Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani: Good morning, my friends, and welcome to the Throne Labs warehouse here in Queens. I first want to acknowledge and to thank City Council Member Sandy Nurse, who - let's have a round of applause for Sandy - who has been a leader in this fight for years. It is an honor to make today's announcement alongside her.
I also want to acknowledge leaders from inside of City government that we have here, including our deputy mayor of Operations, Julia Kerson. We have our Parks commissioner, Tricia Shimamura. We have the co-founder and CEO of Throne and the entire Throne team, Fletcher Wilson. We also have our NYC DOT commissioner, Mike Flynn, our EDC executive vice president of Asset Management, Giacomo Landi. And we also want to say an acknowledgment and a shout-out to the World's Borough Bookstore, who is going to be a partner - a local partner - to the Tap Card Distribution Initiative.
Now, there is one universal experience that binds New Yorkers together. I'm not talking about the shared betrayal we all feel about the disappearance of the dollar slice. Not talking about getting sweatier than you ever thought was possible on an F train platform in mid-July. I'm talking about a universal experience that every New Yorker has had at one point or another. Heading out into our city, excited for the day ahead, only to suddenly, horrifyingly realize you have to go.
Many of us have pleaded with baristas and maîtres d's. We have listened intently as a worker at Chipotle whispers the bathroom code to another paying customer. We have bought that $9 latte. And all of us have, at some point or another, just turned around and had to go home.
It is estimated that our city has only one public toilet for every 8,500 New Yorkers. And while some prior administrations have paid lip service to the issue, promising to build bathrooms that never materialized, others have cast the need aside entirely. In doing so, they have told New Yorkers, to paraphrase Donald Fagen, that City Hall is a, quote, "Fool to do their dirty work." But not us.
Today, I am proud to announce that we are delivering on a commitment we made just 10 days after taking office: the launch of a one-year pilot bringing a new kind of bathroom to New York City.
Beginning this month, we are installing 17 modular public toilets in high-traffic areas across the five boroughs: 17 formerly bathroom-less locations that will soon become New York City's number one place to go number two. Or number one. You don't need to tell me or anyone at City Hall.
These modular toilets will be operated, cleaned and maintained by our partners here at Throne Labs. Each bathroom will be ADA accessible, free and open daily from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. And they will include sinks with running water, toilets that flush, air conditioning in the summer and heat in the winter, as well as baby changing stations.
Unlike permanent bathrooms, however, they are affordable to manage and maintain because they do not require drilling into the pipes, sewer systems and utility lines deep in the bowels of our city. And they can be redeployed and relocated as the need for bathrooms across our city changes.
These toilets go beyond the simple act of providing New Yorkers a place to go in a pinch. They are a critical addition to our public health infrastructure. This is how we keep the streets clean. This is how we deliver New Yorkers the basic public services they need to live lives of dignity; whether they're a mom with a child having an emergency or a delivery worker on a 12-hour shift.
At City Hall, we have begun to call this work of delivering public goods and public excellence to New Yorkers "pothole politics." But decades ago, it had a different name: sewer socialism, an approach to governance pioneered by a group of Milwaukee mayors at the beginning of the 20th century that focused on addressing the material issues affecting people's lives.
Today, we are putting the sewage back in sewer socialism, and we're doing so because we believe that there is no problem too big and no task too small for City Hall to help you with.
Thank you very much. And now with that, I will pass it over to our deputy mayor for Operations, Julia Kerson.
Deputy Mayor Julia Kerson, Operations: Thank you, Mayor. Good morning, everyone. I was going to begin my remarks by saying that there is no better feeling than announcing the implementation of a program that was months ago simply a promise. But then I remembered what we are here to talk about. And I realized the truly unmatched feeling is when you finally find the public bathroom you've been urgently searching for.
Right now, New York City has roughly 1,000 public bathrooms. Finding one is like searching for a needle in a haystack. As a New Yorker, you might know your best bet is a nearby park. But as a visitor, or when you've begun to panic in the way only someone does who desperately needs a bathroom, this can be an anxiety-inducing experience.
That's why I'm so excited to be taking this step toward an expansive, accessible public bathroom network designed to meet the needs of New Yorkers who need to go while on the go.
These modular bathrooms offer our city a path forward that is cost-effective, adaptable and innovative. I'll be following this pilot closely and looking forward to working with Throne Labs and our agency partners at DOT, Parks and EDC to continue refining this rollout and program.
I'd like to turn it over to Fletcher Wilson, co-founder and CEO of Throne Labs.
Fletcher Wilson, Co-Founder and CEO, Throne Labs: Thank you. So, I'm Fletcher Wilson, co-founder and CEO of Throne Labs, and I have a terrible digestive system. I won't go into more detail, I promise, right now - ask me after, if you want.
But on top of that, I've always been fascinated with bathrooms. Sort of where they are, how clean they are, what amenities they have. I'm very particular. Kind of the Larry David of any group; you don't want to take me anywhere. But it's these two things that led our founding team to start Throne Labs. And our mission is to dramatically expand bathroom access for everyone, even 3-year-olds.
So, it was a couple years ago that I first brought my 3-year-old daughter to New York City for the first time, and she loved it. All she wanted to do was walk around the city and look up at the buildings. And it'd been a long day. We're walking up Fifth Avenue. We're still really far from the hotel, and she looks up at me and says, "Daddy, I gotta go."
Now, a lot of us have been there. We did the five-minute restroom shuffle, we popped into a few stores that ended up being dead ends, peeked around a couple alleyways, but ultimately her clock was running down. And if you've ever locked eyes with a 3-year-old who's actively peeing in her shorts while standing on a sidewalk, you know how I felt.
I was thinking three things. One, I feel so bad for her right now. Two, I feel kind of bad for myself right now, because the next hour is going to be the worst, because I'm that dad who brings no things for the situation. And three, we got to get some Thrones to New York.
And I'm so excited that that is happening today. I want to thank Mayor Mamdani for making this a reality and for providing New Yorkers with more public bathrooms. I also want to thank Council Member Nurse and the entire coalition of people that have been working on bringing more bathrooms to New York City for so long now, some of which I was lucky enough to meet this week.
We think you guys are going to love these Thrones, and we can't wait for you to try them out. Thank you so much. Next up is Council Member Nurse.
Council Member Sandy Nurse: Thank you. Good morning, everyone. And thank you for having me. I want to start by thanking the mayor for making the expansion of public bathrooms a priority in your first 100 days. It is not a small thing; it really matters and it's a huge win for New Yorkers.
This has been about three and a half years in the making, three years of coalition building, negotiating and getting the city to agree to a goal. It was a ton of work, and I really want to be specific about who did that work, because they really deserve some flowers today.
It was a broad coalition that reflected just how universal this need is. Vocal New York, AARP, the Coalition for the Homeless, the Street Vendor Project, the Safety Net Project, the Workers Justice Project, Legal Aid, JFREJ, the Carroll Gardens Association, Menstrual Equity Advocates. My chief, Ryan Hickey, who's here, who brought this legislation to our office. And I want to mention that Council Member Rita Joseph and Comptroller Mark Levine also did a lot of work in the Council around bathrooms.
But this was the Free to Pee Coalition, and it was started in 2018 by Picture the Homeless and is and was appropriately led by some of the most vulnerable New Yorkers who experienced the lack of public access most acutely.
We have roughly - I had 1,600, but I guess it's 1,000 - 1,000 public restrooms in New York City, about eight million people living here. And on any given day, a meaningful share of those facilities are just not working. And that's just the truth.
And it means that our street vendors, our deliveristas, our taxi workers, our taxi drivers are forced to hold it for an entire shift. It means people who are menstruating are forced in embarrassing situations. It means pregnant people, people with chronic health conditions, our older adults are forced to spend less time outside; and it means our unhoused neighbors are discriminated against from accessing private facilities and then criminalized with a summons for simply having nowhere else to go.
The law we passed forces our city to do better and brings us to today, and I am thrilled to see the launch of this pilot. I've met with the Throne team a few times and got to spend some time this week. And what really impressed me the most is just how you all are tackling the ick factor that so many New Yorkers think about when we contend with, when we're thinking about public restrooms.
You're not only creating something that's functional, but there's some nice aesthetics there. We've got some tropical wallpaper, right? So, this is really, really nice. And it has an impressive maintenance plan that comes with it. And I think that a strong maintenance plan that fixes things quickly is really going to make the difference for New Yorkers who have had to contend with some interesting experiences in public restrooms.
So, I speak on behalf of my colleagues to say that we are excited to partner with you. We want to see this pilot be successful. We're excited to work with you on this.
This is just one pilot and it's an exciting one. But we know to get to 2,100 public restrooms is going to require a lot of creative strategies. It's going to look a lot of different ways, and even then, 2,100 toilets is not enough for a city of 8 million people that's growing.
So that is why the bill actually requires the city to account for public bathrooms moving forward in our city planning processes. So, I'm really looking forward to all the ideas that the interagency working group is going to come up with. And again, I just want to thank the Free to Pee Coalition, our partners in government and the mayor for this excellent work here today. Thank you so much.
Question: Thank you. I have a couple of quick on-topic questions. Number one is, can you talk about the barrier to entry since either a phone is required or a tap card that someone would have to pick up? Isn't that keeping out the same homeless population that others just spoke of?
Mayor Mamdani: So, one of the reasons why, when I began my remarks, I also began with acknowledgement of the World's Borough Bookstore is that we are partnering with a lot of local institutions that are going to be passing out these tap cards so that people can actually have a physical manifestation of them.
And that is going to be a critical part of ensuring that this is something for all New Yorkers. I'll also just invite Throne Labs CEO to add some additional details to that.
Jessica Heinzelman, Co-Founder and COO, Throne Labs: Thank you. The additional benefit of having the phone access is to also be able to hear from people using it so that we're able to get cleanliness ratings immediately as well as any feedback. That goes into our systems, generates tickets so that can get out there quickly. And then we're so thrilled to be working with a number of the local partners. There is going to be signage on each Throne with the address and location and hours where tap cards are available within a 10-minute walk.
Question: Mayor, second quick question is, does 17 on top of the 1,000, does that really make a dent when the goal is 2,000? Are New Yorkers going to notice this?
Mayor Mamdani: Brother, I'll tell you that when you need one, if you can find one, makes a difference. So, 17, yes, it is an important first step toward, you know, you heard from the Council member about a larger vision. But to us, this is also what it looks like for a City government being responsive.
I mean, I can tell you the time when I discovered the public bathroom in the Times Square subway station was an incredible moment for me. And I hope that many others have that same moment when they discover these 17 Throne Labs across the five boroughs.
Question: By the way, did you ever put the bidets into Gracie Mansion?
Mayor Mamdani: Yes, they're all there.
[Crosstalk.]
Question: I was just wondering about the enforcement aspect to this because although I empathize, as the father of a 6- and 3-year-old, [with] having more public bathrooms, I've also covered instances in other places where modular-style public bathrooms have resulted in drugs, prostitution and homeless encampments, so I'm wondering how you're going to combat that here.
Mayor Mamdani: So, I really appreciate the question because so much of the way in which Throne Labs have set up these modular bathrooms is specifically geared toward the kind of outcomes that we want to see. So, there are a few things that I'll just rattle off and then feel free to come up and add some additional details.
One thing that is critically important for New Yorkers to know is that every single unit is cleaned by a real person and is done so on average every 15 uses or fewer.
The other is that these are bathrooms where there's, you know, you start to have flashing lights after a certain point to encourage people to get out of the bathroom. Because, again, the average time of using a public restroom is, I think, somewhere below four minutes, about three and a half minutes or so. And so, the kinds of things that you're speaking of is typically a much longer use of time in the bathroom that doesn't actually need to be accommodated by this. I don't know if you want to add some details.
Heinzelman: And I'm Jessica Heinzelman, co-founder and COO of Throne. The other thing is after plenty of warnings, as the mayor's talking about, with acknowledgement that the time is up, the door eventually will open, letting that user know well in advance.
And that's actually saved lives in other locations where someone is having a medical emergency, contrary to your traditional public restroom that has a door that might stay locked for hours until maintenance comes along and knocks.
This actually provides access to an individual where people can walk by and see. In some cases, our cleaners have showed up and been able to help somebody immediately. And all of our staff will be offered training on Narcan as well.
Question: And mayor, my second follow-up was Mayor Adams had a much broader announcement, frankly, a couple of years ago promising public resources and immediately after people had trouble accessing many of those public bathrooms up to and including City Hall.
So, what is your commitment to the existing public infrastructure, and should anyone be allowed to use the bathroom in City Hall without having to, you know, get ID'd and jammed up by the cops?
Mayor Mamdani: I haven't thought about the bathroom - so which bathroom specifically?
Question: City Hall.
Mayor Mamdani: There are a number of them.
Question: Can the general public have access to City Hall [bathrooms]?
Mayor Mamdani: I think that everyone should be able to use every bathroom that is, you know, within public access. I'll get back to you about the specifics of the City Hall bathroom.
What I will say is that for us, part of the reason that this is a pilot is we want to evaluate the results of this. We're hopeful, and what I would love to see is that at the end of this year that we can see the success of these 17 modular bathrooms and then, as the Council member said, build this into our larger vision.
Because we're a city of 8.5 million people, and we need to have enough public infrastructure for people's day-to-day needs. And I think, especially when we're thinking about New Yorkers who work outside as well as parents who are taking their children around, they shouldn't have to have that panic or have to look for a Google Maps list of different businesses that you can get into to use their public bathroom. And I think that there are too many New Yorkers who have had to deal with that, frankly.
Question: So, Mr. Mayor, I know that this is only a pilot for 17 public restrooms, and I know that Sandy Nurse wants 2,100, but will all the restrooms that you do after this be like this, the modular units, or are you exploring other options as well?
The reason I ask the question is that these are fairly big, and you have to find enough space to put them in. And the question is where you would find it. Does it have to be public space? Will it be on a street, in a park, at an intersection? Do you have to take public property to do it? Will you put it in NYCHA? What are the things that you're looking at in order to expand this? And will it always be these modular units or will you look at other options as well?
Mayor Mamdani: We're going to be looking at all options. Just to give you one example, over the time that we've been in office, we've also opened an automated public toilet as well. I had made an announcement, I think, as this Council member had referred to in the early days of the administration, and that very site actually just opened up its automated public toilet this week. So, that's one example of a way to do it. The modular restrooms are another example of the way to do it.
Frankly, Marcia, I'll be honest, I don't think that there's a shortage of places that could accommodate a public restroom. The interest and demand is so high. And when you look at these, what is so exciting about them is that they do not require what most restrooms require in terms of the connection to so much of the infrastructure of our city.
And also, the cost that we're talking about, 17 of these - and I think the deputy mayor of Operations can correct me if I'm wrong - 17 costs about what one public restroom has historically cost in New York City. And that is part of why we have not built that many, because we've seen the cost of these restrooms just escalate year after year.
Question: So, if I could follow up, I just wonder what the next step of sewer socialism will be.
Mayor Mamdani: You know, I think the next step is, what are the issues that people are dealing with in terms of their quality of life. We've seen New Yorkers come forward to say it's the pothole on their block - that's a priority for us. We've seen others come forward and tell the Council member, the Council member [has] brought it forward of, "I need a place to be able to take my kid when they need to go to the bathroom." That's the priority for us.
Anything that a New Yorker is struggling with in their day-to-day life, that's a priority for us, because we want to show that City government can help you live a better life in this city, and for far too long New Yorkers have been rightfully skeptical of that.
[Crosstalk.]
Mayor Mamdani: What's your favorite public bath in New York City?
Question: If the police will let me use one, I'll usually try to get in there. Are those public?
Mayor Mamdani: Which ones?
Question: Police precincts.
Mayor Mamdani: Police precincts? I'll get back to you.
Question: And my other question is, what happens if you run out of time? Does it just - can you reset the clock if you're in a bad situation?
[Crosstalk.]
Heinzelman: Yeah, I think balancing publicly accessible private space and misuse - it's a balance. So, if there is a need for more time, unfortunately, there is not a way to extend. We are working on a way to do that for people with existing mobility challenges or issues that are ongoing. But for now, no.
But our strategy is really just informed consent. So, there's signage on the outside about the 10-minute limit, on the inside, audio and visual, and then there are warnings throughout the use that are telling you you're at five minutes, eight minutes, 10 minutes, and then you even have a little bit of a buffer at the end when you know it's really getting serious. So, thank you.
Mayor Mamdani: To also just say succinctly that this is not a place to scroll on your phone. I know that many people do that. This isn't one of them.
Question: Following up on the homelessness question, if you're homeless and perhaps you don't have a cell phone, [or] you don't have a charged cell phone, maybe you didn't, weren't able to connect with some, a provider to get a tap card. Maybe the - it's off hours when the nearby tap card locations are closed. I can imagine there being a barrier and I'm wondering, since it seems like the doors do open eventually at the end, why is there a kind of a need for an electronic entry system at all?
Mayor Mamdani: I think one of the key parts of this, and we've heard this, is the feedback loop for New Yorkers to provide of the cleanliness of the unit, of the use of the unit, and that actually triggers a response in terms of it being cleaned faster and sooner.
So, that's very important for us, because you heard it from Henry, who's, I think, indicative of many New Yorkers, at one level sympathetic because of what they've had to experience and another level also skeptical because of what they've heard. And we need to make sure that we can address those needs while also being able to address the concerns around it.
I think one of the other critical parts of this is to have local partners within a 10-minute walk of these Throne Labs - is a critical way such that it's not just those with phones, but also those who have tap cards, and that that card is something that can be used to get into these bathrooms.
I don't know if there's anything else - okay, all right. It's a great name, by the way. It's an incredible name, I don't know-
[Crosstalk.]
Deputy Mayor Kerson: I don't know if it's worth adding, but the ability to track the number of uses is also how we get to those service levels of saying that it's going to be cleaned every 10 to 15 uses.
Because you have to understand how frequently it's being used. Here in New York, there's so many people, some areas are more dense than others. We want to make sure that that maintenance and cleanliness operation is up to par with what we expect from public restrooms in the city.
Question: [Inaudible] your whole name and spell it for me?
[Crosstalk.]
Heinzelman: The other piece is the accountability. In the design, we've used a lot of behavioral science to give people nudges. So, in the same way that when someone's waiting behind you in line in a bathroom situation, you might take a little extra minute, make sure you didn't dribble on the seat, wipe anything up.
The same thing holds true here when you enter with your device. And so, we're able to, if somebody is smoking inside, actually send a warning saying, "Smoke was detected during a use associated with your phone. If this happens again, you may risk losing access."
What we see over time with over 2 million uses is that only 0.2 percent of people are repeatedly misusing the restrooms and getting restricted. We also have a path to get access back, but that is also a critical piece of why we're doing that.
Question: Like, in other words, it's 10 minutes. Tell us when they get warned, when they need to start leaving.
Heinzelman: Yeah, so there's external signage that has the 10 minutes. You also walk in, there's a sign that says 10 minutes. Audio plays, it welcomes you to Throne, tells you it will close the door behind you. It's playing in the back.
It then will tell you it's a 10-minute limit. At five minutes, there's music actually playing throughout, which is also a behavioral science technique in deterring loitering. It's nice music if you're in there for three minutes, maybe not that great if it's 30 minutes.
At five minutes, the music breaks. It says, "Hey, you're halfway there," very friendly. At eight minutes, it will say - it stops and it says, "Hey, your use is coming to an end. Make sure you're prepared. The door will open at 10 minutes." The music comes back on.
At 10 minutes, there are flashing lights. The audio comes on. And this is both in English and Spanish for all of these indicators. It says, "The door - your time is up, the door is opening." The door's opening. That extends for about 30 seconds. So, if you are still pants down, we're not gonna open the door on you. But then the door does open.
And again, as I said before, that has proven to be a very effective safety mechanism as well when people are having a medical emergency inside, which thankfully doesn't happen that often, but can. So, does that - thank you.
Question: I have two questions, both on the EDC.
[Crosstalk.]
Question: You appointed Lina Khan as chair of the EDC in July. Do you expect her to have more prominent role than past board chairs? Is the role and responsibilities of the chair going to change in any way? And my second question, are there any other new projects that we can expect the EDC to take on soon?
Mayor Mamdani: So, what was the last part of it? New projects you expect them to take on? Okay. I'm very excited by the fact that we have Lina Khan as our board chair, and she has showcased a drive, desire and ability to deliver for working people across this country for many years at a national level and has also been instrumental even just as one of the co-chairs of our transition.
She will help to develop that vision, and I'm also very excited about the leadership of the head of our EDC, Tony Shorris, who has just recently started and is an integral part of ensuring that we are able to not only deliver economic development for New Yorkers across the five boroughs, but also economic justice, and that this be a city that isn't just one that is thought of as the wealthiest city and the wealthiest country in the history of the world, but also one where we can address the fact that one in four New Yorkers are currently living in poverty.
Question: So, then City Council posted today that they are going to have an oversight meeting about regulation of AI. They've invited the Anthropic CEO and the OpenAI CEO.
Wondering if you'd be open to meetings with those CEOs as well and if you've had any other further reach out than just your calls for saying that there should be more government regulation. Have you spoken to President Trump about it or any other officials?
Mayor Mamdani: These are conversations that are ongoing internally within our administration of all the different steps that we can be taking to reckon with a question that is on the forefront of Americans' minds coast to coast.
And when it comes to the City Council's announcement, I do welcome efforts by the Council to ask these kinds of questions, to probe these kinds of companies, to explore the role that the city can take in potential regulations.
And yes, I'd be open to those meetings, and frankly I think that what we are really looking forward to is not just having individual meetings, frankly, but to have a policy that can address the scope and the scale of the questions that are in front of us.
Question: So, Benjamin Netanyahu is going to arrive in NYC next weekend. Can you tell us if you're planning to protest his arrival? If not, are you encouraging others to do so? And to follow up on that, has the NYPD expressed any concern to you about the scale of protests, planned protests, things like that?
Mayor Mamdani: I do not have any plans to attend any protest at the UN General Assembly, and I have also been in touch with our PD in general as we prepare for the UN General Assembly. Right now, there are no expected threats that we know of, and we [continue] to be confident in being able to deliver safety and security for New Yorkers.
To New Yorkers, I have never encouraged them to protest. What I have always told them is that they have the right to do so in the city. We respect that right. And this is a city that is proud of the Constitution, proud of the First Amendment, we'll continue to do so.
Question: Just to follow up on Hannah's question, just if you could explain exactly why - I mean, obviously I know that you're not a fan of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Why did you choose not to attend any protests this next week? And did you have any conversations with the president about potentially any protests? And then, I have a second question for you as well.
Mayor Mamdani: You can ask the second one as well.
Question: The Manhattan Institute filed a lawsuit looking for your administration to turn over records related to your deputy mayor and a meeting with the Iran UN ambassador. It didn't end up happening, but just what is the delay for these records? Why not turn them over?
Mayor Mamdani: Sorry, I think - you're referring to the commissioner of International Affairs or deputy mayor?
Question: Your deputy mayor, yeah, Ana Maria Archila.
Mayor Mamdani: She's the commissioner for International Affairs.
Question: I'm so sorry. Thank you so much.
Mayor Mamdani: No worries. I just wanted to make sure that I knew of the same thing that we were talking of. So, our Law Department is reviewing this lawsuit. And we are fully committed to transparency. And we're working to return FOIL requests in full accordance with the law.
And then on your first question, you know, I have made very clear about my views, my thoughts, my assessments. Also, when it comes to the UN General Assembly, my focus is ensuring that our city remains prepared to host representatives from across the world to keep New Yorkers safe. And I think also to ensure that we're able to both address the global conversation that is happening here in our city and the very local concerns that New Yorkers have about traffic and their ability to get from point A to point B over the course of that time period.
Question: I'm Henry Beebe-Center with Streetsblog. In your Vision Zero Reimagined statement on Tuesday, you said we should not have to wait for another family to lose a loved one before we make a street safer.
But another family did indeed lose a loved one on Canal Street last week, where DOT has a safety plan but has put it off until next year at the earliest. And the Bedford Avenue bike lane remains unprotected despite constant danger to cyclists whose families might be next. So, why are you making them wait?
Mayor Mamdani: So, these are conversations that are ongoing within our administration. We take very seriously the importance of delivering street safety and, frankly, to do so in a manner that develops a network across our city. And we also know that while we are proud of the fact that the number of fatalities has decreased since the time that Vision Zero was announced more than a decade ago, that we will not rest until that number is zero.
That number continues to be more than 200, and that is why yesterday we announced a whole suite of initiatives that we are going to be taking, and that is also going to be complemented by a streets plan that we will be releasing soon.
Question: Mayor, the students at Ramaz and some other Jewish schools are planning a prayer vigil outside Gracie Mansion on Friday morning to talk about their support for Israel and for Bibi Netanyahu. I wonder if you have any plans to go out and talk to them and explain your concerns and your views and hear what they have to say.
Mayor Mamdani: I welcome them. They can have a vigil, or I've heard some describe it even as a protest. Whatever it is intended to be, they have the room and space to do so outside of Gracie Mansion. I think that at the time that they are there, I will probably be somewhere else across the city.
