Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Appears Live on Inside City Hall

July 22, 2019

Errol Louis: Welcome back to Inside City Hall. The heatwave may be over but thousands of New Yorkers are still hoping to get the lights turned back on and they want answers from Con Edison. Mayor de Blasio also wants some answers. He’s here to talk about that and more. Welcome, Mr. Mayor. Con Edison says it was, sort of, a preemptive blackout to make sure there wasn’t a wider meltdown. Do you take issue with that strategy or how it was communicated or what?

Mayor Bill de Blasio: I take issue with all of it, Errol. We’ve got, first of all, the blackout from a week ago, we still don’t have answers on that, and no answer as to how they would avoid that kind of scenario from happening again. Now we have a new scenario where we had days and days of warning of a heatwave. We were essentially coming out of the heatwave when this happened. We weren’t at the high point or anything like that, and they had every opportunity to prepare and their answer was we have to arbitrarily shut down power to 30,000 customers to save that part of our system. I don’t understand, Errol, with all the redundancy they claim, and all the preparation, how that could possibly happen. And now we have folks who were shut down almost 24 hours ago still not back up – it’s about 5,600 households still in Southern Brooklyn. And never an answer, I’ve tried repeatedly to talk to Con Ed, to give us something, give us some kind of answer, some kind of timeline for when you’ll have an answer, some kind of example of what you’ve done to protect against this going forward – it’s like a maze.

Louis: I think back and I’d have to check to make sure, you know, year by year by year, but there isn’t a summer I remember where there wasn’t some kind of brownout or blackout at some point, right? I mean, is that just part of life in New York?

Mayor: I’m sure some smaller disruptions come with running such a big system, but that’s not what’s worrying me here. What happened in Manhattan nine days ago was a full-scale blackout. Thank God it was over in five hours, but it was tens of thousands of customers, clearly for a cause that they still cannot explain – which doesn’t give you any confidence that know how to stop it again. This one was 30,000 folks and, you know, the answer they gave was if we didn’t do it, we were going to lose a lot more. Something is wrong.

Louis: Do you think it requires, sort of, a radical solution, and by that I mean things like yank their license or even municipalize the utility?

Mayor: Yeah, to begin with, we need a full investigation because this should not be happening and they should not be unaccountable, and second I think it's time to think about other options. The lack of accountability – now I really have not had, in five-and-a-half years as Mayor, we have had snowstorms, we’ve had Ebola, we’ve had all sorts of things, but heatwaves like this were not part of our reality until this one. This is the worst in my time as Mayor. So my dealings with Con Edison were pretty limited. Now, having had to deal with them up close and personal for nine, ten days – I don’t like what I see, and I kept trying to offer them a chance to explain, to reassure, to give me something, and I kept saying “Guys, in work I do and my agencies do, we can’t keep saying to everyone ‘oh, we don’t even know when we’ll have an answer for you.’” That’s not acceptable. You wouldn’t accept it, you know. No one would accept it in this town.

If there’s a problem, we have to immediately diagnose it, we have to say what we’re doing about it, we have to say what we would do differently to stop it in the future, and do our best. We’re not going to be perfect, but we don’t have the luxury of saying, “At some point we’ll have those answers.” Literally, all I get from Con Ed is, you know, they’ll take weeks and weeks and weeks, absolutely amorphous. That suggests, to me, a tremendous lack of accountability.

And you know, they’re a private company which, obviously, people make some very nice salaries and all, but they don’t have the accountability of a public-sector entity, but they are regulated in a way that sort-of makes them public. It’s a weird mix. I think it’s a bad mix right now because the accountability levels are obviously way off. So, let’s start with investigation, but if that investigation does not yield better answers, I, for one, think we do need to think about some kind of public approach. I’ll give you an example. You turn on the water in the morning, you know it’s going to be there. That’s DEP, that’s a City agency that does an outstanding job providing water to New Yorkers and protecting our water supply, and is always accountable, and has to answer when there is a problem. We need something like that potentially for electricity as well.

Louis: Okay. Part of what happened with the recent heatwave is there are reports that Rikers Island, the Brooklyn House of Detention, and possibly other detention facilities were unbearable, that there wasn’t much or even enough, or in some cases any air conditioning for many, many detainees. These are people who are just waiting for their day in court. Is there something that can be done about that?

Mayor: Well, my understanding in particular of the situation at Rikers is that there were – there’s a swath of Rikers that does have air conditioning, it was functioning. There were certainly cells that didn’t have it. What would happen was moving as many inmates as possible to where the air conditioning was. We have to keep improving that. But honestly the best way to address Rikers, as you know, is to get off it entirely and our jail population has been going down constantly. We’re now around 8,000 inmates, that’s down over 30 percent. It’s going to go down a lot more in the next few months and years. So that one I would say the actual substantial drop in the population should help us get to the situation where we have air conditioning for those who need it. But any place where we identify a problem, we have to go in and try and come up with additional solutions.

Louis: Is that part of the vision for rebuilding or expanding existing houses of detention is that they’ll be modernized and have things like air-conditioning?

Mayor: Amazing things like air conditioning, right? Remember Rikers is 85 years old, some of it – it was not built to be humane, it was not built for redemption. Nowadays, there’s an entirely different concept of how you build a jail that’s supposed to be an environment that encourages redemption, that has proper air, proper light, you know, air conditioning, etcetera. That’s what we will be building on these sites for sure.

Louis: I want to show you some of the video that just sort of came in the late afternoon – officers being pelted with water, buckets, or other kind of debris. This happened, apparently, during an arrest being affected in the 2-8 Precinct up in Central Harlem. There was another one showing people being, you know, hit with water in the 7-3 Precinct in Brownsville. Have you talked with your Police Commissioner and do you have any sense of what’s going on there?

Mayor: What the NYPD is telling me is that they are two very different incidents, one of which was not confrontational, the other of which was. And I’ll just state the obvious – it’s not acceptable for anyone to resist arrest, it’s not acceptable for anyone to interfere with the NYPD when they’re effectuating an arrest. Throwing things at an NYPD officer is not only not acceptable, it can lead to charges. All of those actions can lead to charges, additional charges. So people have to really understand this is serious stuff, don’t do it. Don’t aid and abet it. But again, what NYPD is telling me is one of the incidents was confrontational, the other one was not.

Louis: The non-confrontational one looked pretty, you know—

Mayor: Again, I’m taking – I wasn’t there, I’m taking it from what the NYPD was telling us.

Louis: Looked like they had super-soakers and buckets of water dumped on people – although, during a heatwave I guess that might not be the worst thing in the world. We’re going to take a short break here. We’ve got more to talk about, I’ll be right back with more from Mayor de Blasio, stay with us.

Welcome back to Inside City Hall. I’m once again joined by Mayor de Blasio. And you know, Mr. Mayor, I know you and I have a difference of opinion about Officer Pantaleo and what is supposed to happen to him. You’ve expressed over the last week that it was a mistake to rely on the feds to take the procedures that would have given the family a measure of justice. But you know you’ve seemed to feel that you have some legal restriction that prevents you from expressing your opinion about the case which, as far as I can tell – I mean it didn’t apply to your predecessors as mayor.

Mayor: I believe it’s the right thing to respect the process but I could not be more angry about what the Justice Department did. I want to just really put the horse before the cart here, Errol. I’ve believed throughout my whole life the Justice Department was independent and I believed that they took their responsibility very seriously when it came to issues between police and community. I don’t know how on Earth over two different, very different administrations they could spend five years coming to no conclusion whatsoever.

I wish I had this one back because what I would have done is say we’re just not waiting on them, let’s just proceed –

Louis: But even in a best-case scenario they would have found a civil rights violation which might have been a fine, possibly could have been jail time. But even they don’t have the power to fire the officer. That’s your job.

Mayor: Again, what – first under Eric Holder then later on under Loretta Lynch, we were told consistently that if there was a trial by the NYPD on the personnel issues it would undermine the Justice Department’s ability to determine what action it could take and to bring a case if they chose to. I mean, this didn’t come out of thin air. This came from the Justice Department. And I’ve said that a whole lot of times. I understand, look—

Louis: You know they’ve said something different.

Mayor: They have not said something different about that originally—

Louis: In the end they said if the department trial had taken place they might have had more evidence that might have helped them reach a different conclusion.

Mayor: Again, let’s be really clear – two different administrations. The first two-and-a-half years was under the previous administration, unmistakably made clear to us that they did not want us to proceed and in an administration that we all respected. But now I’ve said the policy from this point on – I hope we never ever have to use this policy and we never have another incident – the policy from this point on is we’re going to proceed with the personnel action. What we heard loud and clear originally from the Justice Department was that if you take the personnel action it undermines the case on the more serious charges than what you have achieved.

So, you know, someone maybe is fired but the issues that are greater – and I think you’re estimating the range of what those charges can be – you know, I understood that reasoning but now it just is obvious we could not have trusted them and –

Louis: Did your lawyers tell you the level of difficulty involved in sustaining a federal civil rights charge here? You have to prove intention –

Mayor: Of course – you know, look, I have a lot of respect for the Law Department. It’s been led very ably by Zach Carter who was a U.S. Attorney. Very strong feeling that when the Justice Department asks you to hold back that you’re supposed to honor that, but that again has been invalidated. Now – what matters now, and I’ve said this to the Garner family, is this issue will be resolved in August once and for all.

Louis: Okay, let me move on. I understand that you’ve withdrawn your nomination for a new Taxi and Limousine Commissioner –

Mayor: No, it’s not a withdrawal, it is a – we’re holding on it because the Council raised some concerns. So, we’re going to have a further discussion with them and try to address those concerns. I do want to say on the previous point – this was put out earlier today. It’s a Medium post. It’s available to all New Yorkers about exactly what happens next in the Pantaleo trial. We are awaiting, literally any day now, a verdict from the Deputy Commissioner for Trials at NYPD. And this is online from the First Assistant Corporation Counsel for the City of New York, Georgia Pestana. And it goes over some of the things that people want to know about how things proceed.

Louis: Yeah. I mean it goes through procedural stuff. I don’t know if anybody really is concerned about, you know, the administrative law judge. As a basic matter folks – and this what the protestors have been saying pretty consistently over the last few days is that they’re waiting for the Mayor to lead and for the Mayor to step forward and stop deferring to the federal Justice Department, the State prosecutor, the administrative law judge, your own Police Commissioner, and everybody else in the world to, you know, step forward and say what it is you want to see happen.

Mayor: Again, it’s very easy to say later – and I respect the protestors and what they’re trying to achieve but I have to say I don’t know how people are ignoring these facts so consistently. So, the previous administration in Washington, that Justice Department asked—

Louis: The previous and the current administration have asked you to do a lot of things that you don’t do –

Mayor: Well, I’m sorry –

Louis: They asked you to enforce immigration law, you say you won’t do it –

Mayor: No, no, no, no. The –

Louis: They ask you to cooperate with ICE, you say you won’t do it –

Mayor: The federal Justice – Errol, respectfully, the federal Justice Department originally under Eric Holder – I’m sorry – that was the right thing to listen to them and respect them. We have learned now that we’re dealing with a very different reality in the Justice Department. But now we’re in the final phase here and I’ve been very clear that this has to be done. Everything has to be done properly and we need to make sure this process, in the end, whatever the outcome, that if it’s challenged, which it often is, that it will pass muster. So, there’s a very specific reason for doing things the way we’re doing it now.

Louis: Okay. The TLC Commissioner, you’re going – you’ve put that on pause. Why is that?

Mayor: So, again, the Council asked some very meaningful questions. Those are fair. I mean there’s an advise and consent process and we respect the Council. Their job is to the vetting also. We do our vetting. They do theirs. They raised important questions. They wanted better answers, more answers. We said, great, let’s pull this back a little bit, have more dialogue and go forward with the process after that. So, that’s our intention to continue after more dialogue with the Council.

Louis: Is it possible that you would submit a different nomination?

Mayor: I think this will work out. I’m hopeful it will work out but I think the Council is raising valid issues.

Louis: We reported earlier tonight, Mr. Mayor, the NYCHA monitor issued its full report. I don’t expect that you’ve read all 237 pages –

Mayor: No, sir.

[Laughter]

Louis: Neither have I. But something did jump out from the executive summary that I looked at – or part of the conclusions. And this is on page 36. They say, “NYCHA cannot clearly identify who is in charge of and accountable for properly addressing lead paint matters,” which struck me as a bit of a shocker along with the fact that they said there have been 18 new cases this year of NYCHA residents with lead poisoning.

Mayor: Well, again, I respect the monitor. There’s a lot of information in this report – some of it that’s been out there previously before, some of it which I think could be made clearer. But the bottom line here – the lead program, we now have a Vision Zero approach to lead. And if you look at the document that was put together to eradicate – you know the plan to eradicate lead in this city once and for all which has never been done before but it’s actually in reach.

Lead poisoning is down 90 percent since 2005. We literally believe we can get to zero. And we are now going through 135,000 NYCHA apartments to determine once and for all, permanently, if they have a lead problem or not. That’s also never been done before. Things are being done on a vast scale. We’ll certainly – everyone at NYCHA will look at the report, we’ll look at the report. We have new leadership coming in, in just a few weeks, that’s going to help us to now aggressively implement the plans we put in place and, you know, to spend properly the billions of dollars that we’ve committed to make changes –

Louis: Just so you know they are calling for you to change those plans because they’re saying that finding out where young people are, for example, is self-reported which they say is not the right way to figure out where there are young children –

Mayor: Of course, we’re going to take every step to determine anytime there’s a young person in the apartment but much more importantly, we’re first going to have, for the first time ever, knowledge of every apartment that actually has lead and doesn’t. We’ve spent a long time in this city and in the public housing authority addressing apartments that it turns out did not have lead to begin with and wasting money and wasting time that should have been focused on protecting those kids and those families where the problem was. So, for the first time that’s going to be resolved.

Louis: Before you go, let’s talk about some presidential stuff. Politico reports that a fair amount of money from your – from one of your state committees found its way into the federal campaign. You’ve made some disclosures and there’s going to be some money that moves back and forth. But there’s one item in particular that I wanted to ask you about where it is suggested that you’re claiming the video announcing the presidential campaign was properly a state expense and not a federal campaign expense.

Mayor: Again, I am not an election lawyer. All of these entities have election lawyers and folks who are trained in this field. So, any question needs to go to the campaign because I just can’t talk about the nuances.

Louis: Well I mean, I’m just telling you their answer. The answer – it kind of sounds absurd.

Mayor: Again, I wish I could help you but I don’t know the specific nuances of how the law approaches each piece.

Louis: I mean are you going to wait for somebody to accuse of having violating the law before you show –

Mayor: I believe we have consistently handled these filings properly and that’s been the history for a long time.

Louis: Substantively, they say that – in three of the first four primary or caucus states, you are not reporting any donations above the $200 level. Are you seeking donations in this—

Mayor: Our focus has been on grassroots donations.

Louis: Meaning less than $200.

Mayor: In the states all over the country, yeah.

Louis: And I guess finally, Patch is reporting that the street safety crackdown which I guess ended on the 21st. It’s sort of timing out now –

Mayor: Wait, what are you – when you say the street safety crackdown, clarify.

Louis: This is to try and clear bike lanes and –

Mayor: No, it’s been – my friend, that’s been announced many times as an ongoing effort. It did not end. It’s going to continue.

Louis: Alright well, what they’re reporting is that –

Mayor: They don’t have it right because it’s repeatedly been made clear it is an ongoing effort.

Louis: Okay, so it’s an ongoing effort but what they are reporting is that there was a 14 percent decline in the first half of the year compared to tickets given last year for bike lane violations.

Mayor: Look, we have sent out the NYPD in great intensity to clear bike lanes. That effort will continue. I have not seen that report but I know for a fact that a lot of personnel is being devoted to clearing out those bike lanes.

Louis: Okay, we’ll leave it there for now. I know you have a busy schedule over the weekend so we’ll see you next week when you get back in town.

Mayor: Alright. Take care.

Louis: Best of luck with the – and we’ll talk some about the debates which are coming up next week.