🍎 citymeetings.nyc #7
Hearings on pedestrian safety, homeless shelter policies, facial recognition technology, and the J-51 tax program
Howdy!
It's been a while since my last newsletter but citymeetings.nyc is still alive and well.
I'm reworking all my tooling so that I am capable of publishing meetings, fast. More about this here.
I plan to be back on track at the end of the summer and have gobs to say about the work this has required me to do.
I've also been giving talks and meeting with folks interested in citymeetings.nyc, most recently at the City Council Legislative Division (👋 thank you for having me!).
In the meantime, I'm publishing meetings slowly or on request: the reason this meeting regarding the J-51 tax abatement is up is because a local real estate attorney reached out about it!
If you want a particular meeting to be published on citymeetings.nyc, please holler.
citymeetings.nyc making the rounds
I shared a bit about citymeetings.nyc making the rounds in my last issue.
The most recent news re: making-the-rounds?
The City is the first newsroom to link to a citymeetings.nyc as a source in this article:
That link goes straight to the meeting's desktop view. A better link would go directly to the chapter where Mitch Katz makes this statement. (I've reached out to the author about this.)
The ability to link to a skimmable, granular section of a municipal meeting is significant.
It makes statements made on the record accessible to the public. It also sets the stage for more sophisticated analytical tools.
Organizations have begun linking to their testimonies, too: Dance NYC, FRIENDS.
City of Yes for Housing Opportunity
The City Planning Commission (CPC) had ~200 people testify at their meeting on City of Yes for Housing Opportunity yesterday over the course of 14 hours!
I don't work on non-city-council meetings yet, but I'll be making a special case for yesterday's meeting and will publish those testimonies so they're linkable and skimmable this week.
If you're interested in learning something specific about the testimonies people gave (individually or collectively), send me an email.
Stay tuned!
For a complete listing of published meetings, visit citymeetings.nyc.
Feedback? Comments? Questions? Reply to this newsletter or send me an email at vikram@citymeetings.nyc.
Hearing on intersections, sidewalks, and changes to streets for pedestrian safety
This was a hearing on 14 bills, which you can view here.
- Margaret Forgione, First Deputy Commissioner at DOT, responds to every bill in her testimony, and citymeetings.nyc splits up her testimony so there is a chapter per bill. Link
- What the different types of bollards and their safety purposes? Link
- $50MM was dedicated to DOT in 2018 for the installation of 1,500 bollards. They built 300 in 2019, 300 in 2020, and none since. Link
- DOT estimates 200 fatalities involving jaywalking in the last 5 years, accounting for 34% of all pedestrian fatalities. Link
- Apparently jaywalking is a criminal offense. Link
- Transportation Alternatives testifies in support of enhanced pedestrian safety measures. Link
- Legal Aid Society testifies on the disproportionate impact of jaywalking enforcement on black youth. Link
- Robin Felsher, a member of Families for Safe Streets, recounts the loss of her wife who was struck by an SUV. Link
- The Worker Justice Project/Los Deliveristas Unidos testifies on the need for improved safety measures for delivery workers. Link
Hearing on improving services and policies for families with children residing in shelters
- 69% of those in shelters are families, with 48,000 children. 105 evicted migrant children lost enrollment in NYC public schools -- Public Advocate Jumaane Williams walks through and criticizes NYC's shelter policies. Link
- Angela Serda, an Ecuadorian immigrant, testifies on the poor living conditions, lack of case management, and inadequate support for obtaining immigration documents. Link
- Ninibeth Rivas, a Venezuelan immigrant, adds to Angela's testimony here. Link
- Neither has been connected with legal services to start paperwork for work authorizations. Link
- Neither was told about the 60-day shelter limit. Link
- Families spend an average of 6-7 hours for intake. This is a reduction from 20 hours. Link
- There is only one intake center in NYC. Link
Hearing on cybersecurity and the regulation of facial recognition technologies in NYC
- Council member Shahana Hanif discusses her bill prohibiting businesses from using facial recognition and other biometric surveillance technology. Link
- There are over 100 employees at New York City Cyber Command. Link
- There's a gap of ~450K open positions for cybersecurity professionals in the US. NYC provides upskilling & reskilling for current employees through an initiative called NYC Cyber Command Academy. Link
- The city has applied for a $1B federal grant for state and local cybersecurity programs. Link
- The council is wildly disappointed at the administration's participation in the hearing. Link 1 | Link 2 | Link 3 | Link 4
- There is no way currently for New Yorkers to report discriminatory treatment due to biometric technology. Link 1 | Link 2
- An interesting discussion regarding location data, data collection consent, and facial recognition technology between council member Gutierriez and representatives of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. Link 1 | Link 2 | Link 3 | Link 4 | Link 5
- A representative of the Security Industry Association testifies against the proposed legislation. Link
- Laws stipulate that businesses using facial recognition technology must have visible warnings about their usage. Link
Hearing on the J-51 tax abatement
- Council member Pierina Ana Sanchez opens by discussing the mission of the J-51 tax program. Link
- "It provides tax incentives for building owners to rehab their buildings make repairs and upgrades by providing temporary relief from an increase in annual real estate taxes that would otherwise result from the increase in assessed value of the property due to conversion alterations or improvements." -- Council Member Sanchez
- The average annual cost of the program has been around $270MM over the last 15 years. Future costs are expected to be on par. Link
- Usage was much higher in the 1990's and early-mid 2000's.
- The highest utilization of the J51 program has been in Queens, followed by Brooklyn, the Bronx, Manhattan, then Staten Island. Link
- Building that received the J-51 tax have a median year built of 1929 in the last 15 years. Link
Thanks for reading!
Comments, questions, or feedback? Reply to this email or shoot me a note at vikram@citymeetings.nyc