NYC NOW - August 3, 2023: Midday News

Episode Date: August 3, 2023

A Manhattan court today hears the case of the blocked minimum wage increase for food delivery workers. Also, New Jersey’s last K-Mart in Westwood announces its closure this fall, leaving only two in the U.S. Finally, New York City Councilmembers Sandy Nurse and Shahana Hanif are introducing a bill to that could add a layer of oversight to city hall's ongoing efforts to clear homeless encampments. The councilmembers want to increase transparency about what happens after people are removed from public spaces, and Councilmember Nurse joining WNYC’s Tiffany Hanssen to discuss.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Thursday, August 3rd. Here's the midday news from Lance Lucky. A Manhattan court is hearing arguments today in a case over raising minimum wage standards for food delivery workers. New York City legislators approved a dramatic wage increase that would have taken effect July 12th, but app-based food delivery giants like Uber Eats, DoorDash, Grubhubh sued to block it saying it would harm their businesses and hurt delivery workers. The regulation would have set take-home pay at nearly $18 an hour plus tips.

Rising to nearly 20 an hour by 2025, most workers currently make below the city's minimum wage. The very last, Kmart in New Jersey will soon be no more. North Jersey.com reports the retailer's location in Westwood will close this fall, once a staple of American retail, Kmart had over 2,000 locations across the U.S. But with the Westwood closing, there will be just two Kmart's left in the 50 states, one in Bridge Hampton, Long Island, and another in Miami. There are still a handful of Kmart's in U.S. territories. Cloudy now 77 degrees near 82 this afternoon. This is WNYC.

On WNYC, I'm Tiffany Hanson. Two New York City Council members are introducing a bill today that could add a layer of oversight to City Hall's ongoing effort to clear homeless encampments. Council members Sandy Nurse and Shahana Hanif of Brooklyn are calling on the city to provide more transparency about what happens after people are removed from public spaces. Councilmember Nurse joins us now to discuss the legislation and what she hopes it will accomplish. Welcome to a morning edition, Councilmember. Thank you. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. All right. This bill calls for monthly reports on how many people were removed, how many were involuntarily hospitalized. So let's just start with you telling you.

us exactly what's in the bill? Yeah, so we initiated this bill at the beginning of Mayor Adams' term when he announced his administration would be conducting a series of sweeps to shut down homeless encampments involving central agencies, including the Department of Sanitation, which I chair. And of course, this was deeply concerning because time and again, we have seen that not only are homeless sweeps deeply counterproductive, they are expensive, and they often result in civil and human rights violations. So last year, the city conducted about 5,000 sweeps. That's about more than a dozen a day. And whenever the city removes homeless folks from public space, there is shockingly little transparency and accountability. We don't know how these were

initiated, how many people were impacted, what were the outcomes? We have very little access to basic data unless we do a foil or have an occasional audit such as the Comptroller's most recent and damning audit. And given the volume of sweeps that the city is doing, we really need consistent reporting in order to create accountability, ensure that the rights of New Yorkers are not being trampled on. So we're introducing this bill as Mayor Adams is fighting to end the right to shelter, as our council just overrode his attempt to veto a package of long overdue reforms to our housing voucher program as the council is really working to address the shelter system and the fact that it is overwhelmed right now due to the end of the eviction moratorium and of course the impact

of influxive asylum seekers. Well, you mentioned Mayor Adams, the Adams administration has been clearing out encampments for some time now. What has the reporting process look like so far? So as I mentioned, it's very, very challenging to get data. This bill has come from over a year of working with homeless organizations, legal organizations, advocates who have very little access to information and spend a lot of their time and resources foiling the city to get this information. Really, the only way we get some clear data is when we have oversight hearings, which we don't get to do all the time. So we're asking for regular reporting in terms of how many agencies are involved, how many people were involuntarily hospitalized or arrested,

How many people were offered some type of housing? What are the cost of these removals? These are expensive operations. And as we know, as study after study has shown, these simply do not work. I'm curious. I'd like to get your take on something. Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services said the city is considering housing migrants in tents and big green spaces around the city, including Central Park, Prospect Park.

That would have the city building outdoor encampments, even as they are ordering other encampments to be dismantled. So I'm curious what your take is on that. Well, certainly the influx of New New Yorkers or the asylum seekers has overwhelmed our shelter system, which is why the council had been focused on the housing voucher package to try to push forth some solutions to expedite and get people out of the shelter system who have been there prior to the pressure that we're dealing now with the asylum seeker. there are thousands of units of supportive housing that are vacant right now.

There are thousands of vacant warehouse departments right now. There are some long structural reforms that we could be focused on right now. Certainly we understand that the administration has a huge task in front of it, a major challenge. And we definitely need help from the federal government. But we also should be focused on long-term solutions that will help New Yorkers who've been struggling in the shelter system for a very long time. Council member Sandy Nurse represents parts of Brownsville, Bushwick, Cypress Hills, and East New York. Councilmember, thanks so much for your time today. We appreciate it. Thank you. Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WNYC. Be sure to catch us every weekday, three times a day for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives.

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