Governor Kathy Hochul: Good morning, everyone. First, I want to thank our host, the president and CEO of Win, Christine Quinn, an extraordinary leader. I have followed Chris's career for many, many years. And not just her ascension to become the speaker of the City Council, but also what she has done afterward. Reminds a little more of Jimmy Carter. The incredible impact that someone has when they leave office and dedicate their lives to continuing their passion, which is to help women and children.
So, I want to thank her and everyone at Win here for the incredible work you do. Incredible work you do. My partner in lifting up families and women and children: our mayor, Zohran Mamdani. You'll be hearing from him in a couple minutes. But, again, this is what a partnership looks like. This is a little foreign to New Yorkers, perhaps. They're not accustomed to seeing people who can collaborate and get real results.
And that's exactly what our significant investments in child care has done. And we've had some announcements this week, and I'm really, really proud of them. And thank you, mayor, for your passion on this issue as well. And of course, our [Manhattan] borough president, Brad Hoylman-Sigal, [whom] I see a lot more now than when he was a senator, although I just came down from Albany, and you're probably a little jealous.
[Crosstalk.]
But we miss you, Brad. But, yeah, I want to talk today about where we are, first of all. When I come to a place that is a shelter, a shelter from the storm for moms and children, it reminds me of something that my own family did when my mother turned 70. Now, my mother's family - she grew up in a place where there was domestic violence, [with] a very abusive father who abandoned her and her mother and left my mom living above a gas station alone. And my mom had to kind of raise herself and the younger kids. So, my mom had a hard life.
And it always impressed me that she didn't succumb to the circumstances. She said she turned that passion into helping others, and she became a social worker and helped women - at the time they called them "battered women," before we came up with the other term of "domestic violence survivors." But when she turned 70, my mom didn't want a party. She wanted to open up a home for victims of domestic violence. And we found an old funeral home, kind of creepy. Went in there and turned that basement into an extraordinary place. It was the kids' playroom. We did the bedrooms over. We all went in, and family painted and brought in flowers and paintings. And the third floor was a computer lab we created so women could have a chance at job retraining. This was many, many years ago.
But I'll never forget the look of the eyes of the children who first came to that shelter. Their eyes were hardened. They had not known love. They grew up in a home where it was not what it was supposed to be. It was not a wrap of a warm blanket of care. It was pain and abuse, especially what they saw inflicted on their mothers. But over time, the kids' eyes softened, and they became part of our family. And we took care of them for many, many years.
And so, when I come here, Chris, it just brings back the memories of what one person can do. And all the volunteers and the workers here, the difference they're making. So those children that we just saw will have a better shot at knowing what real love is about, because they learned it here. And so, I am just so grateful to be here. And the kids who we saw today, they're born into a world [where] they didn't decide where they're going to be. And they're going to be shaped by life itself. They're born in innocence, and they come to a place like this. And maybe their moms have had a really tough life. Obviously, they would have.
But are they going to become victims of those circumstances? [Or] are they going to rise up? And that question cannot be answered by these little kids we saw today. It can only be answered by all of us: the parents who bring them here, who care about them deeply, who let them be cared for by Chris's incredible staff. It's by the volunteers. It's the workers. It's also the role that [the] government has, in my opinion.
A mayor and a governor can make a difference in their lives. And so, we're the ones who can create the nurturing environment for them and end up in a situation where success is not the exception but the expectation. And that's what today is all about. So, I wanted to come here and see exactly what you do. I'm not surprised that I would feel this blanket of love everywhere. The women who are just playing with the little kids - I just want to stay and play with them all day, but obviously I can't.
But we've met some family members, and I just want to talk about something that you're putting out here today, and I'll let Chris explain it in more detail. But they did a very in-depth study on what child care - the lack of child care - means for a mom and how so many women - 80 percent of the women they surveyed - said that finding and affording child care either costs them their job, the lack of affordable child care costs them their job, [or] forces them to work reduced hours or refuse a promotion. And what happens when you can't take a job because you don't have child care? You could be in a place like this. Thank God it's here, but I'm sure it's not what people set out in life to do, [which] is to raise their family in a shelter like this. And so, you see that as a driver, a causational factor, why we have so many women in places like this raising their kids here, and thank God there are child care places like this.
But we talked about how the high cost of child care is driving families out of our state. It's driving families out of jobs, driving moms out of their jobs, because we [don't] have enough jobs here in the city. We have 700,000 open jobs across the State of New York. But if you don't have someone to take care of your children, it doesn't work. And that is the foundational premise behind needing child care. You want to go to a job to support yourself and your family. And so, it's society's responsibility, [the] government's responsibility, [and the] business's responsibility as well to step up and to help families overcome those barriers.
And I've spoken about my experience enough: what it was like without having child care. But I do know this. At the time when I was having our children many years ago, the thought was, "That's your problem. You decide to have kids. You figure it out." So, there was never any thought that anybody else would help with that scenario, that the businesses, your employers, didn't feel any responsibility to the employees they had, or [that the] government certainly did not at the time either.
So that is the evolution of where we are today. We have a more enlightened government and government leaders who understand the difference we can make. So maybe there will be fewer moms needing a place like Win. Maybe fewer moms would have to come here if they had child care, could have a job that could support themselves, and also building the housing they need. So, these are our shared goals that we're working on and focusing on here today. So, we've worked hard. I've been talking about child care, universal child care.
We've invested over $8 billion over four years in a variety of ways to build up the infrastructure and the training and everything else we needed. I'm proud of that. I'm proud we're able to launch this 2-K program, which I think is just going to be life-changing for families, extraordinary. And we're continuing this effort statewide as well. So, I'm just here to say how grateful I am that there [are] places like this, Chris, and I'll never take for granted what you have done and the lives that you've changed and everyone who cares so much about others.
And that to me is what the embodiment of public service is that we think of others, not ourselves, and do anything we can to lift them out of their circumstances [and] give them an easier shot in life. And how could you walk away from that little room of toddlers that we just did and not say that it's our moral responsibility to give them the best shot in life? And that's what we're here to talk about here today. So, I want to thank everybody for this, and I want to thank our mayor for being the partner that we need to get us through these times and to give people hope - give them hope that they have been heard and we understand the pain they're going through and we're here to alleviate that in any way we can. Thank you, mayor.
Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani: It is a real privilege to be here alongside Governor Hochul and, echoing the governor's remarks, the New Yorkers that we are fortunate enough to serve. And I want to thank the staff here at the Women in Need shelter. I want to thank Win President and CEO Christine Quinn for the incredible work and also for welcoming us here today, as well as the teachers that we just had the lovely experience of meeting and seeing the incredible work that they do, as well as our Manhattan borough president, Brad Hoylman-Sigal.
Over the past few days, the governor and I have crisscrossed our city to speak to New Yorkers about the historic investment that we're making in universal childcare. And the governor was alluding to this, the $1.2 billion that the governor has committed to transforming the lives of parents across the city. And we are so excited to be working together as partners to deliver 2,000 seats of free childcare for two-year-olds across four different sets of communities in our city before expanding to 12,000 seats by the end of next year and then a seat for every two-year-old by the end of four years.
To raise a family in this city is to know joy and to know community. It is also to reckon with hardship. Here in the most expensive city in the nation, the happiness that arrives when a family realizes that they will be expecting a child is often followed by another realization: that life is only going to get more expensive in the city that they call home. Many New Yorkers are living paycheck to paycheck. They cannot afford the more than $20,000 a year per child that it costs for childcare. And parents certainly can't afford to leave their jobs to look after their children. And families living here in a Win shelter know this better than most. So many of the families here have struggled with homelessness in no small part because of the financial burdens that build.
For too long, the homelessness crisis has been placed in isolation, forced from the structural cost-of-living challenges that are its root causes. Some of that has to do with stigma. And some of it also has to do with a reluctance to name the problem. Because if you name the problem, then you have a responsibility to fix the problem. The governor and I, however, are not afraid to name the affordability crisis that plagues our city. And we are not afraid to meet the responsibility that we have to deliver the very kind of change that will lift families across our five boroughs out of homelessness and into lives of dignity.
Today, a new report prepared by Win detailed the connections that exist between homelessness and the exorbitant costs of childcare. The numbers laid out in this report, as the governor mentioned, are damning. 78 percent of survey respondents, all of whom are families with children living in one of Win's 16 shelters, said that they face job disruption due to difficulties in accessing childcare. Parents have not only lost their jobs or had to quit; they have had to turn down promotions and had their work hours reduced. Nearly three in ten respondents say they could not find permanent housing until they had access to childcare. Many of the housing vouchers they so desperately needed to get their lives back on track have strict work requirements attached to them. Until they know that their children will be taken care of during work hours, they can't take a job. And if they can't accept a job, they can't get a voucher, and they can't leave the shelter. And over half of all respondents said that the childcare arrangement they were currently using was unaffordable.
This report, frankly, should open all of our eyes and only deepen our commitment to delivering universal childcare to every family across the five boroughs. For the families that are here today, and for so many across our city, the lack of that reliable, affordable childcare is the defining challenge that they face, the difference between a home of their own and having to spend nights in a shelter.
And as we speak, there are over 3,600 children sleeping in wind shelters every night. Half of them are younger than five years old. And as the governor has made this historic commitment, and we together deliver universal childcare alongside our borough president and elected officials across the city, we also know that the changes that this will deliver will not be abstract. They will not be ones that are hard to translate into the day-to-day realities of New Yorkers. They will be felt when parents can stay in the jobs they need to make ends meet, when families can finally receive those housing vouchers that they have worked so hard to be eligible for, and when a child can receive the quality care they deserve during the day, and then return home at night to a bed that they can call their own.
And if today is proof of anything - beyond the fact that I now know the words to the song "Who Stole the Cookie from the Cookie Jar?," apparently at one point it was me - it is that childcare is more than a child receiving quality education and having a place where they can learn and be looked after throughout the course of a day. Childcare is also the key to a life of opportunity, of upward mobility, of possibility - and not just for a child, but frankly, for the entire family. And I am grateful that we will be facilitating that very kind of change in the lives of so many, and in so doing, providing long-term stability to thousands of our fellow New Yorkers.
And with that, I want to just echo the governor's words in thanks to the president and CEO of Win, Christine Quinn, because the work that you all are doing on a day-to-day basis, the work that you have done, and the staff that you are leading - whether it be the teachers or the security guards we just had the privilege of meeting - they are doing the very kind of work that keeps people afloat in this city. And keeps them believing in the possibility that their life could be more in the place that they call their home. And without all of you doing that work, this would not be a moment that we could rise to. And so, I just want to say thank you again. Thank you to our first mom governor that we have here in the State of New York, and thank you as well to our borough president, all of whom have been committed to ensuring that tomorrow is a better day than today.
Christine C. Quinn, President and CEO, Women in Need (Win): Well, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, Governor Hochul. Thank you, Borough President Hoylman-Segal, which is the first time I've gotten to say that, so that's very exciting. Brad and I go way back. But thank you, everyone, for being here today. I also want to thank the elected officials' offices who are with us today. As has been said, my name is Christine Quinn, and I'm the president and CEO of Win. Win is the largest provider of transitional housing and supportive services for families with children in shelters. Right now, there are more children in shelters than there are seats in Yankee Stadium - in the greatest and richest city in the world, that is nothing short of a sin. Every day, Win operates 16 family shelters and eight supportive housing facilities across the city. In the past year, we've served nearly 10,000 of our neighbors, including more than 5,000 children, helping them break the intergenerational cycle of homelessness.
Our mission is to create a foundation where families can rebuild, find safety, stability, and the resources they need to move out of shelter and into homes of their own. The average length of time in a Win shelter is 11.1 months. As the mayor said, half of our children under five. That's a quarter of a child's life spent not in their own home, which has, even in a great facility like Win, a lasting negative impact. We know that parents cannot provide for themselves and their families, they cannot thrive independently, if they cannot go to work. And make no mistake, every mom in this shelter who is work-able wants to work. And they can't go to work if they don't have access to safe, reliable, and affordable childcare. From on-site childcare services here, to after-school programs here, to tutoring, to Camp Win, our work is to make sure we help our families move out of shelter.
But Win's childcare services are limited. We're basically 8 to 6, so we'll stay a little later if we have to. And often when you're homeless and you're starting work or starting back in work, you get the worst shift. So, 8 to 6 is just not that helpful. As the mayor and the governor have said, today we release a report, a comprehensive, unique report with eye-opening insights to how the lack of accessible childcare is fueling housing instability for parents living in shelter. This is the first of its kind study focused on the childcare preferences of families in shelter. And we need that information. If we don't talk to the people we are charged with serving, we will never have our services be on point. When we think of family homeless crisis, we don't often imagine a toddler, the little ones we just met. The mayor was the first one who stole the cookie, I'll just say. But that is the devastating truth of who is homeless.
We know that our families experience childcare-related work disruptions or even job loss at twice the rate of their low-income peers. In our report, we found that 78 percent of respondents reported experiencing some type of job disruption because they couldn't find affordable childcare. 78 percent. Those disruptions led directly to housing instability. No parent should have to choose between caring for their child and earning a paycheck. But too many families are forced to make that choice every day. The high cost of childcare is a driving force that is keeping families in shelter and sending them in to shelter. The unprecedented $8 billion investment by the governor and supported by the mayor can change this reality. Within that plan is a significant contribution to the childcare voucher program across the state.
Right now, in New York City, for close to a year, one of the childcare vouchers has not been given out. In 10 months, one of the childcare vouchers has not been given out because the Adams administration ran out of money and did not fill the coffers. One of the other ones, as the mayor said, you have to work to get the childcare voucher, but you can't find a job if you don't have a childcare voucher. Also, if you are homeless, make no mistake, you have to go to a lot of appointments with the government. If you miss an appointment, you get kicked off your benefits. But if you don't have child care, you're then required to schlep your child all across the city to sit in on government appointments. To hear things that have happened to you in your life that perhaps you don't want your young child to know about, or to find out in that kind of an antiseptic environment.
So, we applaud the governor, the mayor, the borough president, and everyone else who is pushing to first and foremost make sure that the true face of homelessness is known in the city. It's a single mom and a five-year-old child. To make sure that their reality is known - that they're losing jobs because they don't have childcare, and then they're solving that problem by this unprecedented investment that covers every type of mom that is out there, including homeless mothers. There was a period of time at Win where we called our families the forgotten face of homelessness. But because the governor's leadership and the mayor's leadership, they are no longer forgotten in our five boroughs, and that makes today a truly exceptionally great day at Win.
Manhattan Borough President Brad Hoylman-Sigal: Hi, Brad Hoylman-Sigal, the Manhattan Borough President. You know, I've worked with two New York governors and four New York City mayors, and this is a partnership that I have not yet witnessed. The work that you are doing together on behalf of nonprofits like Win, on behalf of New York City children and parents, is remarkable, and I just want to thank you for that. I want to thank you, governor and mayor, for recognizing that childcare really is the keystone for a healthy economy, and that's what Win does every day. So, thank you, Christine. Thank you, mayor. Thank you, governor.
Question: What immediate actions are being taken to ensure seats for families that are experiencing homelessness in shelters with those untraditional work hours get a place, [and] get one of those childcare seats? Are these 2K seats that are opening up this fall, are they being considered for those seats as well? And is there any immediate action for policy changes happening when it comes to reducing those strict requirements for the work authorizations for the childcare vouchers?
Mayor Mamdani: So, I'll just start on the question of how to ensure that this is a system that brings in each and every New Yorker that could benefit from it. We just finished the application period for 3K and Pre-K, and we made sure that in that time we were also doing sustained outreach within our shelters across New York City because for far too long, city government has overlooked a number of New Yorkers for whom this could be a transformative program. So, some of it comes back to the outreach to ensure that each and every New Yorker knows that they are eligible for these programs, and we made that clear time and time again.
And now for 2K, thanks to the governor's commitment in this partnership, we're talking about 2,000 seats this year, 12,000 seats next year, a seat for every two-year-old that wants it by the end of four years. The 2,000 seats by the end of this year will be across four different sets of communities. The eligibility is just having to live in those communities. And so New Yorkers who are residents of shelters within those communities will also be part of the very New Yorkers that we're reaching out to make sure that they're applying for this. That period is going to open up in the early summer, and we're also informing New Yorkers that we're looking to actually have this meet their needs. We're not looking to be punitive in the manner in which they can qualify for it. So, it doesn't matter how much money you make, doesn't matter what your profession is, doesn't even matter what your immigration status is, and it doesn't even matter if your child turns two before the date that school starts. If they turn two before the end of the year, it's also going to be rolling admission so that they can actually enter into the system.
Question: Would there ever be a dedicated or separate program that would supply child care for anybody in shelter?
Mayor Mamdani: Well, I'll just say and then pass it over to our CEO of Wynn that it's a testament to Wynn's work that they have, both at this shelter and others' child care centers on site, that this is for shelter residents, that they can send their children to this and know that they're not just getting child care, they're getting high-quality, engaging child care. I can tell you as the mayor that I wanted to stay there as we were going through those services.
Executive Director Quinn: So, I think it really is a testament to the work. You know, we seek to have child care on site at all of our shelters. Some of our shelters are rehab buildings that don't facilitate the space that is required. But anywhere we can, we have it. At different times, we've had enough funds where we've been able to have longer hours. The more funding we get, private or public - I'm just saying private or public - could add longer hours and add more teachers into the equation. Our child care, as all our services, are run in a trauma-informed way. And at different times, we've worked with consultants like Bank Street College to really make sure we have the highest level of care. But our goal is always to have child care on site. We have another shelter on East 100th [Street]. It's old tenements. It doesn't facilitate on site. We bring those children here, so we'll also do that.
Question: I'm here to ask about the fact that everyone here is talking about these seats - they're lotteries. How do you tell a mother in one of the shelters, they're going to be competing with two-family households or two-parent households making six-figure salaries for the same seats?
Executive Director Quinn: You tell them the truth. The system is what the system is. And trust me, our moms are well aware that the systems out there in society have not always been bent in their direction. But when you're forthright and you tell them what it is, they understand and move forward. But clearly, in the lottery, there's no preference to somebody who has two jobs and a roof over their head. They're not given a higher point count or a higher weight than someone in shelter. This is game-changing. Even having these kind of lotteries makes an enormous difference. And obviously, the availability is only going to grow over time, and as there are more resources and we get out of the fiscal crisis.
Question: Mayor, you've heard some of the pushback from Staten Island on not being included in the first 2,000 [seats]. Was it a mistake to not make this a five-borough approach in the very first year and then expand after that?
Mayor Mamdani: I think one thing that I'll say is that I am so thankful for the governor's commitment of a multi-year one, that this year is 2,000 seats, next year is 12,000 seats. And then as the governor said at the press conference just earlier this week, she and the state are not walking away from this because child care is also a central focus of her work and the work of the state. And so, we have long known that the 2,000 seats this year will expand to 12,000 seats next year and will expand to Staten Island. Now, one of the difficulties in ramping up so quickly is also being able to ensure that we can deliver exactly the high-quality care to the entirety of the communities that we are speaking about. What you'll find is that [with] the four different sets of neighborhoods that we spoke of, they are comprised into school districts.
Now, in any other borough, a school district does not encapsulate the entirety of the borough. However, on Staten Island, it is one single school district for the entirety of the borough. So we wanted to ensure that when we make a promise, we can fulfill that promise. We know that we'll be able to do so next year, and we know that for this year we'll be able to do so for school districts that are of a smaller scale in different parts of the city. But as the president of Win was saying, Christine Quinn, that this is 2,000 to start. It's 12,000 next year. By the end of four years, there is no lottery. It is going to be universal child care for every single two-year-old that wants to enroll in the way in which we're providing it for three-year-olds and for four-year-olds.
And I just want to say a thanks as well to the governor in that the $1.2 billion, it wasn't just to step up on vouchers. It wasn't just to step up on a first-of-its-kind 2K program. More than $100 million was specifically allocated to fix the issues with 3K, where the city was unable to meet the demand. And so what that has allowed us to do is spend an entire month in some change talking to New Yorkers about the fact that for the first time in a long time, the city is being open and direct about the fact that we want everyone to sign up, [that] everyone is eligible and that we can actually start to meet that demand.
Governor Hochul: All right.
Question: For the mayor, obviously this is something that requires a lot of collaboration, as you said, with the governor's office, lots of funding that has gone into this, but there is still a large gap in the budget. Are you suggesting, based on your ultimatum, about whether you may need to raise property taxes?
[Crosstalk.]
Are you suggesting that New Yorkers should blame the governor if she does not approve increases to taxes?
Mayor Mamdani: You know, what I will say is that I'm incredibly heartened, as the borough president was saying, by the partnership that the governor and I have been building over many months. And I think what we see in the governor's actions is not just a commitment to the financial well-being of our city, but also to advancing an affordability agenda - making it easier to call the city home. We have quite some time left in the budget process. I'm encouraged by the conversations we're having. And I'm thankful that, for the first time in a long time, it feels as if, between City Hall and Albany, there is a shared direction that we're heading in, and it's a direction to uplift working-class New Yorkers.
