Transcript: Mayor Adams Holds In-Person Media Availability

November 21, 2023

Watch the video here at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=09Nn4TO5JPg

Deputy Mayor Fabien Levy, Communications: Good morning, everybody. My name is Fabien Levy, and I serve as deputy mayor for Communications for the City of New York. We appreciate everyone joining us today for our weekly in-person media availability.

As we enter week eight of this forum, we remain encouraged by the opportunities it has created for all of you to ask questions for us to provide insight into our work and for New Yorkers to learn more about the everyday efforts of their city government. So, we look forward to continuing that process today. 

Joining us this morning, we have Mayor Eric Adams, First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright, Chief Advisor to the Mayor Ingrid Lewis-Martin, Chief of Staff Camille Joseph Varlack, Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi, Deputy Mayor for Housing Economic Development and Workforce Maria Torres-Springer, Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Anne Williams-Isom, Deputy Mayor for Strategic Initiatives Ana Almanzar, Chief Counsel Lisa Zornberg, Director of the New York City Mayor's Office of Management and Budget Jacques Jiha and New York City Emergency Management Commissioner Zach Iscol. So, without further delay, I'll turn it over to Mayor Adams.

Mayor Eric Adams: Thanks so much, Deputy Mayor Levy. And this is number eight, and the feedback I get on the subways and the streets, New Yorkers are saying we're so happy you're doing these Tuesday briefings. Last week, I think we did Wednesday, because we get to hear the full scope and not just the sound bites and not just the sentences. We are getting to hear directly from you and to see your team and hear what they're doing. And so Deputy Mayor Levy, this was a great idea. It allows us not to live just through a tweet, but what we're doing on the streets, and it's reflected in the conversation we're having with New Yorkers.

And I want you to begin by talking about the November update plan. As many of you know, we have to file a budget two years in the making, and in November we have to do the necessary adjustments. That's why we have Jacques Jiha that's here today to have these conversations about the decisions we had to make. And this team that's up here now, this was a real tough exercise. After doing PEGs several times, three percent PEGs, then we had to go back to the table and do five percent PEGs and find efficiency in all of our agencies. It was extremely challenging to do so.

And when you look at the fact that the tax revenue that's coming in is not at the rate that we would like. We looked at, we had to settle union contracts where so many men and women were held without their union contracts being settled. You just think of the ferry boat workers and operators, 13 years they waited for a union contract. Our police were several years late.

You look at what we did with all of our union employees, over 300,000 employees, we gave them a fair salary so they could afford to live in a city that they're working for. And then when you looked at the sunsetting of Covid, a lot of people didn't realize that money was not permanent. It was sunsetting and there was too much that was put into permanent policies in money that was not permanent.

And lastly, the chunk of the asylum seekers. We were saddled with picking up the course of the asylum seekers. You're talking about defunding, our national government defunded New York City. It's unbelievable when you look at this cost and what we are experiencing. I think last week, the week of the 11th, I believe, we had almost 3,000. And Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom can go into those numbers later that came in. We are still getting a substantial number of people every week. It's not like we're saying, okay, you got over 140,000, just resolve the 140,000 that you have. No, we are still getting in thousands each week.

And so I made it clear over and over again, I'm going to support working people. I'm going to make sure that our city continues to be safe, and I'm going to make sure that we continue to attract businesses here so that we can continue to make sure our economy is strong. With all of the headwinds that we are facing on so many fronts, this body of professionals continue to do their job and they're doing it appropriately.

And so I know New Yorkers are angry when they hear about these deficiency cuts, but New Yorkers, I want you to know I'm angry also. I am angry that instead of doing a budget that I want, a budget that pours into services for our seniors, cleaning our streets, continue to build housing, putting support into our young people. Instead of doing that budget that I am excited about doing, we have to move in another direction and look at these cost savings to continue to have our city operate and to abide by the law.

We also are joined by Zach Iscol, the commissioner at NYCEM, because we are dealing with a weather heavy wind and rain starting later today and continuing into tomorrow. So, if there are any questions, he'll be able to answer that as well. We're expecting one to two inches of rain beginning later this afternoon around 4:00 p.m., minor flooding low lying and poor drainage areas is possible. Wind gusts are expected to reach 30 to 40 miles per hour citywide with the possibility of up to 45 miles per hour, winds along southern coastlines overnight Tuesday. So, NYCEM and the team already put in place a travel advisory in effect today through tomorrow Wednesday. And everyone should wear extra layers and be precaution as they move about.

Last night we had a Code Blue in effect, that expired at 8:00 a.m. this morning, but will be in effect again tonight if the temperature drops below 32 degrees. But again, we really want to continue to say we want New Yorkers to sign up for a NotifyNYC to stay informed on the latest weather information.

More and more people are signing up, but we want to reach those neighborhood and communities that historically, based on our analysis, are not really signing up as much as they should. And we want to do everything as possible to get them engaged because it's a great way of notifying New Yorkers.

First Deputy Mayor Wright did an analysis of who's actually signing up and who's participating, and we're noticing that we need to make it more citywide to get people more in the interaction. And so Fabien, I'll turn it over to you. And any questions?

Deputy Mayor Levy: Great. Thank you. We'll take some questions.

Mayor Adams: Marcia.

Question: How you doing, Mr. Mayor?

Mayor Adams: How are you?

Question: So, your budget director sent another memo to agencies about the next round of cuts that take effect in January. And what he's calling for is a 20 percent cut in the amount of money you're going to spend on migrants. But what he notes is that the state has told you, he says, that they're no longer going to be giving you money for shelter. They're going to focus on targeted programs like legal expenses and things like that.

So, I ask you, if you're going to do the cut and you're not going to get any money from the state to help you house people, are you going to have to close some of the shelters, some of the expensive hotels you're using in favor of the bigger congregate shelters because you simply don't have the room? And the second part of that question is, will we see people sleeping on the street?

Mayor Adams: Our desire — and Jacques will give you his fiscal analysis — our desire has always been a layered approach. The first most important layer is not to have children and families sleeping on the street. That has been my number one concern.

Second layer is not to have everyday people sleeping on the street. I have done too much in the last 20-something months of removing the unsightliness of tents and encampments. We did it in record time through the work of Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom and her coordination. And that is continuing to be our desire.

But I've made it clear after over 140,000 migrants and asylum seekers, of course, that is just continuing to increase, thousands are still coming in each week, the visible signs of this crisis is going to start to show itself. And our goal is to not have people sleeping on the streets.

And you actually, believe it or not, there are migrant and asylum seekers who are saying we want to sleep on the streets. And people have a right to do so. We need to be clear on that.

In New York City, because of the City Council's action, people have a right to sleep on the streets that we cannot stop. I want New York Yorkers to understand that our goal is to not have people sleep on the street. We don't want to turn into those cities that are displaying that. Jacques, you want to talk about… 

Question: You didn't answer the second part, which is, are you going to have to close some of the hotels?

Mayor Adams: Every day, there is a level of maneuvering that we have to do to deal with the flow of migrants and asylum seekers here. Nothing is off the table. Nothing. Every day, we thought we were going ahead and back south. In the numbers we thought we were going to be dealing with 2,400, 2,000. I was just told that we were up to 3,000. Some weeks we go up to 4,000. So, it is challenging to tell you what the actions are when we don't even know the flow that we're getting. So, everything is on the table. Jacques, do you want to talk about the… 

Jacques Jihia, Director, Office of Management and Budget: Yes. Like you indicated, mayor, the governor has indicated to us about three weeks ago in the memo issued by the state budget director that the state will be moving away from funding shelter into funding things such as job placements and legal services, but moving away from the more costly item then…

So what we've been working to exactly know exactly is how we're going to manage this going forward because we are basing our assumptions… Our plan on the assumption that we would get a third of the funding from the state.

So, if the state were to move away from that commitment that they made to us last year, that means that we're going to have to take some more drastic actions, because that would mean that would open up the budget gap.

But however, yesterday the governor gave some clear indication that she would be working with her staff to see what she can do to provide some kind of assistance and relief to the city. So, we are hoping that we don't have to get there because we are expecting to get more assistance from the state now, now that she's committed again to provide us some assistance. So, therefore, we're trying to, as best as we can, not to take any more drastic action than we need to do.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Hey Mike, what's your favorite balloon at the Thanksgiving parade? What's your favorite balloon?

Question: No. [Inaudible.] Maybe Papa Smurf. I have no idea. So, I got a question about your trips to Turkey, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Question: You said you've traveled there six or seven times. From what I could discern, [inaudible] records show you took two trips there. There's, I think, an additional one to Azerbaijan. And it's been reported you traveled there once with your son, Jordan.

So, in the interest of transparency, I wanted to ask you if you could share when you traveled to Turkey on those other trips, who paid for those trips and the purpose of each visit?

And on a related note, but separate, regarding Rana Abbasova. What role, if any, did she play in your 2021 campaign? And I think you might not answer this one, but who did she contact in City Hall? This might be for Lisa, after she allegedly… After her raid. We've heard from a source that she contacted City Hall officials to ask them to delete text exchanges.

Mayor Adams: So, let's peel it back in layers. We will give a complete list of our travel to Turkey. Jordan and I, actually, that was one of our stops. Jordan, my son, after graduating from college, we did a son-dad 21-day tour.

A trip together was probably one of the most joyful times of my life to spend 21 days with my son. We went to several different countries. I think we did two or three days in Turkey, but we went to other different countries. The first time he traveled abroad with me at that level. And we'll give you the complete list. Many of those… I actually traveled to Turkey for the first time as a state senator when I went over to Azerbaijan and to Baku with a Senate delegation. And actually, the first time I went was during Thanksgiving. We just picked up one day and said, hey, let's go to Turkey. And I like Istanbul, I like Cappadocia, I like Antalya. And so we traveled several times there.

But I think it's lost on people that to be able to reach the point that I was able to see the globe, I'm a kid from South Jamaica, Queens. I've been to Africa seven times. I've been to Saudi Arabia, Jordan, South, Central America, Russia. I love travel. And this is an international city. Nothing brings me a greater joy than when I'm able to go to someone from Bolivia and say, I went to your country and I saw the Andes. When I can say, hey, I've been to Israel three times.

I travel. I believe in exploring the globe so I can become a better mayor, a better borough president, a better state senator by having a global view because New York City's an international city. And so someone wrote an article and said, Eric went to 80 Turkish events. I must have went to 300 African events. I'm an international mayor and I enjoy the excitement of an international city.

And so some of those trips were personal. Every time we went personal, we paid. Some of the trips were governmental. We did sister city agreements and we followed all the necessary procedures to do so. So, we will give the list on what was the governmental trips that we took. But we followed the procedure every time because I believe in following the procedures.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Mayor, also… Mike, if it was a governmental trip and it was paid for by the government, the borough president's office would have that information. So, you should check where the borough president's office, because we don't at City Hall, keep records from borough presidents.

Question: Can we get a list of the personal trips to Turkey as well?

Mayor Adams: Maybe.

Deputy Mayor Levy: [Inaudible.]

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to follow up on that question about the drastic cuts to the migrant cost. I also wanted to ask you, in regards to your legal defense fund, you said that this isn't a distraction, but you started that legal defense fund. Seemingly, you have to get some money from donors to pay for your legal fees right now.

And then my third question, there's been, when it comes to the receivership on Rikers Island, plaintiffs in the case filed formally to get the receivership to get city jails away from the city. I'm wondering, do you think that Rikers is truly broken for the city to fix? There's no commissioner right now. Your thoughts on that?

Mayor Adams: You said no way?

Question: There's no commissioner, when it comes to leading the head of Rikers. Molina left, and I was wondering.

Mayor Adams: No, that's not true, and that was falsely reported. First of all, let's be clear, in every agency there is a deputy commissioner and the natural ascension of positions is crucial in every agency. So even when there's a commissioner, there's an acting commissioner, someone is always in charge, and I don't believe that Rikers is beyond repair. And we want the job of repairing Rikers. We want that job.

And what Molina has done, he has moved us into the right direction on decreasing some of the major indicators like violence, et cetera. When you look at the MMR report, you see what Molina has done. And many people who have gone there, even the elected officials have walked through and stated that we just see a noticeable difference in Rikers and we want to continue that and we're going to continue that.

He's going to cycle into a new role, but at the same time, we're going to have someone there that's going to continue the great work that those men and women are doing in the Department of Correction. That's a tough job. And I've been on Rikers Island more than any mayor in the history of this city. Last year at this time, I went to visit a young lady who gave birth to a child on Rikers Island. I've spent Thanksgiving with her, and so I believe it could be repaired. Now, to deal with the fund…

Deputy Mayor Levy: Mayor, do you want to just kick it, Deputy Mayor Banks seems to have something to add on the Rikers piece.

Deputy Mayor Philip Banks III, Public Safety: I've read that like a hundred times that they have no commissioner, and I've read it for people who have been quoted who said it, who should have shown, I think a high level of responsibility to check.

Molina is the Department of Correction commissioner. He hasn't left one day. He hasn't left one minute. He hasn't taken a vacation since it was reported. So, report that. The second thing is that if we look at the indicators on which the monitor came in on the first place, every single one is in the right direction, completely in the right direction. Maybe we want to investigate that. Look at absentee of correction officers. Look at fires, look at broken locks, look at assaults. They're all in the right direction. So, when you hear, those things say they're not in the right direction I like to say we are.’

And the third thing, the question I have is that show me a receivership, point to one receivership, Mississippi, Alabama, Chicago, the receivership came in and they did a better job than that particular city. I would love to see that because if there is one, I would love to be able to take a look at that particular issue here. Because our job is to make sure the Rikers is operating as efficiently as we possibly, possibly can.

So, the answer to your question is that Louis never left. He never even took a day off. So, the reporting, if things are being repeated over time, it doesn't make it accurate. Accurate is he is the Department of Correction commissioner. He will be so until the mayor says that he's not.

Mayor Adams: I mean, this guy came in, the commissioner came in in 20-something months. As long as I can remember. If you will go back and Google how many press conferences as 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement I did about Rikers Island. Rikers Island was a mess.

And in 21, 22 months, all those indicators, as the deputy mayor stated, you saw Louis move in the right direction, change the atmosphere, partner with outside entities to provide services to the inmates under a very difficult circumstance.

The absentee rates among correction officers were through the roof. And look what he did. And I think he is a great public servant. And the next commissioner's going to continue the work that he's doing. And so to speak with, because you asked me a question about the fund. New Yorkers reached out to me and they asked, Eric, how can we help? And they wanted to donate to my campaign account.

And I said, you can't use money for campaign account to pay for legal expenses. Our compliance attorney, based on a law that was passed by the City Council, looked into the records, spoke to COIB, they told them the methodology that they could use to open up a legal trust to pick up the course of legal expenses.

We saw what happened with the former mayor. It was almost a million dollars in legal fees he had. And so everyday New Yorkers that reached out and said, we want to help you, mayor. We made sure that it was done in the proper way.

And I want to thank those New Yorkers. I am just overwhelmed with gratitude of people who have watched my work all these years and they're saying that, listen, we want to be with you during this period of time, and that's what New Yorkers are. And that's how that came about.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. Happy early Thanksgiving.

Mayor Adams: Thanks. Same to you.

Question: Thank you.

Mayor Adams: And it's Thanksgiving, folks, not thanks receiving. So, go out and give something.

Question: I can give you two questions.

One I know is near and near to your heart, talking about Department of Education cuts. The $60 million for the food program. We know about healthy eating and how important that is and some important initiatives you brought. What is your understanding of what those cuts will mean?

And then the 37,000 eliminated 3-K and pre-K slots. Why, in your view, has more not been done to fill those slots? And would filling those slots not be a better budget solution because then you would get more money from the state and federal government?

Mayor Adams: Great question. Great question. When we came in, the team looked at 3-K, pre-K. And I spent a lot of personal time on this, personal time, because I was extremely frustrated that I didn't get the answers that I wanted.

And I realized that what we were doing previously under the previous administration, we were paying for seats, not children in seats. We were having a level of centers who were actually stating we can fill 50 seats when they were only filling 10 seats, for example, but we were paying them for 50 seats.

And what First Deputy Mayor Wright did and her team is that they looked at how do we properly align the seats so we could know where they're needed, because it was based on ages. This is just not a one size fits all.

And then we went even further to… We want to improve on the invoicing process because it's too labor intensive and very problematic. We were advancing centers who never got the number of seats and they were saying, we are not even bother invoicing because you already paid us. There was just a real layer and layer of problems.

So, what we're saying to our city council members and partners, here's your council district, here's how many seats are opening your council district, let's go find these children so we could place them in the seats instead of just paying for empty seats. And that's what we're doing.

Question: Outreach and right sizing?

Mayor Adams: Right. Outreach, rightsizing, mobilizing, because too many children that should be in these seats are not in these seats and we need to get them in the seats. So, the DOE is playing a role. We're asking our city council, we're asking advocates, let's go find these children and get them in these seats.

Ingrid Lewis-Martin, Chief Advisor to the Mayor: And let me add, it's accountability. Because as the mayor said, some of these entities were not sending in invoices, they were not giving us information. Now there is accountability where they have to let us know the seats are filled, these are the individuals in the seats, so we have accountability.

Question: And on food, Mr. Mayor?

Mayor Adams: Go ahead. I'm sorry.

First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright: Just to clarify one point as well. Through the analysis that was done by the team, it's very important for everybody to know that there is a seat for every child who is eligible.

And the rightsizing is like we can't pay for seats that are never going to be used because the population and also families want a certain time, they want full day or half day. So, there was a lot of work that was done to make sure that the system is actually meeting the need. And that exists today.

Deputy Mayor Levy: It is about 7,000 seats that we were adjusting this past year, right?

Jiha: Yes. We currently have 37,000 empty seats we're paying for. So you can imagine, we are making difficult choices, cutting PD, cutting sanitation, when we're paying for seats that are left empty. I mean, can you imagine?

So, we are taking a small portion of those seats because there is a misalignment of the supply and demand because we built up the supply and without the demand. So therefore, we're trying to realign the supply and demand. That's what we're going through right now. But you have to look at this in the context of the choices that we have to make.

On top of that, the notion that we're going to get funding for it, that's not true at all. Okay? This has been paid for out of the stimulus money that is basically… We have a cliff. It's running out.

Mayor Adams: Right. Because your question is such an important question. And number one, this is temporary money that the previous administration used for a permanent program. Then we were paying for empty seats without the real outreach to place children in the seats. We have over 30,000 empty seats.

And so what people are saying to us, don't get rid of those 30,000 empty seats. Leave them and keep paying for them during the time when number one, the money's going to run out, number two, we don't even have the money anymore.

But as the deputy mayor has said, and as Ingrid stated, every child that wants a seat, we will place them in a seat. And so I think that when people do an analysis, what this administration did with a concept that was a good concept, but it was not operationalized. People are really going to see how we took these difficult steps to place children in seats. This symbolism of we have 3-K and let's keep expanding it, I mean, that makes no sense. Expand something where you don't have children to put in the seats just so we have X number of seats.

That's not how we're going to operate. That's not how I'm going to use taxpayer's dollars. And the food program, listen, everyone knows what I feel about healthy eating, being proactive, placing good quality food in schools. It feeds the healthcare crises that our children, childhood obesity, childhood diabetes, we can go through the list. That's how tough these choices are.

These programs that we put in place, the budget I would like to see is to make sure these children are getting the healthy food they need and that's how painful this is. The initiatives that we put in place to improve the lives of everyday working class people is being impacted right now and D.C. needs to do its job.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: Good morning.

Question: My question is first there’s reports of increasing threat to New York and the City of New York. I want to ask you about that in terms of what's going on with Thanksgiving upcoming and, of course, it is related to this situation in the Middle East. That's what I mean.

And the second, would you comment on the fact that NYPD encrypting radio communication discussion is going on and what would be your position?

Mayor Adams: Yes. First the threats to deputy mayor and the commissioner and the whole team over at NYPD and Deputy Commissioner Weiner, we have been monitoring these threats. We are clearly looking to be proactive with our partners.

As you know, we have a Joint Terrorist Task Force in the city to focus on these threats and monitoring a lot of chatter that's out there. And when you think about it, we have over 300 protests that took place in the city. Some of them were side by side, and some of the violence you're seeing in other municipalities you did not see here. Hats off to Commissioner Caban and what his team has done,

And we're going to continue that omnipresence. We're going to continue to coordinate with the New York State Intelligence Center to identify those threats. We know that after October 7th there's been an increase in level of concerns, but we are on top of it. No one does it better than the NYPD and their partners to deal with some of the potential terrorist threats that we are facing. And so we are going to continue that. Your second question was dealing with the… 

Question: The NYD communication…

Mayor Adams: Yes. The radios. The encryption of radios. People think that it's about preventing the press from hearing our comments. No. Bad guys are listening to these channels. They know when we're responding, they know where we are.

So, we are going to find the right balance to make sure that people are allowed to stay on top of the actions of the Police Department. But we can't give a leg up to these bad guys that know when we are responding to jobs, they know they can listen to calls of service, they monitor themselves.

So, it's not so much, the press is not the concern. It's that these bad guys are becoming more and more sophisticated. And when you are putting that communication out there, you're jeopardizing the safety of the public and you're just jeopardizing the safety of police officers, and we will find a proper balance to make sure we could do it appropriately.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. A few weeks ago following the FBI raid on the home of your top fundraiser, your campaign promised an extensive review of campaign documents and actions by campaign workers. Has that review uncovered any inappropriate action by campaign workers or any donations that might be problematic?

And then I also just wanted to follow up on Mike's question, which I don't think you answered about Rana Abbasov. What was her role in your 2021 campaign? Who did she text on the morning of the raid and can you confirm the reporting that she was in fact placed on leave?

Mayor Adams: My review and the review from our compliance team continues to show what I've always felt and will continue to say. Our campaign follows the rules. And that's something I always tell them, follow the rules, follow the rules, follow the rules, and I'm going to continue to say that and that's what the preliminary review from our compliance team…

I have a compliance attorney that looks over these records and he has done an amazing job and he's going to continue to do so, and he will continue to review the records, but that's what we saw. And anything dealing with, particularly, the potential employee, I'll turn it over to our counsel.

Lisa Zornberg, Chief Counsel to the Mayor and City Hall: Yes, so as I previously said, we're not going to do anything that impedes on SDNY's investigation. I said last week, I can guarantee that they don't want a pending investigation playing out in the press. I know that from personal experience. Look, here at City Hall, we've done everything by the book. We're not conducting the investigation, we're cooperating with it. And so we're not going to comment in response to the question that you asked

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. Just wondering, back to Kelly's question about the 20 percent migrant cuts if you could go into detail exactly what would those cuts to migrant services look like? 20 percent. Also in the next round of budget cuts, why is NYPD, FDNY and Sanitation excluded? And then, have you set up another meeting with White House officials on the migrant crisis and just about the cost? Thank you.

Mayor Adams: Jacques will go into the analysis of the 20 percent, either Jacques or Anne, who's here. From the first view, FDNY, which is public safety, NYPD and Sanitation. But if we have to, we're going to have to go into them as well. Because this is going to continue to evolve.

We sent out the letters for an additional PEG, five percent PEG, and based on the numbers that come in and our analysis, everything is on the table. We want to be clear on that, everything is on the table. We don't want to do anything that's going to endanger public safety.

That's the foundation that the city's built on. We have to be safe. The thought of they were included in this PEG was a challenging one. It brought a great level of debate and conversation with the team that's here, but if need be, they will have to be included in the next round also if we can't get to the numbers that we want. Because by law, we have to balance the budget. Jacques, you want to go into or… 

Jiha: Yes, mayor. The goal is, OMB will work with the Office of Asylum Seekers Operations. Basically we have to come up with a plan in terms of how we are going, first, to reduce the per diem costs. That is looking at different service models to see what kind of services we're going to reduce because we want to basically provide the same kind of services we provide to folks in the DHS system.

So, that's one aspect of the solution. Look at different staffing models to see… All of this is to basically are geared toward trying to bring down the per diem costs. At the same time, we're exploring different exit strategies whether it is 30 days, 30 days seems to be working, 60 days seems to be working. So, we are exploring this model and trying to expand them as quickly as possible.

Question: How about the White House meeting?

Mayor Adams: We are in plans of scheduling a meeting with a group of clergy members that want to go to D.C. with me, and there are certain invitations that I've had in the next week or so that we're doing an analysis to make that determination.

But we do want to thank our coalition and partners from Chicago, Denver and others who have been part of this coalition. But I'm looking forward to getting to D.C. to have a real conversation around the impact of the migrant crisis on our city.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Mayor, if I could just add also to Morgan to that point. Since last summer when the migrant crisis, when we saw it really explode here in New York City, the mayor's been down to D.C. to talk to both the White House and members of Congress nine times.

That's nine conversations he had about… Every single time he talked about it. Even earlier this year, I remember we were at the White House Correspondents Dinner and asked the FEMA administrator and staff there, he's like, where's New York City's money? So, these conversations we're having every single time that he was there.

Obviously, we want to have as many people in the coalition as possible. So, that's what the mayor was talking about, hopefully, organizing with other cities as quickly as we can.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: How are you?

Question: You talked briefly about street homelessness earlier. I was wondering, is the city ever going to give out the data about people being moved off the streets into hospitals and services? Do we have a timeline on that?

Mayor Adams: I'm sorry, I didn't hear. On what?

Question: People being moved off the street, like street homelessness in the subways, into hospitals and for services. I know there was talk about data for that earlier in the year.

Deputy Mayor Anne Williams-Isom, Health and Human Services: You start.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Well, first for the Subway Safety Plan, remember there was two pieces of it. It was homelessness and those that are having severe mental illness on the subways. The homelessness piece, it was over 6,000 people I believe that had already gone into shelter from last February. It was mid-February last year through current year or so. The mental health piece of it, we announced last year?

Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom: November this time.

Deputy Mayor Levy: And so it's end of this month, I believe, is the one year anniversary. And so we're going to be releasing additional data once we hit that one year mark. But if...

Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom: Yes, I just wanted to say then we'll be releasing some data. And also talking about the case practice, what have we learned, what have we seen? So, we'll look forward to having that conversation with you.

Mayor Adams: Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom, you should do just a real briefing on what you set up. What has happened behind the scenes on the encampments, subway safety, the whole actions around street homelessness. I told them the other day that they need to do a presentation to show other cities.

Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom and her team, coordination with all of these different services, it is really impressive to see what they accomplished. You don't see it. Early in administration, January and February of 2022, I drove around the city taking pictures of encampments, now I have a problem finding them because of what her team with NYPD and DSS and all these other agencies have done together, Department of Sanitation. And she should really do a presentation to you on what they have done behind the scene.

Question: So, happy Thanksgiving. I imagine Turkey Day is very important to you. One for the chief advisor. I'm wondering, are you fundraising for the legal defense fund or who is in charge of fundraising for the legal defense fund? And then also for the budget team. How can we trust these numbers? I mean, you just added $6 billion in migrant spending in between June and November, by my understanding. How is that not predicted? Is this just a negotiating tactic with the White House or are these numbers for real?

Mayor Adams: Go ahead.

Lewis-Martin: Okay, so legally, I am prohibited from raising funds for the mayor and we have a mayor who believes in following the law. So, I will not be raising any funds for the mayor. And the mayor already explained. We have an excellent compliance team that is in charge of that. So, they will do their job. I will pray. I believe in God.

Mayor Adams: We both do.

Lewis-Martin: Yes, I believe in God. So, I will help by praying and asking God to do His work.

Mayor Adams: The question about trust in numbers. And I really need help from all of us here on this. This is our city, and I'm not quite sure that even some of the electeds are saying this is not a financial crisis, this is not a financial crisis, and we have to be careful. We're not trying to negotiate with Washington. We are trying to say that 140,000 people, 3 to 4,000 a month coming here, there is a cost.

Lewis-Martin: A week, a week, a week.

Mayor Adams: Week. I'm sorry, a week. Thank you. There is a course. So, if one wants to dispute that, okay, you should pay $300 instead of $315. Okay, let's do that argument. But to constantly send out the signal that this is not impacting our city. I just think it's wrong.

And I think that when you have elected officials looking for political points instead of making the point that New York City tax dollars should not be going to paying for a national problem. Every conversation should start with that from my elected officials.

So, we're not trying to use this as leverage. This is costly to the City of New York, and it could be a long-term impact. It's unfair to migrants and asylum seekers and it's unfair to New York City taxpayers. We should let them work. They want to work.

Jiha: Jeff, you remember last August, I presented that chart to all of you. Okay. Showing this is the red line, which is what we had forecasted when the budget was adopted. And right around August, we see a huge spike, a huge deviation from that. Okay. All right.

And we laid out, we explained our entire model to the rest of the world how we came up with those numbers. And if you want us to go over the numbers again, we'd be more than happy to do so. We did it before with all the editorial boards. We met with them, we briefed you, you guys asked questions, we went through an entire review process. So, the notion that things didn't change, here’s what changed.

This is the path that we forecasted. This is the actual numbers. It's a huge deviation. That's when we change our forecast, moving from, assuming, 40 households a day to 55 a day. And then the per diem went up from what we forecasted initially at $320 a day to $383 a day. These are the things that explain the significant increase in the cause of these asylum seekers.

On top of that, we add one more year. This is what confused a lot of folks. Initially we started with fiscal year ‘23 and ‘24. Okay? At the end of fiscal year ‘23, we drop off fiscal year ‘23. So, we have ‘24. Now we have to balance ‘25. So, we have to account for the asylum seeker costs in ‘25.

So, it's not just fiscal year ‘24 that was changed. Okay? We had to update the forecast for fiscal year ‘24, but we also have to add a new fiscal year, that's what explained the $6.2 billion additional.

Deputy Mayor Levy: I would also add, Jeff, August 9th, 2023, the mayor was standing right there. He gave a nice speech for about 20 minutes. Then he walks into the Rotunda and took questions for about 30 minutes. Wait, Jacques literally did the math per person, so you went over this. You asked questions. I think you're on this video asking questions.

So, I would just point out and everybody who covers this, Marcia, I know was there, asked questions. Katie I know was there But the point is, we've been very clear about these numbers. Nothing has changed and we gave these briefings to the City Council members as well.

Jiha: Weekly briefing…

Deputy Mayor Levy: Everybody saw these numbers and everybody wrote about it.

Jiha: No one should be shocked by this.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Just to be very clear.

Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom: I’m just shocked that the federal government hasn't done more.

Question: Happy Thanksgiving, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

Question: Two subjects, please. First on your legal defense fund. Can you explain why you need a personal legal defense fund that is separate from the campaign and the city? And also I read that Vito Pitta is maybe heading a fundraising for that. Is that true? And is that appropriate since he has clients who do business with the city?

And then on my second subject, please, what is the status of the so-called deputy mayor for operations list of projects at the FDNY. Who is on that list right now? Is there a list and is this a necessary thing because of a slow bureaucracy or an example of political interference in fire operations?

Mayor Adams: You have a lot. Well, no, first, if I can, just off the top, I really want to thank you for your reporting that you did that really took this secrecy over that I was the only one that was doing my job around the communication with the Fire Department of saying they look into something.

Your reporting, any people came up to me after looking at that reporting and saying, okay, this was going on long before they even asked you. You brought a level of, I think, journalistic integrity to the conversation because prior to that, there was just this misnomer or this misbelief that my basic service as a public servant of… There were a whole lot of people that were doing the same thing.

Vito is not leading my fundraising. I'm going to hire a fundraiser to carry out that function, because I have a city to run. And those who want to reach out, people reached out to our team and said, New Yorkers reached out. They said they want to help. You know, something of this magnitude can go into hundreds of thousands of dollars if not a million dollars.

And so we want to properly make sure we comply with all the rules, and that's what we're doing. Vito's reached out to COIB, he reached out to all of the decision makers so that after the law was passed last year that we want to make sure we do it accurately, who's allowed to contribute, because not everybody can contribute.

So, we want to make sure we follow the rules, and that's why we're doing it, that's why we're we doing it correctly. But he's not leading the fundraising, so whoever reported that reported that inaccurately. Deputy Mayor Meera Joshi, you know, 52 miles, a marathon runner. You want to go into that list thing?

Deputy Mayor Meera Joshi, Operations: Hi, I'm Meera Joshi, deputy mayor for Operations. And I had never heard… Actually, let me rephrase that. I'd never seen the phrase "deputy mayor DMO list" until I saw it in the press recently.

The way this administration has handled systemic problems around bureaucracy has been in a report that we issued last year, BLAST. And it's really about building, and it applies to everybody who deals with all of our city agencies when it comes to land use and development. It focuses on efficiencies we can find in the traffic mitigation process, in the environmental review process as well as within DOB and the actual IT that DOB uses to process applications.

But fundamentally it's about coordination between DOB, FDNY, SBS, DOT, Parks, the many agencies that an individual has to go to when they're doing land use development in New York City. There's over 111 recommendations there and many of them have already been completed.

But the point of it is, is this is an administration about equity, and that's how we think about solving problems, systemic problems. And so we have a system‑wide approach that applies to everybody who interfaces with the system.

Question: Can I just quickly follow up on… 

[Crosstalk]

Mayor Adams: No, no, let them… I'm going to let you follow up.

But if you go back to listen to my campaign speeches, I specifically talked about the bureaucratic slow movement of execution. And one of the areas I talked about is why is it taking so long for people to get basic sprinkler permits? Now, deputy mayor, I think our numbers have increased on permits, allowing people to open their businesses. If you have those numbers, it would be good to share.

But we had restaurant owners who put their entire life savings to open their restaurants, paying $30,000, $40,000 a month, and they couldn't get a C of O. We were devastating small business owners. Hotels were open, and they couldn't get a sprinkler inspection.

And so when I ran, I ran that government must become more responsive and not be so bureaucratic. That's what GSD was about, just get stuff done. And at no time did this administration, and when you look at some of the reporting, it was convoluted. It made it seem like this administration had this specialty list. That was not this administration. This administration said no one should deal with the bureaucratic madness that they were experiencing.

Question: Mr. Mayor, I wanted to ask you what you're doing now. I know that times are tight right now in the budget, but some people will complain that, you know, the Fire Department isn't properly staffed to manage all of these inspections and approvals. So, what have you done in your time to make that process move more smoothly aside from just pushing for particular projects as they pop up?

Mayor Adams: Yes, and we have been, with all of these efficiencies we had to find, when you look at the numbers in comparison — that's why I was asking of the deputy mayor about — you're seeing an improvement in filing of permits, Department of Buildings action, you're seeing an improvement. Because part of the problem was that we didn't raise our expectations.

You know, we didn't say, listen, we need to handle… If we want our economy to recover, we are expecting us to treat our businesses as a client and not as a burden. There was just this level of why are you bothering me in this city, and we said no to that. We need to recover our economy.

And that means making sure our restaurants can open, our bodegas can open, our hotels can open. That is what we stand for, and we're going to continue to call for the delivery of services to people who dreaded coming to government because of the bureaucracy.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: And if I can just specifically…  Yes, just answer that question as well. As Deputy Mayor Joshi said, the Get Stuff Built, 111, I mean these were about business process improvements. But the Fire Department actually just had a briefing on this the other day, it was 18 weeks on average just to get that work done, it's now down to four weeks. And that has been done under this administration.

Deputy Mayor Joshi: So, that's a 33 percent decrease in the time it takes. They're doing them 33 percent faster as well as the Department of Buildings is going through construction, plumbing and electrical inspections now four days within receipt. But again, I want to emphasize this is system wide. That's why we did a system wide analysis of what the blockades were and came up with 111 recommendations to implement.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Meera, just to be clear, you're saying the Fire Department is operating, doing fire inspections for fire alarms 33 percent faster this year than they did last year.

Deputy Mayor Joshi: Yes.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Got it. And DOB is doing these inspections in, what, four days or something?

Deputy Mayor Joshi: Yes.

Mayor Adams: So, Melissa, it's being done not because of a DMO list, it's being done because of a GSD mindset. You know, this is an administration that we're tired of New Yorkers going to agencies and feeling as though they're being burdened because they're asking the agencies to do their job.

I saw this too much, and I ran on this that we're not going to have a city that treats you as a burden. You are a client, you are a customer, and we need to operate as such. And you see the action. The numbers don't lie. And we don't get a list from REBNY. Whoever calls us, whoever seeks assistance, we help them. That is what this administration is about.

Question: [Inaudible.] I'm well, Mr. Mayor. How are you? Happy Thanksgiving to the team.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

Question: Mr. Mayor, could you talk a little bit about the announcement made that you and Governor Hochul have given $95 million in emergency assistance to NYCHA residents?

Mayor Adams: That was crucial.

When many people received a lifeline during Covid, we left NYCHA behind. And I'll never forget when during the Covid, it must have been at the beginning, Ingrid, when I was going to NYCHA to give out masks for them. You know, you guys need to go look at those articles. It was like, why are you giving masks to those people? You know, they don't deserve to get masks. It was unbelievable how we were treating NYCHA residents.

Lewis-Martin: I actually received a call from two other administrations selling us the mayor has nerves going into NYCHA to give out masks, how dare he? It was reprehensible. I couldn't believe it. I said, they're your constituents and they're his constituents also, so he will give masks out in NYCHA.

Mayor Adams: And so this is a continuation of what Deputy Mayor Maria Torres‑Springer did about including NYCHA in our housing plan, what we've done with the NYCHA Land Trust. One in 17 New Yorkers live in NYCHA. It's a substantial population.

And so what the governor — and I take my hat off to the governor — what she partnered with us and the lawmakers both of Majority Leader Andrea Stewart‑Cousins, Speaker Carl Heastie, they said, listen, need to be helping NYCHA that are behind in their rent and helping the NYCHA residents. And that's what we did yesterday.

Not only do we identify the money, we fast tracked to make sure people can get the checks. The worst thing could happen for people to be removed from their houses, their homes. And so kudos to the entire process of how we identify the needs of NYCHA residents and worked with them to get the money to assist them.

We cannot lose our NYCHA residents in the city, and we are focused on NYCHA I think more than any other administration. And I think the Chelsea project is going to be the way forward in NYCHA of how we can build that infrastructure, that crumbling infrastructure with a real capital crisis there.

Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer, Housing, Economic Development and Workforce: If I could, could I just add a couple of things to what the mayor mentioned. With one in 17 New Yorkers living at NYCHA, I don't think there has been a city administration that has been more focused on making sure that we don't just deal with immediate, urgent issues across NYCHA developments but we're making the long‑term investments.

And so the announcement just a couple of days ago certainly provides immediate relief. That's close to $100 million to support NYCHA residents who fell behind in terms of the rent. But as the mayor mentioned, with the tens of billions of repairs that are needed given the state of NYCHA, we've also been full speed ahead on the types of tools that will help us turn the corner, whether that's the NYCHA Trust, whether that is PACT, whether that is accelerating the types of capital modernization projects that are necessary.

But what's really critical here is that we're doing it with residents at the center. And so one thing for everyone to really pay attention to is the fact that we've just started the voting process, for instance, at Nostrand Houses in Sheepshead Bay. And so keeping the residents at the center of the decisions that affect their lives while advocating from the state and the federal government to do their part, that's how we think we're going to continue to make the investments that NYCHA residents truly deserve and they're long overdue.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. So, my question, I actually want to pivot back. We keep on speaking about the homeless population or homeless New Yorkers… Well, homeless migrants, but I want to pivot and talk about our indigenous or our native homeless New Yorkers.

Earlier this year in September you… You know, you increased the CityFHEPS program which was welcomed with those reforms. So, my question is twofold. First question is, with these budget cuts, do these budget cuts affect the rental assistance vouchers? And then my second question, Mr. Mayor, is there any data on the number of New York's homeless families who have moved to other parts of the state now that they're finally able to? Thank you.

Mayor Adams: And the reason we were talking about the asylum seekers, because that was… You know, that was the roots of the questions. We have not taken our eyes off of those New Yorkers who are living in the shelter system that are not migrant and asylum seekers. We're still operating, transitioning them into permanent housing.

And Deputy Mayor Maria Torres‑Springer, why don't you share some of our FHEPS numbers? And that whole transition, my understanding, we have the largest participation in the FHEPS program in the history of the program. But Deputy Mayor Maria Torres‑Springer can go through that.

Deputy Mayor Torres‑Springer: That's right. I want to leave you with a couple of numbers that demonstrates our commitment to making sure that we're doing everything that we can for the formerly homeless getting into permanent housing. So, a couple of statistics. In the fiscal year '23 — the first full fiscal year of the mayor's term — we financed close to 2,000 homes for the formerly homeless. Those are permanent homes for the formerly homeless. And that number happens to be the highest on record since we started counting these numbers.

And in terms of CityFEPS vouchers for permanent housing, that, too, is an all‑time high. It's about 9,000. And so those are ways that we, in addition to building as much housing as possible, in the previous off topic I laid out the numbers for the work that we did in the last fiscal year.

But that work is not done, though, right, mayor? So, we financed the most in these categories and we have to do more, and that's why the work that we're doing with the Department of City Planning, for instance, the City of Yes for Housing Opportunity is so critical.

The more we build across different neighborhoods, the more we're going to make a dent in the types of indicators that have for too long plagued New Yorkers like percentages of rent burden, like the numbers of people who are sleeping in shelters.

So, we're working on all cylinders: financing, zoning, advocacy at different levels of government, because we have to make the type of progress in this housing crisis, again, that New Yorkers deserve.

Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom: And just really quickly, DM? DM, I just wanted to add that we're not taking any cuts to rental assistance. And as you, I'm very excited about the fact that we can now use CityFHEPS statewide especially for people who are victims of domestic violence. So, we are working with many families right now to get them resettled in other places.

Question:  That was actually my follow up question, because we have a lot of families with children, school‑aged children in our shelters, so I was very curious as to, you know, will they be impacted by the budget cuts as well as how many of these families are actually, you know, moving to other parts of the state, the families?

Mayor Adams: That's why I just love these Tuesdays, because we're able to give you long hand information, because if Katie would have wrote the story she would have probably said we were cutting. And so that's why…That's why. First of all, you like talking to me so you'll never stop wanting to talk to me. You know? Why don't we do a few more before we bounce. Okay?

Question: To follow up on what Merra said, she said she has never heard… Well, two questions. First, the DMO list, she said she's never heard or she never heard of it until she saw it in writing in a newspaper account. Have you heard of it before reading about it?

And then secondly, have you or your team reported any other campaign or administrative staff to federal investigators aside from Rana Abbasova.

Mayor Adams: I want to talk about the DMO list. No, I have not heard of a DMO list, and that's why I thought it was so important that we separated that list from that administration, because when you read some of the reporting, it appears as though this was my creation. Any time you're in the beginning of an administration, there's a tendency for people to believe that the actions of the previous administration was the actions of the current administration, because normally when we write these stories we put my face there.

And so you may be savvy enough to read through the story, but the everyday New Yorker, they see my face and they see a suicide on Rikers Island, happened in 2019, but hey, why is Eric's face there? You know, people are connecting things that happened in the past to this administration, and it gives the impression that the actions… The sins of the past is playing out on this administration.

So, this administration never had a DMO list. We know nothing about a DMO list. I have one deputy mayor of Operations, and that's Mayor Joshi, and if she would have walked in my office and said, hey, I have a DMO list, I am going to say, no you don't. You know, that is not how we operate of having this.

So, I want to be very clear: we don't know of a DMO list. We have not created a DMO list. Every New Yorker that comes to me is serviced. Every New Yorker that comes to me is serviced. And talking about the investigation, counsel, Lisa.

Zornberg: Yes, thank you, mayor. Look, the mayor's direction has been clear and so has mine. City Hall plays by the rules. If investigators want information from us, we provide it. I've stated previously that we've been proactively cooperative.

And SDNY will complete their review. We at City Hall remain focused on running the city. We're not going to do anything to impede their investigation, we're going to continue to focus on our work, period.

Question: Not to belabor the point but was…

Deputy Mayor Levy: The non DMO list, got it.

Question: Well, under your administration the non DMO list, but the prior administration, when you were then borough president and you just became the Democratic nominee for mayor, did you recommend or contact the administration, the prior administration to get any other businesses then on to that list? Fast track list [inaudible].

Mayor Adams: I think that's a great and that's a legitimate question. First of all I want it very clear: I knew nothing of a list. I knew nothing of a list. And so if ever I contacted the prior administration any time as borough president, any time as state senator, it was to ask them to examine something. I'm not contacting them and saying you have to do this, because I had no authority to do that.

So, any communications that I had with the previous administrations… Ask all electeds. I want to be clear on this. I don't know if you guys ask other electeds, do you call agencies to ask to help your constituency. This is what we're supposed to do.

And so if I reached out to the previous administration, it's because a constituent reached out to me and stated that I'm having a problem getting a speed bump on my block, I'm having a problem getting my restaurant opened, I'm having a problem getting this tree that's ripping up my sidewalk.

So, as an elected officials — particularly like me that's on the ground — if a constituent reaches out to me, I want to make sure those actions are carried out. I don't know how many thousands of… And our CAU unit in Borough Hall, I used to do the Speak With The [Borough President] once a month on Channel 12. People will call in and say, I can get a light fixed on my block. My role is to tell them, I'm coming to meet you on your block. I'm going to find out the problem and we're going to get that light fixed.

And so I never called the previous administration to say can you add this on a list that I didn't know about. But I constantly reach out to administrations on every level to say constituency needs must be resolved. And any elected official that's not doing that is not doing their job.
  
Question: Hey, Mr. Mayor, how are you?

Mayor Adams: How are you?

Question: Good, good. So, I wanted to ask, since the raid at the home of Brianna Suggs, have you spoken to Frank Carone about the investigation? Has he offered any advice? And since we last spoke, has anybody at the administration been approached to or spoken to either the FBI or SDNY?

Mayor Adams: I didn't understand… You asked me did I speak to Frank Carone? Frank is my former chief of staff. I speak with him about a number of things, I don't go into personal conversations. But who's the other… I'm sorry?

Question: About the investigation?

Mayor Adams: I don't go into personal conversations. I've said that a million and one times, you know, the personal conversations I have with people, I never go into that. So, you could always feel confident when you share personal information with me, I will always keep it a secret between you and I.

Get Katie. Get Katie. Go ahead, you're welcome.

Lewis-Matin: You're mayor's choice.

Mayor Adams: It didn't work.

Lewis-Matin: You're the mayor's choice.

Mayor Adams: It didn't work. I just, you're my choice this week.

Question: I wanted to ask you, we reported a story last week in The City about Winnie Greco who works for your administration, she also was a volunteer when you were Brooklyn borough president. Significant allegations that we reported. Has your office referred any of those allegations to the Department of Investigation, and is she still working in her previous capacity as Asian Affairs Liaison in your administration?

Mayor Adams: Listen, we follow all reporting requirements. That is what we always do, and that's just general. All reporting requirements we do that, and I think that we have a record of doing that.

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