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New York City Main Office Yonkers Newburgh Poughkeepsie

115 East 106th

St., 3rd

Fl. 28 N. Broadway Ave., 2nd

Fl 18 Lander St. 29 N. Hamilton St., Ste L06

New York, NY 10029 Yonkers, NY 10701 Newburgh, NY 12550 Poughkeepsie, NY 12601

212-860-6001 914-751-2641 845-562-2020 845-790-5945

Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos55 Front StreetRockville Centre, NY 11570

August 18, 2012

Re: Our visit to your home & an invitation for you to come to ours

Dear Majority Leader Skelos,

As you probably know, hundreds of members ofCommunity Voices Heard visited your home todayon Long Island to urge you to be more responsive tothe needs of low-income communities andcommunities of color. Before we stopped by yourhouse, we considered your job performance to-dateon a few specific issues that are critical to ourcommunities.

We write to share our evaluation of your jobperformance and to invite you to join us in touringour communities in New York City, Newburgh,Poughkeepsie and Yonkers. This should give you asense of how New Yorkers, particularly low-incomeNew Yorkers, feel about the way you have beenleading the state government.

In addition to the report card included here in

this letter, we are leaving hundreds of report

cards completed today by CVH members and an

oversized, 4 ft. x 5 ft. report card at your home.

We offer this large-format report card as a

reminder of our visit today and hope that it will

serve as a daily encouragement for you to step up and fight for our communities.

Our organization has been attempting to get your attention on our issues, and we hope you willmake time in your schedule to join us on a tour of our communities. We urge you to do more toadvance the causes of:

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Good Jobs & Access to ThemThere arent enough jobs in our communities and our people arent able to get the onesthat are there. Families cant live on the $7.25/ hour minimum wage in New York.The minimum wage should be increased to a living wage, and it should go up every yearas inflation does.

Real Democracy & Fair ElectionsElections are being bought by the rich and corporations. Low-income people get ignoredwhile attention is paid to those with deeper pockets. Our government should not be forsalelow-income people should have the same ability to influence policy and politics asthose with money. We need Fair Election reform and a public campaign finance systemthat caps what the rich can donate to candidates and matches what the poor give to maketheir money worth more.

A Just Safety NetPeople cant find jobs in this economy and families need to turn to public assistance for

support while they get back on their feet. Meanwhile, government is kicking peoplewhen theyre down and making people do modern day slavery workfare instead ofgiving people the dignity of a job. Workfare should be ended in NYS and all unpaidjobs should be replaced by paid Transitional Jobs.

Truly Affordable HousingLow-income families are being pushed out of New York State as rent is going up,families are being evicted from houses they owned, and the public housing stock isfalling apart due to lack of funding. The state should dedicate $750 million intorepairing the public housing stock across the state.

Community Voices Heard is a member organization of low-income people, predominantly

women with experience on welfare, building power in New York City and State to improve thelives of our families and communities. We are working to accomplish this through a multi-pronged strategy, including public education, grassroots organizing, leadership development,training low-income people about their rights, political education, civic engagement and direct-action issue campaigns.

Many New Yorkers, including many members of our organization, feel that you do not representtheir best interests in the state Senate and that you are not fighting for their communities. Weshare these issues and our evaluations with you in hopes that we can work together to advancethe needs of our communities and we invite you to contact us for a visit to our communities.

Sincerely,

Agnes Rivera & Walter LipscombCo-Chairs, Community Voices Heard