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Mostly Cloudy Town offers rental aid amid Covid-19 spike
Working with the Long Island Housing Partnership, Inc., the Town of Hempstead Board announced the beginning of the second Emergency Rental Assistance Program on Aug. 17.
This announcement marked the start of the application phase of the ERAP which will last until Sept. 28. Applications, eligibility requirements, and information regarding expenses this program covers can be found on the Long Island Housing Partnership’s website in English and Spanish.
The Town received this money through the advocacy of Senator Chuck Schumer as an extension of last year’s ERAP funding.
Along with the announcement, Town of Hempstead Supervisor Don Clavin said, “The COVID-19 pandemic continues to present unprecedented challenges to families in our community, and using these funds to help alleviate concerns with housing insecurity is one of our top priorities.”
He added, “We implore any Town of Hempstead resident facing challenges in keeping a roof over their heads as a result of the pandemic to apply as soon as possible to ensure they can take advantage of this assistance.”
Just two days before the announcement on August 15, Nassau County saw a spike in COVID cases at 714 new cases. This is the largest spike the county has seen since the middle of February 2021.
However, this spike is consistent with the current infection rate trends in Nassau County, which has been steadily increasing. On June 30, the county hit the seven-day average of 22 new cases per day. July 31 had a seven-day average of 205 new cases and the average as of Aug. 19 was 378 new cases in Nassau.
Despite these increases, the number of deaths from COVID in Nassau has not gone over three in one day since April.
The majority of new cases have been in southern Nassau county areas, according to the Nassau Department of Information Technology. Baldwin and the surrounding community, Baldwin Harbor, Freeport, Oceanside, and Rockville Center, makeup around 7.28 percent of the total positive cases in the county, and there have been a total of 14,073 new positive cases in these five areas since Oct. 1, 2020.
