Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Speaks at Asian Pacific American Heritage Reception

May 19, 2014

Council Member Peter Koo: Thank you for joining us tonight. Looking around the room now, I feel both proud and grateful. I am proud because I have the honor of speaking before such a distinguished crowd of Asian-Pacific American New Yorkers. And I’m grateful because I know how hard all of you are working on behalf of our people. You’re here tonight because you are the leaders. You saw a need in your community and you decided to do something about it. As a result, New York’s Asian-Pacific American communities are stronger and more vibrant than ever.

[Applause]

I see every day – not just in my district, but throughout the city – New York City enriched by Asia- Americans. The city depends on us, and we are answering the call.

It’s now my pleasure to introduce a man who understands how important we are to this city, a man who understands that New York City’s greatest strength is its diversity and tolerance. He has proven it time and time again throughout his life, not just in his words, but also in his actions. Mayor de Blasio, thank you for holding this wonderful event. More importantly, thank you for everything you have done and will do for New York City’s Asian Pacific American community. Let’s welcome Mayor de Blasio.

[Applause]

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Thank you so much. I have to tell you, Peter Koo is a very tall man in my eyes.

[Laughter]

Okay? And it’s because of everything about him. I’ve had such a joy working with him over the years. And let me tell you his story for a moment. I bet a lot of people know the councilman, but I’ve got to tell his story because it epitomizes what we’re talking about here tonight. And this is such a wonderful story. It will serve as an example that will be a welcome to all of you to Gracie Mansion for this great event tonight. The councilman immigrated from Hong Kong in 1971, and he has achieved everything he’s achieved through hard work. None of it came easy, he did it all the hard way. He worked minimum wage jobs to put himself through pharmacy school. He founded a pharmacy chain. He eventually became a civic leader. He got elected to the City Council, where he has served with great distinction. Let’s thank Council Member Koo.

[Applause]

And as I’m going to call out, so many people I want to acknowledge. The members of my administration who are here tonight, I want you to come up here. So Ram, come up here. Anyone who’s a member of my team so I can introduce you from up here. But I want to welcome everyone on behalf of the first lady and myself, I’d like to welcome everyone to Gracie Mansion. Now I could say welcome to my house, but in fact it’s your house. It is the people’s house.

[Applause]

It’s kind of strange to welcome people to their own house, but I’ll do it anyway. So this is one of the extraordinary jewels of New York City. And it is such an honor for Chirlane and I to share it with you as we celebrate Asian-Pacific heritage month – Asian and Pacific-American heritage month. This is a really great opportunity for us to take stock of everything that this community does for New York City and how intrinsic this community is to the current success of New York City, and even more to the future success of New York City. Do you agree with me?

[Applause]

Now we have here on stage some examples, some of the leaders of this administration who are helping to achieve the changes that we are setting out on, to make this a city that serves everyone better, that includes everyone better. And these are some of the great leaders that you’ll get to know over time and you’ll see what extraordinary things they’re doing for the community. I’d like to introduce the new president of the Health and Hospitals Corporation, Ram Raju. The commissioner – an old friend of mine, he’s the commissioner of the Department for Youth and Community Development and he’s one of the people we are depending on to achieve this extraordinary change we’re making in after-school so we can reach tens of thousands more kids and give them a better start in life and make sure they’re safe and make sure they’re learning. If you love the sound of that, then the person you’ve got to thank is Bill Chong, commissioner of DYCD.

[Applause]

And if you like the sound of a municipal ID card available to everyone regardless of documentation status – something that actually treats every New Yorker as equal. Half a million of our fellow citizens – or fellow neighbors, I should say – half a million of our neighbors happen to be undocumented. Half a million New Yorkers who are our co-workers, our friends, our neighbors, happen to be undocumented. They need to live a full life, they need to be respected, they need to be embraced. We’re going to have a municipal ID card for them, and the person who’s making that happen is the head of the Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs, Nisha Agarwal.

[Applause]

Good. I was just running out of people to introduce and more came up. Good. The woman who – if you believe that we should use every tool of city government, including the way we do contracts, the way we procure goods and services, the way we reach out to businesses, with all the things the city purchases. If you believe that that should reflect all the communities of New York City, that we should make sure that minority and women-owned businesses get fair opportunity, the person in charge of that is our new commissioner for the Department of Citywide Administrative Services, Stacey Cumberbatch.

[Applause]

And if you happen to have a minority or women-owned business that wants to do business with the City of New York, I suggest you get to know Stacey Cumberbatch.

And if you believe that the city has so many people who are involved in their own communities, trying to make them better – and we have to tap into that civic energy and that volunteerism – then the person you want to know is the chief service officer of New York City, Paula Gavin.

[Applause]

Now – and send up Chief Chan too. First I’ll introduce Marco Carrion, the man who runs the Community Affairs Unit. Every neighborhood of New York City, reached out to from City Hall, Marco Carrion.

[Applause]

Finally, a man whose been charged with implementing one of the biggest initiatives of this administration. You know we’re trying to make this a safer city, we’re trying to make sure that we don’t have as many crashes, we don’t have as many pedestrians and bicyclists injured. We’ve taken an idea called Vision Zero. We’re going to make it real all over the city and we’re going to save lives. We’re particularly going to save children’s lives and make school zones safer. And when it comes to the NYPD, the man that Commissioner Bratton put in charge of that is Chief Chan. And we thank him for his great leadership.

[Applause]

Now,  couple other people I have to thank. And I have to say from the outset, a number of our elected officials – I don’t know if any have arrived yet. I know some of them had to be out of town. They’re all doing the people’s business. But I want to thank them up front. Whether they’re here or not it doesn’t matter. I want to thank them, especially Congresswoman Grace Meng, Assembly Member Ron Kim, Council Member Margaret Chin – I want to thank them all for what they do. And as we have other elected officials, they’ll send me a note to tell me who’s here.

Now the people who made this event possible – a lot of people here at Gracie Mansion worked hard at it, but there’s also a group of sponsors. I wanted you to thank the sponsors and the entertainers. Let me give you the list – Patrick Ng, the president of Po Wing Hong Food Market, thank him; John Park, the president of the Korean Community Empowerment Council; Dae Ken Yoo, the president of the Korean Super Market Association; Mr. Chong Hor Kim, a small business owner; and Mr. Yeong Bae Choi, the President of the Republic of Korea Marine Veterans. Let’s thank them all for their help this evening.

I’m going to be brief and just say to you, this is a joyous occasion. This is an occasion where we celebrate all the communities here today that make up such a strong part of New York City, such a vibrant, growing, ever more powerful part of New York City – making the city better all the time. Everyone in this room who is so active in the community represents that growth, that improvement in our city that you’re bringing in. And we are so appreciative of it.

But we also know there are challenges. There are things we have to overcome. There’s still divisions and biases to overcome. And tonight on a somber note, I want to say something a lot of people have been thinking about right now. There’s a vigil going right now – a vigil going on – for Ruan Wen Hui, who was tragically killed and senselessly killed. And people all over the city, regardless of what background you come from, are feeling this horrible incident of a defenseless grandfather, had just dropped off his grandchildren, killed brutally for no reason at all. And beloved by his family, beloved by his community, and all I can say is our hearts go out to the family. And I assure you, the NYPD is doing everything in its power to bring the assailants to justice.

[Applause]

But in that which we can celebrate is so much. There’s so much to be proud of. These communities represented tonight, some of the communities of this city that make up the Asian and Pacific community go back as far as the 1700s in New York City. So if anyone tries to treat you like a new arrival, remind them the roots go back hundreds of years.

[Applause]

And the influence and the impact has grown with each passing decade – that’s another fact. The impact of all of the communities of Asia on this city has grown deeper and deeper and more important, and is part of why New York City is so much more vibrant today and moving forward economically, moving forward culturally. There’s so many things that people see around the world, they envy New York City, they want to be a part of it. This community has played such a crucial role.

We have a lot more to do – I always will say it – to make it a more unified city, to make it a more inclusive city, to make sure that the benefits of this city reach so many more people. And by the way, you may have seen a report that came out a few weeks ago – we are facing still a profound crisis of not only income inequality, but a persistently high poverty rate. And that is happening in the Asian-American communities too. And this administration is devoted to taking all the tools we have – our huge new affordable housing program, our paid sick leave program, our municipal ID, our pre-K and after school. We’re committed to making sure those tools reach across Asian communities. And we’re going to have a strong outreach effort so every member of this community benefits from our efforts to bring more equality and more fairness to New York City.

[Applause]

So with that, I’m inspired by this gathering. I’m thankful to all of you for what you do to this city. And I’ll tell you another thing that inspires me every day, is that I’m lucky enough to be married to Chirlane McCray.

[Applause]

And I had the joy of meeting her spontaneously one day at City Hall in 1991. And I always say, ‘If you don’t believe in love at first sight, come talk to me because it happened to me.’ I say, ‘The violins played, the angels sang. A thunderbolt hit me.’ None of those things happened for Chirlane McCray, but later she started to like me. And we fell deeply in love, and just last week we celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary.

[Applause]

So ladies and gentlemen, the First Lady of New York City, Chirlane McCray.

[Applause]

First Lady Chirlane McCray: Good evening. What an amazing crowd. Honey, we ought to get a bigger house.

[Laughter]

Mayor: I thought this house would finally be big enough.

First Lady: No, no. Beautiful, what a beautiful crowd. Before I begin, I also offer my sincere condolences to the family of Ruan Wen Hui. Those of us who have heard his story know he was hard-working, generous, and always thinking of others. He may be gone, but his memory lives on among us, who are working even harder to create a more tolerant and peaceful New York. As we attempt to make sense of something that really makes no sense, gatherings like this help us renew our faith in our great city, and remember – our greatest strength has always been our willingness to embrace newcomers while respecting their traditions.

Just think of all the vibrant and thriving Asian-Pacific communities that exist within our cities. Multiple Chinatowns, Koreatown, Little Manila, Little Punjab, Little Saigon, and so many more – Little India, yes!

[Laughter]

Little Bangladesh, and so many more. Of course, the ‘little’ is often a misnomer. In fact, many of our Asian-Pacific communities are rather big, and growing. Between 2000 and 2011, the percentage of foreign-born New Yorkers rose from 24 percent to 28 percent. That’s a good thing. Asian-Pacific New Yorkers are playing leading roles in every sector of our society – the arts, education, business, non-profits, and of course government. This is a well-earned source of pride for all of you, and a source of strength and beauty for our entire city.

[Applause]

Mayor David Dinkins, the man who brought Bill and me together, famously referred to New York City as ‘the gorgeous mosaic’. Well, it was a fitting metaphor when he first said it in 1990, and it is even more so today. All of our lives are richer, thanks to New York’s Asian-Pacific communities.

[Applause]

Now to cite just one example among millions, there is a remarkable Korean-American woman named Eunice Ko who manages my schedule. And let me tell you, that is no small task. I often tell her she has the hardest job, next to mine, of course. A few days ago, we just happened to be talking about Korean food, and I told her about my fondness for kimchi and how many years ago, I had actually prepared a traditional Korean meal with bulgogi. She was so surprised, and she was really surprised that I like kimchi, and she told me about her mother’s special recipe. Now that was just one of those small, beautiful moments that make you happy to be a New Yorker. We’re all from different places, but there is so much we have to share with one another. And I look forward to connecting with all of you, both today and in the years to come. Again, good evening, I hope you have a wonderful time, and Namaste.

[Applause]