Meet Ukah Busgith

Women’s History Month: Providing Healing, Promoting Hope 

For more than 30 years, Ukah Busgith has made it her mission to help improve the quality of life for NYCHA residents – whether through enrichment programs for young people, managing arts and garden programs, overseeing community centers, or connecting residents to the activities, programs, and social services they need. 

This year, the theme of Women’s History Month is “Providing Healing, Promoting Hope,” and Ukah exemplifies this through her tireless work serving NYCHA residents: hours-long phone calls with resident leaders about their concerns, attending events across the city, using her own money to support kids at the community centers where she worked, and learning how to drive so that she could travel borough to borough to make sure community centers were providing residents with great programming. 

Currently, as Vice President for Community Partnerships in the Family Partnerships Department, Ukah manages a team that connects residents to critical services and implements programs and policies that support and enhance household stability, tenancy, individual advancement, and aging-in-place. She also manages partnerships with external providers and City agencies offering youth, senior, and social service programs and serves as a liaison to community-based organizations operating at NYCHA community facilities. 

Ukah has held various positions at NYCHA, starting out as a community assistant at Pink Houses. She recalled fondly the three years she spent commuting via subway from the Bronx to work at the Brooklyn development. Following that role, she became the coordinator of an afterschool reading program for children ages 6 to 8 at over 100 community centers.  

Ukah kept moving up at the Authority, gaining more oversight responsibility of programs and services for residents. That included managing programs for NYCHA’s Manhattan community centers, followed by oversight of all citywide programs. 

“Those were fun, exciting days for me,” she said. “We put our stamp on everything. We had programs that included summer camps, homework assistants, a food program. We had workshops for gardening, visual arts, and performing arts. We had a great art show where residents could submit their pieces and other residents could come see the shows. I remember helping to lead the first talent show, and it was a massive success. We did it with a small budget. It was similar to American Idol – we’d have these auditions, then select people who attended rehearsals, and it was amazing to watch how they grew.” 

Of all her roles at NYCHA, the one that holds a special place in her heart is directing the Tilden Community Center. “I remember that as the best experience,” she said. “It’s always hard because you see the uptick in violence with young boys, and we hope that the community center is a place where they can be engaged. I used to play spades and pool with them. We used to have a citywide basketball league back then, and I thought creating a team would be a good way to build their attendance. I’d come in on the weekends and take a bunch of boys on the subway, like 40 boys to go play in the tournament. They always had my heart. Ms. Boone, the TA president for Tilden, said one of my participants is a lawyer now.” 

When Ukah transitioned to working in the Family Partnerships Department, she said it was challenging to take on the role: “I ran centers and established partnerships, but I never worked in social work, so I had to learn a new way of operating while managing the team and working to improve it.” 

Though the work was a shift, it ultimately provided her with a new way to serve residents: “We get a chance to serve some of the most vulnerable residents, residents who may not have heat or food. I remember there was a senior resident who didn’t have food, it was snowing, and she was afraid of slipping, so we got her DoorDash delivery. Residents know to reach out to us when there’s an issue, and we do everything in our power to connect them to a community-based organization or apply for a grant for them. We find a way to help them.” 

One of her team members, Rodney Gwyn, Social Work Supervisor, said: “I think Ukah should have an honorary master’s degree in clinical social work. She has an organic way; it just comes natural to her to help people and she goes to great lengths to help, to satisfy the resident association members, to make sure everyone is happy. She’s able to find resources, and where she can help a resident herself, she does. She is such a great leader and loves to stay in the background. In the short period of time working with her, I have gained such a huge amount of respect and admiration for her.” 

Ukah said that one of the best outcomes of being in this work for over 30 years is that she’s developed great relationships with community-based organizations, residents, and colleagues, and she’s especially proud to work with her team. 

“NYCHA is working to make sure our residents have better homes – and whatever myself and my team in CEP can do to help them, we do,” she said. “Every single day I see their commitment to the work. I want to get to the point where people recognize that NYCHA works very hard behind the scenes. I always want to work with our teams and residents to resolve their issues to their satisfaction. Sometimes that just means listening. I have resident leaders who will call me and talk to me for hours about what they would like to see. It inspires me to find more programs and address their concerns. I can’t fix everything, but I’ll do whatever I can to make their lives better.”