Transcript: Mayor Adams, NYC Health + Hospitals, and HPD Announce Opening of 93 Units of Affordable and Supportive Housing at Woodhull Hospital

March 13, 2025

Blanca Ramirez, President and CEO, Comunilife: Welcome, everybody. Oh, it's a dance party this afternoon. I'm super excited to be here. Good afternoon, everybody. I am Blanca Ramirez, the president and CEO of Comunilife. And today I'm filled with pride and gratitude that we're celebrating the opening of Woodhull.  

Woodhull II, a sanctuary for hope and healing. The residence that includes 93 units of 57 supportive housing for formerly homeless. And it's more of a building. It's a transformative space where lives are rebuilt and joins our Woodhull I residence, which opened in 2019. That brings 182 units just in this corner of of Brooklyn. So we're very excited about that.  

So as we gather here, I was inspired by a quote, and it's from Toni Morrison, so I'm just going to say it quickly. And it's “the function of freedom is to free someone else.” And I truly believe Comunilife, through our mission, it's a privilege to provide resources and to give a place for our community to have a place to go and give them the freedom to to enjoy the resources that are here in our community.  

So today we're unlocking opportunities and hope for our community. And we are thrilled that we are here with the mayor, Mayor Adams, in this celebration. And then I also want to extend a heartfelt thanks to Health and Hospitals, who's been a partner in this work and their support has been unbelievable. And we're very excited to be continuing to do this work and to bring in these many units as a partnership.  

So to all who contributed, our funders, the architects, the builders, social workers and volunteers. Your dedication has brought this community to life, recognizing that each one of you here has played a part in the development of this beautiful building. I am deeply grateful. As we cut the ribbon, let us commit to continuing this vital work, ensuring that our freedom and resources uplift those around us, remembering that the function of freedom is to free someone else. And the spirit let us continue to work together to provide opportunity and create a healthier community through quality, affordable housing. Thank you all.  

I just want to thank a couple of people really quickly. Of course, Health and Hospital[s], Dr. Mitch Katz and Leora, of course, who's right over there. We could not do this without this partnership and all the staff at H&H as well. Greg Calliste, who is the president and CEO of Woodhull Hospital. The hospital's medical care under your leadership of our Woodhull I and now Woodhull two tenants has changed lives due to improved health outcomes, and we wish you well in your retirement. And yes, we will miss you.  

And the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, who's New York City 1515 enables us to hire the staff to provide the services our supportive housing clients need and deserve. Brooklyn President Antonio Reynoso, who is represented today by Deputy Brooklyn Borough President Kimberly Council. And our syndicator and investor, Sam Ganeshan and the Hudson Housing Capital team, as well as Webster Bank, Jim Dittbrenner, who also was on the same team on Woodhull I. So it's very exciting to keep the team together.  

I cannot forget CSH, who also provided some early funding to actually start the work and get it, get it to a place to to construct. Monica Lopez, our architect. Lettire Construction, I saw Nick over there and Matt. Thank you. And to our commissioner still today, Adolfo Carrión [Jr]. of the New York City Department of Homeless Housing Preservation Development. Your leadership at HPD helped make this resident and so many other supportive housing developments a reality and we thank you.  

And lastly, but not least, of course, I want to thank the Comunilife staff who made Woodhull II a reality. Developing a new resident takes many, many years from concept to to today. Your guidance and persistence has gotten us to this celebration and to the staff who ensure the tenants receive the high quality of services they deserve. Thank you for your commitment to improving their health and housing. And thank you for all your support. And I will pass it over to Mitch Katz. 

Dr. Mitchell Katz, CEO and President, NYC Health + Hospitals: Thank you, Blanca. I'm Dr. Mitch Katz, I'm the CEO and president of Health and Hospitals, and we so appreciate the collaboration we've had with Comunilife. As a public hospital doctor, I struggle to take care of my patients in the best possible ways. Sometimes people have awful diseases, cancer or kidney disease, liver disease, things that as a doctor, I can't cure. But I can cure homelessness.  

Homelessness is a curable condition and we're standing in the treatment. We've taken two, we've built two buildings now in a parking lot, right? In what was a parking lot. And now we have the ability to cure homelessness in these two beautiful structures. So I think that's really, for all of us, an amazing thing.  

Right when the mayor began, one of the things that I was so impressed with about, you know, his intentions for our city was about homelessness because he immediately pointed to the inhumanity of walking by people living on the streets and immediately brought right to the front and center how each of us is diminished when we walk by somebody who is on the pavement, somebody who doesn't have a home. And he committed himself and to all of us to the idea of housing of all, and I've heard him say it multiple times, of all kinds. Housing that is supportive, housing that is affordable, housing for all of the groups of New Yorkers who need that. And Mr. Mayor, we are so grateful to you for that and for being here. Our mayor, Eric Adams. 

Mayor Eric Adams: Thanks so much. And I've been waiting to make this comment all day because one of the residents here is named Elvis, and he lives here. So Elvis is in the building. You know, I say this over and over again to the team. We're going to be a retrospective appreciated administration. What we have done to deal with the systemic problems that, not only did I have to deal with personally, growing up in this city, living blocks from here now. But, also, as a child being born in this community, I know how the city has abandoned and betrayed everyday New Yorkers.  

And one of the most important appointees that I made was with Dr. Katz. People know my legacy around public safety. Yes, we decrease crime. Yes, we move 20,700 guns off the street. Yes, we’re seeing historical safety on our subway system. All of that public safety stuff that we've done and we've done successfully. But health is going to be my legacy. What we've done in our city hospitals, Health and Hospitals, around lifestyle medicine. We have taken a giant step forward to stop feeding the crisis and have a sick care system instead of a health care system.  

And so when we talk about diabetes, when we talk about heart disease, when we talk about kidney failure, when we talk about retina failure, when we talk about losing limbs and arms, those are crises that we are feeding. As long as we have a city where Park Slope and the Upper East Side has Whole Food and in our communities, we have junk food. We're going to continue to feed the healthcare crisis. And one of the fundamental things you could have around dealing with health care is stop the disconnection from health care and homelessness.  

If you're living on the street, you're not going to doctor's appointments. If you're living on the street, you're going to use the emergency room as your primary facility. When you house people, it's more than four walls. It's a precursor to sleep that allows you to experience the American dream. And we're doing it. We're doing it at a level that is going to be appreciated retrospectively with the partnerships that we have created under Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer and really the Bronx born iron jugs of housing Adolfo Carrión [Jr.].  

Breaking records after records. And the numbers don't lie. When you look at what we're doing here today, this is so significant. What we're doing here today because you talked about it. Record numbers of supportive housing. You know, those don't lie. We have transitioned more people out of homeless shelters into permanent housing in year one and year two. I'm going to do it again in year three in the history of individual years in the city. We have built and allowed more supportive housing in these years in the history of the city. You keep adding up the numbers. Noise is not numbers. People who throw rocks don't have a plan. That is not a plan. We are producing qualitative products on every spectrum to deal with the betrayal that many New Yorkers have experienced in general, but specifically Black and brown people.  

What we have done for black and brown people in this city is unprecedented. No administration can match what we have accomplished and what we have done. And we're going to continue to do it. And today we open the doors to a healthier, safer and affordable lifestyle for those who deserve it, like my man Elvis.  

We're handing New York the key to the future here at Woodhull Hospital. $41.1 million housing project which will provide 95 units of supportive and affordable housing. And, you know, I'm a carpenter by trade and I'm looking around this place. Your builder did a darn good job, you know, because I come in right away critiquing, you know, of how well things laid out. This is a qualitative product that people are getting. And every unit here means another New York story continues.  

There's nothing more encouraging when you can open a door to your own place. You know, there's nothing dignified about living on the street in a tent, living on the side of our highways, living in the subway station, living in environments where you can't use restroom facilities, where you're dealing with mental health issues, where you're having in your tents, human waste, drug paraphernalia, dealing with schizophrenic, bipolar disease. That's not dignified. And that's what we saw when we came into office. And we said no to that. With all that pushback, we said we're not going to surrender people living in an undignified manner. And we're accomplishing this task over and over again.  

Woodhull II residences will feature on-site services, access to health care for residents experiencing homelessness and mental health issues, a real issue we've seen in our city. And too many New Yorkers are cycling between the hospital and the streets over and over again. Something that you talked about, Dr. Katz, over and over again, emergency room, medicine for one day, back out in the street, chronic diseases coming back in over and over again. It's not sustainable. It's not affordable. And to be quite honest with you, it's dumb. It's dumb. And we got to bring common sense back to providing services.  

Last year, H&H provided care for over 80,000 patients experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity, including 17,000 children. The new housing facility is how we make sure we have places for New Yorkers to heal and care for and real transitioning from the hospital into the hands of someone that's going to ensure you're taking your medication, to ensure you go into the follow up in your doctor visit, to ensure you get the community support that we deserve. This detached form of service providers is just not working, folks. And we're going to stop that in a very real way.  

Woodhull builds on our State of the City announcement to tackle street homelessness and serious mental illness with a $650 million investment in outreach, safe haven beds and runaway homeless youth beds, including the creation of our Bridge to Home program, a first of its kind model that provides homeless New Yorkers with severe mental illness, with a supportive facility to meet their treatment and temporary housing needs. And we have been clear, we're not going to abandon our homeless New Yorkers. And we could not have found a better partner than Woodhull.  

We've done some great stuff together when I was president, you know, and we want to continue. You saved lives. You've done some amazing things here. We want to thank you for your service and enjoy your retirement. Don't go to Florida. Hang out here in New York. Stay right here. We need your tax dollars here.  

But the numbers are clear. For the past three years, we have delivered housing for New Yorkers every day and everywhere. And we have done my favorite thing, as I say, to break records. Adolfo, you know, this kid from the Bronx, former borough president, former HUD leader, what he has done it’s just unbelievable what he has done. I gave you a difficult task, commissioner, and you just continue to deliver for us.  

Back to back record years of building affordable housing, including combined nearly 29,000 affordable and public housing units in 2024 alone. We passed this historic City of Yes. We have an inventory problem, 1.4 percent vacancy rate. We build units in parts of the city. We may have 800 units and you have 35-40,000 people putting in applications for that. And we can't have a city where everyone is saying housing is a right on Monday, but on Tuesday, don't build it in my community or my district. No, you can't do that. If housing is a right, the City of Yes says we build housing in every district in this city. And we share the ability of housing New Yorkers.  

Our City of Yes is going to be 80,000 new units over 10 years. This is unprecedented. The most historic housing reform in the history of this city and is rezoning in over 40 years. So I want to thank the team for getting it done. Dr. Katz, our partners here at the Health and Hospital. We can build on these sites. You can't find housing for a car, but you can find it for New Yorkers. These parking lots should be places where we build. We should be building on top of libraries so residents are there. We should be looking at hospital spaces. Every space should be– first thinking about how do we house New Yorkers?  

And no one that has a house should have the luxury or opinion to talk about where we should not build housing. I have not heard one person in a homeless shelter say we should not build housing somewhere. But I've heard a lot of people who live in a home and may have a second home talking about how they don't want housing in the community. That can't happen. You can't have 59 community boards and 10 of them are building more housing than the other 49 combined. We have to be honest about this and bold enough to challenge this firsthand. So job well done. Thank you so much for what you have done. 

Dr. Katz: Thank you, sir. We so appreciate your being here. We appreciate your advocacy. We greatly appreciate your incredibly smart appointment of the deputy mayor, current HPD commissioner, who combines a huge brain with a huge heart. Commissioner Adolfo Carrión [Jr.]. 

Commissioner Adolfo Carrión Jr., Department of Housing Preservation andDevelopment: Thank you, mayor. Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you, Mitch, for an unusually generous introduction about the size of my brain. My mother used to say cabezon, but it was not a positive thing. It was followed by a nuggie. And to correct the record, Mr. Mayor, you know, a lot of people over the years thought that I was born in the Bronx, but I'm Brooklyn-born. The truth is out in the open.  

My folks who came from Puerto Rico in the 1950s, Adolfo and Elisa lived in a sub-basement apartment on South Second Street in Williamsburg. And I often like to say not the Williamsburg of today. It was a different time in the 1960s. And then we had the wonderful journey of being supported and invested in by local government and national governments to move into public housing in the Lower East Side and HUD financed housing on 12th Street and Avenue C in Loisaida. And an FHA supported a three percent down mortgage for our first home in the Northeast Bronx in the country. And that's the story we want to repeat over and over.  

And I remember at the appointment in January of 2022, when the mayor shared his story and sort of how personal this business is to him. And I got up and I repeated that refrain and I have for the last three years. This is very, very personal to us because we've been the beneficiaries of that kind of investment. And we see the failure in people's lives when we don't do that. And those negative stories get repeated and they have an incredibly negative ripple effect on our society. And of course, they are very costly to all of us, whether it's in health care or the criminal justice system, homelessness.  

All of these manifestations of disinvestment and underinvestment. And then there's the manifestations and the successes when we do invest where the kid gets a good public education and a stable home and ultimately becomes a contributing citizen to society and a leader. And so that's what we're sort of up against every time we look at a new site, every time we say, are we going to do the right thing or are we going to fail this generation?  

This administration has delivered and it's been incredible, incredible. You know, when we talk about the record breaking pace at which we're going, first of all, he's a really tough boss. So it's like, can we do it again? Oh, my God. The team is sweating, man. The team is sweating, but we're going to try. We're going back on the court. You know, we come out of the locker room and hit it again. And so I want to say thank you to the people at HPD who every day grind it out, whether they're crunching numbers, assessing sites, helping to finance these deals, walking through the construction with the developers, with the design, with the architects, all of the partners that participate in this. And obviously, it requires an incredible amount of partnership.  

It's public. It's private. It's for profit. It's a non-profit. It's public institutions. And the vision that the mayor laid out about– he said, hey, guys, every possible nook and cranny where we can build affordable housing, where we can increase the supply of housing and begin to bring the price of living in New York City down, go find it. And every public institution should be a participant in that. And Mitch and his team stepped up. The hospital presidents, those vast campuses are all opportunities for new housing to continue to create a city that is a city rich with opportunity.  

And to the nonprofits, Comunilife, you do God's work. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And I'll finish with this. We have 294 days left until December 31. And we're going to go really, really hard and finish the work we started because there's so much more to do. I'm glad to be part of this team. And I know on Monday I show up at a new office and we continue to work. Thank you. And congratulations, everybody. 

Dr. Katz: Thank you so much, Adolfo. We really appreciate it. I want to give a shout out to the lawyers who wrote the agreements. Jeremy, thank you so much. And we appreciate it. Without the agreements, nothing happens. Keith has done a variety of contracts and also another great public hospital doctor, Dr. Ross McDonald, the chief medical officer of Woodhull.  

So now is the part of the program that you've all been waiting for. The reason that you came, as the mayor said, Elvis is in the house. And we do these projects so that people have a great place to live. Elvis, everybody wants to hear about your apartment. So come up and tell them about your apartment. 

Elvis Jordan: Kind of a little stage fright, people. This is my first time. My name is Elvis Jordan. And let me start off right. Good afternoon, everybody. I want to start off by thanking Mr. [Powells], they helped me get off the streets and his program and all his staff. Woodhull and all their staff. They were amazing. I mean, I went to— 

[Crosstalk]. 

Jordan: I remember one time I was at my [wits] end. I didn’t know where to turn. That's when I found out about the program and Mr. [Powells]. And, you know, put me on the right path. I used to work, I got hurt at work. I only have 50 percent use of my arms now. I used to work in construction. Like I said, it's amazing what the program did for me. I went to plenty of other places, which I thought were not going to help me as much, you know, I thought they was just talking the talk. But Mr. Powell's and his team, he wasn't just talking the talk. He got me out of the streets.  

And I just want to thank everyone involved down from the construction people that made up the plans to make this building where I live right now. It’s beautiful, I couldn't ask for more. Couldn't ask for more. I mean, I believe everybody should get a second chance. You got to excuse me, because, you know, choked up.  

Alright, well, maybe I'll let you know a little bit more about me. The way I became homeless was in 2020, my mother died of COVID. Then my brother soon right after, back to back. My grandson, I tried to keep him safe, kept him in the house. He accidentally hung himself because he was so bored. Then my family up and left and I stood homeless. And that's my story.  

I appreciate everything that the mayor put in place to help people like me. Don't forget about it. It's like you said, people walk by you and look at you different. Maybe because of the way you dress, the way you look. But we are humans. And with that, I just want to say thank you, everybody. Thank you very much. I appreciate it from the bottom of my heart. Thank you. 

Dr. Katz: That was great, Elvis.  

Jordan: I’m sorry, I can't forget the man himself.  

Dr. Katz: Elvis, that was perfect. That was right from the heart. That's what we wanted to hear. We're now ready to take on topic questions. And I'll defer to the mayor's office. 

Mayor Adams: And just, you know, we cannot thank you enough. Rather, you know, people walk past people who are homeless and they have all of these stereotypes. They don't know the story. They don't know the story. And you just really zeroed in.  

When I became mayor, I went out in the streets during the month of February and visited people inside these tents. And there was an ex-police officer that was in there. And I spoke with him. And, you know, all of a sudden, you find yourself in these places, man. And there's just nothing dignified by walking past people on the street. We've normalized the dysfunctionality of the city. And I just refuse to do it. That question mark sometimes lingers over us, you know. But you just– we could not have asked for someone to better just humanize how we get here. So I thank you for that. We're going to answer a few on topic questions. 

Question: I'm wondering what percent of these units are filled and if they're not all filled, what's the timeline for that? And then I wanted to give you a chance to respond to the DOJ's subpoenas.  

Ramirez: So we are about 60 percent filled and we plan to be fully occupied by the end of April. So that's the plan right now. 

Question: In all seriousness, I mean, it is really moving to watch Elvis talk about that. You mentioned your own personal struggles dating back to when you were young, to what you've gone through as mayor. Is this the sort of thing that keeps you going? And I will emphasize, I would appreciate anything you could say from the second question that Josie asked. 

Mayor Adams: I got it, but I think that what you said is so important. You know, in general, being mayor is a full time plus job. But the last 15 months has been extremely challenging for me personally and professionally. And the only thing that has kept me going was this, everyday New Yorkers. You know, I got up every day excited about what we're doing around health care, excited about what we're doing around public safety, excited about what we're doing about housing. It just became my North Star.  

I would meet people on the streets and they share stories like yours, family members who realize what we've done around public safety. It just became my driving force. God was my strength. But hearing and fighting for everyday New Yorkers was my motivator.  

And so during those challenging times, we saw the product. I'll sit down with my team and we were able to see, look at what we're doing. You know, so I could never complain. This is the best job on the globe. And we're going to continue to fight for New Yorkers every day. And so I'm excited about that.  

And so that everybody's not asking the same question. Listen, I don't know. You have to speak to the Southern District about their review on immigration. They're not, they don't tell us anything. We don't have the authority to go into their reviews on immigration. It’s nothing we– no one has informed us of anything. So we don't know. I don't have the answer to that question. 

Question: Mr. Mayor, I know that you just said that the driving force for you has been doing the work that you're doing. You've also done a lot of work for migrants. And I wonder if when there's an investigation like this, it makes you wonder whether the Justice Department is trying to stop you from the work that you've been trying to do.  

I mean, you housed, when we think about it, over 200,000 migrants over the course of this crisis. And now all of a sudden, the Justice Department is trying to subpoena information for people you've been trying to protect and help. And I wonder, personally, what your reaction to that, given the fact that you sweated blood, sweat and tears to try to make this happen. You had to deal with the $7 billion problem. And then they come and they serve subpoenas. How do you feel about that? 

Mayor Adams: Well, we should be clear. You know, I signed up to be criticized, attacked verbally. I signed up for that. When you become the mayor, I was telling someone the other day, when you become the mayor, New Yorkers enjoy all five of their fingers, but the middle one they love using the most. And so you signed up for that. You don't personalize it.  

But let me tell you who didn't sign up. For the people in the shelters who have taken care of 230,000 migrants and asylum seekers coming after COVID and never really getting a break, but continue to do so. Those who deliver services and food, those who ensure people have health care, medical care and screening for communicable diseases. Those who are up late at night. You know, the Zach Iscols who would go in at 2 a.m. in the morning when buses came in. The workers should never get caught up in the politics of it. And that is who my heart goes out to.  

And I say to them, you know, I'm sorry you're going through all that we're seeing, but they were committed. And what New York did, international immigrant leaders came to this city and said no one is doing what New York City has done. No one has put people on the path of the next step of the American dream.  

And so those who want to rewrite the success of this city and managing 230,000 migrants and asylum seekers, not one child or family slept on the streets of the city of New York. That's a success story. So if you want to criticize, criticize me. But while you're criticizing me, just take a moment and say thank you to the city employees who did their job. 

Question: [Inaudible] you can protect these migrants from the intrusion of the federal investigation where they're trying to find out their names, their birth dates, their private information. Is there any way the city can help them? 

Mayor Adams: No one shared that question with us. No one shared us any information. We're going to keep doing what we've done.