Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears on Spectrum News 1's "Capital Tonight"

January 9, 2024

Susan Arbetter: Welcome back to Capital Tonight. Joining us now with his reaction to the governor's address is the mayor of New York City, Eric Adams. Welcome back to Albany. It's good to see you.

Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you so much. You know, I would say good to see you, but the camera's blocking us.

Arbetter: No, I can see you but you can't see me. But that's all right. I wanted to know what you liked that you heard from the governor today, because it seemed like she gave you a shout out, and there was a lot of applause.

Mayor Adams: Well, I think that it's not only what I heard from the governor but what the governor has heard from the people of the State of New York, and that includes me in these conversations. She has been a partner on tough issues. When we wanted to drive down crime, she came and rolled out the Subway Safety Plan. She looked at these crime initiatives, mental health, she was there.

And now we're seeing a continuation of what a partnership looks like with New York City and other cities in the state and the governor's office. She talked about things that are very important to us: cannabis enforcement, we know we need to give authority to local municipalities. Housing, she's talking about mental health, talking about education. All of these things are just so important and they strike at the heart of what we have been communicating to her.

Arbetter: She spoke directly to you, the governor wants to restore the tax abatement, the 421‑a plan. She wants to eliminate density requirements, convert empty office space to apartments, legalize basement conversions. To what extent will this fix the city's housing crisis, in your mind?

Mayor Adams: Listen, we have a 500,000 moonshot goal in the next decade to build housing. Everyone has been moving around the conversation when it's very clear: it's inventory, inventory. We don't have enough units and we have to find creative ways to build those units. That includes increasing the FAR, it includes converting some of our office buildings. We have roughly 138 million square feet of office buildings that could turn into affordable housing.

And then looking in nontraditional places that we have not looked at before. We've had really a segregated mindset around housing throughout the years since the sixties, and it's time to fix that broken system.

Arbetter: All right. So, these four proposals that the governor has laid out, if the legislature gives you the green light, is that enough to create the 500,000 units that you say New York City needs?

Mayor Adams: Well, it puts us on the state doing its part. Now we need the City Council in New York City to do our part. We're a city of yes, we like to say, and it means the massive rezoning efforts, city‑wide tax amendment rezoning that we're going to do in the City of New York. When you add the state actions plus the actions of the city and with some help from the federal government, we can get the numbers that we're looking for.

Arbetter: You are a former state lawmaker. Do you think that the governor did a good enough job consulting the legislature before coming up with her housing plan last year?

Mayor Adams: Yes, I did. It was a great deal of concern and passion. There with those who were really digging into good cause eviction, then there were those who were talking about renewing some version of 421‑a. There's a lot of passion up here and there's a lot of debate that takes place when people are really responding to their constituencies.

And so I think she did do a good job. Now we have round two, and often in Albany, it takes more than one round to accomplish the task; matter of fact, some of the greatest accomplishments took several rounds. And if we look at the wins that we had in 2022 and in 2023, it shows that we can go into 2024 with good wins as well.

We were able to get increased earned income tax credit, decrease the cost of childcare, NYCHA Land Trust, community hiring, which is going to produce thousands of jobs. We saw that this legislative body is willing to sit down, and we respect the process, the process is going to respect us, and that's what we're going to do in 2024.

Arbetter: So, at this point your working relationship with Hochul seems to be a lot better than your working relationship with the White House. What would you like from Albany to help New York City with the migrant crisis?

Mayor Adams: And the governor has communicated with the White House and our national leaders in Washington over and over again that this cannot fall into the laps of New York City residents and New York State. And we need to continue to do so.

I believe we need to call a state of emergency that will free up resources for our state, but I think it's important that we look at the budgetary weight that this is playing on New York City and New York State. We're going to need some help from Albany when it comes down to paying for the migrant crisis, a $12 billion price tag over three years. And we're looking forward to the governor's announcement on this issue when she talks about her budget next week.

Arbetter: Next Tuesday.

Mayor Adams: But this is clearly the partnership that we needed.

Arbetter: So, the mayoral control of New York City public schools is set to expire in June, and I know that you want it renewed. What are you doing to get the legislature on your side? Because there are some in the legislature that they just aren't fans of mayoral control.

Mayor Adams: And that's understandable, because the whole term of mayoral control takes away from the concept that one should not control anything. I like to believe in school governance. And I think the best way to look at it is that we have shown what we do, what we're doing is working. We are leading the state in math and English scores. The government announced today what Chancellor Banks has done around how we're now going to teach reading, it should be a state‑wide if not a national effort.

We're watching safeties in our schools, dyslexia screening in our schools, the investment of $60 million into career development for our children. We are doing it the way we hope school governance should have been. And people will tell you this chancellor has communicated with more groups, parents and individuals, lawmakers, and that's the winning solution. This is what they wanted when they said school governance, and we're delivering it.

Arbetter: So, the state ED is reviewing mayoral control. Their study is coming out in March and it could sway lawmakers away from your corner. Are you concerned about that?

Mayor Adams: No, I'm not. When I sit down and speak with my lawmakers up here, my Assembly colleagues up here and the state colleagues up here, they realize that you had two kids from the public school that grew up in public school, Chancellor Banks and Mayor Adams, we're products of public schools, and they know how committed and dedicated we are.

And there's going to be different opinions and views, but we can come together and continue the success that we have already displayed. We have displayed the success that New Yorkers are expecting for our children.

Arbetter: This is the second time that Mayor Eric Adams has been in Albany; this time, as mayor. And then this is… The first time around was 10 years ago as a state senator. Has the city changed a lot?

Mayor Adams: Oh, yes, it has. We're dealing with a new norm. Covid has impacted us. Many of us have not come out of the emotional trauma of Covid. We're dealing with 164,000 migrants and asylum seekers. Think about that for a moment. Albany has 100,000 residents here; we have 164,000, 1.5 the size of Albany was dropped in our city.

The difference here in Albany, you are able to work; in New York, a migrant and asylum seeker is unable to work. This is a huge obligation that we have, and we need to continue to cycle out of it. And then we're going to lose a large amount of money from the Covid funds that is going to sunset at the end of this fiscal year that we have to find out how we're going to keep those programs running. So, a lot has changed, but there's a lot of good things.

Arbetter: Eric Adams, I want to thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

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