Bianca Cunningham for City Council District 41

What Qualifies Me?

• I led the fight to organize the 7 Verizon Wireless retail stores across Brooklyn making us the first in the country to join Communication Workers of America
• I helped to organize the largest retail strike in the country with AT&T Mobility workers
• I supported the fight against turning the Bedford Union Armory into luxury housing.
• Recipient of CWA local 1109 SHERO award presented by Tisch James in 2015. 
• I worked in coalition with Communities United for Police Reform to pass  the Right to Know Act
• I worked to train and support hundreds of workers around the city to unionize and improve their working conditions
• I helped develop the campaign for postal banking with APWU canvassing banking deserts like the Bronx and Brooklyn 
• I founded the AfroSocialists and Socialists of Color caucus and grew it to be national with caucuses in over 6 states
• Established AfroSocialists chapters on 3  HBCU campuses
• Partnered with Organizing for Equity to develop a campaign  that reduced the number of days for school suspensions for public school students in NYC. 
• I also supported the trades during the #CountMeIn fight which was a multitiered fight to ensure the Hudson Yards was built 100% union and to stop the discrimination and villainization of formerly incarcerated workers on the job site. 
• I mentored high school and middle school students and developed anti capitalist political science curriculum to present in classrooms around the city
• Organized and AfroSocialist weekend long convention that included organizing 101 and historical content for 50 Black and brown activists across the city at Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung
• Hosted a panel on Gentrification that featured tenant organizers from Brooklyn that discussed gentrification
• I was a keynote speaker for an event to commemorate Brazilian activist Marielle Franco held by Mulheres da Resistência no Exterior
• Testified and organized with public hospital workers in Harlem Hospital to stop the closure
• Guest lecturer at CUNY graduate school on political engagement and power mapping
• Organized mutual aid health and wellness events in Crown Heights
• Organized a march in support of Eric Garner’s family looking  to hold Daniel Pantaleo charged with murder
• Helped to organize a press conference at City Hall in response to the murder of Saheed Vassell
• Has had writings about racial justice, politics and labor published in major media publications
• I was one of the core organizers that called for the occupation of City Hall Park in 2020 to pressure the council to vote for fully funded public services and reducing the NYPD  budget.
• Guest lecturer at Harvard Business School on bargaining for the common good

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Platform

Racial Justice and Equity in Public Education

I want to see fully funded public schools that serve as community schools with wraparound services for the surrounding community. Schools with culturally relevant curriculum and comprehensive after school programs that include STEM, Music and the Arts and Earth science in partnership with social justice organizations and labor unions around the city. I want to see an investment in participatory budgeting projects in the school districts. Brownsville has a 50% high school graduation rate and I want to address students’ ability to show up regardless of what their home situation looks like.

FIGHT PRIVATIZATION

Education is and must remain a public good.

• Develop and start a process to bring charter schools back under public control. Start with the DOE while advocating for a fully public system at the state level.
• End charter school co-location within public school buildings. Privately run schools with their own budgets should not drain resources from our public school students.
• Halt new charter school openings. We must focus on strengthening our current schools instead of diverting resources to unaccountable schools. 
• Build new public schools and pre-K facilities. Our students deserve to learn in up-to-date facilities that are not overcrowded.
  • Most of us can instantly think of one, two, or three new luxury buildings that have been built in our neighborhoods over the past few decades, but would be hard-pressed to recall the last time a new school was built. COVID-19 has also highlighted our outdated school infrastructure. We need to build new schools for the 21st century. Let’s also invest in structures that would be conducive to outdoor learning, like pavilions and plazas and more green spaces—parks, playing fields, gardens, restrooms, overhangs, and outdoor heating.

YOUTH EMPOWERMENT & ENGAGEMENT

• Provide pathways for all New York City kids from age 14 and up the opportunity to obtain paid internships in fields related to their interests. Paid internships allow students to apply what they are learning in the classroom to real-life settings, gain work experience, and earn income while still in school. Although the city currently offers some paid internships through programs such as Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP), Summer Bridge and Work, and Learn & Grow (WLG), these programs are not available to all kids in all schools. We must expand these programs to ensure that all students have access to paid internships.
• Fund opportunities for students to learn from doctors, nurses, judges, carpenters, lawyers, architects, chefs, engineers, and other professionals who contribute to our communities via both school visits and field trips. Foster relationships that can lead to internships and careers.
• Expand training for green trades jobs through programs like Co-Op Tech.
• Push for comprehensive rezoning of school district zones for lower schools to ensure that schools do not reinforce racial and economic segregation in our communities.
• Experiment with models like dads on duty that reduce violence and increases morale
• Behavioral specialists in every school
• Investing in Restorative justice/conflict resolution models

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Labor and Workforce Development

Workforce Development – Brownsville has an unemployment rate of almost 30%, the highest in the city. We know that development has to happen in Brownsville and I support development of sustainable, affordable housing. I want to build with union labor and offer local folks a pathway to becoming union members by expanding apprenticeship programs.

Brownsville has one of the highest unemployment rates in the city

I want to see more young people and public housing residents trained to get good paying union jobs by expanding apprenticeship programs,  bringing trades back into schools and funding re entry programs for returning citizens

Essential Workers Make Our City Run!

I will fight to make sure these workers have higher wages, better safety standards and the benefits they deserve. 

New York is a Union Town!

I want to ensure we hold bad bosses accountable and make it easier for workers to join unions and negotiate good contracts. I will fight to build affordable housing with 100% union labor and regulate AI so that those jobs stay with hard working New Yorkers. 

Learn More

• Expanding Apprenticeship Programs for local residents
• Re-Entry programs for returning citizens
• Building 100% Union
• Green Jobs
• Local Hiring metrics tied to all new projects and businesses in the district
• Building new development 100% affordable according to the neighborhood  local median household income NOT the AMI

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Healthy Communities

I believe that our sense of safety is tied directly to our health outcomes and our environment.

That means we need to invest in the following:

• 24-7 Mobile crisis units as first responders non-violent 9-1-1 calls  
• More Green spaces
• Supporting the call for universal child care specifically addressing parents with non traditional work schedules
• Investing in Community Healing Circles 
• Fulfilling the Brownsville Mandate by funding and expanding the existing violence interruption organizations
• Funding Mental Health clinics
• Funding supplemental cleaning services that hire formerly incarcerated or homeless folks like ACE, CTE
• Fully Funded Public hospitals
• Reopening psychiatric beds in public hospitals
• Retrofitting Buildings and homes to make them more energy efficient
• Reopening cooling centers that have been shut down by Adams
• Funding  DSNY mobile litter patrols

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Housing is a Human Right

• I support the Rent Freeze
• Building new developments as 100% affordable according to the neighborhood  local median household income NOT the AMI
• Holding Slumlords accountable for their negligence 

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Our Seniors Should Retire with Dignity

I will work to protect pensions and expand funding to foreclosure prevention programs that support seniors at risk of deed or equity theft. I will also support expanding programs that help seniors on limited budgets stay in their homes.