Highlights from This Week’s Indypendent News Hour

The Indypendent News Hour airs Tuesdays 5-6 pm on WBAI-99.5 FM. The show features news and interviews with progressive social movement organizers, thought leaders and elected officials from across the New York City area. 

In this week’s show, the Indy’s John Tarleton and Julia Thomas interviewed Assemblymember Marcela Mitaynes, Crown Heights Tenant Union lead organizer and City Council candidate Michael Hollingsworth and Professor of Social Work Elizabeth Palley. You can listen to the full show (including headlines) here, or to individual segments. 

Segment 1
Last year tenant organizer Marcela Mitaynes knocked off a 13-term incumbent to win a State Assembly seat representing the South Brooklyn neighborhoods of Sunset Park, Red Hook and Bay Ridge. She’s one of six democratic socialists currently serving in the New York State Legislature. She joined us to talk about the scandals that have engulfed Gov. Andrew Cuomo and how the Assembly is thinking about impeaching Cuomo. The annual state budget is due at the end of this month and we spoke about how things are looking for taxes being raised on the rich to fund a robust recovery from the pandemic and why she has introduced legislation to enact a wealth tax in New York for the first time. For more, click here.

Segment 2
The quickly gentrifying neighborhood of Crown Heights, Brooklyn is on the verge of losing an Associated Supermarket that is vital to the neighborhood’s working class residents. A luxury real estate developer has set an April 7 eviction date. We spoke with Michael Hollingsworth, lead organizer with the Crown Heights Tenant Union and City Council candidate running on the DSA for the City slate. Hollingsworth reflected on growing up with the grocery store, its importance to elderly residents and why City Council needs more outsiders like him instead of conventional politicians who perpetuate business as usual. For more, click here.

Segment 3
President Biden signed the American Rescue Plan into law this past Thursday. The $1.9 trillion spending package provides all kinds of assistance to American reeling from the pandemic and the economic crisis that has accompanied it. This includes some generous new provisions to help poor and middle class families with children. We spoke with Elizabeth Palley, a professor of social work at Adelphi University who has written extensively on the policy and politics of child care in the United States. For more, click here.

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