Transcript: Mayor Adams Expands 'Big Apple Connect' to Deliver Free Internet, TV to More Than 300,000 New Yorkers at 200 NYCHA Developments

March 23, 2023

First Deputy Mayor Sheena Wright: Good morning. Good morning. My name is Sheena Wright. I'm the first deputy mayor of the City of New York. Is the Bronx in the house? That's right. I'm from the Bronx. Even though I live in Harlem, I claim the Bronx. I want to first begin by thanking Bronx River Houses, in the house, for being such gracious hosts and we have to thank the incredible Norma Saunders, resident association leader, and she has convened and corralled us, mayor. She kept us in check. She gets stuff done. She is no joke. I'm trying to get her to work with the City of New York because she is phenomenal.

I also want to thank other members and acknowledge them for the administration. You'll hear from Chief Technology Officer Matt Fraser in just a bit, who is the leader and driver of this work. Our chief housing officer, Jessica Katz, who's in the house, and our NYCHA executive VP and chief information officer, Patti Bayross. Where's Patti? There you are. Our interim CEO, Lisa Bova-Hiatt, is actually in DC today fighting for NYCHA, so she couldn't be here, so we want to acknowledge her as well. Also want to acknowledge Council Member Amanda Farías, who's here in the house. And Council Member Rafael Salamanca. Thank you.

Today is really, really a special day. The mayor, as he was running for office, promised to center NYCHA in the work of this administration. One out of every 16 New Yorkers live in NYCHA. If NYCHA were a city, it would be the 33rd largest city, larger than Miami, Atlanta, and many others. We appreciate, this mayor appreciates the importance of this community, so that's one of the reasons this announcement is so very exciting. Promises made-promises kept. The divide that has kept so much opportunity out of NYCHA is being torn down today. So I first want to introduce... [inaudible]. Yes, that's right…

The 110th mayor of the City of New York, Mayor Eric Adams.

Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you. Thank you so much. I have a first deputy mayor that's from the BX. From the BX. And despite what some people think, we love New York. So we want to keep that slogan going and we want to really inspire all of you to realize that this is our home and we love our city and this is our way of spreading the love the Bronx way, as we used to say in Brooklyn. But I've been here before. I'm not new to you, I'm true to you. We sat here and held meetings here to talk about important issues. Norma has been a real ally, and she's assembled the leaders throughout our entire NYCHA homes, when you have just people who stabilize our city and just want the same quality of life that others deserve. And we're excited about some of the things we are going to be rolling out that's dealing with NYCHA.

You are going to be pleased on how much we are leaning into NYCHA because we know how important it is. Bring it back to the glory days of where it was stable, safe housing, and it's so important that we continue to do so. And this is a portion of it. We saw it during the pandemic, Covid-19, how the lack of broadband, broadband is no longer a luxury, it's a necessity. When you think about communication, telemedicine, young people were given iPads that they couldn't log onto. It was the hidden divide that many people ignored, and we said no to that when I brought on an amazing chief technology officer in Matt Fraser. Ironically, I met Matt at an incident in Brooklyn where I was borough president. His family member, who was a peacemaker, was shot and killed on a handball court. He was an innocent bystander.

And I met Matt, and as the creator would have it, our paths crossed again, and I found out what an amazing person he is, not only professionally but personally. And he dug into this. There were some naysayers saying it was not possible to do. He came to see me and stated, "We have to have full access, broadband, high-speed access, for NYCHA residents. No matter how much people say it is too expensive, it is too expensive not to do it." And really thank you for having the vision, Matt, and making this happen. And you just really have to understand the NYCHA cheerleaders in this administration. For the first time in the history of the housing plan, we included NYCHA in our housing plan. This has never been done before and it was only because of our chief housing officer.

She does not sit down in a conversation about housing without saying, "What about NYCHA? What about NYCHA?" Jessica, you have been singing the NYCHA song for a long time. A lot of people have been singing off-key, you are now telling them they got to sing the same song. Jessica is our chief housing officer, she has been an amazing advocate for NYCHA, and we want to thank you for continuing to make sure NYCHA's part of our plan. And no one has lobbied me more 'cause I want to lay down this foundation because I don't want people to think that this is just about the broadband. No one has lobbied me more for on-the-ground, quality-of-life, NYCHA issues. He has nagged me for almost a year now. That cannot be. The city-wide NYCHA rep. Where's Tony? Tony Herbert, right here. Tony. You're going to see a lot of him.

Tony is just, he's everything NYCHA. That's all he talks about. He's going to really be part of our overall plan to ensure that the NYCHA residents are getting the responsiveness that you deserve. And we're going to look at some of the plans and some of your thoughts. And listen, look, I got it. I know that throughout the years you have been denied, ignored, promises made-promises not kept. I got it, I got it. And I understand how you feel. I've been moving throughout my NYCHA homes for a long time, and I know how folks feel. But we are going to turn the corner. And we going to do the best we can. We're not going to always get it right. There are going to be moments we're going to say, "Darn it, we dropped the ball on that." But the commitment is real and it's authentic. It's real and it's authentic.

And I spent a lot of time communicating with the residents of NYCHA to make sure that we can land the plane. And you are extremely fortunate. Because of redistricting, Councilwoman Farías has represented this area at the highest level, and for her now to transition because of the new drawing of the lines and turn it over to my amazing brother, Councilman Salamanca, just a real Bronx-ite. He's going to be representing this area, advocating on behalf of you to make sure things are done right. And that brings us to why we're here today. Communication is the clear indicator of how well you move forward as the city. You have to be able to communicate, and broadband is an opportunity to do so. Six months ago, we promised that we were going to bridge the digital divide for NYCHA residents, and today, I'm proud to say, with this impressive team, we made the promise and we kept the promise.

And I want people to start looking at the things I said on the campaign trail and the things we have done. That is why I want all of you to sign up for direct communication to me because you would think, by some of the things you read, you would think we had no victories, and our victories are unbelievable. I promised that we were going to do dyslexia screening because of my dyslexia. We're doing dyslexia screening in all of our schools. I promised we were going to raise Earned Income Tax Credit to put money back in your pockets. We raised the earned income tax credit. I promised that we were going to put money in the pockets of family's members with childcare. We were able to get billions of dollars for childcare.

Look at the things that I promised on the campaign trail, and then go down the list, and you'll see the things this guy promised are the things that this guy delivered. And you're going to continue to see that, to show how we are bringing home the victories. This is the promise we made, this is the promise we kept. 

We're expanding Big Apple Connect to over 200 NYCHA housing and around 300,000 New Yorkers. The Big Apple Connect is bigger than ever. More than a quarter of a million New Yorkers now have access to internet and cable, and they're using my favorite four-letter word: free. Free. We're seeing that no longer NYCHA residents are being disconnected, they're now being connected. And the fearfulness of getting online, Googling whatever you want to find out how good your mayor's doing, sending us messages, you now have access. Communicating with your loved ones and families is just so crucial. And think about this for a moment, this is the largest free municipal-sponsored broadband program for public housing residents in the nation, the largest in the nation. And today it's grown by nearly 50 percent. 

We are delivering broadband across the five boroughs and getting more New Yorkers online than ever before. This would help residents get greater access to healthcare, education, employment opportunities. We're getting ready to roll out a centralized way to look for what jobs are available. We have thousands of jobs that are available, and we want you to be able to go online, look them up, knock on the bedroom door of your son and say, "Hey, go down and take this job application. Get your butt up, go take this job application," like my mom used to do to me. And so we are going to centralize all of these jobs on hand. It's no longer going to be complicated. Yeah, see I just identify with that, she said. [Laughter.]

So we're going to centralize all the jobs in the private sector, in the public sector. So you could go to one place using your new broadband, log on, do a search, and know exactly where to go for what jobs are available. This is going to be an amazing opportunity for us. This is going to develop our digital literacy skills because we have to do it... This universe of broadband is here and it's here to stay, and we must be a part of it. Big Apple Connect is connecting New York City to the future. And again, I want to thank my entire team in general, but specifically what Matt has accomplished in such a short period of time, of moving the ball forward and really doing what we promised. We made the promise, we're going to keep the promise and we are going to stay dedicated to the promise. Thank you very much. Good job.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Next up our Chief Technology Officer, some people call him superstar, Matt Fraser.

Matthew Fraser, Chief Technology Officer, Mayor’s Office of Technology and Innovation: Well, good morning everybody.

Audience: Good morning.

Fraser: Oh, let's do that one more time. Good morning everybody.

Audience: Good morning!

Fraser: All right, all right. So I don't quite know how I follow the man, the myth, the mayor. And what the people of New York may not know, you may not see every day is that you have a person that runs a city that's an advocate of the people. Every day we make a decision, every day we do something. The mayor's always focused on cost of an action. When we don't do something, what does it cost the people that live in the city? How do we feel the impact?

So although we're here talking about broadband today, broadband is just one component. One of the mayor's favorite sayings, I've taken it on personally because I say it is, if you don't inspect what you expect, everything is suspect. I think, right? Also, if it doesn't make dollars, it doesn't make sense, then it's nonsense, why are we doing nonsense.

There's a number of these, but I think the reason why, if you don't inspect what you expect, when we took the helm in January of '22, there was a program called the Internet Master Plan that was focused on getting broadband into communities like this. The program was launched in 2020 around the same time where we had the explosion with Covid. Now you have people that were shut in. You have kids that were sent home with devices that just didn't work. And what happened in communities like this, Black and brown communities were disproportionately affected, and we had a lot of death in communities like this, because you didn't have access to things like, how do you get telemedicine? You're shut at home, the transportation options unlimited and you can't get access to a doctor.

How do you maintain social and emotional bonds? How do you communicate with your friends? Imagine a kid that gets sent home because schools are now closed, you can't go in person and now you have no way to communicate with your peers so that you can maintain those bonds, you can maintain that peership. And forget about maintaining peership, you can't compete from an education perspective because you can't build on the skills that everyone else that has access can. This is why when the mayor says, "This is not a luxury, it's a necessity," because if you don't have it, you can't survive. Which is why when we stepped in January, the first thing that we said was, let's make the conversation about broadband access and public housing a conversation of the past, which is why within nine months from being in office, we launched the first phase of Big Apple Connect, where we brought broadband into over a hundred developments, and which is why today we come and commit, and we've launched broadband in over 200 developments.

And what that means is for the residents of Bronx River Houses today, your next bill — you don't even have to do anything if you're already a customer — your next bill is now, if you have basic TV and high speed broadband, your next bill is going to be $0. It's free. And for those of you that have higher quality of services or high levels of service, you're now going to have a credit that reflects what we're covering to make sure that that broadband right is available.

And the key of what we've done here is we haven't done it with some sort of voucher program that you have to come and redeem. We haven't done it with money that expires over the next couple of years. We've put it in the baseline operating expense of how the city runs. And the reason why that's important is that you shouldn't have to worry when you come in on how you get hot water or heat. You also shouldn't worry about how you get broadband. And that's what we're dealing with today.

In addition to that, broadband and access isn't enough. We've brought this here, we've given you access. Now we have to follow up behind and bring skills training so that it can give you the tools to use the connectivity that we've provided. For us, we want to make sure our public housing community is part of the strongest part of the city, it's the backbone of the city, and the families that come here that start here deserve access to critical services so that they can compete and they can stay here.

But I'd like to sincerely thank the mayor for his commitment to the people of the city, and thank him for also making sure that every day we are our best selves. And in addition to the mayor, the first deputy mayor, of course, is another big advocate. And I'd be remiss if I didn't thank counsel for the partnership and also the city's chief housing officer. As the mayor said for the first time in the city's history, we have someone that's dedicated in ensuring that not only NYCHA has advocated across the city, but it's also taking beyond the city to the state, to the federal government, and making sure that we bring the best that we can to NYCHA. But thank you all very much. Thank you. Thank you.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Thank you, Matt, now you see why we call him that. I do want to just underscore one thing. NYCHA, if it were a city, would be the 33rd largest city, larger than Miami, Atlanta, the size of Boston. In 15 months giving access to that whole city is how you get stuff done. That is remarkable, absolutely remarkable. And that's what the mayor has charged us to do. We are keeping a list of all your sayings. We're going to make a little book of it, the Eric-isms, it's the GSD book. So very, very excited about that. And now, next up, our leader, Norma Saunders. I mean, she's absolutely incredible. We're grateful for your leadership.

Norma Saunders: Thank you. Good morning everyone.

Audience: Good morning.

Saunders: Is that exciting news?

Audience: Yes.

Saunders: Free?

Audience: [Applause.]

Saunders: Free.

Audience: Thank you.

Saunders: I'm one that's suffered from having to pay high costs and cable and internet service and stuff. And for it to be free, I'd just like to thank you and thank you on behalf of the Bronx River residents. But on that note, first of all, one thing, I'm just going to take two seconds. Why does Mayor Adams always come and our gym is never ready for him? I don't understand, but next time you come, we're going to make sure you're in the gym. We're definitely going to make sure. 

But definitely this is amazing news. No, Bronx River did not get sold. Everybody kept asking me. The news was free cable, free internet. It is a necessity now, whoever thought there would be a necessity, but it is a necessity where now we have our college students that can actually get access to college applications, scholarships. We have seniors that we can teach on how to maneuver the internet and not get scammed, but understand how to go in. Basic TV that we don't have, some of our seniors and some of our residents don't have basic channels to find out what our mayor is doing, what our Council people are doing. These are the things that show that the mayor is moving forward with New York City housing. And I'm an advocate of NYCHA, staying on top of them and making sure that we get what is deserved. Once you pay your rent, you should have the best quality of life.

And having this capability is amazing. And not having to dig in your pocket for those that live paycheck to paycheck, for those that are on very low income like our seniors, like people that have public assistance because they have children and they're disabled. And this is amazing news. So I'm glad you guys came out. You can register today if you want. It's amazing. So I'm just happy, and I'm happy that I can share this with the residents of Bronx River Houses. And I'd just like to thank all the amazing people that made this happen for us. It shows that they're trying to build NYCHA where it should be and where we should be competing with Manhattan, where we should be proud of where we live at, where we lay our head at, where we come home and say, this is where I live at. I can come here and look at the TV. I can come and help my children with homework.

So this is amazing. And once again, I take my hat off to the mayor and to all our people that made this happen, this is something that I just get emotional sometimes. I'm not going to get emotional because I think y'all don't want to see that side. But mayor, thank you so much. Thank you, council, my Council person now, and my future Council person. I feel blessed though because I'm between both of them and I love them both. So I'm really blessed. I'd like to thank Optimum.

Optimum is here. So they're here to service you. Our Assemblyman, he's not here, but definitely got representation all the time. And definitely my board from NYCHA, my board is here as well, NYCHA’s here. And the community, first of all, let's give yourself a round of applause. Without you, none of this could happen. So I'm going to ask a big favor of you guys. Let's give it up for this panel, a big round of applause for making this happen for Bronx River Houses and for NYCHA, period. Thank you so much.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Thank you so much, Norma. Thank you. And now we're going to hear from some of your leaders. Council Member Amanda Farías.

City Council Member Amanda Farías: Good morning everyone.

Audience: Good morning.

Council Member Farías: Good morning. I forget when I say that in this space in Bronx River, y'all respond. I'm Council Member Amanda Farías and I want to welcome everyone to Council District 18. I do have Bronx River this year. Council Member Salamanca, I know he's eager to get one of the best NYCHAs that we have in the district, but I welcome all of you.

Today's announcement on the expansion of Big Apple Connect is an exciting one to be a part of, and I'm glad we're here today in community with our mayor and with my council colleagues. This past November, I helped kick off the Big Apple Connect program at Sonia Sotomayor Houses, which was one of only three locations that had access to the program in my district. But not anymore. Free broadband will now be available at 25 additional NYCHA campuses citywide, including two of the largest campuses in Council District 18, right here at Bronx River and also over by Castle Hill Houses.

Shout-out to our incredible tenant association president, Norma Saunders. And I'll give a shout-out to Jeanette from Castle Hill. For the Bronx River and Castle Hill communities, the expansion of Big Apple Connect is crucial. In 2023, Wi-Fi is a necessity, but still there's such a large digital divide. Free broadband opens up doors for Black and brown communities like mine that were never open before, allowing us to apply for remote jobs that offer flexibility, connect with our city agencies, actually retain what we're learning in school, connect with our families overseas and so much more.

The one thing I also want to not forget is, during the pandemic, what we keep saying back here is folks had to go outside of our community center, outside to our libraries to find free broadband, making the home not where you can get your essential service. And now with this program, the mayor has helped us make your home where your essential needs are being met, and that's critical in this moment.

So with that, I just want to say thank you to Mayor Eric Adams for expanding this program across the city, but especially here in my district and the Bronx. And I look forward to continuing to work together for Big Apple Connects expansion. Thank you so much.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Thank you so much. And now you have your new Council person… Your next Council person.

Council Member Farías: We're going to have to battle this out.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Okay, Bronx battle.

City Council Member Rafael Salamanca: Buenos dias, buenos dias. Good morning. It's a hot one in here, so I'm going to be quick. I just want to thank Mayor Adams and your administration for ensuring that you have not forgotten about NYCHA and the necessity to ensure that we have broadband, that we have Wi-Fi.

I have, I would say, one of the third-largest NYCHA portfolios in the City of New York. This program has been successful in Melrose Houses, which I represent, and I am pretty sure, well, I am confident that it's going to be just as successful as it is here at Bronx River Houses. And I know that you've had a great council member representing you, but I will work just as hard to follow her footsteps to ensure that you get the funding and the program that you need so that you can continue to thrive. [Speaks in Spanish.]

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Thank you. You guys are lucky, a lucky group to have such wonderful leaders. I also want to acknowledge Councilwoman Julie Won. Did you want to say a couple words?

City Council Member Julie Won: Sure.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Okay.

City Council Member Julie Won: Good morning.

Audience: Good morning.

Council Member Won: It's so good to see you. My name is Julie Won. I've traveled here from Queens. I represent Long Island City, Sunnyside, Woodside, Astoria, where I represent Queensbridge Houses, Ravenswood Houses, and Woodside Houses. And thank you to Council Member Amanda Farías, as well as Salmananca, who's going to represent this district.

But we would not be here today without our mayor, Eric Adams, and our CTO, Matt Fraser, as well as our deputy mayor and everyone who is here because this is truly revolutionary. When we started out this journey, what we have done is something that other cities have not done in the United States or outside. Because what you see right here where it says 000, that means that CTO Fraser and Eric Adams, our mayor, said it is not enough for us to give you free Wi-Fi, we have to remove the barriers that prevent people from having it which is all the registrations, all the paperwork, all of the benefits that our government may give you have all of these barriers when we're busy working three jobs, have children to take care of, grandchildren to take care of. We don't have time for the paperwork.

And that is why our CTO and his team said, "We're going to remove that." We're going to partner with contractors, these vendors who already have the majority of the share of these NYCHAs. And that way you will automatically be registered for this free program. So that way when you receive your bill now, it will literally say 000. And that is revolutionary. So we want to make sure that you know that money is going back into your pockets.

That is now money that you could use to buy more food for your children. And that is money that you're investing in yourself that the mayor has allowed you to reinvest in your families. So thank you so much for this program. We are so incredibly grateful to be part of the city. And the City Council supports this program and we want to make sure that not only you have free Wi-Fi, but cable TV so that anyone who is sitting at home during a pandemic or an emergency ever again, even if you don't know how to use a computer, you don't know how the internet works, all of our seniors will have access to TV cable so that you know what's going on outside and you will never be alone. Thank you so much.

First Deputy Mayor Wright: Thank you, Councilmember Won. And thank you for underscoring 000, free. When the mayor said his favorite four letter word, I was like, "What is he going to say?" I was worried. But he said free. Woo. Thank goodness. So thank you. Thank you, Bronx River. I just want to say we will be back. As the mayor said, our chief housing officer has made NYCHA the centerpiece of our housing agenda and there are going to be many, many more announcements to come. So thank you all so much.

Mayor Adams: And before we do, on topic, on topic, I had dinner last night with many of our Council persons and I was just blown away with the depth of what Julie's, her understanding of technology. And she represents some of the largest NYCHA developments in Queens. And her advocacy for Ravenswood, for Queensbridge and some of the others, it was just really impressive at dinner last night. And we really want to partner with her as we expand the whole conversation around technology and broadband so that you don't have the inequality that you're seeing in some of our districts and really understand why this is so big.

This is the foundation of what we are doing. We got it in Albany and in federal government. Now we have to make sure you get it. You could be successful on getting all of these resources, but if they don't get to you, then we're not successful. So now we're going to allow you to, number one, have access to high-speed broadband. Then we're going to give you training on how to navigate the high-speed broadband. Matt is building out a system that's called MyCity where you should not have to fill out forms over and over again.

Once you have all of your stuff at once in our system, we should be able to just extract the data we need as you navigate government. You should be able to know about childcare, go to one place for childcare, go to one place for the benefits SCRIE and DRIE and WIC and all those other things. We don't want you filling out forms anymore. We don't want you to talk to different agencies and they have to ask you the same questions over and over again. You have to say to yourself, "How many darn times I got to give you my social security number? You don't have it?

That's what Matt is building out. We're taking away the duplication of getting the resources you deserve. And then when you do an analysis, as the councilwoman stated, start adding up what we're doing for those who are living on a margin, fair futures for those who are foster care children, reduced fare MetroCard, Earned Income Tax Credit, child care credit, giving you access to WIC and DRIE and SCRIE. You start adding up, we're saying we can't take down federal taxes, but we can find ways in the city to decrease the amount of dollars that are coming out of your pocket.

This is another one that we are decreasing. The dollars of your high speed broadband is no longer going to come out of your pocket, so it allows you to put in your households for those things that you need. This is extremely significant to the overall plan that we're putting together to make government work for you. Government has betrayed you and it's time for government to stop betraying you and working for you. And that's what this is about. We'll do a few on topics.

Question: I have a question. My question is, how long would this be for the residents? How long would this be free?

Mayor Adams: Yes. We are going to make sure it's always free, but here…

Fraser: So the key here is, as I mentioned before, we wanted to create a program that wasn't going to go away in a month, a year. So what we did with Big Apple Connect is we established a minimum for the next five years. And in addition to that, we used money that was operating in the city's baseline budget. And what that means is, as the mayor says, we have to do more for the city. We have to use our resources wisely and make sure that government works for you. And that's why it's built that way.

Question: Hi. My question is how much is this expansion costing the city? And then going forward, projection-wise, when will all the NYCHA developments have internet available? And what do those projections look like in the city budget?

Fraser: Right, so the planned expansion, the specific dollar amounts, we…

Question: A little louder please.

Fraser: Oh, no worries. I'm from Brooklyn, I'm not shy. So the planned expansion covers an additional 67 developments and it takes us over 200 developments. The plan to expand to the rest of NYCHA, we're currently evaluating to see how fast we can get to some of those areas. And in many of the developments where we're not today, we already have low cost internet options from community-based organizations that are offering that. In terms of the total cost of what it looks like for the development, it depends on usage. So right now we can give you projections following on from this, based on our subscription rates, but it's going to be nebulous depending on how many people subscribe and how many people use.

Question: Do you have a number in mind right now that you could just give us like an estimation?

Fraser: Sure. So historically in the city's baseline operating expense, as the mayor, I said don't inspect what you expect, everything is suspect. We had $40 million baseline to support a wireless network to support city agencies. That $40 million had went to, I think maybe about less than 5,000 devices. We took that, we shut that down. Again, it was a program that we found to be ineffective and we used that $40 million baseline to cover Big Apple Connect for citywide usage.

Qyestuib: Oh, thank you. I happen to be a product of NYCHA. So to hear all of these opportunities that are going to be opening up, it's just amazing because that makes a difference for young people.

Mayor Adams: It does.

Question: Access gives you an opportunity to be exposed to things that you can now explore. So in NYCHA I was in Mitchell houses, was in Riverbank. But the project experience is similar…

Mayor Adams: It is.

Question: In most settings. So on topic, we can't be in Bronx River and not address one of… This is where young men took their entertainment equipment from their homes and created a genre that now the world duplicates. But while we were doing that, there was some harm taking place. So just not to be off topic, but for some of the victims that were hurt in the shadows of hip hop's growth, some of the names you've heard, Afrika Bambaataa, Ron Savage.

Mayor Adams: That's a long question, brother.

Question: You speak directly to everything. So what would you have to say to bring balance to that situation?

Mayor Adams: Well, and you're right. Although it's not on topic, it's off topic. But let's be clear, with some of the things that happened during the hip hop generation, it may have produced some who went on the fringe and caused a level of violence. I think that we need to be extremely reflective to understand what hip hop produced in the positive. Hip hop produced a Hakeem Jeffries, who's the first person of color to lead a house in the Congress. Hip hop produced Letitia James AG. Hip hop produced Jumaane Williams, Carl Heastie, the leader of the Assembly. Hip hop produced Andrea Stewart-Cousins. Hip hop produced DAs in the Bronx, DAs in Brooklyn, DAs in Manhattan. Hip hop produced the mayor of the City of New York. I'm a hip hop person that's a byproduct of hip hop. And so I think we need to lean into the positives of the music and I'm proud that we are doing the 50th year anniversary of hip hop.

Just like jazz, hip hop was called the devil music. People were told not to play it. Anytime when we produce a product, people want to demonize that product. But we learned that now hip hop is part of movie scores. Hip hop is what people listen to in the gyms. Hip hop is what they listen to be motivated. And so I think the legacy of hip hop is something that we all should be proud of. And I'm happy to be a person that was raised on hip hop and will continue to listen to hip hop as I fight the power.

Are you part of the We all love New York, Dana?

Question: I think you mistook me for someone else.

Mayor Adams: Yes, I did.

Question: Regarding the Apple Connect, it replaces the Internet Master Plan which was originally supposed to, I guess, bridge the digital gap for 1.5 million New Yorkers. Is there still a plan to address that larger pool of New Yorkers who don't have broadband?

Fraser: Yeah, so when you say the Internet Master Plan, I'd just like to level set expectations. It was an internet master concept. 18 months from its launch, not a single contract had been executed, not a single service had been deployed. And what we had to do is stop looking at the conceptual of what we will do and actually get stuff done. And today what we've spoken about now is 300,000 New Yorkers covered out of funds that came from the city's baseline operating expense. Now the Internet Master Plan was a $2.1 billion plan, projected where the last administration only carved out $157 million to do the first phase. Based on their projections, it would've taken four years to connect as many people as we've done in the last 15 months. So for us, beyond what we've done with public housing, we're also looking at how we can take programs like this to other subsidized housing.

So how can we get this to Section 8 recipients? How can we get it to other folks that need this kind of access? How can we work with our carriers to bring down rate plans, so the barrier for entry isn't so high? So we're working in conjunction with our MWBE, our smaller ISP providers to look at how we can get them entrances into programs like this. And then we'll also have a pilot, which will launch very soon, that's focused on a couple of new affordable housing developments where we will be putting fiber in using a concept that's sort of like the internet master plan. But does that answer your question?

Question: Yeah.

Fraser: And I just wanted to throw out really quick, so to the person who asked the last question, who said that you were a product of public housing. I'd be remiss if I didn't get an opportunity to thank Brett Sikoff. Brett Sikoff is one of the people that's on the team. He runs Franchise Administration, he runs programs like this for the city. And Brett is also a product of public housing. So this administration has people that represent the city, that come from public housing, that come from different areas that are advocating on your behalf. So I just wanted to make sure you knew that.

Question: [Inaudible] the Bronx. So I want to know, when will the actual monthly bill be zero for residents? When does it start? [Inaudible.]

Mayor Adams: [Inaudible.]

Fraser: So as of today, anyone that had… If you had a bill with Charter or Spectrum or Optimum, and you had basic TV and you had high speed broadband, as of today, that bill is $0. So the next bill that you see will be $0. All right?

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