Patricia Ramsey, President, Medgar Evers College: Good morning. I am Patricia Ramsey, president of Medgar Evers College. Happened to be the first woman and first scientist to be in the role. On behalf of Medgar Evers College, I'm delighted to welcome Mayor Mamdani and the Office of Equity and Racial Justice to Central Brooklyn today. Medgar Evers College has a story that is deeply woven in the fabric of this community. Birthed out of the Black community of Central Brooklyn with social justice in its DNA, this college was called into existence by the very residents of this community.
The college is named for Medgar Wiley Evers, who gave his life for the civil rights of others. Today's press conference will speak to issues that sit at the very heart of the community that we serve. We look forward to hearing the vision for a more just and equitable New York City. Mayor Mamdani, thank you for bringing this conversation to Central Brooklyn. There is not a more fitting place than Medgar Evers College. Welcome. Thank you for being here. Ladies and gentlemen, our mayor of New York City: Mayor Mamdani.
Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani: Can we hear it once more for Dr. Ramsey? Firstly, it is a pleasure to be here and to be here also to celebrate what I've now just learned is the most-enrolled major at Medgar Evers, biology, and the 900 students who are studying to be biologists. They are deeply needed because I am a mayor who has very little knowledge of biology. It is a pleasure to be here to announce the release of our Preliminary Racial Equity Plan and NYC True Cost of Living report.
And I want to say thank you first to our chief equity officer and our commissioner of the Mayor's Office of Equity and Racial Justice, Afua Atta-Mensah, for her steadfast leadership. In addition to thanking our commissioner as well as the Medgar Evers president, Dr. Ramsey, I want to thank Council Member Sandy Nurse and Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who are here with us. And we have a number of our leaders from within City government. We have our city planning chair, Sideya Sherman. We have our commissioner, Alister Martin. We have Dr. Sarah Sayeed of the Civic Engagement Commission. We have our SBS commissioner, Kenny Minaya; our DOP commissioner, Sharun Goodwin; our chief climate officer, Louise Yeung; and our commissioner, Yesenia Mata, as well. Now, as I look back, I also see our lawyer, Ramzi Kassem.
And I want to give an acknowledgement as well to our chief of United Way of New York City, Grace Bonilla, who is here with us. Truly. And I'll just end with some final acknowledgements also to the ED and chair of the Commission on Racial Equity, Linda Tigani; one of the commissioners, Kirsten John Foy; as well as members of the advisory board on the implementation of the racial justice charter amendments, Fred Davie and Udai Tambar. And a special shout-out to Dabash Negash, a deputy commissioner of MOERJ, and the nine equity planning commissioners; if we can, give them a round of applause.
So, as we provide these acknowledgements, they are also an acknowledgement of the many who brought this day forward, the many who ensured that this would be something we would actually act upon. And that is not just work that has been done over the last few months, over the last few years, but frankly, over the last few decades even. And I want to give a special remembrance for Bob Law, the radio legend. He was a tireless advocate for racial justice. And when we take a step forward on a day like this, we also do so looking to pay tribute to his memory.
And we do so here at an institution named after an incredible man in the name of Medgar Evers, the legacy of someone who dedicated his life to fighting for the dignity of Black Americans across this country. Now, Medgar Evers spoke at Mount Heron Baptist Church in Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1957 about our obligations to one another. He said: "As men living in as highly diversified and complex a society as ours, it is our duty and responsibility to our fellow men and our children to tackle the problems that lie ahead with faith and courage." Nearly 70 years later, that same directive guides us in our work here in New York City, where extraordinary wealth and devastating poverty live side by side.
The people of our city understand that our faiths are bound up in one another and that we owe each other courage as we confront the problems facing our city. And that is why New Yorkers in 2022 voted to develop a Racial Equity Plan and NYC True Cost of Living Measure. And I want to say thank you as well to someone who is here with us in Jennifer Jones Austin, who was at the forefront of ensuring that that was the case. Now, though the prior administration delayed both of these reports by 580 days, our City Hall has made a promise in the early days of the admin to deliver these long-awaited reports within our first 100 days. And today I am proud to say we are delivering on that promise.
Today's announcement has two parts: the Preliminary Citywide Racial Equity Plan and the inaugural New York City True Cost of Living Measure. Together these reports establish a framework for how our city will both measure affordability and plan for the future.
The True Cost of Living Measure confirms what New Yorkers have long known to be true: too many people cannot afford the city that they love. New York City is home to skyscrapers, million-dollar listings, nine-dollar lattes, and yet more than three in five New Yorkers, 62 percent, cannot keep up with the cost of living in this city. Despite the incredible wealth of our city, our poverty rate is double that of the national average, and it is getting worse year over year. And while today's True Cost of Living Measure confirms that the affordability crisis touches every corner of our city, we know that these effects are not applied evenly. So often it is Black and Brown New Yorkers who are hit the hardest.
This Preliminary Racial Equity Plan is the first step in developing a whole-of-government approach to tackling that reality. It is a plan that lays out these first steps to solve decades of neglect and discrimination, and it places the work of 45 city agencies within a singular framework. Too often, the story of Black and Brown New Yorkers is one of being forced to stretch that same dollar that little bit further. Every year, as wages stagnate, as well as an exodus, an exclusion continues to take place. When I say exodus, I refer to the fact that from 2000 to 2020, more than 200,000 Black New Yorkers were pushed out of this city because they could not afford life in the most expensive city in the United States of America. Because rent was too high, child care was too expensive and groceries cost too much.
Now, I ran for mayor on an affordability agenda because we know that we cannot solve this crisis without reckoning with the fact that the neighborhoods hit hardest by rent and the rising nature of it, by child care costs and the suffocating manner of it, are the same ones that have been hit for years by institutional neglect and racism. In that way, New York City's affordability crisis and its history of racial inequity are bound together. That is why when we secured $1.2 billion in partnership with the governor to place our city on a path to universal child care, we made sure to begin with the neighborhoods that have so often been overlooked. Neighborhoods like Canarsie, Brownsville, Far Rockaway and others.
We also know that the dream of homeownership has been denied to too many New Yorkers due to redlining, FHA loan discrimination and deed theft. That is why we are not only fast-tracking the building of more than 1,000 affordable housing units, but [also] breaking ground on new developments, [such as] Myrtle Avenue in Bed-Stuy, Jerome Avenue in the Bronx, and Farmers Boulevard in Queens. And every single day I've been in office, we have delivered nearly $100,000 back to working-class New Yorkers, small businesses, and so many others who have been ripped off by large corporations that they struggled to make their ends meet in this city.
Now as we finalize this plan, we will continue to tackle our city's affordability crisis without turning away from the decades, and frankly centuries, of disinvestment in Black and Brown New Yorkers. Now we will need New Yorkers' help with this work. The plan we are announcing today is a preliminary one, and to complete it we are opening a 30-day public comment period. Now I know one thing we love about this city is we have no shortage of opinions, and we are asking New Yorkers to share them with us, because we know that in those opinions we will find the answer as to what government can be doing better to finally reckon with both the true cost of living in this city and the racial inequities we've seen pervade for far too long in this place that we call home. Now as we chart this new path forward, we do so with the wish that it be guided by a very simple purpose, that in the wealthiest city in the world, no longer should so many be forced to make do with such little. We will create a New York City that belongs to all who build it, and we will do so together. Thank you, and now I will introduce our Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice Julie Su.
Deputy Mayor Julie Su, Economic Justice: Thank you so much, Mayor. New York City, as you just heard, is one of the richest cities in the entire world. Yet for too many New Yorkers, that wealth feels like someone else's city. 62 percent of New Yorkers, more than 5 million people, cannot meet the true cost of living in this city. This crisis did not fall from the sky, and it does not hit evenly. That is why we are releasing the True Cost of Living Measure and the Preliminary Citywide Racial Equity Plan together.
The people who built this city and who keep it running should be able to afford to live in it. And even that is systematically harder for some than for others. So, 44 percent of white New Yorkers cannot afford the real cost of living in New York City. But that figure is 66 percent for Black New Yorkers, 63 percent for Asian and Pacific Islander New Yorkers, and 78 percent for Hispanic New Yorkers. Now let me be clear: all of those percentages are bad. And they are not inevitable. They are the result of policy choices. Policy choices that were made and policy choices that we are choosing to unmake. This is about equity and it's about economic growth.
When communities of color are denied investment and stability, it drives up costs and weakens the foundations everyone depends on, including white New Yorkers. This country once embraced public investment, the GI Bill, affordable public college, [and] housing investments. But when Black Americans fought for access to those programs, backlash politics taught people to resent government programs instead of expanding them. And the result was a worse deal for everyone.
Black families were hit first and hardest but working families of every race were left with lower wages, more debt, higher tuition, less public investment, and a shrinking middle class. So, we are releasing these reports together because they tell one story. Many of the same forces that drive racial inequity, exclusion, and economic security also helped produce a city that has become harder for New Yorkers of every background to afford. As Deputy Mayor for Economic Justice, my job is to make sure that this story ends differently. And we are already hard at work.
The mayor mentioned protecting tenants; making child care more affordable; strengthening worker and consumer protections; starting an Office of Community Safety; cutting red tape for small businesses; working with organizations led by and for Black and Brown New Yorkers to decide what happens in them; and pursuing economic development that serves all of us and economic growth that is shared growth. Because racial equity cannot be just something we talk about in a plan. It has to show up in whether people have a just day's pay they can depend on, can afford to raise their kids, keep more of what they earn, feel a sense of belonging, and breathe easy at the end of each day. And when we do that, for the New Yorkers least able to afford it, we make this city what it has always promised to be. Thank you.
Mayor Mamdani: Now we'll have our commissioner, Afua Atta-Mensah.
Chief Equity Officer and Commissioner Afua Atta-Mensah, Mayor's Office of Equity & Racial Justice: Good morning, everyone. It is a pleasure to be here with you today as we mark an important milestone for our city. I want to thank so many of our fellow commissioners for being here today. This plan was born during a defining moment in our city's history, when New Yorkers were in the streets in the midst of a global pandemic, calling for justice, demanding accountability, and bearing witness to brutality unfolding on our streets and on our screens.
In that moment, our city was asked to reckon with the deep systemic inequities that have long shaped life here and to do better. New Yorkers across all five boroughs answered that call. Their voices, their advocacy, and their persistence are what brought us to this moment. The release of the Preliminary Citywide Racial Equity Plan is a reflection of that collective mandate. It is not just a document - it is a commitment. A commitment to confront institutional and systemic racism within our city and to begin the work of dismantling it.
This effort represents collaboration across New York City government. Forty-five agencies and more than 200 public servants came together with a shared purpose to build a more equitable, inclusive and just city. That type of coordination only happens when there is a clear understanding that this work is both urgent and necessary. The Office of Equity and Racial Justice is helping to lead this effort, and as a commissioner I want to be clear that this is just the first step. A step we took in spite of tensions around doing so.
Our responsibility now is to move from planning to action and to do so with intention, transparency and accountability. Because plans alone do not create change - action does. This plan lays out a roadmap to address inequities through both targeted programs and deeper structural reforms. It challenges us to examine how systems operate, how decisions are made, and how resources are distributed and to change what is not working. But this work cannot happen in isolation. Community input must remain central to how we move forward. The voices of those most impacted by inequity must continue to guide us, shape our approach and hold us accountable.
So, I also want to take a moment to recognize the individuals and partners who helped guide this work. We are deeply grateful to the Racial Justice Charter Amendment Advisory Board for their leadership and insight; the racial equity planning team members across the city and the nine racial equity planners who are here with us; planning managers; our accountability partners at CORE; and Dr. Ramsey; Esmeralda Simmons; Dr. Brenda Greene; [and] Lurie Daniels Favors of Medgar Evers College, a hallowed institution named in honor of one of America's most prolific civil rights leaders. We also recognize former MOERJ Commissioner and current DCP Chair Sideya Sherman, whose leadership helped bring this plan to New Yorkers through her work both with the Racial Justice Commission and all the iterations that [are] now the Mayor's Office of Equity and Racial Justice. And importantly, we thank the New Yorkers who continue to show up, speak out and remain committed to change. This work belongs to you.
As we move forward, I implore each of you, agency leaders, partners, and community members alike. to stay engaged, to lead into the work, and to hold yourselves accountable and hold each of us accountable. Because the success of this plan will not be measured by its release, but by its impact. Together, we have an opportunity to confront the inequities embedded in our system and to build something better, something more just, inclusive, and more reflective of the values we share. Thank you so much, and it is my pleasure to call up our public advocate, Jumaane Williams.
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams: Thank you. Peace and blessing, love and light to you all. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And last time we had a press conference, I was late because I had to drop off the baby. But I brought her with me this time, so she's listening to [inaudible], not watching it, because I forgot I needed my phone. So hopefully she's all right over there. But thank you all for having this here, and thank you, madam president, for having this space for us. And I always want to make sure I let everyone know, we cannot change the mission of Mega Everest or change who it was for. So, I want to make sure every time that bubbles up in the community, I want to make sure we push back on it.
I'm also not just here as the highest-ranking citywide Black elected, I'm here as a New Yorker, a New Yorker who has cared about these issues for a very long time, following and being inspired by people like Bob Law, and Roger Green, and Esmeralda Simmons, and so many others who have been working on these issues long before I ever thought about becoming an elected official. And Afua, it's awesome to see you. I know that this is not a joke when you're in it, so you're not going to stand up here and talk about things that are not real. And Jennifer Jones Austin, thank you so much for pushing the true cost of living, because that has been an issue for a very long time. And let's be clear, when 62 percent of New Yorkers can't afford to live here, that's not a crisis on the margins. It's a citywide emergency.
What this report confirms is what communities have been saying for generations. Inequality in New York City is not accidental - it's systemic, and it's racial. And I always want to say, you have to mention race in the solution, because race was mentioned in creating the problem in the first place. The federal poverty line has been lying about how hard it is to live in this city. The true cost of living finally tells the truth, New Yorkers feel every single day. And we also know that plans don't just, change lives; actions do. And so, this is a very, very welcome framework and a way to start to figure out how we get that action. We also have to hold agencies accountable to deliver results in addition to the reports. We want to make sure that our budgets are reflective of what's in this report. Millions of New Yorkers are doing everything right and still falling behind. If our policies don't work for them, then our policies are broken, or perhaps they're working how they were designed to work. Most of our children are growing up in families that can't make ends meet. That's not just an economic issue; it's also a moral one, and it demands urgency from all of us.
I want to also thank the people that I mentioned, Linda Tigani, Kirsten Foy, and the Commission Advisory Committee. Also, the people who voted for this in the first place, they understood how important it was to talk about these issues. And I want to make sure that we're lifting up all the communities that were mentioned who are burdened by a system that's created for the wealthy. But I do want to make sure we lift up particularly Black communities. Sometimes they get left behind when we start talking about a lot of issues. It is important to understand that anti-Blackness is rooted in so many of these things by design. Even when we mention other communities, if we're honest, anti-Blackness exists in those. So those other communities, whether it's women or immigrants, when you look at the numbers in the Black communities, they are doing the worst. And anti-Blackness is designed to make sure that we cannot mention Black communities without people feeling uncomfortable. Feeling for some reason that we are asking for something that is not deserving, or something that is not to repair what was created.
And what we've seen, and I specifically want to talk about Black New Yorkers who have been here for generations, who have seen other communities come and benefit from the hard work that they've put in on the backs of the struggles that they've made. And they're still struggling while they see other communities coming. And that leads to division unnecessarily. So, it is important that we understand we have everything we need for everyone that is here, but people's anger [is] valid. And so, it is right to put out a report like this. I'm really hoping that New Yorkers who are watching this, this is not a condemnation of any one New Yorker, Black, white, Brown, because none of us created this system. But all of us have to decide to change the system the way it is.
And I want to be clear that I understand there are wealthy - I'm sorry - there are wealthy Black New Yorkers and there are poor white New Yorkers. But we shouldn't let [the] individual accomplishments take away the community impact. And so, I see that happen all the time. There is a communal impact. And if we are going to address it, we have to be honest about it, because when communities like Black communities, who have been dealing with issues for a very long time, when that community does better, everybody does better. Because the systems that are designed to keep them down keep a whole lot of people behind as well. And we see that happening.
So, instead of allowing leaders to feed our biases and to point to other people and say, "You're the reason why something's not happening," a plan like this can lay out a framework that says, everybody has a right to be here, everybody has a right to thrive, and we're going to knock down the systems that are different for everyone, but we're going to recognize those systems that are keeping them behind and put in policies that change decades and decades of purposeful harm that is done by race. Thank you so much. Peace and blessing, love and light to all.
Commissioner Atta-Mensah: Council Member Sandy Nurse.
Council Member Sandy Nurse: Greetings, everyone. Good morning. Happy Monday. It was really quiet when we walked in here, but I think we're all jazzed up now. Thank you to the mayor and to Commissioner Atta-Mensah for all of your work in the last couple of months, getting this out the door and getting this over the finish line. This plan and this report are long overdue. I am here in my capacity as the chair of the Civil and Human Rights Committee, and beyond that, I've had nothing to do with the work here that's being put forward today. But I am looking forward to advancing this work here through our committee, and where this conversation is housed in the council, I'm really excited to move that forward.
But I think it's very alarming to hear the statistic of 62 percent of 5 million people who are walking around this city living in a crisis every day, mothers, single mothers, elders, our children who are living in the shelter system. It's a five-alarm fire. And we all know its existing, this report just puts it in black and white for all of us. The fact that a single adult needs $75,000 just to cover costs, not even to have a little bit of savings - not to mention that if your tire blows out, if you get sick at work, [if] you got somebody else who's sick, you could just completely spiral into a crisis and not get out of it. So many New Yorkers are struggling. And not only is the cost of living in this city crushing New Yorkers, but there are these historical structural racist forces that are just stacked against them and have been stacked against them for centuries.
And it is very clear that without dramatic action, we will continue to reproduce inequality and inequity in this city. So that is why this plan is so important, this whole-of-government approach where every single agency is responsible for goals, outcomes, and deadlines. Deadlines are so important to have real accountability here. Goals like every single New Yorker having a primary care physician by 2034, that is so small, and yet such a clear intervention that can change someone's entire life trajectory. So, I really want to thank everybody who pushed for this charter revision to happen in the first place, and everyone who has been relentless over the last couple of years to making sure it actually gets published. I know 30 days - what did we say, 30 days? Commentary period. All right, New Yorkers. You know, that means [we've] got to get serious, 30 days go by very fast. We want to make sure that we get this plan into shape, and that is something we can all stand beside. So, I look forward to partnering with everybody in this room to make sure New Yorkers get their voice in here. And I look forward to working with you all in my capacity [as chair]. Thank you.
Commissioner Atta-Mensah: Jennifer Jones Austin.
Jennifer Jones Austin, CEO, Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies: I was proud when I was asked to serve as the chair of the New York City Racial Justice Commission alongside Commissioner Yesenia Mata and Fred Davie and eight others back in 2021. But Mayor Mamdani, I'm even more proud today. I keep thinking to myself, who knew that all that we really needed in New York City was a mayor and an administration who truly care, are sincere when you say that you want all to live with dignity. So, I just have to thank you, Mayor Mamdani. Appreciating that far too many New Yorkers, disproportionately persons of color, struggle financially but go unseen with poverty measures based in deprivation and with self-sufficiency measures that are based in subsistence. The Racial Justice Commission put a True Cost of Living Measure centered in economic security on the ballot and 81 percent of those who voted said yes.
Mayor Mamdani, we then stayed the course for more than four years - some of us eight years, those of us who held the vision - for a standard measure that ensures policies advancing affordability, security and well-being are centered in costs and resources needed not just to survive, but to thrive. And then in less than 100 days, you made the vision a reality. That's a big deal, New Yorkers. We need to give our mayor a round of applause. And now, as was the case with the Racial Justice Commission itself, New York City will be the first, the first in the nation to have and utilize borough-based data, county-level data capturing household costs and resources for daily needs, and for savings, and for debt to inform policy and programs. I want to thank all who have labored to achieve this critical and essential milestone along with the Racial Equity Plans in the enduring fight, the enduring fight for affordability and economic security for all. Thank you.
Commissioner Atta-Mensah: Grace Bonilla.
Grace Bonilla, President and CEO, The United Way of New York City: Buenos días. To say that this has been a labor of love for me personally is an understatement. When I see all the people standing behind me and all the people that didn't make it up here, for decades we have fought to make sure that New Yorkers are treated with dignity. And whether I worked in government or whether I'm at the nonprofit sector, so many of the people standing up here had the same dream. Sometimes we shared that dream with hope, many times with anger. And today, I want to thank the mayor, I want to thank Commissioner Atta-Mensah, I want to thank former Commissioner Sherman. Because it was - this was something that was fought for hard. I see all of my former colleagues sitting over here. The laboring of this work has been for decades. And the reality is that today we are putting a marker down. We're saying that the racial equity - release of the Racial Equity Plan puts government on squarely as a partner to those of us who have fought so hard to make sure every New Yorker can live with dignity.
Deputy mayor, I'm so glad we're leading with data, because it was sobering to hear the deputy mayor say that Latinos are at 73 percent less likely to live with dignity in this city. That is real. And that is a number that we can hold a bar to when we look at the services that we receive from [the] government. Are we receiving them with a level that moves that number, that moves the number for every community in the city? So, when I think about how personal this is to me, it's because I was a girl in Jamaica, Queens, who saw that [the] government was not working for my neighborhood. And today we are saying we are ready to do the work. So, this phase, we will celebrate, but the work continues, and we have to stay vigilant. Thank you.
Commissioner Atta-Mensah: Thank you all for being here today. Thank you again to our partners, to the Hispanic Federation, FPWA, Urban Institute, United Way, and so many others. So, New Yorkers, a reminder, we need your comments, we need you to take a look at this plan, and you can do so and complete a form at bitly.com/repsurvey. That's bitly.com/repsurvey. We are excited for this first step and looking forward to doing the work. Thank you.
[Crosstalk.]
Question: I was texting with your team because I wanted kind of a real number on this 62 percent you've been mentioning. They say that it costs $159,179 for a family with children to live in the city. I don't think it takes a rocket scientist to figure out that's a pretty eye-popping number, well, well, well above the poverty line. So, now that you have that data in hand, two questions. How does this inform what, if anything, you'll do different now that you realize in hard data the scale of the affordability crisis? And also, you have a number of partners in government, including the governor, the comptroller, and the speaker, saying that the job situation in the city is really starting to look very, very troubling. So, looking at this data, looking at the jobs numbers, what are you doing to bring jobs to the city right now?
Mayor Mamdani: So, I'll start with the first question and then go to the second. We, as New Yorkers, have long suspected in our bones that this cost-of-living crisis was affecting far more people than typical indicators would show. And what today's true cost-of-living report illustrates is that this is something which is affecting the lives of millions. I mean, 5 million New Yorkers do not earn enough to match the true cost of living in this city. It inspires us to redouble our commitments in two ways. One is to ensure that as many New Yorkers in this city as possible can earn a living wage so that they can actually keep up with the cost of living in the city. And two is to tackle the costs that are pushing that cost of living so high.
So, some of those costs we know in this city are housing costs. Some of those costs are also childcare costs. Part of the reason why we've been so focused on delivering universal child care in this city is that we know that if a family has a child in this city, for them to find child care, it's considered a good deal to pay $20,000 a year. If you can tackle that cost and you can bring that down to zero, that is a transformative impact on working-class New Yorkers' ability to live and to dream of a future in this city. That's why we're so excited about delivering 2,000 seats for two-year-olds of free childcare this fall, 12,000 seats next year, and a seat for every single two-year-old by the end of year four.
Now to your second question, we are looking to continue to grow not just jobs but also industry in this city and to ensure that growth reaches every single New Yorker. Now, I say reaches because what we've seen in this city is an economy that has grown - and we celebrate that growth - all amidst working-class New Yorkers being pushed out of this city. This report also reveals that working-class New Yorkers are four times as likely to leave as wealthy New Yorkers when it comes to the state of affairs across these five boroughs. And we need to confront that exodus and do everything we can to keep those New Yorkers here in this city. And then also make room for everyone else who would like to be a New Yorker. Because we know - and I'm so glad that we have our DCP head here who's with us - because so much of this comes back to building as much housing as we can to ensure that those who live here can continue to do so, and those who want to live here can find space as well.
Question: Following up on Henry's question, I'm wondering specifically if you could speak to retention of large companies. Do you have any concerns specifically with the CEO of Partnerships of New York commenting on Apollo moving their headquarters? Is there anything in this report that addresses retaining these large companies that are already a big generator of jobs in the city?
Mayor Mamdani: This report focuses on the cost of living for New Yorkers at large. It brings to light statistics like the one I'd shared about working-class New Yorkers leaving at four times the rate of wealthy New Yorkers. It also shines a light on the fact that the median household wealth for white New Yorkers in this city is $276,000. For Black New Yorkers, it's $18,000. The disparities that we're seeing within this city, and I think as the public advocate put it very well, which is that we are here to fight for each and every New Yorker, and that these statistics are not an indictment of anyone who calls this city home. They are an indictment of policies, politics, and a system that we have allowed to flourish for far too long. And so, what this report is a reminder to all of us to do, is to build a city where equity is not a footnote or an acknowledgement but is also a framework for how we deliver for the people of this city.
Question: Is that an immediate concern for you at all, as far as employers leaving the city actively?
Mayor Mamdani: We are going to continue to do everything we can to increase jobs in this city, and we look at every single thing that happens in this city as having an opportunity to that end. We are less than 70 days away from the beginning of the World Cup. Now, I will tell you, as a soccer obsessive, that I have - have dreamed for many years about this moment, purely thinking about what happens on the field.
But now as the mayor of this city, I'm thinking about the immense economic opportunity, the billions of dollars that this could yield, and the responsibility we have in our city administration to ensure that is an economic opportunity that extends far beyond just the typical areas where a tourist might go and into the beauty and the breadth of these five boroughs. And when we're talking about corporate America in our city, we're seeing commitments, whether it be from Bank of America or American Express or so many other large-scale companies to not just the present of this city, but also the future of this city, and that's work that we will continue to do.
Question: You said you'll do everything to grow the economy. Could we have any specifics, any kind of plan about how big companies can grow here, keep their headquarters here, or even have some of those small businesses open up in empty storefronts that are just starting to dot more and more of the city? Do we have any specifics or a plan on that?
Mayor Mamdani: Absolutely. So, we put forward an executive order early on in our administration to catalog for the first time every single fine and fee that a small business would be facing. I'm glad that we actually have our small business commissioner who's here with us, because that is the kind of work that we're going to be looking at to reduce the burden of not just opening a small business, but sustaining that small business. And I'll just share a few facts as it pertains to the economic health of our city.
We are looking at property data and office leasing figures that all suggest that demand for space in our city is rising again. It's not stagnating or even collapsing. In fact, we're seeing in Manhattan's office market that demand has reached its highest level since 2014. Now, none of this - this is not facts or figures that we can rest on or just use as an indicator that there's nothing more to be done. But it is a glimpse into the fact that this city is one that is not only committed to the economic vitality of the five boroughs as a whole, but also one that we're seeing other companies are becoming a part of as well.
Question: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. My understanding is that a version of this report was actually completed under Mayor Adams but never released. Is that something you can confirm? And can you explain why it's taken so long to be released when it was due over two years ago?
Mayor Mamdani: I can't speak to the prior administration in terms of the delay in following through with the law. What I can tell you is that this is a report that was put together over many months. We made a commitment early that we would release this within our first hundred days. I want to really acknowledge our commissioner, Afua Atta-Mensah, who ensured that that was a commitment that we would deliver on, not just in a technical sense, but also with a fulsome report.
And just for effect, this is the report that we were speaking about. Now, this covers 45 agencies, more than 200 goals, more than 600 indicators. So, it is meant to shape decision-making across our city administration. In this, we inherited work that was underway, we strengthened it, and then we made a decision to put it in front of New Yorkers so that this work could be informed by them, as the council member was saying, through the public comment period that is starting imminently. I'm just going to pass it over to our commissioner if there's anything you'd like to add.
Commissioner Atta-Mensah: The only thing I would add is I think it was important that you see the commissioners that we have here today, that each of their agencies, they were able to digest and move this forward. So, we are committed to moving this plan forward. And we are thankful to the mayor to making clear and delivering on his promise that we have this within the first 100 days.
[Crosstalk.]
Question: Last week, Commissioner Tisch said that she's using the gang database on a daily basis and particularly used it to help apprehend the suspects in [Williamsburg], or the shooting that happened with the seven-month-old baby last week. I just wanted to get, what is your standpoint on her using the gang database on a regular basis?
Mayor Mamdani: So, I've made my critiques of the database clear, and the NYPD has also implemented a number of reforms as per the recommendation that came through. And the implementation of those reforms and the results of that are part of the active discussion that we're having.
Question: I know you're heading to Staten Island later, so I have a question about Staten Island. As part of Streetsblog's annual review of placard parking at precinct houses, we discovered that Staten Island's 120th precinct had 82 percent of police officers' personal vehicles ticketed by cameras for reckless driving multiple times. One cop parked there had 57 camera tickets, another had 40, another had 25, another had 24. You get the point. Why does the city provide free parking to police officers who drive recklessly through school zones, or will you do something about that?
Mayor Mamdani: We'll absolutely follow up on this. Thank you for flagging this.
[Crosstalk.]
Question: I was wondering if in relation to the migrant shelter federal investigation, if City Hall has been served with any search warrants or subpoenas. This is, of course, the investigation that seems to be implicating those in the orbit of the former speaker, current council member, those in the orbit of the governor. Has City Hall been served? Thank you.
Mayor Mamdani: Thank you. I'm going to pass it over to my chief counsel.
Chief Counsel Ramzi Kassem: Not at the moment.
Mayor Mamdani: It's better when he says it. Thank you very much.
