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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. If it's Wednesday, it probably means our lead Mayor Adams reporter, Elizabeth Kim is joining the show, with clips and analysis after the mayor's weekly Tuesday news conference. He recently established the Tuesday news conference as the only time each week he will take reporters' questions on topics of their choosing. We've started to have Liz join us on Wednesdays to break down what the mayor was saying to questions asked by Liz and other journalists who were there. What can we learn from this once-a-week, open conversation? Hi, Liz. Welcome back to the show.

Elizabeth Kim: Morning, Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Let's start with a clip of the mayor on the building collapse in the Bronx, 1915 Billingsley Terrace, that's in the Morris Heights section. For those who don't know the area, we can call it a little north of Yankee Stadium for some geographical pinning. Amazingly, nobody was killed or seriously injured apparently, but many families are now homeless. Here's the mayor.

Mayor Adams: Every collapse is a bad collapse. Many of our buildings come from an older stock, and so you have this from time to time. Thank God we didn't lose any lives. If you were there and you saw that building, it's miraculous that we did not lose lives. Thank God we didn't.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, I don't know what else he said. I didn't get to watch the news conference yesterday as I sometimes can, but he sounded a little complacent like, "Well, older buildings, this was a 1920s building, these things happen." He didn't say the landlord was on the public advocate's worst landlord's list, which the landlord is. Was the mayor complacent about this to your ear?

Elizabeth Kim: I think it's fair to say that the administration didn't react with the sense of policy urgency on this issue. Like in the clip you played, the mayor says these things happen from time to time, which is a little alarming because as the mayor himself said, the City was very lucky that nobody was hurt yesterday. He was suggesting that these landlords or these outside private entities, and that the City has limited power to force them to maintain their buildings.

Deputy mayor, Meera Joshi said that the DOB basically has two powers. It can exact fines and it can also withhold permits. What she said was that many building owners will just swallow the fines and ignore or postpone repairs. She suggested that the City should look into escalating fines as one solution, but that would involve the City Council passing some legislation, which she said is already in the works.

Brian Lehrer: Do you know the record of this landlord Jay Zanger or this building to say if the landlord is suspected now of negligence leading to this collapse?

Elizabeth Kim: My colleagues, David Brand and Brittany Kriegstein have dug really deeply into this issue. I really urge listeners to go to gothamist.com to look at their stories on this. The landlord does have a history of violations. The City's housing department hit them with over 100 housing code violations in recent years. Tenants have made complaints about heat outages in the past month. Back in August, the building owner was penalized for lead paint violations across 18 of his buildings.

The issue that most people focused on was unsafe facade problems. Now, I should say that, and the City said this yesterday as well, that does not necessarily mean that the building was structurally unsound. The landlord did start repairs on its facade over the summer.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we can take your questions for our Liz Kim on really anything having to do with Mayor Adams. She can't be into every detail of every single story that pertains to the mayor, but she is our lead Mayor Adams reporter. We're talking about things that the mayor addressed at his weekly news conference yesterday, starting with the building collapse in the Bronx.

Anybody from that building happened to be listening, or anyone in Morris Heights, or who's seen that building, or lives in another building of that landlord, or anything related to this, want to call and tell your story or ask a question. We'll get into other things too definitely including the big, big budget cuts and the big, big debate on those mayoral proposed budget cuts. It was like an 11-hour debate, I see in City Council. On those things or whatever, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692 call or text. What happens with those families now? Did I see it's around 150 households now with nowhere to live?

Elizabeth Kim: In the latest update, they've registered, the City says 37 of those households, and 26 of them have accepted housing. The City is temporarily using Bronx Community College as a welcome center for those tenants. They said yesterday that they're working with the Red Cross to find them places to stay.

Brian Lehrer: Does this collapse reveal any systemic problems, or a single building, or a single landlord problem? It's not like old buildings are collapsing every week.

Elizabeth Kim: That's the major question, Brian. The way that the question was posed to the mayor yesterday was, "This is not the first collapse that we've seen this year." In April, you might recall that there was a collapse of a parking garage in lower Manhattan, and that wound up killing one person and injuring several others. Then what happened was that the City's buildings department went on to identify dozens of other buildings that they said had structural defects. Now, I didn't get to ask the mayor a question yesterday, I was not called on, but I also wanted to ask the mayor about whether staffing at DOB plays a role into how quickly the City can inspect buildings.

The buildings department is among the agencies that have a double-digit agency vacancy rate I should say, and the City controller has put that at around 23%. You have to wonder. The mayor has prioritized public safety as one of his main pledges to New Yorkers, but you can really make the argument that the inspection and upkeep of buildings is a public safety issue.

Brian Lehrer: Absolutely.

Elizabeth Kim: I think that's a completely fair question for the mayor and whether the City needs to really put this as a higher priority, especially given what's happened in the last year.

Brian Lehrer: I hope he calls on you next week-

Elizabeth Kim: Me, too.

Brian Lehrer: -so you can ask that question or whatever else is more burning by next Tuesday. I want to go on to the next topic, but I think we're getting a call from somebody who lives on that block. Can I go to Wendy on line four here? Is she ready to go? I'm just going to wait for a second while my screener releases that line. Wendy in Morris Heights, you're on WNYC. Thank you for calling in.

Wendy: Hi, thank you. Can you hear me?

Brian Lehrer: I can hear you.

Wendy: I just wanted to say that I live at 1917 Hennessy Place, which is right across Burnside Avenue from Billingsley Terrace, the building that collapsed from about three doors down. Anyone who lives in this neighborhood can tell you, and I've been here since 2015, I lived with my kids in a single-family house. Anyone who lives in this neighborhood can tell you that ConEd has been doing construction under the street for over a year now, and there's just constant drilling, and noise, and disruptions.

My question is, for those of us who are understandably nervous because we live just a few doors down, who do we talk to to find out what actually was the cause because my fear is, is it related to the constant construction under the street directly under these buildings that has been going on for over a year now? If not, what's the cause? How do we find out to make sure that we're safe?

Brian Lehrer: Wow.

Wendy: Who do we talk to?

Brian Lehrer: Liz, can you answer that question?

Elizabeth Kim: The Bronx District Attorney's office has initiated an investigation. The City is obviously doing its own research and investigation into this as well. I expect that in the coming days or certainly weeks, we will know more. Based on that information, I think it would prompt if there was something to do with ConEd, for example, which we do not know. No one has said anything of that nature, but that would prompt the City, I would think, to look at other buildings as well that would be very similar to what happened when the parking garage collapsed in April. That prompted a wider inspection of other buildings.

Brian Lehrer: Wendy, thank you. Good luck. Maybe there's a story there to follow up on. I realize you're not the assignment editor. Maybe have a reporter go out there and check on the ConEd work and whether that could have destabilized the building or contributed to it, and whether that threatens other buildings. Wendy, thank you for raising that. Good luck to you and your family. All right. Next topic though, the budget cuts the mayor is ordering, City Councilors' pushing back on the necessity for them. What's the basic conflict? Did City Council really debate this for 11 hours yesterday?

Elizabeth Kim: They really did, Brian. They held a hearing that started at ten o'clock, and it didn't end until the evening. The basic conflict is, and this was something that everybody knew that was going to happen in this fiscal year, 2024. The basic issue is that federal pandemic aid is expiring. Now, that amounted to billions of dollars that had funded a lot of programs that became very popular like summer school for students, the expansion of universal pre-K. That money is no longer available. Then the other issue is that there are also the costs that are associated with taking care of the migrants.

Those two issues have given way to a budget deficit that the mayor needed to address. The way he elected to do it was to begin making some drastic cuts, beginning with what he announced in November. This basically would be considered mid-year cuts that would come in this coming fiscal year, which he has the authority to do. He's going to make two more cuts. In total, he has projected that he could. The City, he's asking agencies to make as much as a 15% cut. That has created a lot of uproar as you might expect because if we're talking at those kinds of numbers across City agencies, that's affecting key services from schools, sanitation, policing, parks.

The City Council has pushed back on the mayor's cuts. They feel that the mayor should be more surgical about these cuts. They acknowledge that yes, the City does, is facing what would be a $7 billion deficit in 2025, but they're definitely pushing back. They said that this would create longer-term problems for the City. That these kinds of cuts are self-defeating in the fact that it would diminish the quality of life and eventually push a lot of poor and middle-class families to leave the City.

Brian Lehrer: One area the mayor was asked to address yesterday in the news conference was the proposed cuts to the Parks Department budget. Here's deputy mayor, Mayor Joshi answering that question.

Mayor Joshi: The mayor has repeatedly said the quality of life and cleanliness is of the highest importance. We're ensuring that we are able to staff those endeavors, ensure that we can keep the parks open, keep the restrooms open, but we're in a budget crisis. Not everything, not every bell and whistle within a park will be still available. We've got to keep the cleaning and maintenance the highest priority.

Brian Lehrer: Liz, why was parks a particular focus? I realize it's just something an individual reporter brought up, they could bring up any department. Given the many, many different services that would be cut, many arguably more life and death not to diminish the importance of parks, but it seems like this is breaking out as a little bit of an issue. How come?

Elizabeth Kim: I think anytime when you're talking about cuts to parks, parks are an enormously popular public resource, especially in a City like New York where not that many people have backyards and open space. What happened is during the pandemic, parks became an essential resource for people to go to because it was all about social distancing. This was seen as this one safe refuge for people to gather together, and socialize, and to exercise. Parks became seen as even more critical to New Yorkers.

Now, we're talking about slashing parks when right after the pandemic, there was a great push to increase funding for parks because it seemed plain to everyone that this is something that is very important and we need to put more money into their upkeep. Now, we're back to talking about reducing funding, which is causing a lot of uproar and outrage among parks advocates. They had succeeded in getting the mayor to pledge to devote 1% of the City's budget to funding parks.

Brian Lehrer: That's a long-term campaign by parks advocates. 1% for parks meaning 1% of the City budget, which these days would be about $1 billion a year.

Elizabeth Kim: Exactly. This was during the 2021 campaign, and the parks advocates had basically pressured all of the candidates to sign on to this pledge. Adams did to his credit sign on to this. Now, the mayor didn't foresee that there would be this kind of fiscal crisis, and that leaves him very challenged in meeting that goal. Now, what we're looking at is if these cuts go through for next year, we're seeing that the parks is going to get less than 1/2% of the total budget.

That has become an issue. As was pointed out at the hearing yesterday, this is also an issue about equity. The people who don't have places to go in the summer, who don't have a pool, for example, they rely on City parks. That's a challenging question for the mayor because, in addition to prioritizing public safety, he has also spoken often quite eloquently about equity in this City.

Brian Lehrer: Yes, and quality of life equity, which obviously includes parks. This is WNYC FM HD and AM New York, WNJT-FM 88.1 Trenton, WNJP 88.5 Sussex, WNJY 89.3 Netcong, and WNJO 90.3 Toms River. We are New York and New Jersey Public Radio and live streaming at wnyc.org at 11:01 and a half. As we have a few more minutes with our lead Mayor Adams reporter, Liz Kim, who's been joining us each Wednesday after the mayor recently established his weekly Tuesday news conference as the only time he will take open-ended questions from reporters.

I think we're going to keep up this Wednesday Liz Kim visit routine to find out what we can learn when people can actually ask the mayor questions on topics that he doesn't determine. Let's go on to another one. The investigation into the mayor's 2021 campaign came up again yesterday at the news conference. We'll play a clip of Mayor Adams and Deputy Mayor for Communications, Fabien Levy, but set this up for us Liz. We'll hear the mayor mention calls people were getting over the weekend. What calls will we be hearing him refer to?

Elizabeth Kim: Starting on Friday, the only way to call them is rumors. There was a lot of intense speculation around the ongoing federal investigation of the mayor's campaign. Now, the mayor has not been accused of any wrongdoing, but we do know that FBI investigators did have a search warrant for the mayor's vehicle and they did seize some of his personal electronic devices, as well as some other people that were associated with his campaign and also donors.

Speculation began to ramp up that something was going to happen, possibly an indictment. That happened all of Friday, but then also into the weekend, so much so that reporters began asking the mayor's office about these rumors.

Brian Lehrer: Here's the mayor and the deputy mayor.

Mayor Adams: When you get those calls, and I'm not sure if you were one of those that got the calls over the weekend.

Speaker 6: I got the calls. Some of you can raise your hand if you are one of his.

Mayor Adams: I'm pretty sure all of you did. There are those who are political opportunists that from the day I was elected, no matter what we did, they did everything to try to derail our City. They've been consistent in it, and we know they've been consistent in it. I've said this more than once, long before of this whole Turkish conversation came up that people wake up every day and say, "How do I get the pilot of this plane to crash?"

Brian Lehrer: Are their efforts now to take down Mayor Adams over something that is only an investigation at this point, no accusations of wrongdoing against anyone?

Elizabeth Kim: If you look back, I think what's a good exercise if anyone wants to do is just look back at the investigation around Mayor de Blasio. He also had multiple investigations into his campaign as well. You'll see there's a lot of stories about it. I think anytime there is an investigation of this scale, and especially one in which there have been details leaked out that it involves illegal foreign donations from Turkey, it just drives a lot of interest because people are trying to figure out where does this lead? Does this ultimately touch the mayor's inner circle and possibly even the mayor himself.

I don't know that those can be considered efforts to take the mayor down, although the mayor himself has said regard, and this is apart from the investigation. The mayor has said for several months now, that he has felt that there are people who he describes as political opportunists who are out to undermine him and his agenda for the City.

Brian Lehrer: Back to the budget for a second, comment from a listener on text message says, "This is a good time to remind listeners that a flat tax on unoccupied wealthy vacation second home style homes throughout the City, would more than fill the missing federal pandemic funds." The listener then phrases the question, "Do you want a pied-à-terre in New York City? Then pay the City to keep it vacant for your occasional visit." I'm going to actually broaden that question, Liz. We did a segment on the recent report, and I'm sure you saw it too, indicating that the top earners, the top income people in New York State are not leaving.

That taxes, including the tax hikes in 2017 and 2021 at the state level, don't seem to be reducing the number of millionaires in New York state. According to the Fiscal Policy Institute, it's people of lesser means who are leaving the City because mostly they can't afford the rent, the high cost of housing here. I'm curious if the mayor was asked yesterday, any version of, will you advocate for a tax hike on the people who can most afford it? That would include some of the pied-à-terre owners that the writer is writing about, but also other most wealthy New Yorkers.

Will you advocate for a tax hike on the most wealthy New Yorkers? Evidence indicates they're not going to leave, they're not going to go to Florida and change their lives that dramatically just because their tax rates get pushed up tiny percentage and it could fill the gap for all these vital City services. Did anybody ask him anything like that?

Elizabeth Kim: He's been asked specifically about property taxes, which is something that is within his jurisdiction and control. He has consistently said that he does not favor a property tax. The mayor himself is a landlord, he owns at least one home in Brooklyn. He believes that it would hurt a lot of middle-class landlords. I've asked experts about this as well, because I was wondering whether there would be this swell of support for raising property taxes in this moment.

The answers that I got was, there is now a widespread acknowledgement that there is inequity in the City's property tax system, and that lawmakers would generally not favor doing that while we have this very inequitable property tax system. Now, the pied-à-terre tax is something that would have to go through Albany. He was not asked specifically about that. Another thing that the state could also consider is raising income taxes on the ultra wealthy. There's a cry from progressives on that issue every year. We'll see how much that becomes talked about in this upcoming legislative session.

Brian Lehrer: All right. We will leave it there for this week with our lead Mayor Adams reporter, Liz Kim. Read her work on Gothamist, as well as hear it on the radio. She's coming on to this on Wednesdays now that the mayor has established this weekly Tuesday news conference the only time he will take reporters questions on topics of their choosing, not his. Liz, thanks as always.

Elizabeth Kim: Thank you, Brian.

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