Nation IN BRIEF : NEW YORK : Up to 20-Year Wait for Public Housing

The number of families waiting for city-run public housing in New York City has reached a record 240,000, and the wait for some could be 20 years, a newspaper reported. “There has been no meaningful construction of new apartments, and the city does not have the means to construct housing in a major way,” Sally Hernandez-Pinero, chairwoman of the Housing Authority, told the New York Times. Federal financing for new public housing in the city fell from 20,820 apartments in 1977 to zero in 1982 and 1983, with a minor restoration of funding since then.