NYC NOW - June 25, 2024: Evening Roundup

Episode Date: June 25, 2024

Registered voters in New York are casting ballots for the U.S. Congress, the state legislature, and judges in Tuesday's primary election. In other news, Kevin R. Johnson, the founding pastor of Philadelphia's Dare to Imagine Church, will be the next senior pastor of Abyssinian Church in Harlem. Plus, a housing provider for previously unhoused New Yorkers says they’ve cut back on costly ER visits by hiring nurses to provide on-site care. WNYC’s Karen Yi reports. Finally, New York City is embarking on a top-to-bottom review of its charter, the city’s equivalent of a constitution. A Charter Revision Commission formed by Mayor Adams has been holding public hearings since late May. WNYC reporter Elizabeth Kim explains the process and what could change for New Yorkers.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. I'm Lance Lucky. Voters are heading to the polls in New York for Tuesday primary elections. Registered Democrats and Republicans are casting ballots for U.S. Congress, the state legislature, and judges. One matchup that's getting a lot of attention is the race between incumbent Jamal Bowman and Westchester County Executive George Latimer for a seat that includes parts of Westchester County and the North Brue. Bronx, the polls close at 9 p.m. Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Church has announced its next leader, Kevin R. Johnson, the founding pastor of Philadelphia's Dare to Imagine Church, will be the next senior pastor of Abyssinian. He's succeeding the late Calvin O. Butts. Johnson and his wife addressed Abyssinian's congregants in a video posted on the church's website.

And if you all will have us, our entire family, we will love, to serve you and to be a part of that Abyssinian legacy and help to take Abyssinian further and forward. The church is widely considered one of the most important black houses of worship in the country Johnson is scheduled to start his new job next month. Up next, a housing provider for previously unhoused New Yorkers says they've cut back on costly ER visits by hiring nurses to provide on-site care. That story after the break. On WMYC, I'm Jenae Pierre. Formerly homeless New Yorkers learning to live on their own often still rely on the hospital emergency room for basic medical needs, but a housing provider

says they've managed to cut back on costly and avoidable ER visits by half. WMYC's Karen Ye reports on their approach of hiring nurses to provide on-site care. Good morning, Mr. Moutanil. You can come off. I'll worry you this morning. Nurse Althea Lewis Sewell stands behind a rolling cart stuffed with all kinds of medication, labeled with the name of each resident. She's tucked inside a little alcove in the lobby of a Bronx building that houses about 50 residents who are struggling with mental illness or used to be homeless.

Drink the water and drink the water. Every morning she supervises residents taking their medication for diabetes, high blood pressure, or depression. She's also there in case residents don't feel well and need a referral to a specialist or a reminder to go see their primary care doctor. What's a little bit of you say? So that's why they don't want to go to wear physical health. But we said it's not being sick. It's about preventing you from getting sick. Her goal is to help residents have some agency over their own health, rather than using 911 as their doctor.

and rushing to the ER for things like a cold or a headache. The program is part of a novel approach by supportive housing provider Urban Pathways, aimed at driving down avoidable ER visits. We're having a health fair. Come get your blood pressure taken, please. Annie Hanford manages the Total Wellness Program at Urban Pathways. Instead of just responding to emergent care,

we really want people to engage in prevention, so getting annual physicals, getting vaccines, getting cancer screening. and these are things that have been neglected for years. The privately funded program started in 2015 in the Bronx, when staff noticed residents were frequently and unnecessarily going to the ER, which is eight times as expensive as seeing a doctor. Hospitals say they pass those extra costs onto other services,

which drives up the price for other patients. Now the program has grown to eight buildings and helps 400 people. Urban pathways also expanded their approach. It includes walking groups, yoga, a buddy system to go grocery store shopping, Uber rights to the doctor's office, or workshops on nutrition and better sleeping habits. And unfortunately, they don't have a lot of structure in their lives, which is something we try very hard to help them with.

Last year, the organization's avoidable emergency room visits dropped from 100 to 50. And now, 93% of residents are receiving primary care, compared to fewer than three quarters at housing sites without the program. Across the city, Mayor Eric Adams is primarily. prioritizing getting people with mental illnesses off the streets. That includes involuntarily committing those who refuse treatment and disassembling homeless encampments. But Urban Pathways says improving people's health

can ensure those who are homeless or at risk of homelessness can stay off the streets and learn to live on their own. They hope their program can be a model for others. There was a time I was living on $1.85 a day. Like, that's what it came down to. A dollar $8.5 a day for me was three honey buns and two packs around. 41-year-old resident Willie Wood says he can better manage his Crohn's disease after living in a homeless shelter for three years. He's learned to prepare low-cost meals and rely less on processed foods.

He's also learning how to move his body, trying yoga for the first time. I've worked in areas where I see folks come out early in the morning and it's very graceful and beautiful, but, yeah, what does it mean to me? You know, and then it's like, oh, hey, you know what? I can cut down on three doses of Tylenol because my hands work and my else. I'll be all good. Urban Pathways says changing habits can take time, and successes can be small, like a client taking medication every day, or someone who finally agrees to see a therapist, or sometimes they can be much more life-changing, like for a 46-year-old resident Avery Kaiser.

Yeah, I start smoking and drinking, so it's been like three months now. I wanted to do it for myself. I'm looking to do EMS because I'm looking to be a doctor. Kaiser savors a sweet Clementine. He says he takes his medication regularly. is trying to start exercising and now visits his doctor every six months. Karen Yee, WNYC News. New York City is embarking on a top-to-bottom review of its charter, the city's equivalent

of a constitution. A charter revision commission formed by Mayor Eric Adams has been holding public hearings since late May. WMYC's Elizabeth Kim joins us now to explain the process and what could change for New Yorkers. Hey, Liz. Hi, Jean-Aid. So this isn't a new exercise for the city. Why do mayors call for charter reviews and what's come out of them in the past?

That's right, Jeanne. This is not a new exercise. People may remember that former mayor Bill de Blasio undertook a charter review in 2018. That was the year of dueling charter review commissions because the city council formed its own separate charter review commission. But essentially, it's an opportunity to reshue. shape and ostensibly reform city government by gathering feedback from the public and civic groups. The commission will issue recommendations on charter changes, but it will ultimately be city voters who decide because the proposals will be put to them as ballot referendums.

Just to give you a couple of examples, one recent example that's come out of these commissions is ranked choice voting. That got on the ballot in 2019. voters overwhelmingly supported the idea, which represented a big change in the way New Yorkers vote in municipal elections. That's ranking five candidates as opposed to choosing just one. Liz, I'm wondering, do we know what's motivating the efforts behind Mayor Eric Adams? That's a very interesting question. Revious mayors have defined the scope or the mission of charter review commissions. Mayor de Blasio, for example, said that he wanted to tackle campaign finance reform.

Bloomberg, who was a Democrat turned Republican, turned independent, he was very interested in exploring nonpartisan elections. Now, Mayor Adams' formation of this latest commission really caught most people in City Hall by surprise. He hadn't really talked about this initiative much. He announced the commission in late May, and it was the same week that City Council, speaker, Adrian Adams, announced that she was introducing a bill that would give the council more power to approve the mayor's commissioner level appointments. That's called an advice and consent measure. Now, it passed the council earlier this month, and it would effectively alter the balance of power at City Hall, but it requires a ballot referendum because it changes the charter. Now,

here's the catch. If the mayor's commission could present its own set of ballot referendums, the mayor could effectively delay the speaker's measure from ever going before voters in November. Wow. You know, it sounds a bit like political gamesmanship by the mayor, but let's talk about this because the commission released its first report on Monday. What is it proposing so far? Well, there's a host of proposals. Most of them seem rather dry and uninteresting on the surface, you know, the changes to the budget and capital process, how film permitting works, increasing the public comment period on public safety legislation in the council. There will undoubtedly be pushback on some of these, especially anything that could curb the power of the council and also potentially interfere with NYPD accountability. The city council speaker, Adrian Adams, she has already accused the commission of being a tool by the mayor to undermine her own advice and consent proposal.

Following the release of the report, she called the commission's report, quote, wholly unsurious. And she says that it's made a, quote, mockery of a very serious process. That's WMYC's Liz Kim. Liz, thanks so much. We'll be following your reporting to find out what happens next. Thanks, Janay. And you, the public, can email your testimony to the commission by 5 p.m. on July 12th at Charter Info at citycharter.n.com or you can testify in person at meetings across the five boroughs over the next few weeks.

Thanks for listening to NYC now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day, for your top headlines and occasional deep dives. I'm Lance Lucky. We'll be back tomorrow. Thank you.