July 1, 2024 Office of the Mayor News
Scott Stanford: Kicked in with a handshake on Friday between Mayor Adams and City Council Speaker Adrian Adams. It was made official yesterday and just in the nick of time. City Council voting to adopt the $112.4 billion budget for fiscal year 2025, which by the way starts today. Mayor Adams joining us this morning. Mayor, thank you for taking a few minutes, sir. We have the mayor there. Mayor Adams, are you with me?
Mayor Eric Adams: Yes, thank you. Thank you very much. Sorry about that. That's the word of the decade, you’re muted.
Stanford: You're muted. It's just like when I'm at home, mayor. My wife mutes me all the time as well. Thank you for taking a few minutes, sir. Yes. Listen.
Mayor Adams: My coach used to say, teamwork makes the dream work, and that's what we saw with Speaker Adams and Finance Chair Justin Brannan. It was teamwork, and we spent months as there was a lot of noise around us, the team was inside figuring out how do we deal with the crises that we're facing, but at the same time deliver for New Yorkers.
Stanford: Yes. Listen, the main story here, of course, the budget approval, the number pushed through $112.4 billion. It reverses many of the budget cuts that you had to propose, the housing, the child care, health care, all going to be funded now. The proposed library cuts reversed. Just give us a review. Was this still because of the additional monies that came into the city, including less spent on the migrant situation?
Mayor Adams: It was a combination of things, and one of the most important reasons we are here right now is what I did in January 1st, 2022. I told all of our agencies we have to find efficiencies in our agencies. We have to do what every day New Yorkers are doing to run their households, and that is to make sure we are taking care of taxpayers' dollars. Because of those efficiencies, where over $7 billion we found in efficiencies, we were able to navigate COVID and navigate 200,000 migrants and asylum seekers. That cost us $4.9 billion, and smart decisions early allowed us to make these decisions that we're facing today.
Stanford: Mayor, NYCHA getting $6 billion over the next two years for more affordable housing, and listen, that only means more housing, but thousands of related construction jobs as well.
Mayor Adams: Well said. Well said. When you do an analysis that we're putting over $26 billion into housing, additional $2 billion now, for the first time, NYCHA is being included in the housing plan when I came into office, but we need to build more housing. That's why our City of Yes is so important. We have an inventory problem with 1.4 percent of vacancy in our city. It's just not acceptable. We have to build. It brings jobs. It brings housing, and it brings prosperity to New Yorkers.
Stanford: Mayor, I just want to touch on a couple other things. The How Many Stops Act kicks in today, right, for NYPD officers. Now they have to record the race, age, gender of anybody they stop out on the street, anybody they investigate. You were a big opponent to this one. Have your feelings changed on it at all?
Mayor Adams: No. I still share my concerns, and other New Yorkers have also shared their concerns on this legislation. I think the intentions were correct, but the actual application of it was just the wrong thing to do at this time.
We need our officers on patrol, not doing paperwork, but it's the law, and we must follow the law. I spoke with our counsel at the NYPD, Mike Gerber, over the weekend, and he stated that training has already been in place, and all of the internal mechanisms are there. We're going to follow the law as it is carried out.
Stanford: Mayor, new CBS News poll showing that since the debate last Thursday, more Americans feeling that maybe President Biden should go after, should not go after, another term in office. I know you've always said you're a big supporter of the president. Do you still feel the same after watching Thursday night? Is it time for him to step aside? What were your thoughts after you watched that?
Mayor Adams: Oh, well, I felt as though, how I feel sometimes. People take your worst performance, and they try to judge your entire life that way, and I don't take the president's worst performance. Listen, he started out slow. He seemed to pick up as we were going on, but here's a person that navigated our economy in the right direction, dealt with the law enforcement issues. He's continuously showing real, true leadership, and so I believe the Democratic Party will come together and make a determination on next steps, but I know how it is when my performance is not my best, and I'm defiant by that, and I know he feels the same way. It wasn't his best performance, but he has performed admirable all throughout his career in politics.
Stanford: Mayor Adams got about 45 seconds left. During the debate, Donald Trump said immigrants are taking Black jobs, taking Hispanic jobs, and he says we're going to see more and more of it. As you can imagine, social media went off the wall when they heard that. What did you think when you heard him say that about the Black jobs?
Mayor Adams: I'm more focused on the fact that we should allow migrants and asylum seekers to work. We have open jobs in all areas, from those in the horse racing industry to lifeguards to medical professionals. We need employees, and so to me, it doesn't matter the ethnicity of the employee, but no one should come to this country where work is part of their dignity, and I think that we need to allow migrants and asylum seekers to work, as well as how we have cut unemployment here in this city. We can continue to do so if we allow people the opportunity to work.
Stanford: City's got a new $112.4 billion budget as of today. Mayor Adams, thank you, sir, for spending a few minutes. Enjoy the holiday weekend.
Mayor Adams: Thank you. Take care. Happy Independence Day.
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