NYC NOW - August 15, 2023 : Evening Roundup

Episode Date: August 15, 2023

New York City council members are touting a new law that they say will help crack down on illegal cannabis shops across the five boroughs. Plus, a Florida company gets an $18 million contract to provide emergency shower trailers for New York’s asylum seekers. Also, WNYC’s David Furst and Albany reporter Jon Campbell discuss plans to redevelop the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx. And finally, we nod to the 50 year anniversary of hip hop with Heather Hills, a rapper from Neptune Township, New Jersey.

Good evening and welcome to NYC Now. I'm Jenae Pierre for WNYC. We have an obligation to protect a healthy, legal cannabis market and ensure that the industry meets its equity goals. New York City Council members are praising a new law that finds landlords who are leasing space to illegal weed shops. The measure is part of a big effort to keep consumers safe and protect licensed sellers.

Under the bill, which took effect last month, commercial landlords could be fined up to $10,000 if they knowingly lease space to illegal cannabis sellers. Council member Lynn Schulman sponsored the bill. The landlord gets a letter from the city saying you're renting to an entity that's conducting a legal business, and we want you to evict them.

If landlords do nothing to evict those tenants, they will be fined. The city is home to an estimated 2,000 illegal weed shops. Council members say they hope this bill will make it easier to shut them down. New York City will grant a company an $18 million no-bid contract to provide shower trailers for asylum seekers here. WNYC's Arun Vanacapal has more on the contract. The company is called Imperial Restrooms and is headquartered in Florida. Its one-year contract will require it to set up emergency shower trailers at as many as 10 sites across the city. This is a very year. This

follows an outcry from asylum seekers and elected officials about the lack of showers and toilets at emergency shelters and how dehumanizing that can be. Some activists say shower trailers that do exist at certain sites may be closed for much of the day without any explanation. Stick around. There's more after the break. In the Bronx, New York officials are taking another crack at redeveloping the Kingsbridge Armory. It's a massive space on Jerome Avenue and Kingsbridge wrote that sitting unused. Both the state and city will commit $100 million to redevelop the long vacant property. Here's Mayor Eric Adams explaining his optimism. This can be the anchor for the Bronx. We get this right here. It can cascade throughout the

entire borough with employment, opportunities, education. For more on what officials are hoping to build there, WNYC's Albany reporter John Campbell talked with my colleague, David First. John, what's going to be different this time around? Well, David, the major difference is the state and city are putting up a whole bunch of cash to make this happen. Kingsbridge Armory sat vacant for nearly 30 years. There were plans to make it a shopping mall. Those fell through. Then there was a plan to make it this huge ice arena complex.

And Rangers legend Mark Messier was behind that. And the state offered a $100 million loan. And that fell through too. So now it's just sitting there. pretty much. And the new plan to fix it is the state and city are both going to put up $100 million in grants, not loans, for redeveloping the site. They'll start taking bids in September, and they're vowing to pick a winner by the end of the year. What are they hoping to build here? That's something that's going to be decided in the bidding process. Basically, the state and

city formed this community group that put out a document that's kind of guiding this process, and it doesn't really specify exactly what type of development they want for the state. And it's the armory, but it does give some options, maybe an urban agriculture facility, maybe a film and TV hub. So that's all still TBD. That said, people are definitely going to be skeptical about all of this. They've heard promises before. Governor Hokel says she understands that, but she vowed this time will be different and they're actually going to get something done. And she said, judge us on the results. And John, I have to ask, with so many New Yorkers experiencing housing insecurity and homelessness,

and of course with thousands of migrants continuing to come here, is the governor considering using the armory space to help? Yeah, that's kind of the thing that jumps right out at you, right? I mean, there's no housing requirement for this armory redevelopment, and there's no plans to use the space for migrants in the short term, and that's a little surprising, given that both Governor Hockel, Mayor Adams, they've made housing development a huge part of their platforms, and they've struggled to find enough space to house thousands of migrants

that continue to come to New York City with many of them seeking asylum. The governor was asked whether she considered the site for asylum seekers, and she basically said the space isn't up for it right now. They are rather serious environmental issues that have to be overcome a great expense and time. So that's why we directed our attention to other state assets and have been for many months. Well, speaking of migrants and everything they're going through, the Adams administration is saying that without federal and state help, They'll have to spend $12 billion over the next two years to accommodate everyone.

What is the mayor asking for? And how have others in state and federal government responded? He's asking for basically what he's been asking for for the last year. More funding, more assistance from the state and federal government. The state has already put up about a billion dollars for assisting with migrant arrivals. And the governor says it'll likely put up another billion dollars next year when the state legislature is back up here in Albany. She also met with a key White House aid in hopes of getting the federal government to open up a housing facility at Floyd Bennett Field in Brooklyn.

That's an airfield in southeast Brooklyn. But she's facing significant pressure to do more, including from the Legal Aid Society, which is pressuring the Hocal administration in court to do more. They want to see more coordinated services under the right to shelter mandate, which is basically a guarantee that anyone in the city, who seeks a bed or shelter is guaranteed the right to that. That's WNYC's Albany reporter John Campbell, talking with my colleague David First. We're still celebrating the 50-year anniversary of hip-hop, which first emerged on the streets of the Bronx.

To honor this milestone, we're amplifying the voices of women from our region who've been influenced by hip-hop culture. My name is Heather Hills. I am from Neptune Township, New Jersey, and I am a trans female rapper. It is an interesting place to be put in when you're in a genre that is considered pretty underrated in a mainstream sense. And then to be in this genre as a member of the community that is pretty marginalized.

It's kind of like being an underdog in the underdog world. But I love it and it's fulfilling and there's nowhere else I'd rather be. I come from a child of the late 70s and a child of the 80s. So my love of hip hop just kind of comes from them. And I spent a lot of time doing musical theater, but rap kind of fell into my lap and it just kind of worked. And my influences are mainly Missy Elliott, Nicky Mnage, and Azealia Banks, as strange mix as that is.

As far as like how big of a personality I am and everything that I'm able to do, I've always been very reserved. Emmercing myself in hip hop culture, I think one thing that has really taught me to do is it's taught me that I just taught me that I don't don't always have to be modest. It has given me the confidence that I need to kind of like step forward and really show up

in the world authentically and as I am, which I think is a pretty common thing for somebody who's a fan of Nikki Minaj to say, you know, and she taught me to like be myself, but it's true. It's very true. Coming from a very small town, immediately, the idea of, of me making any sort of hip-hop music was just not taken very seriously. in any way, shape, or form. I think that's kind of a long-running theme in a lot of circles. I think it could have a lot more to do with me

just being trans, but I think that's always like the first barrier that people have to get over is the idea that I should be making anything other than, like, pop or dance music. That has kind of, like, prepared me for this kind of, like, walking into the room and just kind of, like, letting it be known immediately kind of thing.

Most rap that was around me was very, boisterous, for lack of better word, I'll say, very confident, very braggy. So that's kind of what I have morphed into. Heather Hills is a rapper from Neptune Township, New Jersey. Before we go, let's hop over to New Jersey, where Governor Phil Murphy is facing pushback on plans to invest heavily in wind energy and reduce natural gas consumption. WNYC's Nancy Solomon talks with Murphy about why fighting climate change has become a hard sell. Listen to their conversation on Ask Governor Murphy Tonight, Tuesday at 7

Or you can stream it at WNYC.org. Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day. We'll be back tomorrow.