December 3, 2012

On Thursday, December 6 from 5:30 – 7 p.m, more than 200 community residents from Central Brooklyn will attend a community forum to rally support to save vital health care services and jobs at SUNY Downstate Medical Center. The forum is being organized by Brooklyn-based community, faith-based and labor leaders who comprise the SUNY Downstate Coalition of Faith, Labor and Community Leaders. The forum will be held at the New York Congregational Center for Community Life, 135 Linden Blvd. in Brooklyn.

Dozens of community, faith-based and labor leaders will speak along with several state lawmakers who are members of the Brooklyn delegation as well as some members of the New York City Council. The speakers will call for action to stop further job reductions at Downstate and to rescind the more than 400 job eliminations that have already been issued.

Community residents whose access to health care services would be severely limited by further job reductions will be signing petitions urging Gov. Cuomo and state Commissioner of Health Nirav Shah to intervene to save health care services and jobs at SUNY Downstate.

Coalition leaders coordinating the forum are Bishop Orlando Findlayter of New Hope Christian Fellowship, chairman of Churches United to Save and Heal (CUSH); Pastor Gilford Monrose of Mt. Zion Church of God, president of the 67th Precinct Clergy Council; Rabbi Eli Cohen, executive director of the Crown Heights Jewish Community Council; Pastor Shane Vidal of the Marantha Seventh Day Adventist Church; and Rowena Blackman-Stroud, president of the United University Professions Chapter at SUNY Downstate Medical Center and UUP’s statewide treasurer.

The forum begins at 5:30 p.m. at the New York Congregational Center for Community Life, 135 Linden Blvd. in Brooklyn.

The SUNY Downstate Coalition of Faith, Labor and Community Leaders is a newly formed Brooklyn-based organization collectively fighting for vital health care services and jobs at SUNY Downstate Medical Center.

UUP is the nation's largest higher education union, with more than 37,000 academic and professional faculty and retirees. UUP members work at 29 New York state-operated campuses, including SUNY’s public teaching hospitals and health science centers in Brooklyn, Long Island and Syracuse. It is an affiliate of NYSUT, the American Federation of Teachers, the National Education Association, and the AFL-CIO.