Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Appears Live on the Brian Lehrer Show

December 6, 2019

Brian Lehrer: It’s the Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone, and we will begin as we usually do on Friday’s with our weekly Ask The Mayor segment, my questions and yours for Mayor Bill de Blasio. Our phones are open at 2-1-2-4-3-3-WNYC, 4-3-3-9-6-9-2, or you can tweet a question, just use the hashtag #AskTheMayor, and good morning, Mr. Mayor, welcome back to WNYC.

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Good morning, Brian.

Lehrer: So as of Sunday, the city has a new police commissioner, Dermot Shea. I want to ask you about something that he said this week on 1010 WINS. He said that for him all crime in the subway is the same. Listen.

Police Commissioner Dermot F. Shea: I don’t see a great distinction between these low level crimes and let’s say a robbery or one of the ‘more serious crimes.’ Each of these crimes really has an impact on victims, and it can be traumatizing.

Lehrer: So, Mr. Mayor, do you have any concerns about your new commissioner on Week 1 having that position? No great distinction between low level crimes and let’s say a robbery?

Mayor: No. I’ve worked with Dermot Shea for the last six years and really worked very closely with him. I think he’s an extraordinary leader. I think he is really thoughtful, I would go so far as saying visionary, about where we need to go with policing. And if you heard his remarks when I announced him as commissioner, if you heard his remarks yesterday at our press conference, he is talking about a real transformation of the NYPD, a much deeper use of the neighborhood policing philosophy, a focus on young people, and supporting young people – I mean it’s the antithesis of what we saw with Mike Bloomberg and Ray Kelly where young people were affronted constantly by the NYPD, whether innocent or not, and under the stop-and-frisk policy treated very aggressively, and what Dermot Shea is talking about is engaging young people, supporting them, helping [inaudible] to more positive choices, so there’s something profoundly different in the approach he wants to take compared to the past.

I think what he’s saying in that quote, Brian, is that anybody who experiences the effects of crime feels it and we need to be sensitive to that and understand that, and if something went wrong in someone’s life, you know, it’s our responsibility as a city to try and support them and help them, so I think that’s what he was trying to say, which is very consistent with the approach we’ve taken over these last six years.

Lehrer: To people who might hear that as “uh-oh, here we go again, and it’s going to be more broken windows policing” I think he still embraced that term, if not stop-and-frisk per se, what would you say?

Mayor: No, I appreciate the question and the opportunity to have a real dialogue about it. No, there’s a real disconnect that has to be addressed. Quality of life policing is what we talk about. Broken windows has become, understandably, a term that evokes so many different things in so many different people, and its origins have real problems associated with them. So we don’t talk about that, we talk about a very different and clear approach. The combination of neighborhood policing, which is developing deep relationships between police and community and mutual respect, precision policy which is specifically focusing on the very, very few people who create most of the crime and violence, and then quality of life policing means listening to communities, and I – you know, I was a City Councilmember, I worked very closely, block by block, with communities. Brian, in the larger debate, I think what’s often missed, and I say this with real respect for advocates who are people who I think are heartfelt and are trying to do good, but I think they often miss the reality of life in our neighborhoods – constantly I hear from my constituents they are concerned about quality of life issues, they really want to see these issues addressed. They don’t want it – they don’t want over policing. They don’t want draconian policing. But they do want quality of life issues addressed. And under neighborhood policing, you’d be amazed. I talked to our neighborhood coordinating officers, who are extraordinary people, listening to residents, for example, our officers who work in public housing, listen to the residents and they respond, and the residents are concerned about something they feel is negatively affecting their quality of life, our officers are supposed to be responsive and respectful of that. There used to be a reality in this city, in many communities, particularly communities of color, where you couldn’t get police follow up decades ago on real issues that were effecting people. So the balance to strike, and this is an honest conversation we need to have as New Yorkers, is we want the police to respond to concerns of everyday New Yorkers, we don’t want overreach, we don’t want an aggressive, punitive approach, and we’re trying to strike the balance. Remember, with stops, so far down, arrests, so far down, 150,000 fewer arrests last year than five years earlier, much less incarceration obviously, thank God, we are finding that we can keep this city safe with a much lighter touch. But that does not mean ignoring when a constituent says I have a problem and this effecting my quality of life.

Lehrer: One more crime question before we take our first caller. This is the Daily News version this morning “with just for weeks to go before the end of the year, the NYPD is facing a worrying uptick in murders, making it the first time since 2017 that the city will end the year with more than 300 homicides. By the end of November, the NYPD had investigated 299 killings this year, compared to 275 during the same period last year, a nine percent increase.” What’s going on with murders and, I gather, other violent crime.

Mayor: Well no, I would not gather, and I appreciate the question, Brian. I actually think it’s really important not to conflate. Overall crime continues to go down, and the fact is the NYPD has been increasingly successful at disrupting gangs, gang takedowns, getting guns off the streets. We see increase in guns seizures. We clearly have a challenge, and we take it very seriously with this uptick in murders. Now this was not true for most of the year. It has been an uptick in the last few months. We take it very, very seriously. We’re going to make the adjustments, including moving officers where the need is greatest, and different strategies and that’s a classic use of the CompStat approach. And I am convinced, based on six years of crime going down and murder going down, that this issue will be addressed successfully. Progress, I hate to say it, it’s not always linear, and these are real human’s lives, we take it very, very seriously. But I would caution that folks see a trend, because the trend to talk about is the consistency of the last six years, and even more so the last 25 years, and those trend lines have been exceedingly specific.

Lehrer: Let’s take a phone call. Abraham, in Manhattan, you’re on WNYC with the Mayor, hello Abraham.

Question: Good morning, Brian, and good morning, Mr. Mayor. How you doing?

Mayor: Good morning, Abraham.

Question: About two weeks ago, I heard a driver, an Uber driver that called in and he was complaining about the rideshare app. I just want to mention every time we talk about the rideshare app, we always tend to talk about Uber, but people forget about – it’s just not Uber driving in the city, we have a rideshare app called Via. I work for Via, for about three years right now, and I have to say that Via is more worse than Uber. You can work for Uber for eight hours and the amount of money that you make with Uber – that same money you have to work with Via for about 13 hours in the road. I can give you an example. In Via, they’ll tell you it pay you $20, and somebody will take a ride to the JFK, and you get there within like 30 minutes and probably that person pay like $59. And then you take another person from JFK to the airport – I mean to the city – and that person’s paying like $59. So you are still getting paid $20 for an hour and that person pay like – you know you pay $60 ride going and $60 ride coming back.

Lehrer: Abraham, let me ask you a question. If I gather correctly, you’ve driven for both, do you think the City is regulating Via differently from Uber?

Question: Exactly. I do think so. I think that the Mayor, you need to really look into Via, and number two is they kind of discriminate in what type of car you drive. If you drive a van car, they give you the platform for it, if you drive a sedan, they will not give you a platform for it. Uber, the closer you are to the passenger, they give it to you. So I guess I just want to mention the reason why they do this is because they work with the Mercedes Benz, you know what I’m saying?  They take every week 500 for them. For you, as a driver, you have your own car - 

Lehrer: Abraham, I’m going to leave it there and get you an answer from the Mayor. Mr. Mayor are you aware of any differences between Via and Uber that he’s pointing out, at least from his experience?

Mayor: No, actually, Brian I’m not. And I would just say, even if  there are specific differences, the underlying point that Abraham is raising is crucial and definitely Abraham please give your information to WNYC because I want our team at Taxi and Limousine Commission to follow up and if there are specific problems with Via that we need to address, I want us to make sure that happens right away. So please share your information so we can do that. But, Brian, to the bigger question, look, I think it’s a little bit of pox on all their houses. The ride sharing companies came in promising us, you know, a utopian society where everyone will be treated so wonderfully and there will be opportunity for all. And in fact, it was very, very cynical what they did. They acted like any classic big corporation and they exploited people and they created a race to the bottom, drove down wages, put cars out there in much greater numbers than they knew they needed to grab market share, congested our streets, polluted our air, it’s horrifying.

And the caps that we’ve put in place, and I want to emphasize, the City acted, put caps on these vehicles, and required a minimum wage for these drivers because, otherwise this race to the bottom was just going to get worse and worse. And in the end, when you look at what’s happened here over the last years, we took an industry that in many ways was providing a good living, you know, for hire vehicles in general, providing a good living for working people, for immigrants, it was like a classic way for people to establish themselves and their families over generations in this city, and this “disruption” by these new companies actually ended up being a very cynical corporate strategy that hurt people’s lives on vast, vast numbers, and I think we have to have a bigger conversation in this city and in this country about the fact that this is a small example of the effect of automation and technology on working people’s lives, there’s a lot worst coming, this stuff needs to be regulated from the beginning. It cannot be the wild, wild west where companies come in and just do what they want, because we’ve seen the horrible human cost here.

Lehrer: Can I ask if you have reaction yet – if you’ve even seen it – to the stats that Uber released last night about sexual assault in Uber vehicles? I guess my question for you about this would be, is there any reason to think that there is a different rate of this problem in Uber cars than there is in yellow cabs or any other kinds of for-hire vehicles?

Mayor: I would only say two things. One, I have not seen the report, so I want to be careful until I’ve gotten more details, not to conjecture too much. But I would make a bigger point, and we’ve seen it with safety issues, and obviously sexual assault is a tremendously huge, huge problem in our society. It has to be addressed. But what I think I think is a generalization that’s fair, is much less regulated vehicles create more danger. And one of the things we had from the beginning with the yellow cab industry, and green cabs, is they were highly regulated for safety. There was lots of eyes on the situation, lots of requirements, and lots of guarantees for the customers, and I think this is another problem. These ride sharing companies were very fast and loose on questions of safety. So again, I will comment further after I’ve seen the details but I unfortunately think it fits into a bigger pattern we’ve seen.

Lehrer: Terry in Queens, you are on WNYC with the Mayor, hi Terry.

Question: Good morning. Good morning, Mr. Mayor. Good morning and happy holidays to everyone.

Mayor: Good morning.

Question: I would like to make mention about the homeless situation in Jersey and the housing condition and I was a member of a service and was wrongfully terminated and became – wrongly terminated from my position – and I became homeless. And I went through certain programs trying to get back on my feet and I need help. But the homeless condition in Jersey and – why wasn’t anyone able to go out and look to survey the area before you put money into the program or talk to the landlords and make the conditions better? Listen if you can take my commission after the program, maybe I can give you further commission about my story – my situation.

Lehrer: Terry, we’d be happy to. Let me ask, are you talking about the story that’s in the news right now about a lawsuit coming from the City of Newark? Newark is suing New York City demanding that it stop using what’s called the Special One Time Assistance Program arguing that New York is pressuring people desperate for housing to accept substandard housing conditions in Newark? Are you saying that’s your story Terry? Oh Terry is on hold with our producer. So, Mr. Mayor, what do you say to Terry?

Mayor: But first of all, amplifying your point Brian, we want to get Terry’s information and see how we can help him.

Lehrer: Certainly.

Mayor: The – but I want to use his story even though it was brief to make the bigger point, and I’ve been saying to folks the very poignant phrase, there but for the grace of God go we, I have met so many people who ended up homeless. And I think I understood Terry to say he was a member of the U.S. military at one point and this is a reality we’ve seen. A former veteran – you know, veterans, former military, homeless, we’ve seen folks who have had all sorts of training, education, good jobs, end up homeless, every kind of New Yorker because the price of housing has gotten so difficult, because people can have a single moment of dislocation, you know, a catastrophic illness, a huge economic debt, and then it can put people out on the street. And in this city, we guarantee not only a right to shelter but we guarantee that people are treated with dignity. They are not judged because they happen to be poor at that point or without the resources to afford housing in a city that has gotten more and more expensive.

My objection to what Newark has done is they are demonizing the poor. They are demonizing – this is – remember this program, two key facts, the SOTA program, one it is only for folks who either have a job – who are homeless – but have a job or have a direct source of government income, and that’s supposed to be protected from any form of discrimination. You are not supposed to be told you can’t live somewhere because you’re working poor, you can’t live somewhere because you have government support. So that part alone – to begin with – but think about the fact that we’re talking about people who have struggled and we’re trying to get them not to end up in shelter long time, but have some place that is an actual home, about a third of the time that is a place in New York City. But we all know what’s happening in the housing market in New York City. We simply can’t find enough apartments and it’s wrong to keep people in shelter if there is an appropriate apartment. The underlying question, I am sure you are asking or thinking is, well was there ever an apartment that wasn’t what it was supposed to be. And you know this was referred to our Department of Investigation. And it came back and they definitely found some instances where things were not done the right way but they also –
                                                           
Lehrer: You mean in Newark in particular?

Mayor: I don’t know but I believe it was Newark but the very important point, this is all public now is the Department of Investigation looked at the overall program and said here’s a bunch of things that the Social Services department needs to do to fix it and the Social Services department agreed to all of those changes and has made them. And it’s important to note we did a survey, our Social Services department did a survey of folks who are in this SOTA program, which is only been about two years old –

Lehrer: And just so people know, SOTA is an acronym for Special One Time Assistance, right?

Mayor: Correct.

Lehrer: Housing assistance on a one time basis.

Mayor: Yeah, you have to be a working homeless person or someone with consistent government support to qualify.

Lehrer: But the worst version of the look that I think you are responding to is that some people are asking, they are paying poor people to move out of the city?

Mayor: Yes, and I think it’s – let’s have this dialogue but let me give you this fact first because I think it’s very important. It’s only a two-year-old program but our Social Services department reached out to families who have been a part of it. And about 500 families responded to a survey, of which 13, 13 only, said they had had a problem with the quality of their housing. So I believe what happened here for sure, you know there was a specific problem for sure, that was referred to the Department of Investigation and they investigated and that is public as it should be. And there were specific changes that were suggested to improve the program and those have been done. And so I’m clear, if there were mistakes made, we have to fix them. But the underlying point is what we have to be honest about. If someone is in shelter, just put yourself in this situation or all your listeners, you’re in shelter, you’re in shelter six months, you’re in shelter a year and the City has the ability to say to you – and it is voluntary, it is a choice for the individual, here is an apartment, of course it should be inspected and insured that it is an quality apartment. But we will pay for a year for you to be in an apartment and use that opportunity to help move your life forward, or you can remain in shelter. I think the vast majority of people are going to say, I want to have a home. And that’s what we are trying to achieve here. If there are improvements we need to make in the program we will make them.

But the underlying point in a regional reality and we have to be honest about this, because in the private housing market Brian, we would all agree, if someone cannot find something that they can afford in New York City, they might look to Jersey City or Hoboken or any number of other places. Well the City of New York is doing the same thing. If we literally cannot find enough apartments for people in need, we have a guaranteed right to shelter which is good and compassionate as it should be which is why we don’t have vast numbers of people on the streets like the West Coast cities unfortunately do. But then if there are literally not enough apartments to turn to, no matter how many we keep building, there’s just not enough and it’s a  right now problem –

Lehrer: Then you look to the region.

Mayor: We look to the region.

Lehrer: Shelia in Brooklyn, you are on WNYC with the Mayor, hello Shelia.

Question: Oh wow. Hello Mr. Mayor and big congratulations on the recent legislation you signed to promote animal welfare and animal rights, banning the foie gras and putting in more protection for the carriage horses, and promoting shelter adoptions. I just think that’s great and it’s a step in the right direction. So I wanted to congratulate you on that. But I do have something else, it’s an idea I have to save the city money and help solve the rat problem. But I need more New York City verbal support. I don’t need any financial support. So if I can just give you some quick background. Back in 2008 I noticed a lot of stray cats on my street in Washington Heights. So I started doing trap, neuter, return which of course is endorsed by the city to control the cat population. So you trap the cats, neuter them, vaccinate, and put them back into their outdoor colonies. So that worked perfect in terms of controlling the cat population –

Lehrer: And Shelia I’m going to move you to your point. Are you proposing using feral cats to control the rats?

Question: Well that is it. Sorry I was so verbose. Yes. I noticed over time that our street became rat free, day and night people can walk up and down West 162nd Street, they never see a rat because we have two cat colonies on that street. So I went to the Department of Health which of course is the department that manages all the rat control procedures and instructs the population, puts out the bate blocks etcetera. And they also run the rat academy. So I went to the Department of Health and said hey, could you just verbally support, it doesn’t take any City money because this is all community based, volunteers do it. Could you just support trap, neuter, return as additional effective tool?

Lehrer: And Shelia, I got you and I am going to leave it there. And Shelia’s got an accent we don’t hear in New York very much. Shelia in Brooklyn, she must be from South Brooklyn.

Mayor: South Brooklyn.

[Laughter]

Lehrer: But Mr. Mayor, what do you think of the idea?

Mayor: Okay, a couple of points real quick. One Shelia, thank you for the point you made at the beginning. Look, I want to just say the animal rights, and humane movement in this city has been extraordinary over this last decade. It’s really been a powerful movement and we just did sign some extraordinary legislation. A whole range of things, a foie gras ban and more protections for horse carriages and making it easier to adopt pets, all sorts of things. And this is an example of you know, grassroots activism that really, really worked. So I just want to thank you for your point but also return the compliment to the movement that achieved those changes.

On the specific idea, it’s an interesting idea. I don’t know enough about it. I am going to have our City Hall liaison who works with the animal rights community follow up with you directly Shelia, to see if that’s something that we can do more with. And Brian, just I think all your listeners would be interested that Shelia used a terminology that may be not be familiar with people, to many people, which is rat academy. This is something the Department of Health does as part of this very intensive ongoing effort to eradicate rats in this city. They literally have this group of experts and community members who participate and work with them. And it’s kind of this interesting idiosyncratic, New York institution.

Lehrer: I thought it was you know, the rats graduate knowing how to write code or something like that.

Mayor: Right, we wouldn’t want that.

Lehrer: I want to ask you about Nicholas Feliciano, the 18-year-old boy or young man who tried to hang himself on Rikers last week, allegedly while several Correction officers watched him do it and did nothing to stop him. Feliciano as I understand it is currently in a medically induced coma. What’s you understanding of the issue and if and how any of the Correction officers involved should be disciplined?

Mayor: Well first we are hoping and praying that he comes through. This is horrible and the officers have all been suspended. There is a full investigation. We don’t know enough yet. We know enough to say that something very wrong happened and that’s why these individuals have been suspended. And it is the City’s obligation and the Department of Correction’s obligation if someone is in our care to protect them. And look, it’s – remember that in Rikers and throughout our correction system, a lot of people there pending trial in a country where you’re supposed to be innocent until proven guilty, and even folks who are serving a sentence which if you’re on Rikers it means minor sentence less than a year – everyone deserves to be protected just like the officers deserve to be protected, and this is just not acceptable. So there will be real consequences if it is proven that these officers did not do their jobs. And we’re going to constantly look at ways to ensure that people are protected and monitored properly because this is not an acceptable situation.

Lehrer: In October, for context, the federal monitor charged with overseeing New York City jails released a report that detailed many conditions that appear to have been at play in Feliciano’s case – high rates of violence among young inmates, a “toxic environment” where correction officers act with impunity, “in particular the department does not effectively manage its staff,” the report reads. Would you say that this incident is not a one off, but an example that has happened to make the news of a systemic problem?

Mayor: I don’t think that’s the right way to say it. The monitor who’s been a very productive partner has also noted a lot has changed in recent years in our corrections system. Obviously we’re going to get off Rikers Island. This is one of the biggest things that happened in 2019 in the city is we’re going to get off Rikers once and for all, we’re going to create entirely new jails for fewer and fewer inmates. And I want to emphasize that, I think there’s a lot of misunderstanding, a lot of misinformation being spread, bluntly. This city continues to arrest fewer and fewer people, and the state reforms that have come into place will fewer and fewer people in jail. The goal is to constantly reduce the number of people in jail while keeping us safe. And we’re going to have jails that are actually supposed to be about redemption and safety for everyone, which is not the way our previous jails were built. We’ve retrained our officers across the board, and we continue to deepen the training. There’s cameras everywhere now in Rikers, that was not true in the past. And that’s to make sure there is accountability. There’s a whole host of changes. We definitely have more to do, but no, I think if you look at everything the monitor has said over time it’s a recognition that some really important changes have happened and many more are needed. But to some extent, Brian, the biggest changes will occur when we get out of Rikers and we get into the kind of facilities that are modern.

Lehrer: Can you give me briefly one example of misinformation that you’re alleging is in the monitor report – I think you’ve said that here before.

Mayor: no, no, no, Brian, I didn’t say that. Please, Brian, be careful if you will my friend, don’t, don’t – I

Lehrer: I’m sorry what did you say.

Mayor: I said misinformation on the jails, the construction of the new jails. I did not say in the monitor report at all.

Lehrer: Okay, alright.

Mayor: In the whole debate over getting off Rikers, there was a particular strain in that discussion of people saying, well if you build new jails, you know, of course they’re going to be filled up and all. I just think that specious. And I think that was an absolutely unfair worldview that was not based on fact, that was not based on paying attention to any of the things that have happened in the last six years in this city. We are a city that is absolutely devoted – not only did we get rid of the broken use of stop-and-frisk but we have, there are 150,000 fewer arrests in 2018 than five years earlier. That means a huge number people are not even going into the justice system who did not need to go into the justice system. We have a bail reform that was passed in Albany. It’s not perfect, but in many ways hit the right note, and will have fewer and fewer people in jail. And the whole reason we’re able to get off Rikers is we project a greatly decreased jail population. We’re not yet a society where no will ever be in jail. I’d love to live in that society but the point is by building these new much smaller, much more humane, and modern jails – it’s about actually helping people to be redeemed and to have their lives turned around, helping there not to be violence in the jail system and that required a whole new physical reality. But the goal is an ever shrinking jail system.

Lehrer:  One more call before we run out of time. Sacha, in Manhattan, you’re on WNYC with the Mayor, hi Sacha.

Question: Hi, Brian, Mr. Mayor. So, I’m calling about subway accessibility for people with disabilities and diversity on the MTA Board. So this Tuesday was International Day of People with Disabilities, but New York City remains the worst in the U.S. in terms of disability access. You may know the numbers, but three quarters of stations are not accessible. There’s 25 outages a day in the accessible stations. And the Access-A-Ride paratransit remains deeply dysfunctional. And Mr. Mayor, you and Chairman [inaudible] talked about making New York the most accessible city in the world and that’s really a mismatch right now with reality. And I want to say – that’s not all the Mayor’s fault. Governor Cuomo has much more control and does very little other than spending money to make the stations look nicer and on lawyers to fight our agreements. But you, Mr. Mayor, have the power to nominate four seats out of 21 total on the MTA Board and two of them are vacant right now. And you can change the conversation in that room and what room am I talking about? The MTA Boardroom which right now is really a tale of two cities to take a phrase from your campaign. On one side is us the activists, the transit workers, and the citizens, and that’s the only side that has substantial people of color, and people with disabilities and we make comments but we’re powerless. On the other side is the board, which has 19 filled seats right now, only six women, three people of color, and zero people with disabilities and we’re not going to get our projects prioritized until we have seats on that board. So we’re strongly asking you to consider nominating people with disabilities to the board. Use your—

Lehrer: Sacha, I’m going to jump in here, because I know the Mayor has got to go in a matter of seconds. Sacha is asking you for a very particular thing – nominate somebody to the MTA Board who is a person with disabilities and will advocate from that standpoint.

Mayor: I appreciate very much what Sacha is raising. We just got a new vacancy on the board, because a member that we had – one of our New York City members who did an outstanding job is moving on to a different career, a Latina transit activist who did amazing work. So that is an example that we have been devoted to diversity and other seats that I named is an African-American man. And so we have – that’s been a goal. But I think what Sacha is raising is very, very important that we need to think about representation in a whole host of ways, and obviously I’ve heard from so many folks with disabilities, tremendous concern about the lack of accessibility in the MTA. So I would say this, I take Sacha’s point to heart and as we’re thinking about who to fill those two seats. And second, there is a ray of light here on this big issue of accessibility. Look, the City of New York has put some very stringent rules in place for example with taxi, ensuring that taxi fleets will be accessible. The MTA has not kept up historically. I am hopeful that with the vote that happened in April – congestion pricing and a funding plan, long term funding plan for the MTA – that that really will allow the MTA to make the kind of physical investments needed to get the system to be much more accessible. So I do think there’s hope. But appreciate Sacha’s point, and I’m going to certainly take that into the process of how we choose our new members.

Lehrer: And Sacha, I think we’re going to have the MTA chair on next week. If that comes through, I’m going to ask him your question. So thank you for your call, and Mr. Mayor thanks as always. Talk to you next week.

Mayor: Thank you, Brain. Take care.