NYC NOW - June 18, 2024 : Midday News

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

The NYPD says 6 people are recovering today after a shootings in incidents across the city last night including Williamsbridge and Morrisania in the Bronx, Cypress Hills in Brooklyn and St. Albans, Queens. Also, Frederick Douglass Memorial Park in Staten Island will now become a New York City Landmark after a vote Tuesday morning by the Landmarks Preservation Committee, now the City Council will need to vote to formally recognize the park. Additionally, the heat wave is officially upon us and cooling centers are open and Governor Hochul activated state's Emergency Operation Center to monitor the extreme heat that will last until Friday. In other news, residents of New York City's million or so rent stabilized apartments woke up to the news of rent increases. WNYC's Michael Hill speaks with reporter David Brand for the details. And lastly, teenagers trying to preserve in-person visits at New York State jails and prisons are regrouping after suffering another setback in Albany. As part of WNYC's Radio Rookies program, 18 year old Jamila Small shares why this issue is so important to her.

Welcome to NYC Now. Your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Tuesday, June 18th. Here's the midday news from Lance Lucky. The NYPD says six people are recovering today after they were shot in incidents across the city last night. Police say four men were shot in Williams Bridge and Morissania in the Bronx. Three are expected to survive, but one is in critical condition. A 60-year-old woman was also hospitalized after she was shot in St. Albans, Queens, and a 29-year-old man was shot in Cypress Hills, Brooklyn. The NYPD says he is expected to survive.

Frederick Douglass Memorial Park in Staten Island is set to become a New York City landmark after a vote this morning by the Landmark's Preservation Commission, located in Staten Island's Oakwood neighborhood. It's the city's only non-sectarian cemetery founded by and for the Black Community, according to the Commission. opened in 1935, it offered black New Yorkers a dignified burial site during a time when they were racially excluded from others. Now the City Council must vote to formally recognize the Memorial Park. And as you've been hearing on WNYC, the summer's first heat wave is upon us.

Cooling centers are open and state officials are urging New Yorkers to watch out for themselves and their neighbors. Governor Hockel activated the state's emergency operations center today to monitor the extreme heat, which is expected to last through Friday. I know New Yorkers are tough. We think we can handle it all without breaking a sweat, and we probably will. But we'll be able to get through this because we'll be prepared. State officials say temperatures will feel like there are around 100 in many parts of New York starting today. That includes the border with Canada, where officials say it's extremely rare for temperatures to climb so high. Extreme heat is the leading cause of weather-related deaths nationwide, according to the Centers for Disease Control.

It is 84 now, maybe 88 this afternoon. Sunny and our Juneteenth holiday, 92. This is WNYC. Stay close. There's more after the break. NYC. Michael Hill, residents of New York City's million or so rent-stabilized departments are waking up to the news of rent increases. The rates were decided last night at the annual rent Guidelines Board meeting. WNYC's housing reporter, David Brand joins us now to talk about what exactly happened and what it means for renters. David, good morning. Let's start out with a question on a lot of

New Yorkers' minds. How much will rents go up this time? Well, tenants in rent-stabilized apartments are going to have their rents go up 2.75% on new one-year leases and 5.25% on two-year leases. So for more context, if you're paying $2,000 a month right now, your rent's going to go up to $2,055 on the next one-year year lease and could go up to $2,105 on a two-year lease. And that applies to leases signed on or after October 1st. David, both renters and landlords are not happy with the board's decision, but for quite different reasons. Let's start with the renters. How are they feeling about this? Well, you're right. They're not happy. They say this has been a pattern of rent increases over the past three years totaling 9%. That actually compounds, so it's slightly higher because

This percentage increase adds to last years and adds to the one previously. So, you know, they're pointing to data compiled by the Rent Guidelines Board that show that on the whole landlords are doing pretty well, though that kind of depends on the location of their building, the age and some other factors. But overall, I think their dissatisfaction shows it's a really tough time for a lot of tenants in New York City. A lot of people are paying a huge portion of their incomes toward housing. And this is just adding a little more expense the same time as everything else.

else is going up and wages remain stagnant. What about landlords? They've been saying they need to charge more because the cost of repairs are going up and so are the bills and how are they reacting to this. Well, that's right. The landlords aren't happy either. I mean, this is kind of what happens each year with the rent guidelines board of vote. Tenants say it's too high. Landlords say it's not high enough because the landlords are saying their own expenses are rising. So they need to increase rents to cover that and still make the profit they're accustomed to. They point to, they point to to rising insurance rates, something we've been covering closely, getting hit with new water bill hikes. There's interest rates are up on new loans.

Equipment is more expensive. And everything's going up. Let's zoom out a bit, David. This is the third time under Mayor Adams that rents for stabilized departments have gone up by around 3%. You were at Hunter College last night for the meeting. How did people react? Well, I spoke with Jervine Samuel after the vote. She's a renter in the Bronx, and she says this rent hike is just going to hit low-income tenants, especially hard.

A lot of people can't afford it. You're not going to afford the increase. Well, everything's going up with the mince, the food is going up. Everything's increased. That was a pretty common sentiment, people pointing out the rising cost of food and other expenses with inflation kind of still high. She was one of hundreds of tenants who showed up to the meeting yesterday. But unlike past years where everyone floods the auditorium where the vote is being held, last night it was at Hunter College and are pretty disruptive and can drown out the board while they're voting.

Nobody went inside. Instead, they were marching, banging drums, chanting on the sidewalk outside. A few people even got arrested, including a couple elected officials for blocking the sidewalk and the entrance. And, you know, I'm hearing a lot of people are blaming Mayor Adams for the rent hike. He appoints the board members. They're not happy with successive, roughly three. percent increases, and that's a contrast to how it was under Mayor Bill de Blasio when for eight years the board never raised rents above 1.5 percent and actually froze rents three times the first time ever. But I will say that these current rent increases are about the same as past mayors,

Giuliani Bloomberg. David, just a few seconds left here. Does this vote pretend anything for all renters, even non-stabilized ones? Well, it's another cost for tenants. There's no doubt, but I think at the same time landlords who say they're still not making enough money from their rent-stabilized units might be more inclined to raise rents on non-rent-stabilized units and a lot of buildings there's a mix. Also point out, landlord groups are still continuing to challenge the city's rent stabilization laws in court, and they're hoping to bring that case to the Supreme Court and to them hopefully overturn the rent stabilization system.

WNYC's housing reporter David Brand. You can read more, much more of his reporting, more details on the rent guidelines vote on our news site, Gotham. David, thank you. Thanks, Michael. Teenagers trying to preserve in-person visits at New York State jails and prisons are regrouping after suffering another setback in Albany. Today, as part of WNMC's Radio Rookies Program, 18-year-old Jamila Small shares why this issue is so important to her.

I remember being 10 years old and visiting my dad in prison. I hadn't seen him in years. We were able to eat snacks together and talk. I can't even tell you how long it was for, but it's a memory that I hold very close. Growing up, I didn't know any other kids who had a parent in prison, but a few years ago I found out about a leadership program for teens with incarcerated parents.

It's part of the Osborne Association, which is a nonprofit that works with people affected by the criminal legal system. For the past four years, I've joined them on bus trips to Albany to advocate for a piece of legislation. The Protect in-person Visits Bill. And we ask that you guys pass the bill to protect in-person visiting. A lot of people's first question is, what is the bill actually protecting? My friend Elijah Rodriguez explains it well. This bill allows you to maintain.

that personal touch, that relationship with whether it might be your mother, your father, brother, sister, who's unfortunately behind bars. This bill would protect visitation rights. It also mandates that facilities offer weekend or evening visits. The nonprofit advocacy group Prison Policy Initiative says hundreds of jails across the country have completely replaced in-person family visits with video visits. This is not a new trend. It's been happening for more than a decade, but it is becoming more common.

Elijah grew up visiting his stepdad in prison almost every week. His family would take a 12-hour bus ride overnight to make it upstate. He's 16 now, and he looks back on those weekends as a family tradition. I asked him, what stood out to him most about those visits? His smile on his face and my smile, my mother's smile, my sibling smile. For Elijah, virtual visits can never replace the warmth of a hug or the joy of shared moments. When we would finish drinking our water from the water bottles, we would dampen a paper towel in there to make it a little heavier, but not too heavy. And we would go out in the yard, and he would teach me how to play football.

He would throw that empty water bottle around like it was a football. And we would just seize the moment while we was there. We would enjoy the whole day. In Wisconsin, more than half of all jails have gotten rid of in-person visits. But some states have passed bills to protect in-person visits. In Massachusetts, video calls can be offered in addition to in-person visits, but they cannot replace them. We want our elected officials to pass similar protections in New York. Here's Elijah again.

It's very different to know that I'm really just looking at a bunch of flat pixels on a screen that I might be hearing him, but I'm not there to actually give him a hug if I want to. Research shows maintaining family ties reduces the likelihood of reincarceration. But virtual visits make connecting harder for families, not just emotionally, but also financially. Well, there is a major difference for one, the pricing. That's my friend, Jaden Valentin. He visits his dad who's in prison upstate every few months, but they've also done some

virtual visits. For online visits, you have to pay, we had to end up paying $15 for a 30-minute call. That does not include the distractions that happens, the technical difficulties that occur. Prisons and jails contract with private companies to offer video calls, but the cost of the service is not regulated and it can be high. Still, video calls are a great option. They just shouldn't be the only option. That's why I'm disappointed that the effort to protect in-person visits fell short in Albany this time around. Even though the bill passed in the Senate, it never made it to a vote in the assembly. We'll have to continue to meet with our elected officials to try to get them to see what we see, that our parents, our uncles, our brothers, our sisters are still human.

For us, this bill is about preserving our right to love and support them. For WNYC, I'm Radio Rookies reporter Jamila Small. Radio Rookies is supported in part by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, Epstein-Tyshire Philanthropies, the Margaret Newbark Foundation, and the Pinkerton Foundation. 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.