Transcript: Mayor Adams Appears On 94.7 The Block’s “Jonesy In The Morning”

May 29, 2024

Tarsha Jones: Mayor going to sit his ass down and come to the 90s girl concert. Good morning, Mr. Mayor!

Mayor Eric Adams: How are you doing? Hope you're doing well.

Jones: I am doing well, and I was with Ingrid over the weekend At the 500 Black Men Making a Difference conference.

Mayor Adams: They are amazing. They do some good work and they are committed to just, you know, helping folks.

Jones: Yes, and it was a room filled with empowered women that I didn't even know. I think, is she the first Black female warden at Rikers? Is there a Black female warden at Rikers right now?

Mayor Adams: Yes, it is. She's probably over the house that she's in. I'm not 100 percent familiar with who the young lady is, but I know she's a real pioneer.

Jones: Her name is Lynelle Maginley-Liddie and she's the second, the second black woman to become the commissioner. She was there, It was just so many powerhouse women. So shout out to them and shout out to Ingrid from your office. Thank you for joining us this morning. What were you doing– 

Ladies and gentlemen, Mayor Eric Adams I'm sorry, I forgot to introduce him.

Mayor Adams: All good. Mother used to say if you come more than once, you're no longer a guest, your family.

Jones: This is true. So now you're part of our raggedy bunch So you were in Rome. What were you doing over there? Was it personal or was it business?

Mayor Adams: Business. The Pope held a sort of a world fraternity, human fraternity meeting, with Nobel Laureates and other leaders to talk about some of the national, international problems we're having. 

Everything from climate change to wars to what is playing out in Haiti and in Sudan and Gaza So he wanted us just to come together like a family reunion and say how do we solve these problems together 

Jones: Oh nice. I'm glad that he reached out to you guys for that.

Mayor Adams: Yes, and we had an opportunity to meet him as well. He's getting up in years but he's still sharp as anything.

Jones: Wait a minute now, Didn't I see a headline about him saying something slick and he had to run it back and apologize?

Mayor Adams: Well, you know, the word police is out there all the time and when you do. I tell people all the time, when you do thousands of speeches and communication, you may say something that you want to say differently. 

People should listen to the heart of people and the work this Pope has done is just really impactful across the entire globe.

Jones: He could be our hip hop Pope on the rope? No, Pope no joke No that's not. Stop it, silly girl. 

Tell us what you're up to. I know there was some exciting news about employment opportunities for those people that know how to swim and possibly save lives.

Mayor Adams: Yes. What we had to do is that our outdated over 40 years of how we brought on lifeguards and what their criteria was was  really in the way of making sure we filled the positions. The person who was in charge of the union just really made it difficult. 

So we were able to get an arbitration ruling that allowed us to make it a little bit more easier, but still with the qualification of bringing on lifeguards. It's going to allow us to boost our numbers, make sure we can get as many beaches as possible open. 

And our small kiddie pools, you don't have to be an olympic swimmer to be at a small kiddie pool and save lives and so we made some changes and we think it's going to have a real impact on getting our beaches open and getting our pools open. You know how much these pools and beaches mean to people. That's the French Riviera for those who can't fly out of town. They enjoy their beaches.

Jones: That's right. Shout out to everybody that used to go and still goes to Astoria Pool. That's my childhood stomping grounds.

Mayor Adams: Yes, I know that spot so well.

Jones: That's probably you that was dunking me back in the day. By the time we walked back to Astoria Projects from the pool, we were back funky and sweaty again, but it did not matter. 

We're talking to Mayor Eric Adams. We'll be right back with more.

[Music Break.]

Jones: We are back with Mayor Eric Adams. Go ahead. We were laughing. 

Mayor Adams: I was saying that Astoria Pool, we used to go from South Jamaica Queens and there was some real shawtys over there, you know?

Jones: Yes, yes. I was one of them. Stop it, stop it. Word police are watching and listening to us. Now back to the less important stuff. What about those jobs?

Mayor Adams: Our job numbers are really improving. This was something that Reverend Sharpton and I talked about earlier in the year. When you think about it, the decrease in unemployment among the Black and brown communities is so significant because the success of the city has really escaped many communities and we said we're not going to allow that to happen. 

Now to have a, we were four times the rate of white unemployment and now that number has dropped to two times the rate and is going to continue to fall because we're doing all of these job fairs throughout the entire city.

Jones: That's always good news. How can people, we were talking about the lifeguard positions, how can people find out how to apply for those?

Mayor Adams: You reach out, go to the Department of Parks website online or you can reach out to our City Hall. There's many pathways. We also have a website called JobsNYC and it shows you not only the jobs for lifeguards, but JobsNYC shows you all the jobs we have. 

We have thousands of jobs that are available in the city and people can go on and sign up and find out when the next job fair is and how to apply for some of these jobs.

Jones: Okay, so the next step is on you guys. You have to be proactive and actually follow up, but the jobs seem to be out there. 

One last thing, mayor. I know you're busy and I believe he's got his hands full too, but any luck on getting the keys back from Diddy?

Mayor Adams: The team has been down looking into the process. We have never done that before, but that video, as you saw, was really painful to watch. 

As a person who has two sisters, I was really troubled by it. The team has sat down and determined what the next steps are and we'll make a formal announcement once that's determined. 

Jones: Got you. If all else fails, just change the locks. Call housing. Call housing to change the locks for you. Mayor Eric Adams, it's always a pleasure. I can't wait to actually meet you in person.

Mayor Adams: Be well, you guys. Enjoy the rest of your day.

Jones: Likewise, thank you for checking in.