provided by Steve Cohen, the new owner of New York Mets. The program is focused on small and micro, minority-owned businesses that were overlooked by the federal PPP last year.

As part of Richards’s plan for economic recovery, Richards announced the implementation of a newly created role as an ombudsman, based at Borough Hall to oversee recovery and rebuilding efforts.

The speech then moved on to the topic of Queens’s affordable housing crisis. Richards promises to ensure all new developments are environmentally sustainable, to provide supportive housing for our veterans, and up to two thousand units of “truly” affordable for seniors, and the formation of resident committees within NYCHA campuses.

On the side of providing affordable homeownership, Richards spoke of opportunities for first-time homebuyers to purchase foreclosed homes, with the support of non-profits to rehab abandoned homes.

Richards has also pledged to establish an Immigration Welcome Center at Queens Borough Hall.

Other reforms Richards has launched include digitizing the community board application to greatly increase interest in membership, establishing the Queens Solid Waste Advisory Board, and hosting an ongoing series of virtual job recruitment fairs, a tradition that began last year under Sharon Lee. More than 1,400 connections have been made between Queens residents and employers in a wide variety of industries, according to Richards.

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