Redlining, Section 9, and the Future of Public Housing
Join us for a panel discussion and closing event for Undesign the Redline @ Barnard, a year-long exhibition and event series exploring the continued impact of redlining and predatory real estate practices on communities in Northern Manhattan and beyond. Our panelists will discuss issues facing New York’s public housing – which provides affordable homes for more than half a million New Yorkers – including our neighbors in Barnard and Columbia’s immediate vicinity. This conversation comes at a moment when the future of Section 9 is seriously threatened by privatization programs such as RAD (Rental Assistance Demonstration) and the Preservation Trust. The audience will learn how residents are fighting for de-commodified housing that allows people to thrive, and how to support these important efforts.
The panelists include: April De Simone, creator of the Undesign the Redline exhibit, transdisciplinary designer and architect; Samelys Lopez (BC ‘01) Bronx community organizer and former congressional candidate; and Ramona Ferreyra, social entrepreneur and tenant leader; moderated by Vanessa Thill (BC ‘13), organizer and exhibits designer at Barnard College. Each panelist brings unique perspectives from their experiences growing up and living in the Bronx and Northern Manhattan, doing on the ground research, problem-solving, and building community knowledge.
About the Speakers
As a transdisciplinary designer, April De Simone (Principal, Trahan Architects) brings 20 years of experience navigating the intersectionality of architecture, planning, and systems thinking. Her work, inspired by her experiences growing up in the Bronx, New York, cultivates reframed opportunities within pedagogy and processes, advancing opportunities within the practice of architecture to spatialize healing, equity, and restitution. In 2015, April co-founded Designing the WE where she launched the co-curated exhibition and platform, Undesign the Redline, which explores the historical and contemporary spatial reverberations of unjust policies and practices like residential racial ordinances, Redlining, and Urban Renewal. Her interdisciplinary work investigates the implicit and invisible relationship between architecture and human condition, connecting a deeper understanding of how inequity, supremacy (in its various forms), and dehumanization become spatialized and proliferated. This body of work has been infused in numerous projects demonstrating the equitable, humane, and just capacities of architecture and design mediums, including a supervised visitation site at the Bronx Borough Family Courthouse and the social enterprise venture Urban Starzz. April continues to be an invited lecturer, speaker, and facilitator at numerous institutions. She sits on progressive boards, including the American Sustainable Business Council, and works closely on a local and national level with diverse stakeholders within the design sector, like the Urban Design Forum, on issues of race, equity, and democratic architecture.
Ramona Ferreyra, Tekina Guatu Ke Ini Inaru, is a social entrepreneur and Founder of Ojala Threads. She is a doodler, historian, poet, advocate and defender. Ramona identifies as Hispanic, indigenous, and disabled. She sees Ojala Threads as a love letter to her ancestors, and her descendants. She impacts policymaking in the areas of criminal justice reform, public housing and public transportation. Ramona tweaked her leadership style at Harvard’s Kennedy School and Center for Creative Leadership. She previously led outreach efforts for the FBI and Department of Defense focused on community engagement and environmental resilience.
Accessibility
We regret we will not be able to provide ASL interpretation for this event.
Please email any access needs/requests to mneptune@barnard.edu.
This event is free and open to all. RSVP here.
View the Livestream.