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Ernestine Small, 71, fought for 10 years for low-income housing in her native Rockville Centre and against Urban Renewal, which was a program of redevelopment that relocated people and broke up communities. She went on to become a board member of the village's housing authority and now works as program director for the Rockville Centre Economic Opportunity Commission.

"Housing really took my notice when I was in school. And we needed affordable housing in Rockville Centre. As a teenager, we started with petitions when I was in South Side High School in the '50s. It took 10 years after my graduation before ... they even started on housing stock in Rockville Centre. The village was resistant to this.

"However, we had to fight for so long ... the state laws and things had changed and Urban Renewal laws had come about. We called it at that time ‘Negro Removal.' And that's truly what it was. We lost our families and businesses and things like that. And not just in Rockville Centre, throughout Nassau County.

"I was younger. And see, when you're younger, you don't think too much about fear. Yes, we picketed, yes we went out there. ... But at that time I truly didn't feel fear. We felt change, and that's what we wanted was change.

"We were motivated. Dr. [Martin Luther] King had motivated us throughout the country. We knew what we wanted, and we weren't violent. We were taught not to be violent. We were Christians. I come out of a Christian home. We were persistent, and we did what we had to do, and we did it in a legal way.”

-- Jennifer Barrios

Click here to return to main page. (Newsday Photo / Michael E. Ach / February 8, 2008)