Transcript: Mayor de Blasio, Commissioner Shea Hold Media Availability on Crime Statistics

December 5, 2019

Police Commissioner Dermot F. Shea: Ready? Good morning everyone. Thanks for being here.

You know at this time of year, in this area, the 44th Precinct, in this part of the Bronx anytime we’re normally here in December for press conference it’s usually a free agent pitcher signing at Yankee Stadium. But different draft picks today with Chief Fausto Pichardo to my left and Rodney Harrison, strangely out of uniform to my right – two new free agent pick-ups.

I was a commanding officer here in the 4-4, and as I said at my swearing-in, home to Yankee Stadium, a little tough when I was here, much tougher than it is today being the only Mets fan back then, but it was all good times. The last time, I will tell you that I was at this facility for a press conference, the facility didn’t exist. It was actually the groundbreaking when they were announcing the building of it, so it’s really interesting to be back here today probably five, six, eight years later to see what it’s become and it really is a jewel in the Bronx.

In a few moments you’ll hear from Mayor de Blasio about public safety and then from our Chief of Crime Strategies Lori Pollock to my left, who will go over the November crime figures and then we’ll take your questions. But first I’d like to thank the entire staff at New Settlement Community Center for hosting us today, and for the role they play in crime-fighting, and I do believe they play a role in crime-fighting and changing people’s lives. From all the activities, from the mentoring of kids, from afterschool activities, it is truly inspirational. It’s a shining example of the many ways our great city can help families and young people. And as you know that is one of the highest goals that we in the NYPD have – to guide young people along the road to success. If we can help kids, teenagers especially, avoid at first interaction with the criminal justice system, it will do a lot to better our communities and our neighborhoods while continuing to reduce crime. It’s the next iteration, I believe, of neighborhood policing. Through thoughtful discussion and collaboration, we’re finding new solutions to tough problems. And as I’ve said, to be as effective as possible, it requires participation from all sectors of government and community working together. That’s how we will continue to improve and how we will sustain quality of life in every corner of New York City.

So two people now that I mentioned earlier that fully understand are sitting up here with us this morning – Fausto, to my left, and Rodney, to my right. Two people that when we put out the press notice yesterday, I just want to highlight one section of it, that wasn’t really dug down too deep on. Think about two individuals, 20-30 years later that started out as New York Police Department cadets. And look at how that program has really contributed to getting where we are today. I would say that that investment has truly, truly paid off. So it’s a shining example of [inaudible] today, with the cadet program and really why we think it’s such a valuable outlet.

Rodney Harrison, first, who will be taking over my former job as Chief of Detectives, and Fausto Pichardo, who will be Rodney’s successor as Chief of Patrol. At this time in our history, these two individuals are great choices for our police department and for our city. When you look at the totality of what we’re trying to accomplish across the NYPD, and across the five boroughs, Rodney, first, has consistently performed so well, especially, Rodney, in his work shepherding our neighborhood policing rollout citywide the last few years, and on the investigative side as well. Rodney really gets the impact that precision policing efforts have on bringing in solid cases, gang takedowns, short and medium cases, and long-term cases. They are, today, making a dent in the violence being driven by really a small number of people citywide. And Rodney also knows how to effectively work with all of our partners, from residents and community-based groups, to other agencies, like our federal partners. On top of that, Rodney has been a highly regarded Precinct Commander in multiple commands, and he’s led detectives. And importantly, probably most important, he’s a great cop and an even better human being.

Now to embarrass Fausto—

[Laughter]

Fausto, too, who as Rodney’s Executive Officer in Patrol has really started taking neighborhood policing to a different level. Fausto has a wealth of experience in many areas of our profession. He was also, as you’ll remember, Commanding Officer of the 43rd Precinct, as second in command. And while as the Commanding Officer of the 43rd Precinct, our heroic Sergeant Paul Tuozzolo, was shot and killed in 2016. I’ve admired a lot from Fausto over the years, but probably nothing more than during that time. Fausto was and is a strong dependable leader who held his tightknit precinct together during that terrible tragic time. And on an even wider scope he knows how to set the tone, focus on the mission, and effectively carryout the goals to fruition. So now, to show the way for our entire patrol force there’s no better person. Both Rodney and Fausto bring tremendous leadership experience to their new roles and it’s just the beginning of how we’re going to continue to shape and bring into sharper focus our vision and our leadership team in the coming weeks.

With that, I’ll turn it over to Mayor de Blasio.

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Thank you, Commissioner. And Commissioner Shea, congratulations to you on your swearing-in this week, congratulations on coming home to this precinct, and I know this is so important to you and you feel it deeply in your heart, your connection to this community. I want to thank everyone at New Settlement Community Center, Program Director Jimi Orekoya – thank you and thank everyone on the team here for the work they do. And this is an extraordinary organization, it does amazing work in this community, but I want to pick up on the point that our commissioner has made about the role that the NYPD is going to play connecting with our young people.

For Commissioner Shea, you’ve heard it already several times in the things he’s said over the last days. This is a passion for him. This is a focus, the focus on deepening the ties between our officers and our young people, giving our young people better alternatives, showing our young people a positive path forward. This is going to transform this city. It’s going to transform our neighborhoods. It’s going to transform policing. So you’re hearing the beginning of something very, very big and I think it is extraordinary that this NYPD, today’s NYPD, is thinking about an entirely different approach, an entirely different strategy to reach deeper into our neighborhoods. Everyone up here deserves credit for this change, this progression. It’s going to make a huge difference. I also think – I did actually not know about the fact that two people we’re celebrating today came out of the cadet program, but I think it’s a beautiful example of when you reach young people all things are possible. And there’s extraordinary talent among the young people in this city. Our job is to help each and every one of them realize their potential and realize a very hopeful future. And the NYPD plays an absolutely crucial role in that and will even more going forward so that’s a very exciting prospect to me.

The announcement today about leadership – this is a moment to celebrate and it’s a moment to recognize as real progress and change at the NYPD. Because more and more, we are developing a generation of new leaders who are going to make neighborhood policing reach deeper into communities, who are going to deepen the transformation that’s already underway, who are going to make as safer. They’re also going to create a relationship between police and community that we’ve literally never seen before. We talked about it at Commissioner’s swearing-in. We’re not only not going back to the past, we’re never going back to the past, but we’re going to go to places we have never been before. We’re going to go to a bond and create a bond between police and community and young people, in particular that has literally never been seen. But to do that you need visionary leaders. And you need leaders who are not afraid of change but in fact embrace it, embrace innovation, embrace creativity, and that’s what we’re celebrating here today, an entirely new generation of NYPD leadership.

I want to tell you over the years, working with Rodney Harrison, working with Fausto Pichardo, I share the admiration that Commissioner Shea has for these two individuals. I have watched very carefully and seen the strength that they’ve both exhibited, the character, the intelligence, the capacity, the extraordinary experience. These are two great leaders, the right people for the right time, in these crucial positions. They are also history makers and this is a city that needs to keep moving forward that needs to reflect all of our people and that is happening here today. Rodney Harrison is now the first ever African-American Chief of Detectives for the NYPD, for the greatest police force on Earth. Fausto Pichardo is now the highest ranking Dominican-American officer in the history of the NYPD. And for the Dominican community which is now our largest Latino community, almost 700,000 strong or more, it’s a moment of profound celebration, I know. It’s a real crucial moment for a community that is becoming more and more important in this city, and to see one of their own reach this level is something I know is being felt all over this city today. So this is a really important moment and it fits what you’ve heard so often from Commissioner Shea. This is the guy who always wants to aim higher, in every way, and always wants to see this organization progress, and he is proving it by his actions already.

Now, I don’t have a question in my mind that the future is bright, I really don’t. And I see it in so many ways, and just here in the 4-4 Precinct, we are here in part because it’s a homecoming for Dermot Shea, but that’s not the only reason we’re here. We’re here because this precinct has done some extraordinary things. I was outside with the Commissioner, with the CO, Deputy Inspector Louis Deceglie, and two of the NCOs from this precinct – NCO Shamika Thomas and NCO Michael [inaudible] – we had a great conversation. And when you talk to – I would urge anyone of our colleagues in the media, if you haven’t spent time with NCOs, you need to because it is a very positive experience. They will tell you about a different kind of relationship with the community than what we historically knew. And these two great individuals that we spoke with earlier immediately told powerful stories of community members sharing information with them, working in partnership with them. In one case it led to the closure of an illegal social club, in another case it led to addressing a community problem where there had been a real quality of life challenge for a neighborhood that the NCOs were able to resolve once and for all. NCOs are problem solvers, they are impact players but they also are coalition builders with the community they serve. And so that’s happening here in the 4-4 Precinct in a very, very powerful way. And it’s also important – boy, to think about where this precinct was the day you joined in 1991 –

Commissioner Shea: Yes.

Mayor: Versus what we’re seeing today – the immense progress that has been made and it’s for a lot of reasons, but in recent years especially because of neighborhood policing and precision policing. It’s making a huge difference. Here in this precinct, in a place that used to be one of the most troubled precincts in New York City and dealt with extraordinary and painful violence, now because of neighborhood policing gangs are being disrupted, all the tools of the NYPD working with the community are leading to gang members being identified, arrested, guns being taken off the streets, and gangs being neutralized. That’s what this precinct is achieving. There’s always more to do but they deserve tremendous credit for what they’ve done.

Now, they are also exemplifying this connection to young people. Officers here in the 4-4 started to ask themselves how they could reach our young people and they started working on a cease-fire approach, working with community members to identify young people who really needed to be connected with. They worked with a local reverend to deepen those efforts, to figure out how to stop crime before it even happens. That powerful thing that Commissioner Shea the day he was announced – what if we started tracking the ways we prevented crime to begin with. Well, that’s being put to life right here and brought to life, I should say, right here in the 4-4 Precinct. So, I really want to commend everyone at this precinct, thank them for their extraordinary work. It’s a real example to all of us.

Now, overall, I want to be straightforward about the good news and the bad news. The good news is overall crime continues to go down. It is down year-to-date compared to last year. We have seen a very consistent pattern of overall crime continuing to drop. That’s something to celebrate. All the men and women of the NYPD deserve credit for that. But we are very focused on the challenge of homicide. Year-to-date we are up 22 homicides. That’s simply not acceptable. I want it to be clear. Everyone is doing their job and everyone is digging deeper to get under the skin of this problem and address it but we are not going to accept this situation.

For much of the year we were actually – had fewer homicides than the same time last year. In the last weeks we’ve had some real challenges. We’re going to address those challenges head on and we will turn this situation around. I have watched this organization and these leaders for six years, I know they will turn this situation around but we need to be focused and vigilant to make sure that happens. So, I will conclude by saying, in English and then in Spanish, that there’s a lot of resolve in this department. There is an inability among these leaders to accept the status quo. It’s one of the things I honor about them every single time I sit in a room and think with these good people, it immediately shows you this is a group of leaders that will never accept the status quo and always will take us further. And I have confidence in all of them. And finally just in Spanish –

[Mayor de Blasio speaks in Spanish]

With that I turn to Chief of Crime Control Strategies, Chief Lori Pollock.

Chief of Crime Control Strategies Lori Pollock, NYPD: Good afternoon. As we come to the close of the year, overall crime through November is flat with [inaudible] boroughs showing decreases for the month, and year-to-date overall crime is down 1.3 percent.

The November murder number is 20 versus 16, an increase of four – 16 last year, being the lowest recorded November. The boroughs as follows – the Bronx, five versus four, up one; Manhattan North, four versus one, up three; Queens South, three versus one, up two; Brooklyn South, three versus two, up one; Brooklyn North was even with four; Queens North, one versus four, down three; and Staten Island and Manhattan South recorded no murders in November.

Murder year-to-date as of November, 299 versus 275, which was an increase of 24. 52 percent of our murder victims were shot, 20 percent were victims of domestic violence, 15 percent were in housing, and at least 26 percent were gang related. Our shootings month-to-date were 50 versus 55, the second lowest number to the 48 we recorded in November, 2017. And this is the third month in a row with shooting reductions over last year. Bronx had the most shootings with a five shooting increase over last year, 20 versus 15, but they are down for the year at the end of November 205 versus 207.

Queens South and Staten Island each showed an increase of two shootings while the remaining five boroughs had decreases. Notably, Manhattan North decreased six versus eight; Brooklyn North 11 versus 19 for a decrease of eight; Queens North, two versus five; Brooklyn South, six versus seven, down one; and Manhattan South, zero shootings. Shootings year-to-date are up 24, 720 versus 696. Half of those shootings were gang related and 20 percent of overall shootings were fatal which is consistent with last year.

We’ll talk about DV shootings for a moment. There were 26 DV shooting incidents. This is down ten from the 36 incidents last year, or a reduction of 28 percent. Of these 26 shootings, four this year have been fatal. Last year we had 14 fatal shooting incidents with 19 victims. This year we have four fatal shooting incidents with four victims. So, fatal domestic violence shooting incidents are down 72 percent this year. Our domestic violence gun strategy has resulted in the removal of 140 guns this year from households where there have been reports of domestic violence. Seven were removed this November.

Our rape reports are down almost 20 percent this November, 116 versus 143. The decrease is seen in same-year non-domestic reports of rape and as usual you have the rape breakdown in a handout that you got coming in.

Robbery was up eight percent in November however this is still the second lowest robbery number in the CompStat era for any November. The robbery increase is being driven by incidents in Manhattan North and the Bronx, usually involving more than one perpetrator. We did see an increase in victims between the ages of 10 and 17, a 34 percent increase as a matter of fact. The trend of youth on youth violence for robberies continues and represents 15 percent of November robberies. Our overall robbery arrests are up 5.5 percent in November and 2.6 percent for the year.

But in tying in with the Police Commissioner’s youth strategy, we are seeing a marked increase in arrests for groups of youth under 17. So, 17-year-olds for the year – their arrests for robbery are up 10 percent; 16-year-olds are up 15 percent; and 15 and under is up 25 percent. So, when we’re talking about precision preventing, this is the group that we’re going to focus on by working with our partners in ACS, Department of Probation, the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice, and other organizations that help youth to stay on the right path.

Felony assault in November is up 2.3 percent, or 35 assaults, and domestic assaults are typically 41 percent of the felony assault number and these assaults are up slightly this November.

Burglary, down eight percent – 14 straight months of reductions in burglary and a new all-time-low November.

Grand larceny is down two percent. Phone snatches in Manhattan, phone scams citywide, and theft from autos in the Bronx and Queens North are driving the increase.

GLA is up eight percent, and as we always talk about this year car theft with keys or push start are up 20 percent, and 30 percent of all car thefts occur with the keys in or near the car. 80 percent of the 1,556 cars stolen with the keys have been recovered which indicates that this is a crime of opportunity. The contents may be the motive, using for transportation may be the motive, or to use it in commission of another crime might be the motive but I think we’ve seen many news stories this week with people who had their dogs in the back, their kids in the back, their grandmother in the back, and people are driving off with those cars and sometimes crashing. So, again I implore everyone not to leave their keys near or in their car, or their car running.

To wrap it up, our gun arrests are down by three this month but we are up 13 percent this year, 3,098 versus 2,748. Thank you.

Commissioner Shea: On topic questions, crime stats?

Question: [Inaudible] however at community meetings when they are questioned, what is going to happen because it’s going to be so many different ways that people can just get out jail free, they are saying, we don’t really know. They also say that suspects are going – and their lawyers will have access to crime scenes, even if it’s inside a person’s home. Mayor de Blasio and Commissioner Shea, you’re [inaudible] don’t know what is going to happen. Can you please tell everybody what’s going to happen?

Mayor: I just contest the question, but go ahead.

Commissioner Shea: I’ll take that as there are no on-topic questions for the crime?

Mayor: Okay, let’s take that first, come back –

Commissioner Shea: I’ll come back to that one.

Question: Hate crimes [inaudible] hate crime numbers.

Commissioner: Yeah, thank you. So, on the hate crime stats, I’ll just give it out. It’ll probably be easiest. We’re continuing to see the trend that we’ve seen all year. We got off to a tough start in the beginning of this year where we had an immediate jump of roughly 20 percent in hate crimes and we were about a raw number of 70. That’s held steady, I would say, for the last three, four months, and that continues to be where we are. We did have an incident yesterday in Brooklyn involving throwing rocks at a school bus. It’s still an active investigation. We – detectives from the Hate Crimes Task Force are investigating it but it’s pointing now to it may be – what we have at this point in time is three young males, appear to be young teenagers, throwing rocks at numerous cars.

This – when I first heard this story, obviously troubled by it, but also thinking back to the statements the other day. This exactly the opportunities I think to try to change people’s lives. It clearly makes no sense why these kids are doing this. But how do we point them in a different direction, how do we give them alternatives, how do we get them on the right path? What we know now is we have three kids. We’re putting out that video. We’re imploring anyone to call Crime Stoppers with information. Clearly we could have a tragic incident here if somebody gets hit with one of these rocks.  But we have a group of three young kids throwing rocks at, it appears, probably about eight different cars some with – at least one with Jewish occupants, school kids, and many it appears not to be the case. So, that’s an active investigation.

In terms of the overall trends, what we’re seeing, it really holds the same. We’re up about 23 percent. I just want to highlight though, the Hate Crimes Task Force has really done some stellar work in terms of the arrests that they are making on these cases. The arrests are up pretty significantly. They have made over 166 arrests on hate crimes related cases this year. Yes, sir?

Question: Year-to-date, what are the misdemeanor tallies? Are those …

Commissioner Shea: … yes, sir.

Question: Year to date, what are the misdemeanor tallies? Are those up or are those down?

Commissioner Shea: Lori - you’d have to be probably a little bit more specific in what kind of crime.

Chief Pollock: I mean, what –

Question: Overall misdemeanors, so the non-serious offenses –

Chief Pollock: Well our petty larcenies are up if you are talking about misdemeanors, but there’s many misdemeanor categories, so we can discuss it afterwards which ones you are looking for specifically, but if you take one category of petty larcenies, they are up.

Commissioner Shea: In the back.

Question: Commissioner, the Mayor talked about his concern about the homicide rate and I think you touched on it when you said some things about the gangs problem in the city, but is that what is making this jump, this significant jump that we see in the homicide rate this year. And also, you may want to do this off-topic but can we also hear something from Rodney and Fausto about their appointments? You mentioned that I don’t know if you want go –

Commissioner Shea: Yeah, maybe we can – we’ll coordinate with them, we’ll do that at the end. I’ll start and I’ll kick it to Lori can give her perspective on the homicide rate. But when you look at – we’re up 22 recorded homicides as we sit here tonight – as we sit here today as of midnight last night. Lori will get into the specifics in terms of motives, ages, the method, the methodology, et cetera, are they domestic or not. We’re not seeing significant jumps in those areas. We continue to see a high percentage committed by gangs and gang involvement, whether related or motivated. But really what is driving the increase this year is reclassifications from out of year periods and Lori can expand on that.

Chief Pollock: So like the Commissioner said, every year we do factor in a certain amount of reclassifications, those are murders that weren’t determined at the time and we received the death certificate from the Medical Examiner after a thorough investigation and they turn out to unfortunately be homicides and then we have to count them in the year that we get the death certificate. So we have twice as many this year, twice as many reclassifications as we did last year. So 27 reclassified into this number versus 13 last year, so actual incidents of murder at the end of November was 272 versus 275. We don’t like to talk about it because it’s fairly consistent through the years but this one happens to be – it hasn’t happened since 2006 where you had this many classifications over the year before.

Question: Yes, I see the numbers that Chief Pollock talked about. Teens with guns, teens in gangs, is this something you say you want to address, but how? You know, you see organizations like this in these communities but what is more specific and how do you target – and the instance you just gave of these kids that are throwing rocks. Are kids getting more violent? Or how are you working with that as preventive or proactive?

Commissioner Shea: Sure and let me just, before I get specifically on the juvenile aspect, to the greater murder number. You know, when you factor in the reclassifications and on incidents that actually occurred this year were slightly down, but that reclassification number, that would have fallen to last year to be fair. But when you examine what we’re seeing lately, we’ve had, you know, myself, Terry, Rodney, Fausto to degree, Lori getting ready for CompStat, and what we’ve seen – number one, we’ve seen a couple incidents with high numbers of people killed, which is also inflating the number when you think back to the gambling den in Brooklyn, when you think back to a couple domestic incidents with multiple people killed. But very troubling, we’ve seen a couple incidents and this is from our lens when we’re working, how do we keep people safe, how do we prevent people from being victimized, and we’ve seen a couple incidents, right here in this borough recently. Just this week our regional fugitive task force apprehended an individual, a parolee, out on parole for violence offense, kills one person and then several months later kills a second person. That’s two homicides right there that you would like to think hopefully could have been prevented. We have an incident recently, you know Terry, do you want to get into the 4-0 incident with five people shot?

Chief Monahan: Again, we’re looking at that and it’s important that we intercede with these youth early on. Two incidents in the Bronx recently, one just a few blocks over here, 176th Street, a homicide, Devacchie Cole does the homicide, 17-year-old, numerous previous arrests prior to committing this homicide. We want to intercede with him before he gets to the point to pulling a gun and actually shooting someone. Same one with the Amari Rolle, who we are looking for, for the five people shot the day before Thanksgiving – previous gun collar just back in July. We have to come up with a program, that’s what we’re working on, how do we catch these individuals that are back out on the street after doing it? How do we intercede in their lives so they are not pulling that gun out again and shooting up a block, so that’s what this strategy is all going to be about.

Commissioner Shea: And to the point, really, on the juveniles – you know, Lori touched on it. It’s concerning to me when you see some of the robbery numbers that we’ve seen. We’ve been very successful in recent years in really pushing down that robbery number, and when you look historically on where the number’s now, they’re very good, but we don’t want to see a single person robbed. It’s a traumatic experience, whether you’re a young child getting out of school robbed, or you’re store owner, or you’re a woman getting off the train, walking home, and robbed. So we take these crimes very seriously, and we appreciate the historic low level that we’re at now, but we don’t want to give back an inch, so how do we engage, how do we dissect, this is something that, you know, I’m going to be calling on Rodney, Rodney if you want in a second just to talk about maybe the robbery issue from your lens. But, you know, where are they occurring, who’s involved in them, we are definitely seeing more involvement with juveniles in terms of robberies recently and that gets right – not always gun point – but that gets right into where is this occurring, what neighborhoods are they coming from, what do we know about them? What schools do they go to?  How do we give them a better option? How do we give them better things to do?  How do we provide better role models?  And that’s internally and externally I believe. I’ve already had discussions recently in the last week with some – and I will not tease this out too much – but with some pretty well known people. Hey, what do you want to do? How are you going to help in terms of being a role model for New York kids? So I think the future is bright, we’ll have more to announce as we go forward, but Rodney want to just talk on what you see from both the patrol and the detective side?

Chief of Detectives Rodney Harrison: Yeah. So we have some concerns of – throughout the city – the main issues that we’re seeing them is in Lower Manhattan as well as the northern part of Manhattan, and I think it’s important that we get the neighborhood coordination officers plugged in a lot more with the community organizations, the community partners, to see if we could find a direction for these kids, to see if we can channel them out of these problematic crews and get them off the streets and make sure they are going to schools and make sure that they are learning a skill set. So this is something that is going to be passed over to Fausto but I’m going to make sure, even in my new assignment, that this is something that’s going to be addressed regarding having that relationship with the youth and making sure that we put ownership with the neighborhood coordination officers and making sure that they’re engaged in these kids that maybe heading down the wrong direction.

Commissioner Shea: Fausto, just from your perspective?

Chief of Patrol Fausto Pichardo: Sure, so I have the distinct honor of serving at a time in this agency where I have a few individuals and the very rare opportunity in this organization where down the hallway in either direction I have two predecessors that have served as the Chief of Patrol. And as we turn the corner and the end of year looking to 2020, we have to look at mathematics in my eyes. It’s a simple mathematical formula. When you cultivate and take our dedicated NYPD police officers, our youth officers who are going to play a bigger role as we move forward into 2020, our neighborhood coordination officers, our steady sector officers, neighborhood policing as a philosophy plus the community, our NGO’s, our CBO’s – community based organizations – our electeds. We have to get everybody together. We all have the same mission. We want to make sure we cultivate and develop our youth and power them so they don’t have to seek elsewhere for that power and I think we’re going to have to be successful.

Commissioner Shea: I think now you see why I had such an easy selection for Chief of Patrol. I mean we truly believe this, when you look at – you know, how do – what does the NYPD do about this problem? We think that’s the wrong way to look at it. It’s what does New York City do about this problem and we’ll take the lead and how do we work with all different partners. We haven’t talked a lot about clergy but I’ve been to numerous churches in the last couple of weeks and I think they can play a pivotal role with their connection to families, with their connection to the different communities, they already have set up right in their facilities a pipeline of getting kids onto the right path. So how do we tap into that? I think there’s really endless possibilities here and I’m really confident that with Fausto like taking the lead on this, along with some new members that will be announced shortly. He hit on something that I hadn’t said today but I’ve been battling around in internal discussions for the last two weeks. You know, how have we done it historically? How do our youth officers get deployed? What do they do on a daily basis? Do they deal with the good kids? Do they deal with the kids that are arrested? Do they deal with kids somewhere in the middle? And really we’re going to wipe the slate clean and really try to reinvigorate how we direct kids in New York City. Working with them, not when it’s too late and we’re taking out handcuffs. Yes, sir?

Question: Just a question about the classification of crime because I thought I heard iPhones mentioned in the context of grand larceny – are all smart phone thefts considered a grand larceny or do they have to be—

Commissioner Shea: Anything taken from the person is going to be a grand larceny. If I put – then if it’s not taken from the person then it would default to what’s the property value of that crime? So anything over a $1,000 taken whether it’s on the person or not, would automatically be a grand larceny. Anytime you hear of a phone snatch, it’s at a minimum going to be a grand larceny, sometimes a robbery.

Question: Is that because of the cost of smart phones? I mean if someone had like a flip phone?

Commissioner Shea: No, if you take an empty pocketbook from somebody, that’s on somebody’s shoulder and rip it away, that’s a grand larceny because its property removed from the person. In the back?

Question: Commissioner, I don’t know if you and then maybe someone else may want to speak to this but historically crime continues to go down and still the safest big city but next month with the criminal justice reforms—

Commissioner Shea: Just before we hit that, any last on topic? Tony?

Question: Yeah, Chief Pollock, on the re-classes, how old are some of those re-classes [inaudible] a year, two years, 30 years, 10 years?

Chief Pollock: We had 15 from last year and we had one that went back as far as ’87. We had one from 1990 – just anecdotally – someone who was shot during gunpoint robbery in the 9-0 and succumbed to those injuries this month so – the month of November – so that’s – it’s scattered throughout but the biggest bulk is from 15 from last year.

Unknown: Last on crime, okay we’ll move onto [inaudible] –

Commissioner Shea: Okay, I owe you an answer, alright. Can you just re-summarize please?

Question: Okay, your NCO officers are being trained for what is going to happen come January 1st, with the new State laws –

Commissioner Shea: Okay, I got it. I remember it now. Yup.

Question: Their talking about the perpetrator being at the scene, including being inside a person’s home – okay go ahead.

Commissioner Shea: Ernie do you want to jump in at some point? So I’ll just tee it off and then Deputy Commissioner of Legal Matters Ernie Hart can speak a little bit about, but, this is sweeping criminal justice reform and I want to frame it the right way because a lot is being said and I think that’s a good thing, recently. We are for reform. We just have some very slight concerns about some parts of this reform that’s coming. Why? Because we’re worried about public safety but overall we welcome and I think in the last couple years we’ve been a part of great reform that’s really transformed how we police New York City. With this sweeping reform that’s set to take effect, we’ve been preparing and planning for this for many months now. You mentioned training to NCOs and if there’s an issue, we’ll revisit and make sure the training, you know, is better received. We’re training not just NCOs, we’re training executives, I was at the Police Academy yesterday speaking to a group of new captains and a new group of sergeants and lieutenants that are just within the last month promoted and how was the training and then talking to Freddie Grover who is leading up the training at the Police Academy and what are they being taught on, on a myriad of topics, including the criminal justice reform. We’ve had detectives in, ITB has been working on the technical aspect of how do we transfer some of these records. So, we are out there, we feel well prepared as an agency in terms of being ready for this. And if there are any bumps in road we will learn from it and quickly. We think we are in a good position to abide by the coming changes. Now Ernie if you have anything, you know specifically – I heard something about crime scenes mentioned, maybe you can expand on that.

Deputy Commissioner of Legal Matters Ernest F. Hart, NYPD: The whole thrust of the discovery reform was to get discovery to the defense more quickly. And what the Legislature did was provide access to that evidence a bit more quickly. It’s not that people can go into or the accused, the suspects can go into a person’s home. It’s that they have access to material. If there is any issue about whether or not a suspect can go to a scene of whatever, it is up to the district attorney to get a restraining order, an order of protection, it’s built into the law. The law is focused on getting information to the defense, not access to victims, not access to victim’s homes. That’s not the purpose of the law. We are doing training, legal is doing training, we are doing training not only with our own members in the Police Department, we are also doing training with district attorney’s offices. We have been working on this for several months. We’ve been working with the Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice, we’ve been working with the DAs so we are well on our way to be ready on January 1.

Question: This is a follow up to the criminal justice reform question. So there is a Long Island assemblyman who has been tweeting about the fact that when criminal justice reform comes into effect, the only penalty that police officers can give somebody involved in a forcible touching incident is a DAT, a desk appearance ticket. And he included a tweet of somebody on the subway just the other day who is touching somebody in an inappropriate way. Do you think that a desk appearance ticket is the proper penalty for somebody involved in a forcible touching incident?

Commissioner Shea: Yeah. So what the law does is, it doesn’t change the penalty. The penalty is it’s still an A misdemeanor and the penalty is punishable by up to a year in jail. What it does do is change the process from time of arrest to time they eventually go before an arraignment and then have the case adjudicated. And they are changing now with this and many other crimes, they are legislatively putting into effect when the police must issue somebody a desk appearance ticket. So it won’t change the penalty, it will change from time of arrest, who’s eligible to be remanded, kept in jail when they must go to the judge. Do I have concerns about parts of it? Yes I do. I mean I have spoken on this many times in terms of, I think we have done some pretty good work and probably more to do in terms of how we police this city. I wish that I said this, I wish there was a magic blueprint that told you here’s the exact perfect way to do it. We’ve made mistakes in the past. I think that we’ve made some improvements in recent years on the precision piece with many of the people up here with me in terms of keeping New York safe with a softer touch. We truly believe with the precision policing piece and the neighborhood policing as they come together that we can do things differently here and be a model for all of the country on how to police the most efficient manner that doesn’t give up public safety.

But part of that is, when you have the data, when you have the intelligence, when you know who the real drivers of crime are, we’d like to have those individuals, that small number, dealt with a little differently than giving desk appearance tickets and released right out to the crowd. There are times when maybe supervised release can be appropriate for them too. But we just have to make sure that as we tackle these tough issues, we don’t create more victims. That’s my concern.

Question: Are you concerned in this case that you could create more victims, because somebody involved in a forcible touching incident gets a DAT, can walk down –

Commissioner Shea: Absolutely I am concerned.

Question – the platform and do it again in like five minutes?

Commissioner Shea: Absolutely. And this is I think at the heart of what everyone up here has said. We need some common sense approaches too, to the reform. The reform is good. And it can be much better with small tweaks to it where we allow a judge for example, to have access to records and say that person has done crime X three times, gotten arrested. Why am I going to put him on the street to do it to a fourth victim? There are going to be times, and not just for sexual offenses, think of a robbery, we are going to have situations where individuals, and we have the data to back it up, go out and do repeated robberies, caught, released, caught,  released. Those are the small types of issues, concerns that we’d like to correct. And then I think that will be a win-win for everybody involved. Rocco?

Question: Commissioner, two part question. One to follow up on Marcia, there was talk earlier this year of trying to ban from the subway system those arrested or convicted of repeat sexual offenses. Where does that stand and regarding concerns raised by victims and victim advocate groups, concerns they have about criminal justice reform, I assume you have spoken to some of these groups? Can you talk a little bit about that dialogue?

Commissioner Shea: Yeah, I’m going to let Eddie, our resident expert on all issues transit handle that one.

Chief of Transit Edward Delatorre, NYPD: Yeah so I have talked about people from time to time, throughout the course of the year, that real predators that come into the system constantly. They get held on bail for two or three months, as soon as they are out, my teams are looking for them again, we spot them multiple times in a course of a month or two, they spot us, we don’t catch them and finally we catch them once again live in the act, often forcible touching and other types of low level sex crimes. Right now there is legislation up in Albany and we are hopeful that when the Legislature comes back in, I know the Senate has passed it. We are hopeful that the Assembly will take a good look at it and put it to vote. I think that will empower the MTA to actually ban which is where we need to go. There’s no doubt in my mind, like that video you talked about, that 18-year-old girl who had that done to her, for the rest of her life, she’s going to worry, and feel nervous standing on a platform that somebody might come up and do that again, especially knowing that that guy has free access to the subway system after he did that. And even if we catch him and arrest, he will still have access unless the State empowers the MTA to put a ban in effect.

Question: Do you think that giving a DAT is something that you should worry about or you should ask the legislature to change? Especially in cases of forcible touching or you know sexual crimes?

Chief Delatorre: I agree with the Commissioner. The judges on the bench have to have a little discretion to look at the totally of the circumstances, to weigh just how much somebody is a danger to the people of the city when they are reviewing these cases.

Question: Commissioner, the second part of that question about any talks that you’ve had with victims advocacy groups about their concerns beginning on January 1?

Commissioner Shea: Not as of yet Rocco, specifically with advocacy groups. In the past I have on some of this topic but I will keep those private. I think I would summarize it as you know, we all have concerns in terms of, and we all, not just myself and the team that’s sitting up here and not just the advocacy groups. I believe that all New Yorkers want the same thing. I think it’s important to talk about this, I think this is healthy. I think it’s healthy, I think that the reform is well intentioned, and overall good. But I think that at the same time, slight improvements that could be made that could really take a well-intentioned bill and not compromise public safety. Yes sir?

Question: The use of force reports show that arrests are down 14 percent, but the use of force during arrests, total, you know the overall number ticked up, why?

Commissioner Shea: Yeah, Ben you want to handle that one?

Deputy Commissioner Tucker: I don’t know that you can talk about why necessarily, I mean we are talking about 94 percent of that number that’s up, it represents, you know, use of physical force, which is the lowest level of our force policy. So level ones if you will. We all know that the reality of police work is police officers charged with making arrests when it’s necessary and not everyone is interested in coming quietly and so compliance is important. And when we can get it, it’s good. When we can’t get it we use necessary force to do that. But when that force is used as I just mentioned, 94 percent of that 7,879 in 2018 represents the lowest level of force necessary. So that’s putting handcuffs on someone, you put their arms behind their back, whatever it takes, but always with a view with doing and using the minimal amount of force.

Commissioner Shea: Dean?

Question: The CCRB released a report today saying they recommend more training or better training for officers when it comes to Tasers, and also a better record of when these Tasers are being used. Your reaction to that, maybe the Mayor’s reaction as well because obviously Tasers are less force than a gun but there’s been a lot of concern about Taser use.

Commissioner Shea: I think – and we have been in contact. I’ve read the summaries of the report. I think that the overall takeaways from the report is when you look at, there’s a couple of different issues. When you look at the uses of Tasers in the myriad, as Ben said, of you know everything from gaining compliance to trying to mitigate somebody that is not being totally compliant to eventually escalating that. When you look at the use of Tasers I think the number was .39 of one percent. It’s a minimal occurrence rate or for when we actually deploy Tasers. And then there was some data in there that maybe was a little preliminary in how it was assessed. Because if you think back historically on who in the NYPD used Tasers, it was all supervisors. In recent years, we’ve rolled out thousands, literally thousands and thousands and thousands of Tasers, combining that with the low usage rate – I think that we are in a good position in terms of our training, there was an issue raised in the report about Taser, using a Taser on somebody fleeing. That’s certainly not what is taught. I am confident that the current training is adequate. But what the report kind of could expand a little better perhaps on is, it’s also not an absolute that it can’t be done. It’s the totally of the circumstances. And that’s what we teach our members. You are not going to normally, in the normal the course of action tase somebody that says I am going to run away. But what if that person just killed somebody or raped somebody, maybe it is a appropriate. So it’s the totality of the circumstances. Overall I am confident in our use, training and roll out of the Tasers.

Mayor: I would only add that the – look, oversight and perspective is helpful. And it’s good question to ask, are we aligned in all of our different policies? And I think the basic answer is yes but there is still more work to do. But I would focus on two things. One, de-escalation is the dominant approach now. It has been for years. The retraining of the entire police force, I don’t think ever was sort of fully felt – the meaning of that was not fully felt because there are so many other things happening. But if you really stop and think about it and look around this country, retraining an entire police force and then continually reinforcing that training in the name of de-escalation, is a seismic change. That’s the dominant piece. But I would just say, as a civilian, having Tasers available as a tool much more is also good. So I see sort of the hierarchy just to put it in my own simple, civilian terms, de-escalation first, but Tasers are a tool, they are much more available as a tool then they used to be in the past. That’s a good thing. Getting the training calibrated is something that’s an ongoing effort.

Question: Commissioner, you answered my question.

Commissioner Shea: [Inaudible]

Question: The DOI, sir, released this report about the Special Onetime Assistance Program –

Mayor: Can we do that after? That’s going to be off-topic.

Question: [Inaudible]

Mayor: No, we’re in police off-topic, we’ll go to other off-topic.

Commissioner Shea: Julia?

Question: My bad.

Mayor: That’s okay.

Question: Back to the Tasers, how does a Taser go off accidentally? The report indicated that one in four go off accidentally. How does that happen? Why does that happen?

Commissioner Shea: Well, it does happen. Part of the Tasers – Do you want to talk on it Terry? Testing it –

Chief Monahan: Part of it, especially when we first started rolling out the Tasers, you’re supposed to test it before you take it out to make sure there is spark, that the battery is charged. Sometimes they don’t remove the cartridge. So a lot of times it happens in a station house. It’s not – you know, if you read the report, it’s not accidentally shooting it at somebody. Most of them, 95 percent of them took place in a station house when they were testing it.

Question: And that has to be recorded every time it goes off?

Chief Monahan: Every time it goes off, absolutely.

Question: Do you have anything on the Brooklyn Tech threat?

Commissioner Shea: I’m sorry?

Chief Monahan: Brooklyn Tech.

Question: Brooklyn Tech.

Chief Monahan: Yeah, so at around 6:30 this morning, the principal over at Brooklyn Tech at 29 Fort Greene Place received an email saying that there was a bomb within the school somewhere and that there was an armed person within the school. At that time there were around 300 students in the school. A decision was made to evacuate those 300 students down to LIU University and our CRC responded. Any additional students that started to show up were sent down to LIU. Our Emergency Service, along with CRC did a complete search of the building. It’s a nine story building. So we did it. We used five canines going through the store. Nothing was in there. At around I think it was 10:30 or so 11:00 o’clock the students all returned into the school. Email threat from a hashtag from that we know, that’s been utilized around the city and around the country before calling what would be called swatting type calls, so we’ve – currently our Intel is working and investigating through the IP address and everything on that. And we’re hoping to make an arrest, because listen – this caused a major inconvenience. You’re talking about 5,500 students that were kept out of school until around 11:00 o’clock this morning. So we are going to be intently to identify the person who sent in this hoax threat and hopefully make an arrest.

Question: Commissioner, I know we’ve got a lot of issues here, but I did want to just repeat my question from earlier about – if we could hear from Rodney and Fausto about the significance of their appointments to the positions?

Commissioner Shea: Let’s start on my left. Fausto –

Chief Pichardo: I mean, I’m speechless. You would think from – but I’ll say a few words.

Mayor: I don’t believe.

Commissioner Shea: That’s not good.

[Laughter]

Mayor: Fausto is lying to you everybody, he’s rarely speechless.

Chief Pichardo: It’s remarkable, both personally and certainly professionally. Where I came from – I was born in the Dominican Republic, and came here at an early age. Just a kid from the Lower East Side, went to the public school system. Certainly saw what the city looked like in the 80’s and early 90’s, I recalled distinctively one summer on my block eight murders in the span of three weeks. And this is not the New York of yester year. What we see today is through all the sacrifices and the dedication of our police officers, the involvement of the community, the city’s come a long way. And I’m just elated to serve in this position, to work side by side with the many dedicated men and women on patrol. I look forward in the coming days to going out to all the precincts in the city, meet the community certainly, to collectively focus on working together and continue to build on neighborhood policing. Don’t lose sight, we’ve been at this four years, and I know I said I at a loss for words, but –

[Laughter]

Mayor: We hate to see it when you’re not at a loss for words.

[Laughter]

Chief Pichardo: Okay, I’m done.

[Laughter]

Commissioner Shea: Let me just say, and you can continue Fausto but I put a call in yesterday to Fausto come up and see me in the office. So, I don’t know if he was nervous. I think he might have been nervous when he first walked in, when he walked out I think I need chiropractor. He grabbed me and hugged me so hard. So, Fausto I could not be happier for you. I know you’re going to do a phenomenal job.

Chief Pichardo: Thank you, thank you.

Mayor: Now, from South East Queens –

Chief Harrison: So, first if I – if you don’t mind I’d like to use this platform to thank the Mayor. His support to this organization – I don’t think he gets the credit that he deserves. So, I want to take this opportunity and thank the Mayor. I also want to thank Commissioner Shea, Commissioner Tucker. I call him my mentor, but he also breaks my chops all the time, Chief Monahan for allowing me this opportunity. So, in essence I am humbled. I am very grateful, but I am also excited. It’s bitter sweet. I loved being the Chief of Patrol. We did some great things, seen some of the great work that the Anti-Crime officers did regarding getting some of the guns off the street and keeping the city safer, from the neighborhood coordination officers that were building relationships to the steady sector cops, how they just responded to the day in and day out jobs. But once I became an executive this is something that I really admired. The Chief of Detectives is something that I always had passion about. If anybody has an opportunity, look at my background. I walked these shoes a lot of years of my career. So I’m looking forward to continuing precision policing. I am looking forward to continuing the great work that the investigators are doing throughout the city and making sure that people that victimize New Yorkers are brought to justice. So I am grateful, I’m looking forward to this opportunity.

Mayor: But you’ve got to shout out your neighbored. Tell people where you come from.

[Laughter]

Chief Harrison: So, yeah, I am from South Jamaica, Queens. I lived there for 26 years. I grew up in the area where there were some issues, and there was a recent shooting that happened there with Amir Griffin that kind of hit home for me. I know the investigation is pending right now, but that community has changed around, and just seeing some of the violence that I had to see growing up and now where they’re at now with the great work that they’re doing in the 1-13 and the investigative units to make that a safer community to me is remarkable. So, I am a New Yorker, I am proud to be a part of this phenomenal organization and I’m looking forward to working with everybody here in the dais, and the rest of the men and women in the investigative units. Thank you.

Mayor: Well done.

Commissioner Shea: Tony.

Question: Circling back to criminal justice reform, specifically the discovery [inaudible]. Some of the upstate crime labs from what I’m hearing are really distressed about being able to mechanically [inaudible] the time when it’s some of these protocols, because the labs just done have the equipment, they don’t have the money to get the equipment, and they’re really worried about this. What’s the NYPD’s Crime Lab situation now [inaudible]?

Mayor: Can I just start with one piece as you – on this before you jump in. Our – our fellow New Yorkers upstate, and around the state really have a valid concern here. This is a huge unfunded mandate from Albany. So, again, I want to echo what Commissioner Shea said. This reform is in many ways the right thing to do and represents important progress. We’ve always said that there were some things that needed to be addressed in it. And I hope they will be in the next session. But what we haven’t talked about as much is the fact that Albany gave a huge unfunded mandate to this city. It’s going to cost us tens of millions of dollars, could easily get up toward $100 million. But it’s even harder for our colleagues in the suburbs and upstate many of whom literally will not have a way to afford it. And that’s something that has to be addressed too by Albany, because you just can’t ask people to do something they have no resources to do. Go ahead.

Commissioner Shea: Yeah, Tony, thanks for that question. I tell you when I first really started to dig and peel back the bill, one of the first thoughts that I had being completely honest – I had some concerns and I think I voiced them, and they’re prioritized. But one of the first things I thought of was you have to kind of look around New York City here. I mean we have a pretty well run machine – always, always can do better, always new obstacles. But my first thought was what are the smaller departments are going to do. We can – we’re well-resourced when you look at the man power, when you look at the resources that we get from City Hall. What is a 10 men department going to do, what is the Albany Police Department or Utica – I actually, that was the first thing I thought when I started to learn about this bill and particularly to some – when you think of Marcia’s questions about people getting arrested and immediate release back. We have a pretty solid system here on how to keep New Yorkers safe and always looking to do better but that’s what my first thoughts were. Some of these departments in my opinion are going to have a pretty tough time. And that’s not even talking about the money.

To the Lab question, it was probably one of the furthest things from my mind when I first started hearing about – the danger was first and foremost. The discovery piece which is tied but not necessarily to the Lab – I just – the irony on me was not lost at the time. That – Fausto, Rodney, Terry to my left have done so much work, Jimmy O’Neill who just left – all of us, Lori, myself on trying to change policing and reaching out to people. Man, I think it would be an awful shame if some parts of this law cause New Yorkers to be less hesitant to call the police. And I think that needs to be looked at to in terms of how are cases built, how does somebody interact with the police? Am I going to be fearful to interact with the police now, because my information is going to be immediately turned over to somebody dangerous on my block? These are real problems, and this is – I think it’s good that we’re talking about it. And I think it’s good that we shine a light on it, not the police department. You’re seeing some elected officials talking, you’re seeing prosecutors, you’re talking about advocates. We’ll get through it, and we’re resilient and we’ll ultimately at the end of the day we’ll do the right thing and we’ll keep New Yorkers safe.

To the Lab piece – to the Lab piece you have to really peel it back and really look at what is in that bill. I think there’s – when I sat down with our legal bureau and our Manny Katranakis as Chief Katranakis as many of you know him at the Lab. And just the volume of information that has to be turned over for simple arrest. It’s pretty – that would probably Devora be a separate new conference in terms of the thoughts behind some of it. Every machine that comes into contact with every employee, every history of every employee going back years and years. The machine, where did it come from? It seems a little excessive at times. But I’ll leave that for others to debate.

Commissioner Shea: I’m not used to calling on people –

[Laughter]

Question: [Inaudible] shooting in the [inaudible] precinct in which a woman was shot inside her home, bullet came through the window. Do they believe it was a stray bullet shooting or do we think there was any gang involvement [inaudible] –

Commissioner Shea: At this point it’s pretty preliminary from last night. We have a group of individuals hanging out outside. We are speaking to some individuals as we speak. With the extremely preliminary information that we have thus far, it does appear likely that there’s gang involvement and everything that we have at this point appears that the individual that was shot which is very concerning was not involved in any way, in her apartment and a bullet came through the window. She is expected to survive but obviously, you know, myself, Rodney, Terry, Lori – this will be a top priority to bring those responsible to justice. In the back?

Question: [Inaudible] the Tasers, what the CCRB data and your own use-of-force date show a large number of people being Tasered during a mental health crisis, EDPs. I know you said that you emphasize de-escalation. I’m just wondering if you can speak to what kind of circumstances officers are encountering with these kind of calls that make the use of a Taser necessary and you know I know the Mayor announced clinicians going on certain calls, are there are other things being discussed in terms of how to respond to these mental health calls [inaudible] –

Commissioner Monahan: Obviously, when you look at these incidents, all you have to do – there’s a video not that long ago where an individual walked into the 7-5 Precinct, I think everyone in the media had it, with a knife, where our cops were able to circle at him. Instead of using deadly physical force, trying to talk to him, used the Taser, took him down, and easily was able to remove the knife from him. That’s we train – these are incidents where a lot of times you may not get a conversation, you want to be able to get that person unarmed as quickly as possible, get them into custody, and get them the help that they need.

Commissioner Shea: Before they hurt not only our police officers but themselves. Last one?

Question: Do you guys have any information on a fatal explosion in the Bronx?

Chief Monahan: Yeah, it was at an Amtrak location in the 4-9 Precinct. A worker there was working on an electrical line. It wasn’t powered off by a transformer. He hit the electrical line and he’s now deceased.

Unknown: Okay, thanks everyone.

Commissioner Shea: Okay, thank you.

[...]

Mayor: Okay, fire away. Way back?

Question: Okay, I didn’t get to ask my previous question. So, it’s still sort of police related. Two thin blue line flags were seen on NYPD properties. So, I have two questions – one, I’m just wondering what the rules are, if precincts are allowed to fly that symbol, or post other symbols? And then, Mr. Mayor, I’m just wondering, you suggested that the photos – the images may have been photoshopped. I’m wondering why you suggested that and [inaudible] more information [inaudible] response.

Mayor: I’ll start and turn to the Commissioner on the policy. No, I said – and I want to be really clear about this, I’m constantly being asked to judge something before we even know if it’s real or not. And that’s what I tried to make a point about. It wasn’t about this particular incident. It’s if someone says there’s an allegation of something, somewhere, because of an image someone saw, I’m like, I’m not responding to that until it’s confirmed exactly what it was by proper authorities. It’s just not responsible to comment on something until you know the facts. That’s all I was trying to say. Go ahead.

Commissioner Shea: So, when you look at – we’re a paramilitary organization. There’s rules and regulations in terms of how exactly to fly the American flag and – sunset, sunrise, when it’s going to be taken down. That’s the flag that I want to see flown at every police department facility. We’ll handle that at a command level. My understanding is they’ve already been taken down and they shouldn’t be up.

Mayor: Dave?

Question: Mayor, on the DOI investigation about homeless folks being moved to other cities. I want to get your reaction on that but also specifically earlier this week on NY1, you sounded like, let’s all work together and then no sooner within 24 hours your office came out accusing East Orange, Newark, and some of the other towns of taking a page out of the Trump playbook and trying to ostracize these homeless people –

Mayor: Well –

Question: Why did you say on one hand let’s make peace and then you do something like?

Mayor: No, Dave, let’s put this in perspective. I appreciate the question but let me put it in perspective. First of all, this is my particular statement for my colleague, Mayor Baraka, who I have had a good relationship with. But my point to Mayor Baraka is, ‘There but for the grace of God go you or I.’ This is about helping working people, working poor people who ended up homeless. The whole idea of this initiative, of SOTA, was to help working people who simply through no fault of their own could not make ends meet and ended up in shelter and needed a place to live. And we tried to get people to the best possible option available rather than have them languish in a shelter.

And that should be my concern, Mayor Baraka’s concern, every public servant’s concern to help people regardless of where they come from, just help people have a home. And I thought that’s the way we were trying to work with it. I had spoken to him several times over the last year. Our teams were in constant contact. But when it goes from what appears to be an actual dialogue to the City of Newark, with no warning whatsoever filing a lawsuit that was really a derogatory lawsuit. It was a statement against working poor people. When you read what they’re suggesting, it’s entirely disrespectful to these people who are just trying to make ends meet and live their lives. And I was deeply surprised and I think – I commend the Daily News for their editorial today. It said it better than I could say it. You know, how could any city turn its back on people in need? It just doesn’t make sense. So, that accounts for – your question again is fair but I thought we were all trying to work together on something that’s everybody’s problem.

Question: [Inaudible] today’s report from the DOI that the City didn’t follow through and a lot of these apartments were really [inaudible] –

Mayor: Well, no as I understand that report – and I appreciate DOI having done that report. That’s exactly what they’re here for and our Social Services Department, in fact, not only cooperated but reported some of the specific instances that DOI followed up on. They alerted DOI to the problem. When this new initiative was put together about two years ago it was absolutely the right intention. We would rather have human beings in a home than in shelter. I think everyone here in this room, if I said to you let’s just beginning at the beginning. Let’s imagine any one of you was in shelter – and by the way, we know, it happens to every kind of person regardless of background, income, there’s all sorts of people that have ended up in shelter for all sorts of reasons – and you had an opportunity to be in an apartment and get your life back together. I think everyone would say of course I’d rather be in an apartment than in a shelter. That’s what we were trying to achieve. It was a new program.

Now, as with many new things, was it perfect on day one? Absolutely not and there were mistakes for sure and those mistakes were caught and acted on. And I think that one of the things that DOI notes is that changes were made and DOI offered recommendations and they were followed. So, the intention of this initiative is very decent, very humane, and there has been a recognition that has to be made better all the time. And in fact in our conversation with Newark, the whole discussion was how do we make it better and everyone was proceeding with that understanding. That’s why I find these actions so confusing. Please?

Question: Just following up – I’m reading the DOI report. It actually is in line with a lot of what was in the Mayor of Newark’s lawsuit against the City. They have an affidavit from a resident in the lawsuit who said that she was placed in an apartment that then didn’t have heat and electricity. DHS wasn’t getting back to her. A lot of what’s in the DOI report – vermin-infested apartments, people who are assigned to look through the apartments actually just stayed in their car [inaudible]. So, why, I guess knowing – and obviously you’re independent from DOI but why come in so hot against the City of Newark, call it derogatory, when in fact former New York City residents were being placed in absolutely squalid conditions in Newark because of a lack of oversight [inaudible] –

Mayor: Again, I’m just going to say to you, here was an initiative to get people to homes. It was an initiative that got a lot of people to a better situation. There were obviously some things that needed to be done better and they have been changed. And in the end, the question really is, okay, if we’re trying to make sure that people get housing, this was us constructively trying to act on that and paying for it by the way. If the question is, are there the proper standards being kept for buildings in Newark, well that also begins the discussion about Newark’s own responsibility to its own people because it’s not that those buildings are occupied by New Yorkers, they are occupied by Newark residents.
So, again, I’m coming from a place that if there was a concern and there was an ongoing dialogue, why initiate a lawsuit that suggests very clearly that working poor people – and again the program is only for people who have a source of income – that they are not going to be allowed to rent an apartment that’s available, that’s not available someplace else. This is where they can get an apartment and the City of Newark is trying to tell them they can’t have a place to live. That doesn’t conform with American law or American values. Please?

Question: [Inaudible] DOI report found was the flaw was in the program itself because they were paying upfront to who they call unscrupulous landlords, getting money upfront then not having the oversight and the follow up to see [inaudible] landlords are getting paid and then there was also a flaw in the paperwork and the documentation that actually would prohibit these landlords from actually getting prosecuted for violating some of these rules. So, I guess that seems to be a flaw with the City not with the [inaudible] –

Mayor: Again, I come back to the beginning. If the buildings in your jurisdiction, you have a responsibility for the health and safety of the building. That’s true everywhere, right. So, again, physician heal thyself. If Newark is saying these buildings are not acceptable places for people to live, why is Newark not doing anything about it? Second, you’re talking about individual instances and I take those seriously, and in fact a lot of changes have been made to improve that program but we do know a substantial number of people got housing and were able to continue with their lives and get out of shelter, which again, should be everyone’s concern. Please? Hold on, hold on, hold on.

Question: [Inaudible]

Mayor: Hey, Emma, how are you?

Question: I wanted to ask about Paid Time Off because it looks like the Council is not going to approve that this year, and I wanted to find out from you – are you disappointed and what does this say about sort of the future of your relationship with the Council as you try to get things done in the last two years?

Mayor: I am confident they will pass the bill based on the conversations that I’ve had with the Speaker and with members of the Council. The timing will be – there’s obviously been a lot going on. It will be when it works for their calendar. I think it will be relatively soon but there is no disagreement on the fundamentals here and I literally have not heard anyone on the Council side say they disagree with making sure that a million New Yorkers who have no guaranteed time off in a year will finally get time off for themselves and their families. The underlying principle here is as we try to improve the lives of working people, it’s shocking to think that what is a common reality for a lot of people in this room that you can expect every year some time off that’s paid that you can really enjoy with your family or with your friends or for just time for yourself, that there’s literally a million New Yorkers who have no such right, and that has to be addressed. I haven’t heard a single voice in the Council say that’s wrong. There have been real concerns about small business and we’ve had very productive conversations about how to address that. So, I think all the pieces will come together.

Question: Mr. Mayor, back to Katie’s question. Is it not an admission of failure on the City’s behalf that is has to create a program that ships the city’s working poor to Newark to find housing?

Mayor: Again, it is a recognition of realities of a market economy and the laws of this country. Look, I would like to see a federal government that made massive investments in affordable housing so we wouldn’t be in the situation we are in. We don’t have that right now. I would like to see the kinds of investments that would really change peoples’ lives in terms of insuring that more and more people could get better and better paying jobs. We are doing everything we can do in New York City. But we’ve got to deal with the reality, it’s a free market economy the cost of housing has sky rocketed in the last 20 years in this city. And by the way, these two guys right here, are part of the reason why but ironically for a very good reason, because they and their colleges have made the city safer and safer. And that is one of the central reasons why property values have gone up and rents have gone up, is that more and more people want to live here.

But the fact is, if you’ve got someone who through no fault of their own, they are doing their best, they are working, or they have a source of income and they are trying to make ends meet and they can’t. And they end up in our shelter system, and we try of course the SOTA program also tries to place people whenever humanly possible in New York City but everyone knows there is a profound shortage of affordable apartments in New York City. And it’s a regional problem. There are people from all over the region who end up in New York City and vice versa but we are trying to get people a home, that’s the bottom line. Yes.

Question: Mr. Mayor, I wanted to ask you about NYCHA’s hiring of former NYPD Officer Charles Schwarz and just note that what’s kind of unusual about this case is not only involvement in the assault of Abner Louima but the fact that he was already a City employee when he committed his crime I guess, or when he committed perjury. So why does he deserve a second chance to be City employee?

Mayor: The, look first of all, for a lot of people in this room may not have been around for the Louima case it was horrible, it was disgusting and it goes against everything we believe. And those who were involved paid the consequences as they should have. But look, we have to be consistent about our values. If someone has paid their debt to society, they are supposed to go on with their lives. And this induvial paid his debt to society and we do not discriminate against people once that is complete. It’s as simple as that.

Question: Right but one of the criteria that you are allowed to consider is whether someone’s -whether the crime they were in kind of pertains to their duties of the current job. And he was a former NYPD officer who committed perjury, now he is at NYCHA, it’s an organization that has seen specific to repairs, things like fraud and I guess I’m wondering if you see any kind of connection there?

Mayor: It’s a fair question but I would just say to you, all of this was out in the open. Everything that he did was disclosed before he was hired. And I think again, I go back to if you know someone did something wrong but they paid the price for it, and you don’t see any specific evidence that it’s going to happen again, I think that conforms with our entire justice system and how we act on things. We do not assume that something bad is going to happen in the future. That’s just not- you know - it’s not a Napoleonic code. It’s not guilty until proven innocent. And it’s once someone has paid their debts to society, they get an opportunity to go back to their lives. And as I understand there has not been a single problem since his hiring. So it’s as simple as that, yes? How are you doing?

Question: Could you please speak to the charge that some of the homeless families from New York were relocated to other jurisdictions without notice. You might know of course that Union County is mulling the joining the lawsuit, Elizabeth as well. So your problems may be compounded and I have a follow up if you don’t mind.

Mayor: Sure, look I would say to all my colleagues in the different jurisdictions and I am happy to talk to any and all of them, no, what we are doing here is we, as I understand what the folks as Social Services do, is they say to a family here is an apartment that’s available and that family can take it or not take it. And again the goal is to address an ongoing problem of working people or people with a source of income who still can’t find an apartment. I don’t think anyone in this room would say oh just leave people ad nauseam in shelter. That’s not what any of us aspire to. And we are putting a huge amount of resources into creating affordable housing and placing people in affordable housing. I think its 120,000 now have come out of our shelter system and into affordable housing in the last six years. So that’s happening all the time. But there is not a limitless supply of affable housing here. And we are paying the rent. And again there’s been I think a misunderstanding of who these individuals are. They are working people or they are people who have a source of income or they can’t even be in the program to begin with.

Question: I hear you Mayor. On the notice matter. It’s not necessary to give other cities notice?

Mayor: Well again, I think there is a bit of an individual liberty question here. If you are helping an individual to get housing and paying for it, and again there is this very unfair and I will say derogatory again, assumption in the Newark lawsuit that there is something wrong with these people because they are poor. There’s - you know, the suggestion that they are going to need all sorts of other things from Newark. No, that’s just not true. They have a source of income. And if they were to need other support, if they need Medicaid, Newark doesn’t pay for Medicaid for example. So I just, the whole underlying - the whole underlying reality here is somehow to demonize or victimize poor working people. And my attitude is we are trying to address the issue constructively. But if any city said we want to talk it through and this is what Newark did originally. This is why I am so surprised at their current approach. They said we want to talk it through, we want to talk about how to coordinate better, we need some help with something, we would work with them and we will do that for sure. Rich?

Question: So, Mr. Mayor, just on that topic as well. So I guess, what happens? They get the money through a check or something to pay the landlord?

Mayor: No directly to the landlord is my understanding.

Question: So does anybody go out and check out the apartment if they are giving them –

Mayor: Yes. Again, let me – Rich, a very important question. I want to just also not act like I am the expert often every detail of the program. We’ll definitely make sure after that any details on the operations, we will get to you guys, and get the right people to talk to you. But what I can say with assurances is there is an inspection protocol done by either City workers, New York City workers, or nonprofits that New York City already contracts with to provide homeless services. And yeah, if there is a problem or a concern, there’s a protocol to address that problem or concern. So I think, again, I am not going to say with this or any other initiative that it’s perfect but I am going to say it’s been a very good faith effort to pay for what needs to paid for. And to make sure that people have a better circumstance, and if there is any problem we want to address it. And again, this is the underlying reality.

It’s one thing if you are dealing with a city or you know a leader, no we don’t want to address the problems. If there’s problems, I’m saying out loud we do want to address them. But we are also going to fight to defend the right of someone who is struggling to make ends meet that if they can be in an apartment rather than a shelter, I’m going to fight for their right to have that ability. I literally think this is an American values questions and an American law question. You cannot tell a human being they are not allowed to live in your city simply because they are poor. You just can’t do that. And the law is abundantly clear. And if you discriminate, we have a provision in New York City law that bans discrimination against someone because of source income. No one should be discriminated against because they get a check from the government. Or because they are disabled and they have you know, government support. You should never discriminate against someone. By the way State of New Jersey has a similar anti-discrimination law. Go ahead.

Question: Mr. Mayor. I have two SOTA related questions but first is this, given the fact that Newark, Elizabeth, and [inaudible] already filed suit and other New Jersey cities are thinking about filing suit to stop the City from placing families there. And this report from DOI which is sort of scathing - I’m wondering if you think you should discontinue the SOTA program?

Mayor: No

Question: Why?

Mayor: Because we are helping working poor people have a place to live. And we are going to keep doing that and we are going to address the issues in the lawsuit, for sure. Yes? Please.

Question: I have another question if I could just follow up? I guess the question then becomes if you need a place to locate people in other cities or places, are you not admitting failure of your administration to build affordable housing?

Mayor: No, I think if you guys really want to have a serious conversation – you have to decide if you want to or not. This housing crisis in New York City has been going on for decades. The cost of everything has gone through the roof. We have the biggest affordable housing program in our history. Come on. You know, does someone have some new land they want to offer me, to you know – it’s like let’s get real. It’s like we can kid around with the public and get people riled up or we can have a serious, mature conversation about what’s happening in this city. We’ve got 120,000 people out of shelter and into permanent housing in six years. That does not seem to be dwelled on in this discussion. I don’t know why. I would urge you all to look at that a little more.

We have the biggest affordable housing initiative in our history. We are putting vast billions into it. But we have limitations. We have limitations on if we can’t get apartments to rent, if we can’t get new buildings to buy or lease, there’s just a finite amount that we can do in real time. And the problem is Marcia, people need housing now. If I say to oh, I am going to build some new affordable housing five years from now, that doesn’t help you know, a single mom with three kids right now who is in shelter. So let’s be honest about the reality. Meanwhile there are very nearby areas that do have apartments that are available, that are affordable, that are empty, and we are trying to get people a home. But we are trying to do it responsibly. We are paying for it. These are people who do have income. I think that’s the essential point. Go ahead.

Question: Mayor, following up on that, Union County specifically has said that they are considering a lawsuit too, so do you think the same thing that they are having a derogatory attitude to homeless?

Mayor: Absolutely, this is – look again, I know some of you reported on the fact that people from some of those places have ended up in our shelter system. But did you see me calling them out because some of their residents ended up in our shelter system? No. Because if someone is struggling and they end up here, you know what? We are trying to help our fellow human beings. You know, this season of the year, especially, I find this extraordinary that they decide to sue the City of New York to stop working poor people from housing - from getting housing in the middle of the holiday season. I mean, just to think about the ramification of that. Now, if someone, God forbid – there but for the grace of God go we – if someone is here in New York City and they are on our streets, we're going to give them shelter, period. And if there's a way we can get someone to an apartment so they can live a better life, we want to do that, and that's equal opportunity. You know, and, again, I refer back to the Daily News editorial – we are paying for it. We're not saying, oh, you know, dropping people off on the corner in Newark and good luck everyone. We're literally going out finding apartments, inspecting apartments, paying for apartments to try and get people decent life.

Question: [Inaudible] again, I think, you know, what a lot of the reporters were asking and what the public wants to know and what's at the root of this DOI report is that it's a flaw within the Department of Homeless Services. We see it when there are reports of expired food being given out at homeless shelters. We see it when there’s contractors given multi-year contracts despite oversight into what the facilities are like, dangerous conditions. So, I think the question is, should there be more oversight of a deeper look at the Department of Homeless Services, the Department of Social Services, HRA, and the conditions that residents are living in. No one's saying that homeless people shouldn't have shelter, but I think the question is – and it’s at the root of my questions and my colleagues questions – is people are being placed in squalid conditions, the City's paying for it. People, whether it's nonprofits, homeless service providers, or these bad landlords in New Jersey, they're getting paid a lot of money for it. So, I think that's at the root of the question – oversight.

Mayor: Thank you. It's a fair question, but I want to go back to first principles. Again, are we all engaged in magical thinking? Or are we actually living here on this earth? We are dealing with a massive affordability crisis. It cannot be solved by New York City alone. Again, I really appreciate your question, I think it is honest and heartfelt and important, but if we're really going to go deep, then I urge you all go deep. Why in this city of 8.6 million people are we – why do we have a reality where hundreds of thousands of people are spending 50 percent or more of their income on housing? Why do we have 60,000 people in shelter? Because even the most generous city in America with all the strength we have cannot make up for the absence of a federal affordable housing policy. It does not exist. There is no vision from our national government to address the affordable housing crisis not only in New York, in the entire country. And we do not have the resources and we get a very limited amount of support from the State. So, let's start at the beginning. If you're just have only so many options you can turn to, you're going to always have a mismatch here. Second, we've got a lot of folks who need a place, and we all know for years and years – we had the problem right here, the clusters – housing that was not what we wanted it to be, not acceptable, that homeless folks were put in. The City did that for decades. I announced two-and-a-half years ago we are ending their policy. We've converted a number of buildings, we've gotten out of a lot of clusters. We're on a point pretty soon where it will no longer be in those buildings. If we have someone that we're supporting elsewhere, we want it to be quality housing, and that's why there have been inspections, and there is supposed to be a good follow-up regimen. Sometimes it hasn't been good enough, we’re fixing it. To your bigger question, I would argue, the Turning the Tide plan made very clear, by creating 90 new shelters – so it was to get away from the mistakes of the past by getting out of clusters, getting out of those pay-by-the-day hotels, and building 90 new shelters so once and for all the City would have a shelter system that was actually humane. And again, one day we look forward today when we don't need 90 shelters and those buildings will be converted to affordable housing – that’s the vision. No, I would say our Social Services folks, Homeless Services, HRA are actually doing a lot of very good work under very tough circumstances. But that doesn't mean there aren't problems to be addressed. I agree with you that – I only heard of it once recently, honestly, that that bad food was served, but even once is unacceptable. That has to be addressed. Of course things got, in this particular program that we're talking about here, there were some things that need to be done better. But does that mean to me that I think the larger system is missing it’s mission? No, I would argue to you the 120,000 people – and guys, just take in that magnitude – there are – you know, some of the biggest cities in New York State don't have 120,000 people. 120,000 people went into our shelter system and now are in permanent affordable housing. Something therefore is working – all the people who have not gone into shelter because of anti-eviction legal services, for example, that's working – that’s Homeless Services and HRA too. Now, I think they do have a lot of oversight. I think like every agency there are things that need to be better, but I would look at the big picture. 

Question: [Inaudible]

Mayor: Hold on, hold on, hold on – people haven't gotten a chance. I'm coming to you. 

Question: [Inaudible] challenged us –

Mayor: Someone who hasn't gotten a chance and then I'm coming to you. Go ahead. 

Question: He can ask his.

Mayor: Fine.

[Laughter]

Question: [Inaudible] look at the bigger picture, but since the Great Recession, New York City has permitting housing at just two-thirds of the rate that it was before the Great Recession. So, it doesn’t –

Mayor: Could you make that claim a little clearer? I couldn't hear.

Question: The Department of City Planning put out a study in October that said that the metro area and the City are permitting housing at two-thirds of the rate that it was before –

Mayor: The metro area and the City are two different concepts. I have not seen the report so I'm just going to stop you there. 

Question: [Inaudible]

Mayor: The City is that what we have jurisdiction over.

Question: The City is what you have jurisdiction over. If you look at the rate of new housing per job created before the Great Recession, there were 2.2 new units of housing [inaudible] in the city before the Great Recession. After the Great Recession, it’s just half a new unit of housing per job. So, it doesn't City Hall bear some of the responsibility for the housing crunch?

Mayor: I will happily review the report and give you a more detailed response, but I think you're leaving out of the equation that we've added half-a-million new jobs in the last six years. So, I appreciate the vigor of your question, but let's talk about the big picture again. If you've added half-a-million new jobs – something else I have not seen a whole lot of reporting on – of course that ratio is going to change. We've also had the biggest affordable housing initiative in the history of New York City and this place is booming in terms of housing construction. So, I'm happy to look at it and respond in detail, but no it's not that our problem is a lack of market housing construction, because the fact is the market can't solve this problem. Any of you who are free marketeers out there, I think New York City is a tremendous example of the fact that a housing market doesn't function sufficiently in the reality of the American economy today and the government has to intervene and change things. Thank God, we have rent regulation. Thank God, we have public housing. Thank God, we have a massive affordable housing program. But again, it's magical thinking to think that New York City can be this island that can solve all of our problems on our own. What you should be asking is, where is the federal government we knew from 1930s to 1980 – actually, 1933, I should say, to 1980 – that actually was a major partner in affordable housing? That absence over the last 40 years is what's killing us. You’ve got to look at that because that's the heart of the matter. 

Please?

Question: So, changing topics, your staff and you have argued that your official schedules don’t – aren’t really an accurate reflection of your work patterns. So, I'm just curious, why don't you feel the need to tell the public how you're actually spending your time?

Mayor: I think the public – you know, I've have town hall meetings and many, many other opportunities where I get to hear from the public, and I will just tell you honestly – I'm pushing, I think, 70 town hall meetings of various types – I have not gotten a single member of the public who has asked the question, what are you doing with your time? Because in the middle of those two or three hour sessions, we cover, you know, 50 different topics and people can see with their own eyes that if I can address 50 different topics off the top of my head with no notes, they are pretty clear about the fact that I'm working on all these things all the time – same with the call-in show on WNYC, et cetera. If you're Mayor of New York City, you are working on things all the time – it’s phone calls, it's emails, it's everything. It's nonstop. It's literally nonstop. It’s from the first moments in the morning, the first email you look at, until the end of the night. And it’s weekends, it's holidays, it's all the time, it never, ever goes away. And I think New Yorkers actually understand that. That’s the bottom line.

Question: Well, I mean, back on that point, you're comparing your actual scheduled time to a three-and-a-half month period in 2018, and a three-and-a-half month period this year, it’s actually – you had half as much scheduled time on your official schedules. So, I mean, even if you go with the argument that you're constantly working, which I totally understand, you're obviously the Mayor, you are scheduling fewer meetings. And I'm just curious, is that just the reality of a national campaign?

Mayor: Well, the national campaign obviously does take time and energy and that was, in the scheme of things, you know, four months and change. But the fact is, when you are leading all of it, I'm talking to Deputy Mayors, I'm talking to Commissioners, I am giving instructions, I'm getting reports – it is all the time. And I don’t – look, there's a dissonance here and I don't blame anyone for the dissonance, I’ve thought about this a lot. It's really hard to understand if you haven't done it, and there’s only a handful of people who've done it, and I get it. Like, you can look at it and say, oh, it doesn't make sense. Look at the product, look at the things we should be measured by – six years of crime going down, biggest affordable housing program in our history, Pre-K for All, soon to have 3-K for All, more kids going to higher education than ever before, highest graduation rate ever. This in the end – and I really think when I talked to the people that I represent, they concern – their great concern is the product. What does it mean for their lives? They see that a lot is happening. It doesn't mean we're perfect by any stretch, we got a lot to do. But it is not about do you have this meeting or that meeting, it's about the product. 

Question: Just as a follow-up – 

Mayor: I’ve given you a couple, I’ll come back to you. Go ahead.

Question: State Senator Luis Sepulveda is with you on all three of your campaigns. His son, has had three jobs in your administration – first in Parks, then Sanitation, now Department of Education. Senator Sepulveda put up a posting donating 500 turkeys to NYCHA residence across my district. 

Mayor: This is getting complex. 

Question: [Inaudible] photo he is seen standing between a pile of boxed turkeys and a New York City Housing Authority truck, license plate [inaudible]. 

Mayor: I’m not following the question. What’s your punchline here? 

Question: My question is, who is that truck registered to? I mean, who drives that truck? And was Senator Sepulveda using that truck? 

Mayor: I don’t know. We’ll happily have someone follow up. I have no frame of reference. Anyone who hasn't gone? Okay, we're going to go around again. Go ahead, Erin.

Question: Mr. Mayor, you’ve made some very harsh comments recently about former Mayor Bloomberg running for president. Would you support him if he does win –

Mayor: I’ve said whoever the Democratic nominee is I'll support.

Question: And how would you sort of get your mind around to doing that, given –

Mayor: Because even though I fundamentally disagree with him on a whole host of issues, and I think he made a lot of mistakes here, he's better than Donald Trump.

Question: Just a quick [inaudible] question, was anybody at DHS disciplined or removed for falsely certifying [inaudible] properties or –

Mayor: We’ll get back to you on that? I just don't know the answer on that. Go ahead. 

Question: Mr. Mayor, Hart Island is now in the hands of the DOP versus DOC. Could you just talked about the impact that's going to have and what it's going to mean to people trying to pay their respect to the loved ones.

Mayor: Yeah, I have to tell you, I want to really give the City Council credit on this. This is something that Corey Johnson raised to me with real passion, and other Council Members as well, and they really understood the history. I didn't know a lot about Hart Island previously, honestly. There's a very poignant scene in the show Pose about it that, if anyone wants to understand sort of the meaning, it’s worth seeing that scene, because one of the underlying realities here is during the HIV/AIDS epidemic’s most horrible moments, you know, a lot of people died alone and tragically rejected by their families and unfairly rejected and ended up, you know, being buried there and community members were trying to honor them. And you know, it was a very, very tough dynamic. And that history and the history of just, you know, poor people over generations who helped build this city but then got forgotten. It’s a really painful history and reality. And I want to say that, you know, it ended up in the hands of Department of Correction, and I want to be really clear, and I heard this from a lot of folks who were the strongest advocates. They appreciated that even though Department of Correction ended up with this responsibility that they – a lot of folks, the Department of Correction really tried to be honorable and respectful to the families and did their best under a really tough circumstance. But I think it's time to just acknowledge the history, reset the entire equation, put it in the hands of the Parks Department that can treat it differently and give people honor whether in life or death – you know, really be respectful of people in a way that the city wasn't before. So, I think – but this, I want to give full credit – the Council saw this problem and they really worked with us on a positive solution.

Question: Any reaction to the potential sale of the Mets to a new owner? 

Unknown: He’s a Red Sox fan.

Mayor: I am a Red Sox fan, but I’m a baseball fan too. So I have – I represent millions of long-suffering Mets fans, and I have talked to many, many long-suffering Mets fan. I think we have one right here. 

[Laughter]

So, you may want to offer your comments. But I will say, you know, the people of this city really, really want to see the Mets succeed, and it's been a tough few years. So, you know, let us hope that this is a beginning of positive changes.

Question: [Inaudible]

Commissioner Shea: Hope springs eternal. 

[Laughter]

Mayor: Beautiful. Beautiful. 

Please?

Question: Have you spoken recently to Mayor Baraka? 

Mayor: A week or two ago – it’s hard to talk to people when they’re suing you. I don't remember the phone call – hey, I'm going to sue you. I had a very constructive conversation with him and we had talked about it previously, and we've talked about a lot of things. This is a guy who I think well of, have been out there working with him on – we did a press conference in Newark on anti-eviction legal services a couple of years ago, or a year or two ago. I endorsed him for reelection. I considered it a fine relationship. We talked about the challenge. I said we want to do whatever it takes to work together, and then, bang, we're being sued. 

Question: So, you’re not speaking to him –

Mayor: You literally can't speak to someone who is suing you, because everything ends up being part of the lawsuit. And that’s – again, I'm just profoundly disappointed that that's what he chose to do.

Question: On Monday, the Post, published a two-month investigation on Vito Mustaciuolo's track record at HPD. Were you aware that he blew key deadlines and a third of the –

Mayor: Yeah, your investigation, with all due respect, I think a lot of the ways you interpreted that information was just not accurate. 

Question: How so?

Mayor: I can get you more detail, but I think you ignored the fact that, in part, because of the efforts of Vito Mustaciuolo and folks at HPD that the amount of young people exposed to lead has been reduced by 90 percent since 2005, which is kind of fundamental to this discussion – that was conveniently ignored. And the fact is, you can't get access to an apartment if the people won't let you in. So, we'll give you a point – I think my colleagues probably have given you a point by point rebuttal.

Question: [Inaudible] provide that information. I'm wondering why missing key deadlines – 

Mayor: Again, you obviously have a bias here with all due respect, and I think your assumption is inaccurate. 

Question: [Inaudible]

Mayor: We know what your bias is. Go ahead, anything else? 

Okay. Thanks, everybody.