Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Holds Media Availability

December 13, 2021

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Good morning, everybody. So, as we prepare to conclude this administration, we're focusing on finishing strong, fighting COVID every day, getting this city strong for its recovery. But we're also looking at all the things that have been done over the last eight years and providing a final summary to New Yorkers of what's been achieved, particularly how we acted on a vision. The vision from the beginning was clear in every way we could stop the tail of two cities. We knew it was a longstanding reality. The inequality gripping our society was intense eight years ago. It continues, of course, to be a challenge here and all across this country. And it's something we have to keep addressing deeply. We're going to be able to move forward and if we're going to be able to heal. And obviously COVID just made it tougher and, and exacerbated some of the inequalities, but I'm happy to tell you that some of the things we've put into place over these last eight years have had a real impact and I'm also really happy to tell you that we've actually gotten some of the real help we needed from the federal government and more is coming. And even in the weeks ahead, we may see extraordinary progress hoping and praying that President Biden's vision is fully realized by the Congress.

So, after eight years, I can tell you it actually can work. You can make an impact. We can uplift working people. We can fight inequality at its core and make a real change. There's more to be done but what I can tell you and we have evidence, I'm going to present today is, it works. It works, it can be done, and we got to do it a lot more.

So, I'm going to give you an example. Back in 2015, we said a very powerful goal, thinking about all the New Yorkers below the poverty line and near the poverty line, folks who were really, really struggling. I said, we needed to take that reality and alter it for fundamentally. And I set a goal in 2015 of moving 800,000 New Yorkers out of poverty in the course of 10 years, that we would basically take a 10th of this whole city, the folks who are struggling the most and reach folks in a new way, lift them out of poverty, change their lives, give them better futures. That was the goal. Today, we're releasing a new report, and this is the annual report provided each year by the City of New York. And it's something my predecessor, Michael Bloomberg started, we've updated it and added to the approach. And this is the report going now back to 2019, obviously this is not yet account for the impact of COVID and that's real, but what it does account for is everything that happened in the years before COVID and it gives us a very powerful roadmap for the future as well.

So, here's the reality, by the end of 2019, we had moved 521,000 New Yorkers out of poverty or near poverty. The goal was 800,000 by 2025 already within the first four years, we had moved 521,000, over half a million New Yorkers out of poverty, proving it can be done. And again, we got to do a lot more. By 2019, the poverty level was the lowest it had ever been in this city. And that's going back to when the measures were started in 2005, but what's so powerful in on top of that is that the progress was across races, across age groups. It was a universal reality because we put a series of policies in place that all complemented each other. And we believe that you're going to see this again, continue even after the horrible disruption of COVID and the very disparate impact that COVID had, the unfair impact it had. You're going to see the positive trend continue because of the child tax credit, because of the stimulus pavements, because of a lot of the actions that have been taken in Washington and we believe will be taken in the weeks ahead.

So, the bottom line is this has worked. This has proven that a city can do something on its own that makes a huge impact. And when you add federal and state policies, we can actually do something transcendent. Remember I used to get this question a lot. Remember when I was running, especially, and I talked about ending the tale of two cities, people say, ah, city can't do anything on its own, it all resides in all at the federal level or at a state level. And I said, no, there's actually a lot of things we can do to do better, to do more, you know, deep and profound things. We, of course, need federal and state partners, but it's stunning how much the city could do on its own and we proceeded to do a lot of that.

So, over the eight years, what do we do? Of course, Pre-K for All, now followed by 3-K for All. Huge personal economic impact on families. We always talk about the educational impact, but also for a family, for each child, $10,000, $15,000 a year per child, that they used to have to pay that lifted off of them. After school program, same thing, parents used to have to find a place for their kids after school. All the afterschool programs we put in place took away a financial burden. Summer youth jobs brought income into families, paid sick leave, made sure people kept more of their paycheck even when they were sick. Affordable housing, obviously, we’re going to be at 200,000 apartments that were built or preserved for those families, that's over half a million New Yorkers who are reached by that affordable housing. That's changing their reality. That's lightening the burden. All the things we've done to improve the rent laws. Yeah, we went to Albany and fight, fought that fight and we succeeded, but also what we did to improve our Rent Guidelines Board and make sure that rent increases were more fair. All of that put money back in the pockets of working people. And of course, the long fight we had, and we won started here. We won in Albany, the $15 minimum wage. All of these things contribute to these profound changes and they're great examples of where we have to go in the future.

Now, the Independent Budget Office did analysis recently. I want to thank everyone at Gothamist, because they focused the IBO on these issues to get the facts and the IBO is as scrupulously independent organization and Gothamist is obviously a thoughtful, critical media outlet. And what they found independently was that New York City was bucking the national trend on income equality. Income equality has gotten worse and worse in the United States. It's a dangerous reality for this country. It's part of why we're having so much division in this country on a political and societal level. But what the IBO proved was that New York City was going in the other direction through the policies we implemented. That for the bottom half of income levels for the New Yorkers who are making the lowest incomes, their share of income distribution grew between 2014 and 2019. So, the folks who are struggling the most started to get more income. And that is the very definition of addressing inequality. So, that was powerful, but we now have additional details on how these policies, a range of policies had an impact and this report we're putting out as well. And the title says it all, the Tale of a More Equal City. We got a long way to go and everyone knows it. But what this report affirms is that these policies can make an impact and that they give us a good roadmap for where to go from here. And also, when we talk about a recovery for all of us, the policies we put in place help define what that needs to be, because it has to be a recovery for all of us. We do not want to repeat the inequalities and the problems pre pandemic. We want to fundamentally take this moment, as a moment of transformation, just like we saw this country do after the Great Depression, profound transformation, much greater equality and fairness in the distribution of wealth. That's what made America strong after World War II for decades. And we've got to follow that model again here in this city, in this state, in this nation. As someone who's been doing a lot of this work leading the way in administration, he's studied these issues and written about them and spoken about them all over the country before he joined our team. And he's put those ideas into life as a member of our team. My pleasure introduced Deputy Mayor, Phil Thompson.

Deputy Mayor J. Philip Thompson, Strategic Policy Initiatives: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. As Mayor de Blasio said, New York has made great strides over the last eight years. Reducing poverty and supporting working people from 2013 to 2019 our poverty rate declined by nearly 13 percent. At the same time, low income black workers saw their wages rise by 15 percent and low income Latinx workers saw their wages rise by 24 percent. And I know we have James Parrot here today, who could speak more about this data. 

How did this happen? It wasn't because poverty was decreasing across the nation. The opposite is true. Poverty is risen across the country and it's not because of one single program or even a few City programs. Poverty is decreasing because of the single-minded focus of the Mayor and the administration across all agencies on helping people in need. Raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, which was a hard fight, played a part in reducing poverty. Building affordable housing for hundreds of thousands of people over the last eight years was very important. Also, that's enough housing to take care of an entire mid-sized American city. We expanded NYC Care to provide access to a doctor for every New Yorker and nearly 100,000 New Yorkers have now enrolled. NYC Care helps people to stay healthy and to work. If workers need time off, as many have, since the COVID pandemic, a half million more of them have paid sick leave and won't go broke because they're sick or they have a someone sick in their family they need to stay home to take care of. This was because of City legislation the administration supported in 2014. Last summer, this past summer, the City provided summer youth employment for over 75,000 young people. And we hired an additional 10,000 people to help clean up and revitalize our streets in parks. We also helped the City University of New York expand a program for community college students called ASAP, which stands for Accelerated Study and Associate Programs. Many community college students go to school hungry or can't afford the subway or can't afford books, ASAP helps pay for those expenses. We helped expand the program from 4,000 to 25,000 students. And graduation rates for students in ASAP is over 50 percent, double that of students not in ASAP. And of course, maybe the most important and impactful program of all has been Universal Pre-K and 3-K.  I often go out at 7:30 in the morning and see some hard-looking men. You can tell they've had a lot of struggles in their life, walking, their four-year-old daughters to pre-K. Their daughters are all dressed up with ribbons in their hair and you can tell that these men are so happy and proud to take their daughters to school. And you know that these men are doing everything in their power to make their daughters proud of them, too. That image sticks in my mind. This is an intangible effect of pre-K. Like creating a new affordable housing complex or helping someone get healthcare, pre-K creates a spirit of hope and a pathway to our better future. This is the spirit of New York City. That's what the Statue of Liberty and our harbors symbolizes to the entire world. And this administration has lived up to the promise on that Statue, even as the rest of the country has moved in a different direction. Thank you.

Mayor: Thank you, Deputy Mayor Phil Thompson. Thank you so much and thank you for your absolutely extraordinary contribution over these last years and also your incessant energy, which I always admire. You always help everyone else to believe that we can reach the next goal and the next goal. And you've been just a wonderful contributor to this effort. So, thank you so much.

And perfect continuity here, I want you to hear from someone who helped us from the beginning of this administration to build some of the most powerful elements of what we created. Of course, he is well, well known for his extraordinary role. He's one of the key architects of Pre-K for all. And then, 3-K after that. He also is a former Deputy Mayor in our team and now the CEO of the Robin Hood Foundation. My pleasure to welcome and welcome back in a sense, Richard Buery.  Let's try that again. He was there. Is he there? Keep going. We'll get him back. We'll get him back. Okay. It's all right. It's Monday morning.

So, we have another special guest and Deputy Mayor Thompson referred to him. He's really regarded as one of the most important analysts of these issues in this city, in this state, in this nation is someone who constantly searches for the ways to address inequality, particularly economic inequality, the kinds of policies can make a difference. He's spoken to them. He has documented what works he has provided the solutions he has fought for them. He's the Director of Economic and Fiscal Policy at the Center for New York City Affairs at the New School. My pleasure to introduce Dr. James Parrot.

[…]

Mayor: Thank you so much, James. Thank you for the work you do and for providing the evidence of what works. And we all need to do a lot more on this. But having a roadmap that works and having it validated by independent thinkers who have put their whole life into solving these problems is incredibly helpful and powerful. Thank you so much for the work you do, James.

All right. I think we have Richard Buery, back. And again, I'm going to say I want to thank him. He was such a powerful contributor to this administration of this city. One of the great architects of our greatest achievement, Pre-K for All and 3K for All. So, now doing the same work in a different way as CEO of the Robin Hood Foundation. So, we welcome you and we welcome you back, Richard Buery. How are you doing?

CEO Richard Buery, Robin Hood Foundation: Good. Good, Mr. Mayor, can you hear me now?

Mayor: Yes, we can.

[…]

Mayor: Thank you so much, Richard, Richard, listen, stay there for a second, because first I want to say, thank you. You contributed so much to the city here in this administration, and now you are building upon that work deeply at Robinhood. But I also think the people of New York City need to understand now, I'm watching the screen. Is that a bow tie? Because I'm trying to understand your fashion sensibility here?

CEO Buery: I wore this for you, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor: And you know, I just can't see. Is that holiday themed, Richard?

CEO Buery: You know, it's [inaudible]. Trying to be festive.

Mayor: I want to tell you that that takes guts. I appreciate you're living out loud. Thank you so much, my friend.

CEO Buery: Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor: That's – he's up on the edge there on fashion choices. I don't know if I can get to that bow tie, but I admire him for it. All right. Everyone look, so we're talking about as always, a recovery for all of us, and really today we're being very explicit. It has to be for all of us. And the way to get there, the foundation in this moment, as we're still fighting COVID is a course vaccination. And it's very powerful to recognize tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of vaccines being available for the people of this city and this country. It’s extraordinary. One year ago, as of tomorrow, Sandra Lindsay, that famous moment, nurse from Long Island, got the first dose in this country. And then proceeded to make very powerful and moving comments as a health care provider. of why everyone needed to recognize it was time to get vaccinated.

We've come a long, long way. It's been a year and we've come a long way since then. Now to give you perspective at this moment, a year ago, zero, zero percent of New Yorkers were vaccinated. Literally, we were waiting every day, every hour for the vaccine to arrive. Zero percent as of this day, a year ago. By mid-August 2021, 60 percent of New York City adults had had at least one dose. So, in a very brief time span we saw a lot of progress, but we knew we had to go much farther. And we saw things were lagging. We had to supercharge our efforts. So, we added incentives and we added mandates. And if you need further proof that mandates work as we've shown you in the schools, health care system, our public employees in general, Key To NYC, restaurants, fitness, indoor entertainment, time and time again, the mandates have worked and now we're going to go farther with all the mandates we've announced in recent days. The mandates have worked and here's evidence. 60 percent of adults in mid-August this year had received at least one dose. As of today, breaking news – as of today in New York City, 90 percent of New York City adults have received at least one dose. 90 percent. Now that is an amazing figure. And I got to tell you, our health care team, all through the COVID crisis dreamed of that level of vaccination and said, that's when things change profoundly. When you can reach that thorough and extensive a part of your community, you can change everything and really put the COVID era behind. So, as of today, 90 percent of adults, at least one dose. We're going to keep pushing now to get everyone their second dose, their boosters, to get that 90 percent to go even up higher, to reach our youngest New Yorkers. And the mandates are going to help us pull all these pieces together and do something transcendent. But this is a good moment and we have more coming of course, on our private sector mandate taking effect December 27th. We'll be sharing more details about that on Wednesday at our press conference on the specifics of that implementation. But the bottom line is these strategies are working. I want you to hear from someone who has been a leader throughout the COVID crisis. She has been a leader in the City Council as the Chair of the Committee on Hospitals. And she's spoken up time and time again for the importance of strong efforts to get people vaccinated. My pleasure to introduce Council Member Carlina Rivera.

[…]

Mayor: Amen, Council Member. Let's look forward to putting COVID behind us, the COVID era behind us. It can be done. Thank you for your leadership and thank you for your strong voice.

Now, everyone, I want you to hear from folks who represent key elements of the business community. And who recognize because they've been seeing the results of mandates, how important it is to use strong tools to get everyone vaccinated so we can put the COVID era behind us. First of all, she's an extraordinary public servant who now serves the downtown Brooklyn community, thriving community, both in terms of business and residential community. She was the former President of Brooklyn Bridge Park. Did great work there. And understands what it takes to keep a community moving forward as we overcome this crisis. She is now the President of the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership. My pleasure to introduce Regina Myer.

[…]

Mayor: Thank you, Regina. Thank you for the great work you're doing in downtown Brooklyn and encouraging and supporting all the businesses as they get their employees vaccinated so we can keep moving forward. I think you have the quote of the day, COVID is bad for business. It's bad for all of us, but that's a great, great point. It's simple as that.

President Regina Myer, Downtown Brooklyn Partnership: It's bad for all of us, that’s for sure.

Mayor: It is. And the thing we got to avoid at all costs is making sure there's never any more shutdowns or those horrible restrictions we had in 2020. And that's one of the things that most motivated our new mandates. Thank you very, very much for your leadership.

President Myer: Thank you.

Mayor: Now, everyone, I want you to hear from another leader of the business community here in this city and nationally. And we're going to talk about this particularly in the context of tomorrow, when we extend the Key to NYC approach for indoor dining, entertainment, fitness, to our youngest New Yorkers. And we're doing that very consciously. We want to protect everyone, we want to protect our youngest New Yorkers. We know Omicron has had a lot of impact on younger folks. We know that we need a whole family to be safe. And if the youngest kids are safe, that also helps protect our seniors. And we know that when people have an incentive in effect, if they know if they want to enjoy all the great stuff happening around the holidays, they need to get that vaccine dose and they can do it real quickly. Get the card and you're in. You can go and then enjoy all these wonderful, wonderful, wonderful places our city has to offer. So, we did this consciously. And we did it understanding that so many people in the business community have told us that the vaccine mandates worked for them. The folks in entertainment, indoor dining, fitness, said in fact, it created a safe atmosphere for customers and employees alike. I want you to hear from someone who has implemented a companywide vaccine policy for all employees. He has two theaters here in New York City, 20 in other parts of the country. He is the founder and Executive Chairman of Alamo Drafthouse, which has become very, very popular, really innovative approach to entertainment and dining together and people love it. It is my great pleasure to introduce Tim League.

[…]

Mayor: Thank you so much, Tim. And Tim, congratulations on what you've created. I got to tell you, I have heard from many, many happy customers who just love the environment you've created. And it's something special and it's something I think is going to grow. But thank you, especially for sending this powerful message. And I know your fellow business leaders are going to hear your voice. So, thank you for all you're doing.

[…]

Mayor: All right. Now we're going to go into another really, really timely and important topic, but it will require a little wardrobe change. Hold on. We're going to do this live. I think I should do it this way around. Wardrobe change. Here, I think that looks good. Danielle, do you think that looks appropriate to the occasion? Yes? Maybe this as well. Okay. For all of you who were watching on Saturday, a riveting soccer match. And for all the NYCFC fans out there, that final minute before, you know, everything looked like it was all lined up and then it goes the other way. And then the team rallies and what as a New Yorker that made me so proud. A team that had just had the wind punched out of them and could have given up at that point, rallied, stuck with it. Perseverance, grit, all the New York great qualities were shown by the players of NYCFC. And what was the result? Well, I think this shirt says it all. Congratulations to NYCFC, the champions, the champions of Major League Soccer. Bringing the glory home to New York City. That team just showed so much determination, so much fight. And we are going to celebrate this amazing team. And we're going to celebrate all they mean to New York city this year when we fought back against COVID, when New York City came back, these champions really epitomized the best of New York City. So tomorrow, Tuesday, December 14th, 12 noon, right here at City Hall steps, we'll have a wonderful ceremony. Anyone who wants to join us in celebrating these great players and their coaches and the whole team, tickets go live today. First come, first serve. We'll be posting a link to get the – so, everyone can get tickets online.

And to begin the celebration now, we have a very special guest, and he was a key member of this team that brought the victory home to New York City, and I love the fact that he is a native, a native of Rye, New York, right next door, and there is nothing better than a hometown player. And just so much to be proud of, my pleasure to introduce NYC FC defender, and midfielder, James Sands. 

[…] 

Mayor: Hey, James how's it feel? You're really a homegrown product. You're the real thing, I think people have been dreaming of this for a long time, that soccer's grown in this country, players would come up and represent their home city, their home area. What does it feel like as New Yorker to be part of this winning team? 

James Sands: It’s such an amazing feeling. You know, I was a fan of this team before I played on this team. So, you know, to go from watching in the crowd to being on the field is, you know, such a surreal experience and, you know, to do it with other New York born players, you know, Tayvon Gray, another homegrown, born in the Bronx, and I think, you know, together, we just represent all that's great about New York. Just, you know, the hard work, the determination, and it's such a special feeling. 

Mayor: I love that, and I'm going to ask you one more question because I can only imagine what it felt like as a player, 94th minute, and I watched that replay a hundred times. I'm not asking you to judge whether it was a foul or not. I just want to know what it felt like as a player, you thought I'm sure in a few seconds we're going to be done here, and then suddenly here we go again. How did you guys rally yourself at that moment? 

Sands: Yeah, it was such a devastating moment for our team. You know, we had it, you know, in the bag all wrapped up and then to have that happen was, you know, kind of a nightmare scenario. But I think, you know, the message from, you know, our captain and our coaches was just the stay calm and, you know, trying to rally, which we did and, you know, I think it's a credit to all our, you know, all my teammates for all the work they've put in, and you know, it is not easy being away from home, being in a tough environment. And I think it just shows how special this group is and, you know, how much we wanted to win that game. So I think it's such a special moment for everyone involved. 
  
Mayor: Well, I got to commend you. Those Portland fans, they were a little revved up. But you guys –go ahead.  

Sands: Just –  they were really into it, and you know, to do it on their soil was pretty sweet. 

Mayor: It's amazing. Well, you should be really proud, my friend, and you guys – really, we need the inspiration that athletes provide us and this city got hit real hard last year, we got knocked down, but just like NYC FC, we got back up. So, what you did epitomized the greatness of this city and I just want to say on behalf of 8.8 million New Yorkers, we're proud of you and we're proud of your whole team. 

Sands: Thank you so much. It means a lot and I guess we'll see you tomorrow. 

Mayor: We'll see you tomorrow, my friend, take care.  

Sands: Thank you.
 
Mayor: And everyone come on down to City Hall tomorrow, get those tickets online, they'll go up at 12 noon and reminding everyone's going to be a wonderful ceremony, a beautiful moment, everyone must be vaccinated. So, reminding everyone, you want to be a part of it, make sure you're vaccinated. Or if you haven't gotten vaccinated, this is going to inspire you, go get that dose, and you can download the NYC COVID Safe App as an easy way to keep your ID and your vaccination proof in one place, show them both, that's the easiest way. That's going to be required for entry to this great event, and that's going to also make it easier for everything else you're doing in this town where we're going to make sure people are safe.  

All right now I will go back to my traditional look as we go to our indicators, and the indicators always begin with my favorite part which is how many doses have been administered to date, and this number is growing intensely, and it's going to grow again as these mandates take effect. You're going to see these numbers jump up more and that's what we need. So, number one, doses administered to date, 12,831,351. And then number two, daily number of people admitted to New York City hospitals for suspected COVID 19, today's report, 131 patients. Confirmed positivity level of 37.41 percent. Hospitalization rate per 100,000 people, and this number clearly going up, 1.30. And again, our hospitals are doing well because of the high level vaccination in this town, but that number clearly shows something is going on with Omicron and Delta both, and we got to take it seriously. And the same with number three, new reported cases on a seven-day average, today's report, 2,408 cases. Okay, few words in Spanish. I'm going to go back to where we started, the effort to fight income inequality, and to lift people out of poverty.  

[Mayor de Blasio speaks in Spanish] 

With that let's turn to our colleagues in the media and please let me know the name and outlet of each journalist.  

Moderator: We'll now begin our Q-and-A, as a reminder, we're joined today by Corporation Council Georgia Pestana, by Dr. Dave Chokshi, by Dr. Mitchell Katz, by Dr. Ted Long, by Small Business Services Commissioner Jonnel Doris, by EDC President Rachel Loeb, and by the Executive Director of the Mayor's Office for Economic Opportunity Matthew Klein. The first question today goes to James Ford from PIX-11.  

Question: Happy to kick things off, no pun intended, with NYC FC, but congratulations to them. And you look good in the gear Mayor.  

Mayor: I see what you did there, James, with kick it off, very clever. 

Question: Again, no pun intended. Onto the question, look a quick backstory. My daughter goes to school on the Upper East Side and needs to get a PCR COVID test in that neighborhood once a week for activities she does outside of school. It's never a problem finding a testing site that can provide with results within 36 hours, usually within 12, also on some stretches of Fifth Avenue in Midtown, there are COVID testing vans on every block that provide the same services as those on the Upper East Side. I got sick last week and needed a COVID test. I live in Hamilton Heights, Harlem, and in order to find a testing site that could give me a PCR test under similar circumstances, as the others I've mentioned, I had to go 24 blocks downtown and six blocks across town while I was sick. One of the places I tried to go was the Health + Hospitals’ Sydenham Clinic which only does testing one day a week, and it wasn't one of the days in which I was sick. And Harlem's not the only neighborhood that's a testing desert. So, will you, Mayor, and Dr. Katz, maybe Dr. Chokshi as we'll address the problem of COVID testing deserts and say what needs to be done going forward to address it. 

Mayor: Yeah, very important question. Thank you for raising it, James, because this is – as the strategies continue to evolve, obviously testing is really essential going forward. We got to make sure people can get to well. Before I turn to Dr. Katz to beginning, I just want to say, James, are you okay? You gave us this very powerful lead in. I want to know if you're feeling okay. 

Question: I greatly appreciate your asking. I was, again, after going that far, I was able to find a clinic that does testing within 36 hours and it was negative and I've recovered as you probably tell I am back, you know – 

Mayor:  You sound very lively. That's good. Okay. Specific of the Sydenham Clinic and to the broader point about testing availability. Let me turn to – actually Dr. Kat's followed by Dr. Long to start answering here. 

President and CEO Mitch Katz, Health + Hospitals: Thank you so much and hey, I'm really sorry that you got sick and I'm sorry that it was hard to find a test. We've been working hard to make sure that we had testing everywhere and the Sydenham Clinic will be back on a daily basis tomorrow. We're using those resources in order to take care of the vaccination efforts at our schools, as well as the testing efforts at our schools. So we're constantly trying to balance the needs of the city and get all the testing done, but starting tomorrow, it will be back as a daily site. Also, of course, Harlem Hospital has COVID testing as well as vaccination available every day. So with that, Mr. Mayor, I think Ted may have an update as well. 

Mayor: Go ahead, Ted. 

Executive Director Ted Long, Test & Trace Corps: Hey, James, I’m sorry to hear about your experience. We temporarily had moved that unit to support our schools, but tomorrow it'll be back there on a daily basis as Mitch said at Sydenham. If you want to look for other sites, you can go to NYC.gov/COVIDtest, and it's important to look at that site moving forward now too, because starting tomorrow as well, we'll be at the point where we will have doubled our mobile fleets. So, we're going to be at a lot more locations than we've ever been able to be at the past. So, please do take a look at that site. And if you can, if there's anything more we can do to help you, just let us know.  

Mayor: Thank you. Go ahead, James. 

Question: : Just to follow up. So, you're saying that the COVID testing at Sydenham was among clinics that were used to do increased testing at schools –   

Mayor: Can I interrupt – can I interrupt, James, just to clarify?  

Question:  Yes. 

Mayor: The personnel who do testing obviously can also do vaccination in many cases and there was a big effort the last two weeks to get to every school again. We had had an important experience with the five to 11-year-old's vaccination in school. We went back to every school that served five to 11-year-olds, either to give first dose or, in some cases, second dose. And we – that took a lot of personnel, I believe it was about 800 hundred schools we had to be in. So we had to draw off some of our existing personnel, but what Dr. Katz and Dr. Long are saying is now Sydenham is back to its normal operating reality which is having testing available every day, but continue. 

Question: Okay. Thank you. So, I just want to ensure that going forward it's clear that there will be adequate testing capability at city sites, as well as at schools. I mean, isn't that really the need going forward to ensure that wherever anyone needs to be tested, whether it's at a clinic or a school, wherever, that they actually can get tested. what assurances do we have going forward for that especially as we move deeper into the winter months?  

Mayor: So, I'll start. I'm going to go back through Dr. Katz and Dr. Long, and then, of course, we'll bring in Dr. Chokshi as well. So, bottom line schools, we have an ongoing plan we've had from the very beginning of school year, that will continue. Every school gets testing regularly. That is accounted for. You're, I think, raising a really powerful point, making sure testing is available in a wide variety of communities in an easy manner. That's something we've augmented with the mobile approach, but we're going to keep making those adjustments. So, with that, Dr. Katz, you start, and then Dr. Long and Dr. Chokshi. 

President Katz: Thank you, sir. And yes, James, the vaccination efforts for those five to 11-year-olds was just so important to us. We found that that was the preferred method for parents to get their children vaccinated. It was easy. It was fast. We got a whole lot of five to 11-year-olds vaccinated, and yes, as the Mayor says, it's the same people who run testing have the same capability, it’s registration people and nurses, and they can do either testing or vaccination. But that huge effort to hit every school, which I don't think any other city in the US did, is now done. And so now it's just a matter of maintaining the ability to test, and as you say, James, it needs to be available at schools, it needs to be available in the community, and so we are committed to that. Thank you, sir.  

Mayor: Thank you, Ted Long. 
  
Executive Director Long: And James, the best piece of evidence I have for you to make the statement I'm about to make which is that we have the strongest testing infrastructure in the whole country. People vote with their feet and can they actually get tested. At H +H and T2, we've now done more than seven million tests, more than seven million. That's your city working for you there. We're doubling the size of our mobile fleet now, and even a matter of a week or two ago, we hit the same level that we’ve - has been the highest level of testing in a given day that we've ever hit before, more than 120,000 tests in a given day. As we've been doing that meaning as people have been coming out, making that sacrifice that New Yorkers have been willing to make all the way through, we've been there for New Yorkers, seven million times to date, but 120,000 times in that one day recently, and the median lab turnaround time due to our hard work, building our own lab in New York City, to make sure you, as you said, James, can always get your test results back has been unwavering through all of that at a median lab turnaround time of one day. So, between doing 120,000 tests in a day, your city doing more than seven million overall for you, doubling our mobile fleet, and having one of the fastest lab turn of times probably in the world, we're ready for this wave. And all we need is for you and New Yorkers to continue to come out and get tested. But I know that you will, because you've done it all the way through and New York stands together. 

Mayor: Thank you, Dr. Chokshi, do you want add?  

Commissioner Dave Chokshi, Department of Health and Mental Hygiene: Yes sir, just briefly. First I want to say I'm really grateful to my colleagues at Test and Trace for the massive testing infrastructure that they have built up for our city as Dr. Long just went through. I wanted to briefly highlight one option, particularly for New Yorkers who are immunocompromised or those age 65 and older, which is at home testing. If you go to that same website, nyc.gov/covidtest, you'll see the information to request that at home testing which is available seven days a week for all New Yorkers. Similarly we have in-home vaccination for anyone who would like it, and you can just request an appointment for that by going to nyc.gov/homevaccine. The bottom line is that we will do everything that we need to make testing, vaccination, and other COVID safety measures as accessible as possible for New Yorkers. Thank you. 

Mayor: Thank you. Go ahead. 

Moderator: Next is Steve Burns from WCBS 880. 

Question: Hey, good morning, Mr. Mayor, looking to talk a little bit about the Governor's mandate that starts getting enforced today. So, I wanted to see what enforcement is going to look like within the five boroughs on that? I know the Key to NYC already kind of applies to a lot of what she's looking to accomplish here, but now that we have to look like - look at places like grocery stores, houses of worship, other shops, especially given all the other enforcement that's happening right now in New York City, what more enforcement is going to be happening as a result of the Governor's move today?  

Mayor: Well, thank you, Steve. Important question. So first of all, as I've emphasized, I respect the Governor and the decision that she has made and we've been working cooperatively. Obviously the strategy of this city has been first and foremost vaccination, that will continue to be the case. We believe the central strategic thing we have to do is vaccination. But we're going to work with the state to implement this mask mandate. What we found is when we communicate with businesses, treat them with respect and a spirit of cooperation, we get a very good result. So, we're going be doing a lot to educate the businesses on this new rule, hear their concerns, answer their questions, and what we want, of course, is a high level of compliance, but we want to do it in a very cooperative way. Go ahead, Steve. 

Question: Thank you very much. And I wanted to see if there's any update on the city employee mandate and accommodation requests, especially I know there was a lot of discuss about the NYPD and the number of religious accommodation requests there. Last we heard was I believe late November, the next few weeks you'll be going through those accommodation requests. So I wanted to see if there's any resolution there, foreseeing any dismissal within the NYPD and associated staffing challenges?  

Mayor: Steve, thank you for the question. We are not seeing staffing challenges at all. We have started to see – I don't have the exact numbers and we'll get them to you – we have started to see those reasonable accommodation requests work through. For folks who have been told after the whole process that they don't get the accommodation, I think so far, we're seeing what we've seen before, people then typically choose to get vaccinated. So they, you know, exhaust their options, and if it doesn't go their way, most people choose to get vaccinated. We have seen some increases in the last week or so, and I think part of that is that process beginning to play out. So, right now, NYPD is at 88 percent vaccinated. Fire to department overall at 94 percent now. So, you know, those are very, very healthy numbers, and the folks who are going through the reasonable accommodations will continue to work in the meantime, but we're really confident now that the process is working smoothly, and as these get resolved, if someone gets the accommodation, they keep working. If they don't, vast majority are going to get vaccinated. Go ahead.  

Moderator: The next is Erin Durkin from Politico. 

Question: Mayor, I wanted ask about the poverty data you released. I know you have, you know, the specific data [inaudible] 2019, but is anything you can us to say, you know, where that has gone in the last two years throughout the time of the pandemic? Any data or any just sort of reasonable expectation of what you think has happened?  

Mayor: I’ll start and then we have Matt Klein on who is the Executive Director of the Mayor's Office of Economic Opportunity, and he has really been leading the way in tracking this data and has watched it now over many years. And what I'll say, Erin, is we have sort of two diametrically opposed realities, the horrible impact to COVID, humanly in terms of people's lives and health, obviously in terms of their livelihood, the economic impact, very sharp negative impact. We did see, thank God. A lot of those jobs start to come back quickly, but much more crucially to people survival the huge amount of federal support that came into play. And of course, we in the city did everything we could to support people directly, including things like food programs, making sure that no new Yorker went hungry and everything else we could do to directly support people. So horrible blow, but countered by a lot of focused investment, a lot of resources. And then the good news that we think bigger impact ahead will be all of the federal support coming in, particularly if President Biden's agenda gets approved by the Congress and that could, you know, really compensate for a lot of the impact to COVID. So, that's very, very top line, but to hear from a real expert who's watching these trends carefully, Matt Klein, give us your analysis.  

Executive Director Klein: Thanks Mr. Mayor. You got it exactly right. The data that we use to construct the New York city poverty rate comes from the census and hasn't been released yet. So we don't have the data in place to give you numbers for 2020 and 2021. But what the Mayor said is exactly right, we see that the federal support during the pandemic is holding down increases in poverty. So we expect in 2020 for it to stay relatively stable. And then, for 2021, for the significant federal support around the extended unemployment insurance, the economic impact payments, the child tax credit, all of those had had very meaningful impact on keeping poverty down and potentially lowering it. That speaks to two things. One, it speaks to the importance of policy and confronting poverty. And having a partner in the federal government, as we did during the pandemic, has been critical, particularly in 2021. Secondly, there's a difference in how poverty is measured. So, the Census official poverty measure here doesn't take into account important things like after-tax credits, like the earned income tax credit, the child tax credit; doesn't take into account in income support such as housing subsidies and nutritional supports. And so, that has actually – the reason why the City developed and issues the New York City government poverty measure, because it does take into account all of the policies that you heard at the top of the availability. And now, the Census also issues the supplemental poverty measure. And we saw that for 2020, under the Census’ supplemental poverty measure, poverty actually went down from 2019. So, we expect the numbers to – on this measure to continue to go down.

Mayor: And Matt, before we continue, just to thank you and your team, because this is painstaking work you do, but it really informs policy decisions that reach millions of people. And documenting it, making sure we understand what works, what doesn't work has been absolutely essential. So, you guys – you know, people may not know everything that we'd like them to about the day-to-day work you guys do, but it really has had a profound impact on the work we all do. So, I want to thank you for that.

Executive Director Klein: Thanks, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor: Erin, go ahead.

Question: [Inaudible] …and I'm just wondering, you know, the neighborhood he mentioned I know has had a few sites that have – used to be operating by the City and have shut down. I know you've also shut down the site in Queens, on Northern Boulevard, there used to be a very big site there. I would also – I believe – I do believe that's also been the case for a couple of NYCHA sites, and there have been others that have scaled back their hours, and I would flag that they're not necessarily updated on the website. So, some of those are wrong and say they're open, for instance, on the weekend and they're not. So, my question is just, kind of, you know, although the city still does have a very robust public testing infrastructure, why would you be shutting down sites, you know, at the time when you're just encouraging people to get tested more? And kind of connected to that, you know, there are all these little kind of pop up tent sites. And then, some neighborhoods you see on pretty much almost every corner – you know, privately run, I believe. I'm just wondering if you can kind of offer any guidance on, you know, are those sites generally reliable or what should people look for when they're looking for something to get tested?

Mayor: Yeah. And I'll start with Ted long. And then, if either the other doctors want to jump in. But here's the big frame. I'd say, Erin, first of all, yes, there are privately-operated sites that are not under the City's direction. And, of course, that's just value-add, we welcome that. But they tend to group where, you know, their strategies dictate. But one of the things we've talked about over the last few months is, we saw some sites where there wasn't a lot of activity and it did not make sense to put a lot of medical personnel and support personnel in a place unless there was a lot of activity. It made sense to move to where the need was and also to move to the more mobile approach, because we found that to be very high impact. But we’ll keep making adjustments. Where there's a need for more testing, we’ll keep moving resources, you know, any place it's needed. And I say, testing is crucial, but the number-one focus is vaccination. So, you know, we have a very big, strong apparatus here. It’s not limitless, but it's very strong. But the first focus will always be on getting more people vaccinated, because that's how we end the COVID era. So, with that, to Erin's questions – Ted, you begin.

Executive Director Long: Yeah. Erin, thanks for your question. I mean, if your overall question is have we strengthened or began to decrease our testing infrastructure that's publicly run, it’s definitively we’re strengthening it every day now. Like I said, we're doubling the size of our mobile fleet this week for the reason that we want to continue to be guided by our community organizations and our community leaders. If you have to ask me what I think our secret ingredient to success in terms of getting testing numbers where they have been, it's because we have a grassroots effort. We listen to our communities and we're able to bring testing literally to their doorsteps. Or, as Dr. Chokshi said before, oftentimes through their doorsteps if you're immunocompromised, above 65, an international traveler, or a close contact. So, the reason we're doubling our mobile fleet is wherever we hear that there's a need for more testing, we can now bring our mobile units to that site. And a couple more points to what James said about the – our site [inaudible] – again, that was a, a temporary couple-of-days type thing, because we wanted to support our schools. But there are actually microsites and other mobile units in Harlem as well today. And we could point you in the direction of where those are that are not 24 blocks away. On Northern Boulevard – thank you for pointing out that site – it's one of the rare occurrences – it's a rarity where we've transitioned to leave mobile units there. There is a school being built there and the school really wanted to continue to be built there, and we felt like it was reasonable to continue to offer the same testing presence that we've always offered through our mobile units, but also to allow the school to be built there, to sort of, you know, be a double win there to enable the school to be built but also to continue testing. But moving forward, what you expect from us is more and more testing, especially as we have Omicron here and especially as we're continuing to go into the fourth wave with Delta. Getting tested is one of the most important things New Yorkers can do, which is why we're doubling the size of our mobile fleet, keeping the lab turnaround times where they are. And if there's any areas of New York City, Erin, where you or others feel we need to bring more testing, that's the reason we have our mobile fleet and our microsites. We'd love to deliver our promise to be wherever you think it's most important for us to be. So, let us know.

Mayor: Thank you. Dr. Chokshi or Dr. Katz, anything to add?

Commissioner Chokshi: I'll just add briefly to underline the point that the testing infrastructure has moved from being more bricks and mortar to getting further into neighborhoods and into people's homes. So, as Dr. Long has pointed out, you know, the doubling of the mobile fleet means that there are many more opportunities to bring those mobile testing sites closer to where people are actually living and working. So, for example, in my home borough of Queens, you'll see 22 mobile testing sites listed on nyc.gov/covidtest. We also want to make this as easy as possible, because we understand, you know, from James’ to this question, when someone is sick they just need to know where they can go as soon as possible. So, you can also text 85548. If you text “COVID Test” to that number, it'll give you a list of options that are close to you. Finally, I'll say the Health Department and Test & Trace, continue to collaborate on ways to bring rapid home testing even further into people's communities and their neighborhoods. And so, you'll be hearing more about that from us in the coming weeks as well. Thank you.

Mayor: Thank you very much. Go ahead.

Moderator: Next is Jeff Mays from the New York Times.

Question: Hey. Good morning, Mr. Mayor. My question is about the inequality that you've been talking about this morning. So, you know, one of the sort of criticisms I've heard of your efforts at addressing inequality is that you were sometimes hesitant to support reforms that would help the city's most vulnerable residents, such as deepening affordability on your affordable housing plan, closing Rikers Island, half-price MetroCards for the poor. And you've often talked about how the pandemic has disrupted some of these efforts, your efforts at reducing inequality. I'm wondering if some of these vulnerable New Yorkers might have more resilient when the pandemic came, if you not – if you had not hesitated on some of these issues that seem to align directly with your goal of reducing inequality. And do you wish you had acted more urgently on some of those proposals now that you're looking back at your eight years in office?

Mayor: Well, thanks for the question, Jeff. I respect the question, but I will tell you, I believe the most important fact is we got to each and every one of the things that you indicated. We did the Fair Fares initiative, working with the City Council, which I think was very positive. We are closing Rikers Island. We did lower the affordability levels for affordable housing. And I think in a lot of times when you're making these decisions, you’ve got to figure out what works and how to make it work. So, in each and every one of those cases, we found a solution. Rikers was extremely complex for a lot of reasons, including having to create the new community-based jails and working with communities. But we got there and I'm real proud of it. And it's going to get done. We're going to close Rikers once and for all, and that's going to be so important to the future of this city. But in terms of COVID, I mean, clearly with each of these we saw different outcomes. The closing of Rikers was not going to happen before COVID under any condition, just too much work had to be done. The Fair Fares was up and running and moving well, but people stopped riding the subways in large measure. And then, the housing affordability, you know, this is area where I'll say I think it was really important to reach lower income folks. That was a change we had to make. We had to prove with our housing plan, that the plan could work. And then, we had to figure out way to reach large numbers of low income New Yorkers, while also producing constantly high amounts of affordable housing. We couldn't have done that the same way in the beginning, especially without mandatory inclusionary housing. But that's an area where I would say, to your very fair question – that's an area where I will say we needed to find the fastest path to reaching low income New Yorkers, not exclusively, because I believe in housing for working class and middle class people too, but we had to find the fastest path. And that's an area where I certainly think the City's going to have to do more in the future. Go ahead, Jeff.

Question: Thanks. Thanks for that answer. I wanted to ask also, you've talked about homelessness. Since we're looking back on your tenure, you've talked about homelessness and some of the regrets you have and dealing with that, I'm wondering if you are looking at the fact that, you know, the number of single adults in shelters have increased since you took office as any sort of indication on how you've done in addressing the issue of homelessness overall? And especially in relation to, you know, your pledge to address inequality. I mean, why do you think – what has happened that, you know, you haven't been able to reduce that number of single adults in shelter?

Mayor: Well, that piece – I'm very concerned about that and we've put a lot of effort into trying to address it. Clearly, we've seen during COVID that number go up. So, it does seem to bear a connection to the COVID crisis. But the big-picture reality – and again, this has proven in the numbers, the federal study that we do annually has shown that street homelessness has gone down. That's really important. We’ve got a lot more to do, but, unquestionably, our Journey Home Strategy, you know, that intense outreach to folks on the street has worked. And then, we're going to be doing a lot more of that. Safe Havens, all those approaches have worked. Shelter population is down substantially from the number of folks who were in shelter when I took office, and that's because fewer and fewer families are in shelter, and that's great. So, you know, as I'm handing off to Eric Adams, I'm happy to say that number is down substantially. Also, we've gotten about 170,000 people out of shelter to a permanent affordable housing. That's crucial that worked. But what I'd say overall is, yeah, I am worried about the number of single adults who have gone into shelter. And Jeff, I think, in the end, we, in the first years – I've said it repeatedly, I'll say again – in the first years, I think we missed some strategic opportunities that we later figured out. But since we've implemented them, starting really in 2017, I think the trend line's been really good. And I think we can overcome this recent surge when we come out of COVID, because we found better ways to reach people, including right to counsel, which was something we didn't have in the beginning. That was one of the things that we figured out along the way would be – you know, we believed in anti-eviction legal services, but making it as robust as it was under the right to counsel law was crucial. So, this is an area where we didn't see all the solutions in the beginning. I'm very honest about that. And I wish I had seen some of them earlier, but then we got to a place where we had a really clear, powerful set of tools, and those have been working.

Moderator: Next is Chris from the Daily News.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. I want, wanted to circle back on the indoor mask mandates since enforcement is set to begin today. I guess I'm just wondering, is the City sending out enforcement teams today to make sure businesses are abiding by this? And as a follow up, you know, should business owners expect to face $1,000 fines as laid out by Governor Hochul, if they do have patrons in their establishments without masks on?

Mayor: Chris, thank you for the questions. We are working with the State. This is obviously brand new, and it's taking effect very quickly. We're working cooperatively with the State to figure out the best approach. What we've done historically has worked, which is a heavy focus on education and on problem solving. We don't want to penalize people unless there is overt resistance and unwillingness to cooperate, and that's very, very rare. So, the focus will be educating the business owners, making sure they're complying, if there's a problem, addressing it with them, getting to solution. And that's what has worked for us. Go ahead, Chris.

Question: Thank you. On a different topic, last week, as you probably saw some letters from the Conflict of Interest Board that were sent to you years ago were finally released. The revelation here seems to be that you told DOI investigators as part of the investigation that they launched in 2016, that you were unaware of certain specifics regarding your fundraising endeavors. But what we learned from these letters released last week is that when you told the investigators that, you had already received a letter from the Conflict of Interest Board, specifically saying that you should not solicit donations from firms with business pending before executive agencies. What these letters are showing is that you still kept doing that, you still kept soliciting donations from these types of businesses, even though you were warn to not do it. So, I guess I'm wondering, how do you explain that?

Mayor: Yeah. Chris, respectfully, that's not how I see the history at all. What we were doing was working to get pre-K for all the kids in New York City, working to get affordable housing for hundreds of thousands in New Yorkers. That's what these efforts were focused on. There was a clear process for me to get guidance for each and every phone call, literally a script. The person to call was delineated by a team of people. The script was delineated. I followed those scripts. We acted in good faith throughout this effort. And it was looked at and then the cases were closed by COIB and other entities. So, I think it's really been covered. Go ahead, Chris. Oh no, I got two of Chris. Go ahead.

Moderator: Next is Yoav from The City.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to ask you about the intervention of Chief Maddrey, in an arrest in the 7-3 Precinct a few weeks ago where a retired cop allegedly menaced three kids with a gun. Can you – what do you know about that incident? Could you explain why it's appropriate for a three-star chief to intervene in the arrest of a retired officer? And do you have any idea what information Chief Maddrey was given in the hour or two after this retired officer's arrest that made him reverse the decisions and investigative findings of the officers in the precincts?

Mayor: Yoav, you're literally the first person to say anything about the situation you're describing. I have not heard anything about it before. I will have our team follow up right away and get you some answers, but I'm not familiar with this at all.

Question: Okay. That takes care of my follow up question, but – so I'll switch gears and go to the COIB issue. You just told Chris of the Daily News you don't see the history the way he described it. It is 100 percent accurate to say that the Conflict of Interest Board wrote you a letter specifically telling you that it was prohibited for you to fundraise directly from people with business before the city. And then, when DOI did their probe you told them were not familiar with that specific rule. So, did you get the – you know, the letter from COIB was addressed to you at Gracie Mansion? Did you get that letter and did you read it?

Mayor: Yeah, again, you're characterizing what I said to DOI and I just don't believe that's the accurate way of characterizing it. The bottom line is the process worked with specific scripts, following specific scripts. And I believe that the vetting had all been done accurately of who to call, what to say, how to specifically phrase things. And that's what I followed. I followed those instructions. And so, I'm comfortable. I know everyone acted in faith. And, again, every time these things have been looked at over years, the same outcome – every case closed with no further action. I think that speaks volumes.

Moderator: We have time for two more for today. The next is Elizabeth Kim from Gothamist.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to ask you about City Council speaker race that's currently unfolding. By this time in 2013, the candidate that you backed for speaker, Melissa Mark-Viverito, had pretty much sewn up the votes she needed. I was wondering if, as a mayor and a former political strategist, you would contrast your approach with that taken by Eric Adams' team. And can you say how much political damage this inflicts if his choice for speaker doesn't get through?

Mayor: Well, it's an honest question, Elizabeth, so I'll give you an honest answer. First of all, I’m not so certain that by this date things were quite as wrapped up as you characterize. And I know you're saying it in good faith. I'm saying, my memory is that when I ran for speaker back in the end of 2005, it literally went down to the final days. And I think that has been the truth in many ways of each of these races, which is my bigger answer to you. I think there's a lot of time on the clock here. I think for a vote that's over three weeks away, this is far from certain where it's going. And there – and I think that answers the other part of the question, which I don't think anything permanent has been done to anybody yet, because I think the outcome is far from clear and there's plenty of time for everyone involved to figure out what they're going to do. So, I know for folks in the media and the political world it feels like urgent, it feels like of the moment. My strong belief is there's still a lot more to play out. Go ahead, Elizabeth.

Question: Changing topics to schools. Our health team has been looking at the opt-in rate for in-school testing and they see that only about a quarter of public school students have opted in for testing. And, as a result of that, there's – they're hearing that the same handful of kids are getting tested over and over while the vast majority, you know, aren't able to participate, because their families haven't opted in. Can you or the DOE release the testing opt-in rate for each district school so we can see how this – you know, we can see basically what the disparity is in each district?

Mayor: We'll follow up with you certainly to release, you know, anything that we have full, accurate information on we obviously want to release. Now, this is a situation that's changing all the time, because the effort to get more and more parents to sign up continues. So, it's not a fixed situation. But the bottom line is, we're doing testing regularly. The results have been very, very consistent across 1,600 schools and that tells us a lot. But I'll turn to Dr. Chokshi and Dr. Long, just to see if there's anything that they want to add about the ability to get the consistent, accurate results we're looking for with the current approach. Dr. Chokshi?

Commissioner Chokshi: Thank you, sir. Yes. I'm happy to start. We are able to do the surveillance testing that requires, you know, that opt-in that Elizabeth is describing. And that has given us the sample that we need, you know, to assess the spread of COVID in our communities and how that affects our schools as well. The one point that I do want to highlight is that vaccination is also related to what we're seeing with respect to COVID, as well as how that affects COVID testing in our schools. And particularly with five- to 11-year-olds, having recently become eligible, we have emphasized how important it is for kids to get vaccinated so that they are not subject to unnecessary quarantine once they become fully vaccinated. So, that's another area of focus for us. As you heard earlier, there have been a number of in-school vaccination events that have helped with that. We've also collaborated with our DOE colleagues on a backpack letter and other parent engagement to ensure that parent are aware of this really important intervention that we have to protect children and keep them safely in school.

Mayor: Thank you. And Dr. Long, just honing a little more on Elizabeth's question about, you know, what I would phrase as, are we able to get accurate results, able to get the right sample we need each time to really give us a picture of what's going on? What would you say Dr. Long?

Executive Director Long: Yeah. I would say that we definitely are. So, we're getting a 10 percent random sample, to your point, Elizabeth, among those that have consented for our unvaccinated students. The CDC calls for a 10 percent random sample as well, which we actually developed the methodology for last year. We were the first big city in the country to reopen our schools. The way that we do surveillance testing is now how the CDC recommends to do it. We proved last year when we studied it, that actually among students and teachers that were in remote learning, they were at – they were as likely if not more likely to get COVID than students and teachers in our schools. And the surveillance testing that we did helped to prove that point, but also in our ability to identify cases helped to keep our schools safe throughout. So, we're going to continue to do this testing program that we've done for now millions of tests to keep our schools safe. But I do appreciate your question, Elizabeth. Thank you.

Moderator: Last question for today, it goes to Reuvain from Hamodia.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. How are you doing today?

Mayor: I'm doing well, Reuvain. How about you?

Question: Good, good. So, I'd like to ask about the justification for the vaccine mandate, specifically as they relate to children, whether it's the mandate on school staff getting vaccinated to protect kids or the mandate on kids getting vaccinated to go to restaurants and entertainment venues. Firstly, the early reports are that Omicron actually has relatively mild symptom. But generally, throughout the pandemic, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics, of all state's reporting data, between 0.1 percent and 1.9 percent of child COVID cases result in hospitalization. And between zero percent and 0.03 percent of child COVID cases resulted in death. What is the justification for mandating vaccines as it relates to children?

Mayor: Now, a fair and important question, Reuvain. And sometimes you and I don't see entirely eye to eye, but you always ask very thoughtful and well-informed questions. And I appreciate that. Look, first of all, it is not just Omicron plus cold weather, and we've got plenty of evidence of what happens with cold weather and people coming indoors, the impact on the spread of COVID. And then, the gatherings we know have been and will be happening around the holidays. You're seeing the trend lines with cases going up, hospitalizations going up. So, we need to attack on all fronts. We're doing a preemptive strike, putting extremely strong measures in place to stop us from ending up where we did in 2020, with shutdowns and restrictions, because we can see the handwriting on the wall, Reuvain. There's a lot moving here. Look at Germany, look at Austria, look at the United Kingdom. There's too many places that are shutting down, because I didn't put the strongest possible measures in place. There's too many places that didn't do a pure vaccination mandate. They did vaccine or test or show proof of a recent case. We made a decision early on to actually go farther than some of the standards set in Western Europe and do pure vaccination mandates. And they have worked and it’s the reason, the life of the city is as normal, relatively speaking, as it is now. So, it all goes together. By putting that mandate on for the youngest New Yorkers for indoor entertainment, etcetera, we know a lot more kids are going to get vaccinated and that affects the whole household. When you have a multi-generational household, if one person brings COVID in the door, it puts everyone else in harm's way, including particularly our seniors and folks with preexisting conditions. So, that's how all the pieces connect. Dr. Chokshi, I should have given you a heads up I was going to turn to you. So, I'll give you a second here. But in terms of – again, Reuvain’s question is fair and well documented. But to me, the issue is where we see COVID going and how we have to get there ahead of it. That dictates what we're doing. Dr. Chokshi.

Commissioner Chokshi: Yes, you're exactly right, Mr. Mayor. And allow me to just start with the bottom line, which is that COVID-19 vaccination for five- to 11-year-olds is strongly recommended by the nation's leading scientists, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, which Reuvain cited. And this is based on robust data. But beyond the evidence, beyond this science we should listen to whom I consider the foremost experts on this topic, which are pediatricians who are parents themselves. They are urging vaccination and they also strongly support the vaccine requirements that we have elaborated. And you ask for the reason – the reason is rooted in health and safety. If we were to vaccinate every New Yorker aged five-to-11, we would prevent tens of thousands of cases of COVID-19. And remember that, although it is true that COVID-19 is generally somewhat milder in children, some of those tens of thousands of infections would result in hospitalizations, ICU admissions, and long-term effects from COVID-19. I have to also put into context that COVID-19 can largely become a vaccine-preventable disease among kids, just like chicken pox, rotavirus, measles, all diseases for which childhood immunization is now routine, and for which there are vaccine requirements as well. But there's one key difference between COVID-19 and those other diseases, which is that unfortunately COVID-19 is more deadly among children than any of those diseases, which lends vaccination even greater urgency. The final point is what the Mayor said, which is that there is a very tangible benefit for children, but if there's one thing we've learned during COVID-19 it's that we are all connected. You know, our children, of course, are part of our families, are part of our communities. And so, there is a strong community benefit as well. Thank you.

Mayor: Thank you. Go ahead, Reuvain.

Question: Mr. Mayor, you’ve long spoken about wanting to help the poor and historically oppressed minorities. 63 percent of black adults in New York City are vaccinated. How does a champion of oppressed minorities declare that in two weeks, 37 percent of black adults in New York City will be unemployable?

Mayor: I don't see it – I respect the question, but that's not what I see at all. I see the mandates moving people to get vaccinated. We heard this very fair concern when we first had the mandate for health care workers. Obviously, a lot of our health care workers are people of color. And as Dr. Katz has said very powerfully from the beginning, he had a lot of hesitancy in his workforce. That changed with the mandates. His workforce is now over 95 percent vaccinate. We saw it with the rest of our City workforce. We saw it with the Key to NYC. When we said we're going to reach restaurants, indoor entertainment, fitness – obviously, many, many people of color, many African Americans, many Latinos work in those industries. There was tremendous fear, would people not get vaccinated. Consistently, we saw the mandate sort of things that got people vaccinated. So, I understand the question – and it's a fair question, except the results have been so consistent, that when there is hesitancy and you've gone through all the incentives – we're talking about now a year, as we indicated – a year of vaccination efforts, every form of education, we'll answer to any question any time, outreach to all communities, incentives, the hundred-dollar incentive and a whole range of other incentives. We did everything possible to make it amenable, and open, and available. If someone still hasn't chosen after all that, it’s time for a mandate in terms of their employment, because that will keep them safe, their family safe, their community safe, their workplace safe, and the entire city safe. So, to me, when people experience the mandates, all about the most ideological people – and that's a very small sliver of our society – the mandate is the thing that gets people across the finish line, the thing that gets them vaccinated, the thing that keeps us safe. And that's why we did it, because we need more people vaccinated to be safe.

And with that, everyone, I'll say very simply – if you're not vaccinated yet, or if your child's not vaccinated yet, or you haven't gotten your booster yet, no better day than today. Do that for yourself, your family, and your city. Thank you, everyone.

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