NYC NOW - April 10, 2024: Morning Headlines

Episode Date: April 10, 2024

Get up and get informed! Here’s all the local news you need to start your day: Some New York City council members say the Adams administration is instructing them to fill out a detailed form if they want to communicate with agency leaders. WNYC’s Giulia Heyward has more. Meanwhile, conservative activists Jacob Wohl and Jack Burkman have agreed to pay more than a million dollars for using robocalls to discourage Black New Yorkers from voting in the 2020 election. Plus, New Jersey officials say a very rainy spring is contributing to a mild wildfire season, but they warn that as the weather turns drier and hotter, the frequency of fires is expected to increase.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WMYC. It's Wednesday, April 10th. Here's the morning headlines from Michael Hill. Some New York City Council members say the Adams administration is instructing them to fill out a detailed form if they want to communicate with agency leaders. WNYC's Julia Hayward has more. Three members of the City Council confirmed the new protocol with WNYC. It has selected officials a series of questions when they're requesting to meet or otherwise engage with agency commissioners and their executive teams.

Two of the council members, Rita Joseph and Shahana Hanif, say that having to fill out a form every time they want to speak with agency heads could bog down the delivery of services their constituents need. But several other council members said they weren't aware of the form when contacted about it late Tuesday afternoon, suggesting the protocol is still being rolled out. Adams' office not officially respond to request for comment. Two conservative activists have agreed to pay more than a million dollars for discouraging black New Yorkers from voting in the 2020 election. Authorities say Jacob Wall and Jack Berkman used rebel calls to target black voters telling them the government could track them down for mandatory vaccinations, for warrants, and for outstanding debts if they voted by mail.

Mark Epstein is with the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights under law, and represented some of the plaintiffs, he says the duo violated the Voting Rights Act and the Koolx Klan Act of 1871. The KKK Act was passed in response to people who used intimidating tactics like burning torches to get black people to not vote. This is just the modern corollary to those tactics. Davis Schwartz represented the defendants and says they were glad to reach the settlement so they could put the case behind them. New Jersey officials say a very wet spring is contributing to a mercifully mild wildfire season. So far this year, the Garden State has had 218 fires that burned a total of 171 acres. That's substantially less than the same time last year, which saw more than five times a number of acres torched.

But New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection officials say as the weather gets drier and hotter, they're expecting more and more wildfires. wildfire season begins in March and can extend all the way through October. 52 and mostly clear now. Slim chance of showers this morning, cloudy and 61 for a high today. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day,

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