Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Holds Media Availability on the City's Heat Emergency

August 12, 2021

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Good morning, everybody. We're here at New York City Emergency Management to discuss the heat situation. And I want all New Yorkers to listen carefully because this is really serious heat. We got to take it seriously, best way through this is if everyone is aware of the danger created by the heat, makes the adjustments in our own lives and our family's lives so everyone can stay safe. So, simple things like staying hydrated. Keep an eye on your kids if they're out playing. Don't let them be outside too long. Obviously, checking in on neighbors, loved ones, our senior citizens. All the basics today for sure, tomorrow looks like as well.

You're going to hear from our Emergency Management Commissioner with some of the details in just a moment. But what I can tell you right now, we have extreme heat in all five boroughs. And it's really important that one recognize, when the heat gets like this puts more and more strain on our electrical system, on ConEd. And everyone can help us, everyone can help each other by being smart today and tomorrow about how you use energy. We really want to keep people safe. First and foremost, we want people to be safe during this heat situation. But we also have to recognize the danger to our electricity supply. We don't want to see any interruptions. We don't want to see any outages. Everyone can do something about it. Last time, some weeks ago, we had a real challenge, made an appeal to New Yorkers to reduce energy use. You did a great job. Everyone in the city did a great job. We reduced energy use rapidly in the course of hours, and it helped protect our electrical supply. And we got to be ready to do that again. So, we want to tell everyone, if you don't need to use something today, if you don't need to do the laundry, if you don't need to use your microwave, if you don't need to use air conditioning, or a lot of lights, turn off anything you don't need. Help us get through today, tomorrow, and I think after that, things are going to be looking a lot better. But let's just be smart about it. And we're certainly taking that action with our City government buildings. We are reducing energy use. Everyone working together just a little bit is going to help us protect energy for everyone.

Now, as I said, we want to keep everyone cool. Look out for anyone who appears to be in distress. We have of course, cooling centers open. We have pools open. Pool hours extended today. So, it'll be from 11:00 AM to 8:00 PM at all the City pools. Cooling centers open now. Anyone looking for a cooling center, go to nyc.gov/beattheheat. And we've got something new. We had good questions. I want to thank our colleagues in the media, said, you know, we need some cooling centers to have extended hours. We did that. We got a question about, could people bring pets to cooling centers? Yes, there are some cooling centers where you can bring your pets. But we've got something else going on, which is great. A partnership with Petco. And I want to thank Petco for this. At any of their stores, you can bring your pets. If you want to just cool off your pet, you can go to a Petco store and they'll be ready to help you out. And go again to nyc.gov/beattheheat, to get information on that. And a lot of pet owners, a lot of animal welfare activists have called for measures like this. So, we're happy to be doing it.

So, everyone, the bottom line is what we're experiencing is serious – particularly today. This should be the worst day. Tomorrow, we're still waiting of course, to get a better sense of, but we expect it to be very hot tomorrow as well. This is not unfortunately something that is only going to be occasional given what we're seeing all around the world. The really horrible crisis with our climate is bearing down on us. The recent UN climate report made very, very clear the kind of heat problems that we're going to be dealing with. And we've gotten a lot better than many other parts of the country, but for all of us, we're going to have to address the climate problem together. But, right now, together, at least we can address the immediate problem by looking out for each other and by reducing our electricity use to protect each other. I want you hear from our Emergency Management Commissioner. I want to say Commissioner to you and your team, thank you. You've been doing a great job, keeping everyone informed and making the right steps to make sure there's protection for all New Yorkers. I know you've been working constantly with ConEd in particular to watch the situation with the energy grid. My pleasure to introduce Commissioner John Scrivani.

Commissioner John Scrivani, Emergency Management: Thank you, sir. I am going to duplicate some of the things the Mayor said, just to echo that message because it is so important. So, this is a safety message to start. We want to make sure that everyone is safe. So, we're going to experience a heat index of a high of almost 106 degrees through today and tomorrow. So, the hot temperatures are going to continue and we possibly have elevated temperatures on Saturday as well. There's still an excessive heat warning in effect until 8:00 PM tonight. And that may possibly be extended by the National Weather Service tomorrow. So, it will continue to be dangerously hot. This is not just a regular August hot day. It's very hot out there. And we want to make sure that all New Yorkers stay safe. We've also activated the City's flash flood plan. As you've seen each evening, we've had some thunderstorms. So, we have our flash flood plan activated as well. And our agencies are prepared to deal with that. Cooling centers. The Mayor mentioned, we have cooling centers. We actually have 369 cooling centers activated today, 121 of those have extended hours. And as the Mayor mentioned, the City pools also have extended hours. So again, I want to just repeat, if you need to find one of those locations, go to nyc.gov/beattheheat and, or call 3-1-1. The Mayor mentioned the pet-friendly centers. We want to, again, thank Petco for their support.

And there also are a lot of additional cooling options in the city. We obviously have the hydrant spray caps that have been installed by the Fire Department and Department of Environmental Protection across the city. And we have over 700 City parks that have misters or sprinkler systems that people can go and cool off. One thing the Mayor mentioned, which is vital, is please check on your neighbors and your family members that might be vulnerable to the heat. It's going to be very hot. And if you do see somebody in distress, please call 9-1-1. As always, I want to remind people to sign up for Notify NYC. Notify NYC is our city's emergency notification system. You can go to nyc.gov/notifyNYC to sign up. And we – it is the best way for you to stay informed on the things that are happening here in the city.

I just want to speak quickly about the utilities. The Mayor did mention the conservation message. We are in constant communication with ConEd and PSEG Long Island to monitor our electrical grid. We want to, you know, remind people as the Mayor did, run those larger appliances, ovens, washing machines, dryers, and dishwashers either early morning or late at night, if you have to use them. But for the next two days, if you can avoid using some of those, we really would appreciate that. And the electrical grid will thank you for it. We want to make sure that, you know, we keep the lights on. Again, with your air conditioners, try to keep those on a low setting and maybe raise the temperature just a little bit. And every little bit helps. We're doing that here at the City buildings as well. If you do experience an outage, please make sure you notify your provider and they can help you right away and give you an ETA of when that would be restored. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I appreciate you being here at our facility today. Thank you.

Mayor: Thank you, John. I didn't know the electrical grid could thank us, but I'm glad to hear that John. It's going to. We'll all be thanking each other if we can keep the electricity on. So, that's the name of the game. Everyone today, obviously we'll take questions on any matters, but the first focus we have today is on the heat and addressing that. On Monday, we'll be coming back with our regular briefings on everything we're doing to fight the Delta variant, on the actions we'll take. Starting in the course of next week on the Key to NYC plan. And of course, continuing to talk about all the other big issues on the recovery of New York City and everything that's it’s going to take to do that. Let me just say a few words in Spanish on the heat situation.

[Mayor de Blasio speaks in Spanish]

Mayor: With that, let's turn to our colleagues in the media and I will call upon you. I got my cards right here. Let me do four on this side, four on the other side. Who wants to go first? Yes.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor, Steve with WCBS Radio. Nice to see you in person.

Mayor: Hey Steve, how you doing, man?

Question: Good. As you can imagine, we have questions on a wide range of topics today.

Mayor: Yes. I don't know what you're talking about.

Question: The first one is to get your impression of what you have seen of the incoming Governor Hochul – your experiences with her and your plans to work with her.

Mayor: I certainly plan to work with her. I had a good conversation with the Lieutenant Governor on Tuesday afternoon definitely plan to work closely with her. I look forward to sitting down with her. I have not worked closely with her in the past, but all our dealings have been pleasant and, you know, I expect it to be a positive approach.

Question: Given that we still have 12 days left with Governor Cuomo, I’m seeing some lawmakers say they have some skepticism, some concerns about what these next 12 days may entail from a Governor that has been somewhat abrasive or retributional. What concerns do you have about the next 12 days?

Mayor: Well, I think people should keep a very close eye on him after everything he's done. And I don't know why it needs to be 12 days, honestly. I think we're all ready to move on. And I think the quicker we can move on the better at this point. Juliet?

Question: Yes, do you think there should be impeachment hearings?

Mayor: I think there has to be accountability – whatever form that takes. You had 11 brave women come forward and take a huge risk in the process, and we all owe them a debt of gratitude. They deserve accountability. That is one of the many truly troubling things that happened here. What happened to those 11 women, but we still have huge questions on the nursing homes and the coverup, on whether vaccines were given as a political favor, you know, supplies were provided to allies and withheld from those the Governor didn't favor. I mean, there's huge, huge questions here. There has to be further accountability.

Question: Do you think though accountability can come in the other investigations? You know, the Attorney General is doing continuing her investigation into the book deal. The feds are still looking at nursing homes. The DA’s or prosecutors are looking at the harassment allegations. So, is impeachment, given that he's leaving office, still the best way to go or the best way to spend city money?

Mayor: [Inaudible] Yeah, obviously, I don't have a particular sense of the best way to create accountability. I know we need accountability and I think you said something important. There's a lot of other entities working on it and that counts for a lot, depending on whether they pursue these things or not. But I think the important thing for the legislature consider is what's the best way to achieve accountability. By the way, the Governor wasn't the only actor in all this. Others need to be held accountable as well. So, it may be one form or another, but what would be a huge mistake is to leave this chapter and not find out exactly what happened and who did it and how to make sure it never happens again. Erin.

Question: Can you just describe when you heard that the Governor was resigning – I know you were off on vacation, I know you have a long history with him. What were the sort of emotions that went through your head when you heard that?

Mayor: I did not expect him to do what I regard as the decent thing and get out of the way. So, I was surprised, and I felt a sense of relief for all of us. I thought about the 11 women who came forward, who were the reason that justice was served. And I think ultimately the most important thing for us to recognize is these women were vindicated. They said something was horribly wrong. They came forward and actually an extraordinarily powerful guy and extraordinarily powerful bullying guy was brought down because they stood up. And I think that's the most important thing here, go ahead.

Question: And you know, at the time Governor Hochul announced this morning that she will be running for a full term. You know, what are your thoughts on the next Governor? And are you considering running yourself?

Mayor: Look, right now, obviously in addition to the heat before us, right now, I'm focused on getting us through fighting COVID, fighting the Delta variant, bringing the city back. That's my focus. There's plenty of time to sort out everything else. Bobby.

Question: There's been a lot of talk the last couple of days about Governor Cuomo's legacy. I wonder if you think you can separate his accomplishments from the scandal, and do you give him credit for any of his accomplishments in office?

Mayor: Bobby, it’s an important question. I can be objective enough to say, well, even someone I think did horrible things, also managed to do some good things in the mix, but let's be clear. He did horrible things. In the end, history will judge them harshly because he amassed power in a way that led to bullying and intimidation and threats. And it's almost Shakespearian in the sense that so much power led to his downfall. No one should have that much power. And it's absolutely meaningful to me that the very effort to dominate everything else in his path, undermined whatever good there may have been in his plans. And it's a cautionary tale to everyone. You know, there's actually supposed to be checks and balances. There's – it’s democracy, right? You're not supposed to have one person with that much power and it got the better of him. Go ahead, Bobby.

Question: Separately on COVID you're going away for a few days. Have you seen the updates you've gotten – has the situation continued to deteriorate in terms of the number of cases and so forth?

Mayor: We're definitely seeing, you know, a lot of cases, the three questions we ask ourselves all the time, vaccination levels, hospitalization rate, case numbers, two out of three, I feel pretty good about, you know, right now we've got 4.7 million New Yorkers fully vaccinated, 5.2 million have had at least one dose. You know, we're over 60 percent – I got to get the exact percentage, but over 60 percent total population, at least one dose, and over 70 percent of adults. So, those are good numbers and they keep climbing. The incentives are clearly working. We're going to have an update on that later today, we're seeing some real pickup on the incentives. The mandates are starting to have an impact. So, I'd say number one thing is vaccinations. We're making some more progress.

Two, hospitalization rate. Today, hospitalization rate is 1.04 per 100,000. Higher than it was a few weeks ago, but still well within the range that we need to be in and with better outcomes for those hospitalized than what we've ever seen previously. So, that's good news, but cases, you know, that's not a good situation between confirmed and probable. We've got 1,650 cases. I don't like that one bit, but we are still very much in a situation we can handle. We’ll go over to this side, Marcia.

Question: Mr. Mayor, in the report that the Attorney General did she accused the Governor of participating and having a toxic workplace. I wonder if you yourself feel that you were a victim of that same toxic workplace in the way that he handled you and the city and the city's needs. And do you feel that there's going to be a change now that he's gone from the scene?

Mayor: Well, there needs to be a change. There needs to be a change, Marcia. First of all, what the 11 women went through is horrifying to me. And they were put through hell by someone powerful. They had to wonder every step along the way, what would happen to their careers, everything, but that was tragically one of many horrible things that happened. And in terms of dealings, I've talked to mayors around the state, county executives, everyone feels the same thing, the disrespect, the withholding the kinds of things that any normal governor would do in working with a colleague at a local level as part of political payback. I mean, we've all seen it. And Marcia, I think the real question is, how do we make sure it never happens again in New York State? And that's the bottom line to me.  

Question: So, my follow-up question has nothing to do with the Governor, actually, I wanted to talk to you about COVID and the opening of schools. If a student test positive for COVID when schools reopen, will they have to quarantine? And will you allow a remote option so that they won't miss class? 

Mayor: So, we're not going to remote as we had it previously, I've made that very clear. Everyone's coming back to school. Remember that anybody who is vaccinated, and this is, you know, the CDC guidance as well, anyone who was vaccinated, whether a staff, whether they're a student, unless they are symptomatic or confirmed positive, they're going to stay in school no matter what. So, I think we're going to see some kids, some staff who may have to be out for limited periods of time, but we should remember the very high levels of vaccination we have among DOE staff and educators, and I'm guaranteeing you, parents are going to rush to get their kids vaccinated by the time we get to the opening a school. So, I don't think we're going to have a huge problem there. How we deal with a kid who is out for a week is something we're working through right now, but we're going to be on a fully in-person system. Julia?  

Question: Mr. Mayor, you said others need to be held accountable as well. Obviously, the Governor had enablers. Who do you have in mind? Is it Melissa DeRosa? Is it any other folks? And what do you think should be the mechanism of accountability there? 

Mayor: Well, Julia, look, I'm not going to list names. That's not what I think is appropriate for me to do. I think it's appropriate for the prosecutors to look at that, FBI to look at that, US Attorney's Office, legislature. I think there needs to be a full accounting. Look, if our seniors – if some of our seniors lost their lives because of choices, the Governor’s team made, that has to be understood. If there was a conscious coverup, that has to be understood. If some people were given testing and some people were given vaccine and others withheld it for political purposes, anyone involved, needs to be held accountable, anyone who gave those orders, but that's for the investigators in the legislature to determine. Go ahead.  

Question: Okay. Also switching over to COVID, you have seen vaccination numbers tick up over the last couple of weeks. How much do you think that's attributed to both fear of the Delta variant and how much to the mandates and incentives? 

Mayor: I don't think anyone – I mean, I'll see if has Ted has a deep thought on this – I would say we know sometimes what we can't very specifically know, but we do see something good happening. We're going to put out the numbers later on today on the incentive impact. There's no question incentives helping. Can I tell you exactly what parts incentive, what parts mandate what's part is fear – legitimate fear of Delta? I can't parse all that, but I do think those pieces are synergizing. Certainly, at Health + Hospitals when the mandate was announced, we saw a lot of people crossed the Rubicon who had been holding back previously. So that's more of a, you know, a specific example that we can see some very, very specific outcome from. But I'll tell you this, Julia, whatever moves people, right? If I - I'll speak as a parent now – as a parent looking forward to school opening, if my kids were unvaccinated and they could be vaccinated, I'd go out and do it right now just seeing what Delta is doing. I would make sure everyone else in the household was vaccinated, just on the basis of what Delta is doing to people, but certainly the incentive has moved some people and certainly the mandate has moved others. Okay. Way back. 
  
Question: Matt King with FOX-5. Both Mark Treyger and Gale Brewer have called for a remote learning option in the fall. Is that something that city is at least reconsidering given the rise of Delta infections? 

Mayor: No, we are not. We need our kids back. There are kids who last saw a classroom in March of 2020. It is not healthy in any sense for our kids to be out of the classroom. Again, we have a huge number of vaccinated people in the school system, kids, and adults alike. We can do this safely. We did safely even when we didn't have vaccination. So, there is no question in my mind, the right thing to do is get all our kids back into the classroom. Go ahead. 

Question: Is there a remote learning plan, locked and loaded, if it came to that? What if we crossed whatever threshold the city deems? 

Mayor: We've got one plan, let's be really clear, one plan, all kids back to the classroom. We're going to follow up and come back between now and the opening of school on how we're going to handle the temporary situation like if a kid is out for a few days, and obviously we've talked about this previously, we know how to go remote for a school day – excuse me – a snow day, for example. You know, I'm sorry and I feel some nostalgia about snow days too, but now snow days are replaced by remote learning. We can turn that on quickly. So, we know we could move quickly if we needed to. But in the end, you know, plan A is plan A, and the best way to get to plan A is to get as many people vaccinated as possible. Okay. One last, you’re the last. 

Question: Wanting to get back to the Governor and the idea of accountability, as part of the impeachment process, there's the possibility of barring him permanently from ever running for office again? Is that something you think is warranted? 

Mayor: Look, he should never run for office again. I mean, obviously, it’s – we've just seen the beginning of the proof of the damage he did. He should never hold office again. Whatever happens impeachment or no impeachment, go ahead. 

Question: On Lieutenant Governor Hochul, you said you spoke to her. Number one, can you tell us a little bit about what that conversation was like? And secondly, what do you think her top priority should be once she actually takes over as governor? 

Mayor: The same for all of us, the priority is fighting the Delta variant and bringing our city and state back, and that's what we talked about. We said, you know, we got a lot of work to do together, we need to do it in a collegial fashion, and, you know, sit down as soon as possible and start the conversation, how to do things right, and do them better because it should be, you know, I've said this to folks. I've had a number of conversations over the last year or two with Governor Phil Murphy in New Jersey, just as smooth and clear and thoughtful conversations you could ever hope for. I talked to Governor Lamont a couple of times, I've talked to, you know, obviously Chuck Schumer a lot. I mean, what we were experiencing in Albany is not normal. It's not normal. It shouldn't be that way. The idea should be that a governor picks up the phone to a county executive or mayor and says, how do we work together? What do you need? How can I help? Or if a mayor has an idea or a local official has an idea, offers it to a governor, it's like, let me look into that. Let's see if we can work together on that. Never, that was never the reality. So, I just look forward to some normalcy, you know, I just think having people just a professional, normal discussion and there'll be – sure sometimes people agree or disagree. That's fine. That's normal. How about we try to find as much as possible a common path. All right, thank you, everybody.

###