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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PR- 349-12
October 7, 2012

MAYOR BLOOMBERG DISCUSSES HOW CITY GOVERNMENT IS HELPING TO DRIVE JOB CREATION AND GIVE AT-RISK YOUTH THE OPPORTUNITY TO SUCCEED IN WEEKLY RADIO ADDRESS

The following is the text of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s weekly radio address as prepared for delivery on 1010 WINS News Radio for Sunday, October 7, 2012.

Good Morning. This is Mayor Mike Bloomberg.

“In boxing, it’s called ‘punching above your weight’ – hitting harder than your size suggests. That’s a good description of New York City’s powerful job-creating impact, too. Look at it this way: Although our city has less than 3 percent of America’s workforce, so far this year we’ve accounted for nearly 8 percent of all the new jobs created in the nation.  In fact, we’re on track to create more jobs in our city during 2012 than in any year since figures starting being recorded, some 50 years ago.

“A big reason: Our booming tech sector, which we’ve worked hard to expand. In the space of a few short years, it’s become a major generator of new jobs; between 2007 and 2010 alone, the number of workers in digital media companies here grew by an astonishing 74 percent. Today, our metro area is #1 in the nation in job growth in the extremely hot mobile app industry. Digital giants like Google, Twitter, and Facebook; homegrown firms like Tumblr, Seamless, Boxee and Foursquare: They’re all thriving in our city.

“Our Administration is doing all we can to build on that strong base. To assist new tech start-ups, we’ve set up ‘incubators’ that provide them with low-cost office space, and a public-private fund that offers them early-stage capital that helps them get off the ground. Our innovative www.mappedinny.com web site shows prospective tech workers which companies are hiring, and where. Our major trailblazing partnerships with Cornell, Columbia, NYU, and other schools and private firms will create new academic applied sciences programs that will spin off hundreds of new tech start-ups and generate tens of thousands of new jobs in the decades to come. And because we know that to keep our economy growing we’ve got to prepare young people for the jobs of the future, just last month we opened a new public high school, the Academy of Software Engineering, dedicated to computer science.

“All of our young people deserve a shot at the great American Dream – and that’s why we’ve also established the Young Men’s Initiative. It’s a major joint push by our Administration and private philanthropies to improve outcomes for many more black and Latino young men in our city. In the past year, the Young Men’s Initiative has made a difference in education, health, employment opportunities, and other vital areas for nearly 4,000 young men. Last week, we took another big step, by marking the start of what’s called ‘Close to Home.’ It’s a sweeping reform that means, in most cases, that juveniles who run afoul of the law in the five boroughs will be supervised, educated and rehabilitated in our city. They’ll be near their families and also in public schools where they’ll keep working toward graduation. That’s instead of their being confined in remote Upstate facilities that don’t have accredited classrooms – a big reason that youngsters from our city who in the past have been sent Upstate have had an 81 percent rate of recidivism.   

“By helping these young people stay off that wrong path to more run-ins with the law, and on the right path to graduation and jobs, we’re going to make our neighborhoods even safer and our economy even stronger. And that’s good news for us all.

“This is Mayor Mike Bloomberg. Thanks for listening.







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Marc La Vorgna   (212) 788-2958



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