LISTEN TO LINDA LEAKS
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PT. 2 – Q & A
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“The mayor is pitting one set of low income people against another set of low income people,” said Linda Leaks, lead housing organizer for Empower DC. Leaks spoke Saturday at an event put on by the Gray Panthers on Fighting Back Against the Budget Cuts.
“Vincent Gray’s budget is a continuation of pushing [lower income] people out. We see that what his budget calls for is major, major, major cuts of social services and healthcare, programs that benefit the lowest income, the most vulnerable people.”
The DC Fiscal Policy Institute noted, “Mayor Gray’s budget proposal contains close to $190 million in cuts, most of which would fall on human services and other low-income programs. Two out of every three dollars in cuts comes from human services, even though that part of the budget makes up only one out of every four dollars overall.”
Leaks said, “One way or the other people are going to pay. Everybody is going to pay. The people who are directly impacted are going to pay. And the people who live in this city, who live in this country, are going to pay. One way or the other. And it just makes sense that we put the funding into the budget that we need so that people are not pushed out on the street.”
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