February 29, 2008
KINK GOES INSIDE
his prowess to State Senate Dems
|
Kink: Advocacy in action |
After 13 years of fighting for people living with HIV/AIDS in New York and throughout the country, Housing Works legislative counsel Michael Kink is leaving us to go on "the inside" as director of policy and special counsel to the Democratic party in the State Senate. Kink takes up his new post on Monday.
Kink came to Housing Works in 1994 as a senior staff attorney, and two years later set up camp in Albany to establish an office that proved a powerful organizing and lobbying base for people living with HIV/AIDS, disabilities and chronic illnesses, LGBT people, homeless people and people living in poverty. Kink was also instrumental in developing Housing Works offices in Washington, D.C. and launching AIDSVote.org and Campaign to End AIDS, as well as the Update you are reading this very moment.
"Mike was the mastermind of the messaging in many of our most successful campaigns," said Housing Works President and CEO Charles King. "He has an incredible ability to synthesize complicated issues and frame them in a way that makes them easy to understand, and his integrity in doing that gains him considerable respect even from people who disagree with him on substance. As a consequence, we were able to win a number of important victories on behalf of people living with AIDS and HIV notwithstanding the partisanship that informs so many decisions in Albany and Washington today."
Kink's career at Housing Works began with a bang, as he worked to develop landmark ADA case Henrietta D. v. Giuliani, which in 1995, guaranteed the right of everyone with HIV/AIDS, regardless of their disability, to receive public services. In 1999 and again this year, Kink's lobbying prevented the state from forcing people with HIV/AIDS to go into managed care programs. "That's a life-and-death issue," Kink told the Village Voice in 1999.
In 2000 Kink and Housing Works got communities of color funding through the State Legislature. He and Housing Works created a report that, in essence, said that while 70 percent of people living with HIV/AIDS in New York State are people of color, only 30 percent of the state funding is given to organizations led by people of color. In 2002 the state created an initiative based on this report and lobbying efforts of about $4 million. This report was also the basis of $5 million for communities of color funding in New York in 2001. Also that year, after a protracted battle with the Harlem community to secure housing for people living with AIDS, Kink spearheaded a campaign that secured development of Harlem housing. Kink was also responsible for expanded Medicaid access for all people with HIV in New York State that allowed people to return to work.
The road to Housing Works
After graduating from NYU School of Law in 1988, Kink was informally involved with AIDS advocacy through gay friends in the West Village, ex-drug user friends in the East Village and families affected by HIV/AIDS that he knew through his work at the Legal Aid Society where he was an attorney. "Back in those days when ACT UP would do an event, it would filter down and I was one of the thousands of people who would show up spontaneously. At that time the sort of sophisticated and multi-level advocacy going on around HIV/AIDS was absolutely cutting edge," Kink said.
When Kink learned about a job opening as senior staff attorney at Housing Works in 1993, he jumped at the chance. Two years later, when the opportunity arose to set up an office in Albany, he pounced again, partially for the opportunity to move with his wife Karen and two young children, Dylan and Jasper, out of New York City. And more than any specific legislative victory, what Kink cites as his biggest accomplishment at Housing Works is bringing people living with HIV/AIDS to Albany and D.C. to advocate on behalf of themselves. Thanks to Kink, clients are in Albany three times a week during session.
"I'm most proud of setting up a structure where Housing Works clients are in Albany and D.C. so regularly and the voices of our clients could be heard," Kink said. "It is a very effective way to do advocacy, and it's not the way it always happens. Many legislators had never met a person with HIV before. By the mid-1990s, they had someone in front of them who could say, 'When I got out of prison, all I had was a garbage bag and $5.'"
Housing Works client and former New York State peer Eric Bartley is one of those individuals who has been empowered by Kink's advocacy. "I ended up at Housing Works by chance, but Mike saw something in me. Mike continually inviting me to Albany to meet with legislators has made me committed to advocacy in a way I never was before."
Hello, State Senate
While Kink said he could have "worked 24 hours a day, seven days a week and spent all my time productively" one of the reasons for his latest career move is to achieve a little more work-life balance. Working for the State Senate will keep Kink closer to his family in Western Massachusetts, as opposed to Housing Works, where part of the job description required constant traveling from D.C. to Mississippi to Chicago to Colorado on short notice. "Albany may seem a little less glamorous than Washington, but trading weeks on the road to be closer to home is a good thing."
And Albany is happy to have him. Since picking up a Senate seat Wednesday, the Democrats are only one seat away from having a majority in the Senate for the first time in 40 years, meaning that Kink can help bring about some real help to the people in New York who most need it.
A spokesman for Kink's new boss, Senate Minority leader Malcolm Smith, told the The Daily News that Kink "brings the kind of energy and professional that the conference is searching for." State Senator Tom Duane adds that "Everything that's been done for people with AIDS in Albany, Mike's been involved with. I'm extremely excited to have him in the Senate. He's going to be a great addition to our conference. Of course he's progressive but also he's so smart. That's a great combination. It would be hard for me to not use any superlative adjective for Mike Kink's name."