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☆ In Escalation, Adams Says Migrant Crisis ‘Will Destroy New York City’
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-07 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | More About Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Mayor Eric Adams escalated his rhetoric over the migrant crisis on Wednesday night, claiming in stark terms that New York City was being destroyed by an influx of migrants from the southern border and saying that he did not see a way to fix the issue. “This issue will destroy New York City.”Mr. Adams, a Democrat in his second year in office, has clashed with leading members of his party as New York City has struggled to provide housing and services to the migrants, who now number 110,000. For months, Mr. Adams has criticized President Biden and Gov. Kathy Hochul for failing to help the city provide for the asylum-seekers and pleaded for additional funding and expedited work permits. In particular, Mr. Adams has focused on how it was hurting New York City’s budget and would prompt widespread cuts to city services.

Persons: Eric Adams, Mr, Adams, Biden, Kathy Hochul Organizations: New, Democrat, New York Locations: New York City, Manhattan

☆ In Israel, Adams Has Swagger in His Step and ‘Hustle’ on His Sleeve
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-25 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | More About Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Apparently the mayor chose to follow a similar practice to his trip to Israel. On a whirlwind three-day visit, Mr. Adams dined at the Whiskey Bar and Museum in Tel Aviv, a sleek restaurant with more than 1,000 types of whiskey. He was photographed with the son of an Israeli billionaire as he enjoyed Tel Aviv’s buzzing nightlife scene. Mr. Adams may have been thousands of miles away from home, but was still very much himself: high energy, highly quotable, spiritual, ideologically to the right of many Democrats in his party, wary of the press, fond of police drone demonstrations and foremost a foodie. The trip gave Mr. Adams some distance from a series of pressing challenges in New York City, allowing him to focus on preferred topics, like his ties to the Jewish community, public safety and courting business.

Persons: Eric Adams, Adams Organizations: New, Bar and Locations: New York City, Israel, Tel Aviv

The mayor’s return to New York City from overseas was plagued by mishap. The chair of his “reception committee” was late; his aides violated the health code by boarding the mayor’s ship, the Vulcania, before the ship could be screened for contagion. And reporters — barred from asking questions on political or administrative matters — had the nerve to question the length of the mayor’s journey, which, in an apparent first for a New York City mayor, included a three-day visit to the new nation of Israel. In the 72 years since Mayor Vincent R. Impellitteri’s voyage in 1951, every single New York City mayor would follow his lead, in recognition of a faith-based political reality: New York City is home to the largest population of Jews outside of Israel. Mayor Eric Adams upheld that rite of passage this week, visiting Jerusalem and Tel Aviv in a three-day tour highlighted by meetings with Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and its president, Isaac Herzog.

Persons: ”, —, Vincent R, Eric Adams, Benjamin Netanyahu, Isaac Herzog Organizations: New, New York City, York Locations: New York City, New York, Israel, York City, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv

On the second day of his trip to Israel, Mayor Eric Adams of New York City will seek to strike a political balance by meeting with Benjamin Netanyahu, the prime minister, and with leaders of the country’s pro-democracy protest movement. On Tuesday morning, Mr. Adams met with protest leaders, although his office did not specify which leaders or where the meeting was being held, and reporters were barred from attending. Later, at around 5 p.m. local time, Mr. Adams planned to meet with Mr. Netanyahu — part of a routine itinerary for New York mayors who have long visited Israel to show solidarity with Jewish voters in the city. But the political implications of such a meeting may be more fraught than usual, following the move by Mr. Netanyahu and his far-right government to limit the powers of Israel’s judiciary. The rollback, part of a broader fight over the country’s future, has prompted widespread protests among those who fear that Israel is abandoning its democratic traditions.

Persons: Eric Adams, Benjamin Netanyahu, Adams, Netanyahu Organizations: New, Mr, New York, Jewish Locations: Israel, New York City, New

☆ At a Tense Moment, Eric Adams Visits Israel in a Show of Solidarity
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-21 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | More About Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Mayor Eric Adams of New York City will travel to Israel on Monday, the beginning of a rare three-day foreign trip to highlight his ties to the Jewish community. The political schism has prompted widespread protests by those who fear Israel is abandoning its democratic traditions. Mr. Adams, a moderate Democrat in his second year in office, has close ties to the ultra-Orthodox community in New York. The mayor’s office said in a statement that Mr. Adams plans to “learn about Israeli technology and discuss combined efforts to combat antisemitism.”A trip to Israel is a rite of passage for mayors of New York City, which has the largest Jewish population in the world outside Israel. But the political crisis in Israel could make the trip more difficult to navigate.

Persons: Eric Adams, Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel, Adams Organizations: New, West Bank Locations: New York City, Israel, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, New York

The fanfare started building minutes before Mayor Eric Adams made his arrival on Monday. Dozens of supporters, most on Mr. Adams’s payroll, lined the City Hall rotunda staircase, behind the lectern where the mayor was about to appear. With everything in place, Mr. Adams strode in to make his announcement. He was elevating his press secretary, Fabien Levy, to become his administration’s seventh deputy mayor. In doing so, Mr. Adams was underscoring the importance he places on messaging: Mr. Levy, according to the mayor, will be the first person in New York City to hold the title of deputy mayor for communications.

Persons: Eric Adams, Jay, Alicia Keys —, Letitia James, Adams strode, Fabien Levy, Adams, Levy Organizations: of Locations: New York City

“This is a room full of people who truly believe in the ability to go up against Adams and win,” said Cristina González, one of the hosts, on Thursday, after word of the meeting leaked. Mr. Adams will likely be a heavy favorite to capture a second term. He remains broadly popular with the coalition of Black and Latino voters outside of Manhattan who sent him to Gracie Mansion. Evan Thies, a spokesman for the Adams campaign, said in a statement that the mayor had lowered crime and “invested billions of dollars in working people” and that polls showed he had strong support from New Yorkers. “The fact that these folks would rather play politics in some back room two years before the election, instead of help the mayor help working people, tells you all you need to know about what they really care about: their own power,” he said.

Persons: Adams, ”, Cristina González, Gracie, Evan Thies Organizations: Democratic, New Yorkers Locations: Manhattan, New

☆ New York City Is Poised to Make Outdoor Dining Permanent, With Caveats
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-03 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | More About Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Outdoor dining along New York City streets, one of the rare pandemic-era accommodations that proved popular, is set to become permanent — but in a way that is expected to present challenges and new costs to restaurant owners. The City Council is expected to approve a bill on Thursday that would allow restaurants to continue to offer outdoor dining in roadways under a new licensing system, but not during the winter months. Restaurant owners would be required to take down street-based outdoor dining structures each year by Nov. 30 and leave them dismantled until March 31. Sidewalk cafes would be allowed year-round. The bill aims to strike a balance by retaining a popular al fresco program while regulating it more closely, allowing for the clearing of abandoned or ugly dining sheds.

Locations: New York City

Mr. Adams said that he wanted to “localize this madness” so that people sleeping outdoors were contained to certain parts of the city, without identifying the potential locations or making it clear if people would be sleeping on sidewalks or in tents. “Our next phase of the strategy now that we have run out of room, we have to figure out how we’re going to localize the inevitable that there’s no more room indoors,” he said at an unrelated news conference on public safety. The firm, DocGo, has bused hundreds of asylum seekers upstate to cities including Albany, but many of the migrants there said that they felt misled and abandoned, and that local security guards hired by DocGo had repeatedly threatened them. DocGo, which provided Covid testing and vaccination services during the pandemic, is also involved in running the city’s “arrival center” for migrants at the Roosevelt Hotel. Over the weekend, people were seen sleeping outside the hotel with blankets, and vans were provided so that people could cool off on a hot summer day.

Persons: Adams, DocGo Organizations: New York Times Locations: Albany

Despite falling poll numbers and critical news coverage, Mayor Eric Adams clearly has the continued monetary support of two influential spheres of influence: real estate leaders and the donor class from New York City and beyond. Mr. Adams has raised $1.3 million since January for his 2025 re-election effort in the latest reporting period, drawing maximum $2,100 donations from real estate magnates like Marc Holliday, the chief executive of SL Green, the city’s largest commercial landlord, and its founder, Steve Green; and Alexander and Helena Durst, members of The Durst Organization real estate dynasty, according to new filings with the city’s Campaign Finance Board. About $550,000 came from donors outside New York City who live in the suburbs, Florida and other states — a continuation of a pattern displayed early in his tenure, when he held fund-raisers in Beverly Hills and Chicago in his first months in office. As mayor, Mr. Adams has often taken positions that benefit the real estate industry, including being supportive of rent increases and criticizing state lawmakers for failing to replace a tax-incentive program for developers known as 421a.

Persons: Eric Adams, Adams, Marc Holliday, Steve Green, Alexander, Helena Durst Organizations: SL Green, Organization, city’s Campaign Locations: New York City, Florida, Beverly Hills, Chicago

☆ The Mayor Had a Photo of a Fallen Officer. Was His Story About It True?
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-06 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | More About Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

But the weathered photo of Officer Venable had not actually spent decades in the mayor’s wallet. It had been created by employees in the mayor’s office in the days after Mr. Adams claimed to have been carrying it in his wallet. The employees were instructed to create a photo of Officer Venable, according to a person familiar with the request. Fabien Levy, a spokesman for the mayor, did not dispute that Mr. Adams had shown a photo to The Times and at the police ceremony that had been recently created by a City Hall aide. Mr. Levy, however, insisted that Mr. Adams had carried a photo of Officer Venable for decades, and provided the names of several former transit police colleagues who said in interviews that Mr. Adams and Officer Venable had indeed been friends.

Persons: Venable, Adams, Fabien Levy, Levy Organizations: Google, City Hall, Times, City

☆ Mayor Compares Housing Activist, Who Fled Holocaust, to Plantation Owner
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-29 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

The woman, Jeanie Dubnau, an 84-year-old housing activist and molecular biologist, said in an interview afterward that her Jewish family had fled Europe during the Holocaust. Mr. Adams, the city’s second Black mayor, has often raised concerns about racism when he has felt under attack. More recently, he has twice compared himself to Kunta Kinte, a character from the 1977 television series “Roots” who was beaten for refusing to accept the slave name Toby. Mr. Adams also claimed recently that there was a “coordinated” effort to prevent him from winning a second term. When asked who was coordinating that effort, the mayor again compared himself to Kunta Kinte and said, “There’s a body of people who were pleased with 30 years without having a mayor that looked like me.”

Persons: Jeanie Dubnau, ”, Adams, Andrew Yang, Kathryn Garcia, Kunta, Toby, “, Kunta Kinte, Keechant Sewell Locations: Europe, New York

☆ 3 reasons why the Titanic will never be raised
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-26 | by ( Jenny Mcgrath | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The Titanic sank in 1912, and ever since people have wanted to salvage it. Its lack of structural integrity is just one of three main reasons why the Titanic is destined to remain sunk forever. The Titanic wreck site is a gravesiteApproximately 1,500 people lost their lives in the sinking of the Titanic. "NOAA recognizes the Titanic wreck site as a maritime memorial and supports Article 4(1) of the 'Agreement Concerning the Shipwrecked Vessel R.M.S. "Captain's bathtub is a favorite image among the Titanic enthusiasts, and that's now gone," Titanic historian Parks Stephenson said in a statement in 2019.

Persons: it's, —, Daniel Stone, Monica Allen, James Cameron, who's, Eva Hart, rusticles, Halomonas, Lori Johnston, Clare Fitzsimmons, Captain Edward Smith's, that's, Parks Stephenson, Xavier Desmier, Charles Smith, Ethan Miller Organizations: Service, NOAA, Titanic Inc, CBS News, New York Times, Titanic, Institute for Exploration, University of Rhode, Materials, USA, Newcastle University, BBC, Costa Concordia, Architectural Locations: Britain, University of Rhode Island, Las Vegas, Luxor, It's

☆ Why Eric Adams Issued His Second-Ever Veto Over Housing Bills
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-23 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Why It Matters: The mayor and the City Council have disagreed about how to address New York’s housing crisis. New York City is facing a housing crisis with soaring rents and record homelessness. Mr. Adams has received criticism from housing advocates for not moving quickly enough to create affordable housing, for supporting rent increases and for clearing homeless encampments. This one is the first by Mr. Adams since January 2022, when he vetoed a bill that would have increased penalties for zoning violations. But the mayor could sue the City Council to stop the laws — a tactic used by former Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg — or the City Council could sue the mayor if he chooses not to implement them.

Persons: Adams, Jonathan Westin, “, Mr, Bill de Blasio, Kathryn Wylde, ”, Michael R, Bloomberg —, Mihir Zaveri Organizations: City, Families Party, City Council, Mr, Partnership, New, Bloomberg Locations: New York City, New York, “

☆ Choose Wisely, Choose Often: Ranked-Choice Voting Returns to New York
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-16 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Did the voting system help Eric Adams become mayor? Mr. Adams had expressed doubts about ranked-choice voting, but it might have helped him win — even if the process was messy. Initially, early unofficial results showed Mr. Adams with a narrow lead. Under the old system, Mr. Adams would have faced a runoff because he did not receive at least 40 percent of votes. Mr. Adams won the primary by a slim margin: only 7,197 votes.

Persons: Eric Adams, Adams, Maya Wiley, Wiley, Kathryn Garcia, Garcia Organizations: Democratic

Mr. Adams on Tuesday angrily rebuffed the notion that he was facing a staff exodus, and accused the media that covers him of existing in a narrative-generating “bubble.” He noted that he oversaw more than 300,000 employees, and the high-level departures represent just a fraction of the city work force. “And we’re saying, is everybody running for the door?” he said. “No, everybody is running to do their job.”Reached by phone on Tuesday afternoon, Ms. Sewell declined to comment on her exit. “This is an unprecedented moment in New York’s history and we should acknowledge that everyone who works in public service is under tremendous pressure to manage myriad crises,” Mr. Young said. “People will leave, but one thing remains the same: our commitment to handling the crises we inherited, turning this city around, and improving the lives of all New Yorkers.”

Persons: Adams, “, ”, Sewell, Banks, ” Max Young, Mr, Young

☆ Did N.Y. Leaders Leave Residents Unprepared for the Air Quality Crisis?
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-09 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | Luis Ferré-Sadurní | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On Tuesday afternoon, the governor’s office issued a news release announcing that the wildfires were creating hazy conditions in New York City and elsewhere, urging residents to limit exposure and saying state experts were monitoring the situation. On Wednesday morning, as many New Yorkers woke up to a thick blanket of haze, the governor spoke to reporters in Albany about the situation, saying it was “an emergency crisis” and warning it could last several days. Asked about the wisdom of declaring a state of emergency, Ms. Hochul said that it was unnecessary. “A state of emergency is a mechanism you use when there’s something you can do about it,” she said. “We don’t have a lot we can do about the circumstances for contaminated toxic air coming into our airspace, so there’s not a need for deploying resources or bringing money to the table.”

Persons: ”, Jay Varma, Bill de Blasio, Hochul, there’s Organizations: Cornell Center for Pandemic Prevention, Mexico City, state’s Department of Environmental Conservation Locations: Beijing, Mexico, New York City, Albany

☆ Mayor Adams Loves to Tell a Good Story. It Might Even Be True.
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-01 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In early May, the mayor twice claimed that New York City schoolchildren “start their day going to the corner bodega buying cannabis and fentanyl,” despite there being little evidence of the trend. The mayor recently told reporters that nearly half of New York City’s hotel rooms were occupied by migrants, suggesting that the influx of asylum seekers was hurting the tourism industry and taking rooms away from vacationers. City Hall officials later walked back Mr. Adams’s claim, explaining that the mayor had meant to say that migrants had taken up 40 percent of the occupancy in the city’s midsize hotels. Hotel industry leaders said that migrants had not hurt tourism and that more than 20,000 rooms remained unoccupied. “At a time when the city is facing real crises, how can New Yorkers tell if the mayor is telling the truth when he keeps misleading them?” said Monica Klein, a Democratic political strategist and a deputy press secretary for former Mayor Bill de Blasio.

Persons: “, Adams’s, Adams, ”, Monica Klein, Bill de Blasio Organizations: New, bodega, City, Independent, Democratic Locations: New York City, New York

☆ Outdoor Dining in New York City Is Here to Stay. (Just Not in Winter.)
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-18 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

New York City’s outdoor dining program, a popular pandemic-era measure designed to be a temporary salve for a devastated restaurant industry, is about to become a permanent part of the city’s landscape. A City Council bill, released on Thursday evening, called for creating a licensing structure that would allow outdoor dining structures to exist in roadways, but only from April through November. The bill, which is supported by Mayor Eric Adams and still requires the approval of the full Council, aims to strike a balance between retaining a mostly popular program while taking steps to control its outgrowth. The bill would set forth basic design guidelines that are still to be determined. Some elements of the plan drew immediate criticism, including a provision requiring restaurants in a historic district or at a landmark site to receive approval by the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission for an outdoor dining site — a policy that could affect restaurant-heavy neighborhoods like Greenwich Village and Park Slope, Brooklyn.

☆ To Fight Rats, N.Y.C. Restaurants Will Have to Put Trash in Containers
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-18 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In the latest front in New York City’s fight against the proliferation of trash and rats, city officials plan to require restaurants and bodegas to set out trash in containers instead of bags. The move would address one of New York’s ubiquitous, age-old eyesores: the heaps of smelly trash bags filled with restaurant food scraps and liquids that remain at curbside for hours at night, providing easy targets for rats until commercial haulers arrive. “We want people to understand that bags on the street attract rats, and we need everyone to do their part — residents, businesses and the city — to get the black bags of rat food off the streets,” Ms. Tisch said. The rule would apply to a wide range of businesses that produce most of the city’s food waste: catering companies, food manufacturers, restaurants, food wholesalers and retail food stores. They would be required to put trash at the curb in “rigid receptacles with tight-fitting lids.”

☆ Eric Adams Says He’s a Progressive. Democrats Beg to Differ.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-14 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

When a homeless man was choked to death on the New York City subway earlier this month by another passenger, Mayor Eric Adams had an uncharacteristically guarded response. For more than a week, he did not denounce the killing, as many of his Democratic colleagues immediately had, or express much sympathy for the victim, Jordan Neely. Instead, the mayor chose a more detached view, noting that there were “serious mental issues in play here.”“I was a former transit police officer, and I responded to many jobs where you had a passenger assisting someone,” he said on CNN. “And so we cannot just blatantly say what a passenger should or should not do in a situation like that.”The mayor’s response was the most recent example of him tacking away from the city’s left, creating a wedge with some of his Democratic colleagues. Mr. Adams has been pushing more moderate, sometimes even conservative, views on issues like rent, religion and his signature theme, improving public safety — a sharp turn from his Democratic predecessor, Bill de Blasio, and from progressive leaders who have recently won mayoral elections in cities like Chicago and Los Angeles.

☆ Adams Weakens Right-to-Shelter Rules, Anticipating Migrant Surge
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-10 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | Andy Newman | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

City officials have said they expect as many as 1,000 people a day to come after the rule is lifted. Already people have been crossing into the United States from Mexico in anticipation of the change. New York City has opened eight humanitarian relief centers as city officials have moved to help more than 61,000 migrants who have arrived over the last year. New York is the only major city in the country that provides “right to shelter,” the result of a legal agreement that requires the city to provide a bed to anyone who needs one under certain conditions. Under the nightly-deadline rule, homeless families with children who arrive at a shelter-system office by 10 p.m. must be given beds in a shelter the same night.

☆ A Subway Killing Stuns, and Divides, New Yorkers
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | Maria Cramer | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Almost as soon as the video of one subway rider choking another to death began to ricochet across the internet, the killing came to signify more than the tragic death of one man. For many New Yorkers, the choking of the 30-year-old homeless man, Jordan Neely, was a heinous act of public violence to be swiftly prosecuted, and represented a failure by the city to care for people with serious mental illness. Many others who lamented the killing nonetheless saw it as a reaction to fears about public safety in New York and the subway system in particular. And some New Yorkers wrestled with conflicting feelings: their own worries about crime and aggression in the city and their conviction that the rider had gone too far and should be charged with a crime. Now, as prosecutors continue to investigate the circumstances of Mr. Neely’s death, the case has become a political Rorschach test, dividing the city along long-simmering fault lines.

☆ Why New York’s Giant Trash Bag Piles May Be an Endangered Species
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

New York City, where sidewalks have long been overrun by foul-smelling heaps of garbage bags that force passers-by to yield to oncoming rat traffic, is about to try a not-so-novel idea to solve the problem. The concept, known as trash containerization, seems simple enough: Get trash off the streets and into containers. To do so, however, will require removing 150,000 parking spots, and up to 25 percent of parking spots on some blocks. The report does not address the cost of implementing trash containerization citywide, but it could easily cost hundreds of millions of dollars over the next decade. City officials must buy new specialized trash trucks and stationary containers, while also increasing the frequency of trash collection in large swaths of the city.

☆ N.Y.C. Libraries Stave Off Sunday Closings in Adams’s New Budget Plan
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Emma G. Fitzsimmons | Jeffery C. Mays | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Why It MattersWith more than 200 locations across New York, the city’s public library systems are beloved as a community resource and a foundation of critical priorities like childhood reading and providing access to the internet. “This investment is an investment in the people of New York City,” he said in a statement. What’s NextLeaders in the City Council have vowed to fight the mayor’s cuts, with a budget deal expected in June. On Wednesday, Adrienne Adams, the City Council speaker, said the budget fight was far from over. The mayor’s executive budget, she said, “still leaves our libraries facing significant service cuts, agencies that deliver essential services harmed, and programs that deliver solutions to the city’s most pressing challenges without the investments needed.”

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