NYC NOW - July 25, 2023: Midday News

Episode Date: July 25, 2023

A New Jersey bus monitor is accused of negligently causing the death of a 6-year-old girl with special needs last week. Also, Robert Hadden, a former Columbia University gynecologist, receives a 20-year federal prison sentence for sexually abusing four patients. Lastly, "Just Action," a new book, provides a blueprint for building integrated communities. WNYC race and justice reporter Arya Sundaram spoke to Leah Rothstein, one of the authors. Arya joins Tiffany Hanssen to discuss

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Tuesday, July 25th. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. A New Jersey bus monitor has been accused of causing the death of a six-year-old girl with special needs last week. Somerset County Prosecutor's office said Amanda Davila was on her phone and using earbuds and failed to notice when Fajar Williams suffocated in her front. four-point safety harness after the school bus hit a series of bumps in the road. NJ.com reports the child struggled violently for almost three minutes, flailing her arms and legs and lost consciousness. Investigators say when the bus reached its destination, 14 minutes later, the monitor realized

something was wrong. This morning, the 27-year-old bus monitor remains in the Somerset County jail, charged with manslaughter and child endangerment. She goes to court on Thursday. A judge has sentenced former Columbia University gynaecologist Robert Haddon to 20 years in federal prison for sexually abusing four patients who crossed state lines for appointments. Haddon had pleaded guilty in state court to abusing two patients, but evidence indicated his abuse was far more widespread. Former patient Amy Yoney says the court action stirs mixed feelings. It's a little bit of a relief, but it's also so disappointing that Columbia knew and others knew. and it was reported and it was brushed under the rug. It should have never happened.

Almost 230 former patients agreed to settlements with Columbia University Irving Medical Center and New York Presbyterian Hospital. Mid-70s tonight at 705 when the Mets visit the Yankees for a two-game subway series, the stadium may have to deal with some scattered thunderstorms at that time as well. 84 and partly sunny now, afternoon showers and fun.

Thunderstorms likely, mostly sunny in mid-80s, and then sunny in 86 tomorrow. It's WNMYC. On WNYC, I'm Tiffany Hansen. New York City consistently ranks high on the list of the most segregated urban areas in the country. A new book titled Just Action offers a playbook on how to build more integrated communities. WNYC's Race and Justice reporter, ARIAS, spoke recently to Leah Rothstein, one of the authors of that book. us now to talk about some of the takeaways from their conversation. Hi, Aria.

Hi, Tiffany. All right, first off, tell us how New York City got so segregated in the first place. That question is actually one that Leah's father, her co-author, tackled in his last book, which is called The Color of Law. And that book was a huge hit on anti-racist reading lists in recent years. And he argued that segregation across the country isn't the product of personal preferences so much, but actually decades of government policy, and that's going all the way from the city level,

all the way up to the federal level. And just to take a step back for a second, segregation is usually measured by how evenly two groups are spread across a given area. And the New York City region last ranked second in the nation for black-white and Latino white segregation. And in his book, Richard gives multiple examples of how New York City government

in the early 20th century actually helped enable the segregation to happen in this first place. So, for example, the local public housing agency created separate complexes for black and white residents. The state Supreme Court actually approved and backed racial covenants that were written into housing deeds. And just action is really a follow-up to the color of law. The question being, what do we do next? Though they say that government policy is responsible for segregation, they say policy is also the only way to undo the segregation that we're facing right now. Well, to that point, what are their main recommendations?

So part of what makes this book really unique is that there's a lot of practical advice, beyond lawsuits and the typical call to better enforce anti-discrimination laws, which the authors say aren't enough in the first place. And some of their recommendations, though, are pretty intuitive. Their main argument is that policymakers need to, on one hand, increase investment in these lower income black neighborhoods that have been segregated, and then also open up historically exclusionary affluent white neighborhoods. And within this, they offer some more conventionally controversial opinions, I would say, about how exactly we

should go about doing this. Like what exactly? Well, they say that gentrification isn't the boogeyman that we make it out to be. You know, once you increase resources and underinvested and segregated black neighborhoods. It's even inevitable, they say, and that's not a bad thing. Here's how Leah put it. People with higher incomes, often white people will want to move into those neighborhoods because now they have better resources. The only way to prevent that is to not invest in those communities. And that's not an acceptable solution to us, to keep those communities, make them remain underinvested areas. Instead, she says there needs to be more resources that are, focused on preventing displacement and keeping people from getting displaced.

So she also mentioned to you that it's important not just to advocate for the poorest people among us. So who, in her opinion, deserves more attention? The missing middle, as she put it. And those are people who earn too much to qualify for low-income subsidize housing, but earn too little to be able to afford market rate housing. She said there's a huge gap in need for these people because, you know, market rate units are profitable. And on the other hand, there are subsidies, government subsidies for low income housing. But there aren't really many subsidies for middle income housing.

And also this is important politically, she said, to really have middle income people be more focused on. Because she said there needs to be a broad coalition to actually make change happen. And it's just a political necessity. Speaking of tough political landscapes, what other advice does she and her father offer for actually making some sort of change a reality? So the broad coalition is key. You know, they say that we need to unite people across classes, across races and ethnic groups. And here's how Leah put it in our conversation. The whole kind of premise of the book is that we need a new activated civil rights movement around the country that is made up of local.

groups in local communities that are looking at these issues and what they can do in their own communities to challenge and remedy racial segregation. That requires actively going against the social effects of segregation and building relationships with people from different races and from different parts of town. Ariah, thanks so much for talking about your conversation regarding this book. The title, again, is called Just Action. The author you spoke with is Leah Rothstein. We really appreciate it.

Thanks so much, Tiffany. 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. And subscribe wherever you get your podcast. We'll be back this evening.