Ask the Mayor: May 19th Re-Opening, MTA Cops, and Pedestrian Safety

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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning again, everyone. Now, as every week on Friday, it's time for a weekly Ask The Mayor segment, my questions and yours for Mayor Bill de Blasio. 646-435-7280 or tweet a question @BrianLehrer. Good morning, Mr. Mayor, welcome back to WNYC.

Mayor de Blasio: Good morning, Brian. Brian, I have some breaking news for you. Today, according to our health department, positivity level for COVID in this city is at 2.41%. This is the lowest COVID rate in New York City in six months.

Brian Lehrer: That is really good news. It was that 3% positivity threshold that you were at for closing public schools that you had to deal with in the fall. It's been many months, and that is good news indeed.

Mayor de Blasio: Man, it's going in the right direction. Really, this is something to celebrate about how New Yorkers have handled this because folks have been heroic and strong and done the distancing and worn the masks, and also gone out there and gotten vaccinated in extraordinary numbers. We got more work to do, but this is a story of New Yorkers really pitching in and making a difference. Something to be really happy about.

Brian Lehrer: Well, that might change your answer to what was going to be my first question. I noticed that since you were on last Friday, the governor did it again, he one-upped you on something that you initiated. Last Friday here, you were touting your plan to fully reopen the city on July 1st, because by then there would be about 5 million vaccinated New Yorkers you said, and it would be safe enough to do so. First, the governor wouldn't even promise to allow you to do that, but then he announced a full reopening for May 19th, six weeks earlier than your July 1st date. My question was, and I guess still is, since you hung your timing on when enough New Yorkers would be vaccinated, do you think a May 19th full reopening is safe?

Mayor de Blasio: Well, look, Brian, what he's put forward is actually a variety of steps. It's not quite the same as what I said is a full reopening, essentially things back to normal with obviously some exceptions, but basically getting back to normal where we go to things as we always did. The plan the state has is a series of steps over the weeks ahead, still with a variety of restrictions in place. We're going to watch. We're going to watch carefully. Our health leadership is constantly looking at the data. We think everything needs to be based on the data and the science. Today, I feel good. I see things moving in the right direction. Let's keep watching carefully, and we'll make adjustments if we need to.

The most important point is for people to get vaccinated. What we're seeing is folks continue to get vaccinated. I want more and more folks to do it. This is the difference-maker. Everyone now has perfect proof that vaccination was a difference-maker because we went from a situation where COVID was rampant to a situation where it's now on the run, decreasing all the time. The X factor is the level of activation, even with the variants. A reminder to all your listeners, if you haven't yet gotten vaccinated you can walk up at a variety of city sites, including the wonderful site in Times Square that we featured yesterday in our video and the American Museum of Natural History.

You can go to vaccinefinder.nyc.gov to find the site. If you want to make an appointment you can call 877-VAX-4NYC if you prefer to go by phone, but it's time for everyone to contribute to this progress and consolidate it by going out there and getting vaccinated.

Brian Lehrer: Question about another safety, safety on the subways. I've been seeing the reports from our transit desk of several disturbing incidents. Just this week, an off-duty subway worker was slashed in the face on a J train with a box cutter and sent to intensive care. Another person barricaded himself in a conductor's cab on another J train, disrupting subways for over an hour. A conductor confronted someone smoking on a two-train in the Bronx and was knocked unconscious. The NYPD reports major crimes in the subway are down right now, but the NYPD also reports they've been at least 300 assaults so far this year, compared to around 380 last year at this time.

Considering there are more than 3 million fewer riders every day, that would be a high and higher per rider number of assaults significantly. The MTA says it needs more police, you say there enough. Do these recent incidents change your thinking at all?

Mayor de Blasio: No, what's happening right now is clearly at the instruction of the governor. The MTA leadership is fearmongering. I've never seen anything like it, Brian. People constantly saying something isn't safe when it is. I've ridden the subways. So many folks in my life ride the subways all the time. They're overwhelmingly safe. There have been some incidents that truly are troubling. You're right, the individual incidents are troubling, and we need to do a lot to make sure there's not even a single one, but we sent 600 more officers into the subways, we've sustained that. We have a huge amount of mental health outreach and homeless outreach now happening in the subways.

What's really going to help the subways get safer as more and more people riding them, and that's what's happening. New Yorkers are choosing to get back to the subways, ridership is going up every single week. The recovery is going to bring safety with it, and with the other things. Because of a global pandemic we went through unprecedented problems, but now we have a chance to do a really full recovery. The economy's incredibly strong, jobs are coming back quickly. What leaders should be doing is saying, "Hey, we can do this and we're going to make the difference."

They should be rooting for New York City, not trying to undermine the recovery for political reasons. It's absolutely for political reasons, so let's be clear about that. Now that we've put a lot of cops in the subway, you're going to see them, but more importantly we need the people back and the people are deciding, they're voting with their feet.

Brian Lehrer: Marie in the Bronx, you're on WNYC with the mayor. Hi, Marie.

Marie: Yes, good morning, Brian. Good morning, Mayor. Thank you very much for doing this every week, and thank you for the good news on the positivity rate. My question and my concern regarding an outdoor dining structure on my street in front of the laundromat I use and in front of the street tree I mulch, I have been mulching for a few years. The bar-restaurant in January started its outdoor structure covering entirely not just its frontage, which is double at a corner, all the way across the laundromats. They're using everything for their own end. No one can pick up or drop off in the laundromat. They've broken branches of our street tree, they have started the levels their own street tree pit with [unintelligible 00:07:26] .

Because of their construction, the end in front of the laundromat is blocking the flow of water into the storm drain, which is at the other end of the structure, creating a backup and they have been trying to use the pit as a storm drain because it's closest to that end, so I need help.

Brian Lehrer: Where is this?

Marie: Kingsbridge on 231st Street.

Brian Lehrer: Mr. Mayor?

Mayor de Blasio: Marie, thank you. Thank you for raising this. This is exactly one of the things I appreciate about this show and I appreciate about you, Brian, but I especially appreciate about your callers when they raise something that we need to fix and we need to address. This is the voice of the people, so Marie, thank you for caring so much for your community. Please give your information to WNYC. We'll have inspectors come out right away to address this. Look, I think outdoor dining has been amazing. It's going to be permanent and it's going to improve life in the city, and it's going to bring back our restaurant history and hundreds of thousands of jobs and keep them but it also has to be done in a smart way in terms of being good neighbors with everyone around.

If folks can't get to their own laundromat, that doesn't make sense. Obviously, that's unacceptable. For years and years and years, I depended on the laundromat. I understand if you can't get to it, it really destroys your quality of life. We need restaurants to be good neighbors, our nightlife office often is able to go in and mediate situations like this and come up with positive resolutions. We'll get them involved, we'll get department of transportation which handles the sidewalks involved. I think we can find a resolution here quickly. Please let WNYC know how we can reach you today, Marie.

Brian Lehrer: Pat on Staten Island, you're on WNYC. Marie do hold on, we'll take your contact information off the air if you want to give it. Pat on Staten Island, you're on WNYC with the Mayor. Hello.

Pat: Hi, good morning, Brian. Good morning, Mr. Mayor. Mr. Mayor, I hope you're practicing the Dutch reach which we spoke about a couple years ago. This is a Vision Zero topic. Obviously Vision Zero has not been working because we're having more traffic fatalities. Listen, this is the common-sense program that we need to get going. We need a blitz on obstructed windshields. Too many people are driving with suction cup cell phone mounts on their windshield, obstructing the view. They can't see pedestrians when they're turning, they have handicap tags on the rearview mirror. They have air fresheners. They have masks. They have dice, they have stickers all over the windshield.

I see more and more cars driving with front tinted windows and tinted windshields than I have ever seen living in New York City for the past 36 years. I haven't seen one ad from New York City DoD, and I met with the education and outreach department. They have no idea what I'm talking about. How can you have a program called Vision Zero when you don't do anything about suction cup cellphone mounts on windshields.

Brian Lehrer: Pat, I'm going to leave it there, but your question is very clear. Obstructed windshields as a safety hazard. Mr. Mayor?

Mayor de Blasio: Pat, thank you for raising this. You have raised it before and I think you've got a good point here. Look, I will disagree with you profoundly on Vision Zero. Vision Zero undoubtedly has worked. Vision Zero got, like so many other things, thrown off by a global pandemics that changed everyone's patterns, and we saw people using cars more et cetera. We're going to reverse that. There's no question about that, but Vision Zero, for God's sakes. Before the global pandemic, the facts are abundantly clear that we were pushing down the rate of fatalities and injuries consistently, and there's a lot more Vision Zero coming.

In fact, next week we're going to focus on the streets in New York City all week, we're going to talk about new Vision Zero actions, new ways of reimagining the streets in New York City. There's a lot more coming to even deepen Vision Zero, including we got to have more speed cameras, and we've got to have help in Albany passing the legislation. I said it should be in honor of Detective Anastasios Tsakos, passing legislation to protect crash victims, to be tougher on reckless and dangerous driving. There's a chance to do that this year in Albany and help us deepen Vision Zero. To your specific question, I think you have a valid point, Pat.

I'm going to ask the transportation Commissioner Hank Gutman to talk to you directly about this, and see what it will take for us to get more action, whether we need state or city laws or what it would take to be able to reduce some of these obstructions you're talking about. I do see your point. It's a very good moment for us to be acting on these issues, and the commissioner will follow up with you directly.

Brian Lehrer: Pat, thank you for your call. I was going to ask you, and I will ask you now, a more general Vision Zero question anyway, which is based on the number of traffic deaths going up this year. 70 traffic deaths, including 43 pedestrian deaths, up from 26 last year at this time, are the numbers I saw from the group transportation alternatives. The Staten Island, that caller was from Staten Island, the Staten Island advance cites a recent study by a car insurance industry group that named Staten Island as the number one most dangerous place for pedestrians in the United States. All Boroughs but Queens ranked within the top 10 based on the proportion of drivers in each metro area who have received one or more citations for failure to yield to pedestrians. Your reaction to all this?

Mayor de Blasio: I would say we've got a lot of work to do. First of all, Staten Island obviously is the Borough proportionately where people use their cars the most. That's a known fact. That means there's more vulnerability there. Second, we couldn't do all the enforcement we wanted to do because our police resources were stretched thin, many police officers were out because of COVID, et cetera. I want us to get back to intensive police enforcement on speeding, on failure to yield. That was a crucial part of Vision Zero that was working, but we still got to go farther. I think the changes now that we need, deepening Vision Zero, more speed cameras, tougher rules for drunk driving and reckless driving, ensuring that there's much more stringent penalties.

There's still a culture. I talked about this painfully at the funeral for Detective Tsakos. There are still a culture in the city in this country that if you go out and you drive impaired and you hurt someone, you kill someone, it's not treated like other crimes. It's somehow tolerated. People driving drunk every single day in the city, and it's still socially too tolerated in so many ways. The legislation in Albany, the Crash Victims Rights and Safety Act is absolutely essential. This has been strongly supported by Families for Safe Streets. It's been strongly supported by Transportation Alternatives. Within it is Sammy's law, named after a 12-year-old in Park Slope who died because of a reckless driver. It is time to tighten these laws. Vision Zero works but we've got to go even farther is the bottom line, especially in Staten Island.

Brian Lehrer: Two weeks ago on the show, I asked you about the police killing of Kawaski Trawick, who was in a mental health crisis alone in his own apartment. Commissioner Shea found no wrongdoing, so no discipline for the officer who shot him dead. The case was described in ProPublica, based on the officers at the scenes own body cam footage, as containing a more experienced Black officer trying to convince his newer white colleague not to use force before Kawaski Trawick was tased and then shot and killed anyway. ProPublica quoting a former NYPD detective who said they could have waited for help, and just close the door since department policy is to isolate and contain people in crisis when they're alone.

When I asked you two weeks ago, if you support your commissioner's determination of no wrongdoing, you said you weren't familiar enough yet with the details and you would find out more. Do you have a position now on whether that officer acted properly in killing Kawaski Trawick and should not have been disciplined, as he was not?

Mayor de Blasio: Here's the bottom line. I have seen the video now, gotten a lot more information. I'm glad you raised it. I'm glad that ProPublica raised it. I'm concerned. It's a complex situation when you watch it. There's clearly some real efforts to try to de-escalate and address the situation. There is a weapon present in terms of the individual involved. It's a complex situation, there's no question about it, but I am definitely concerned by what I see. The Civilian Complaint Review Board is looking to bring action in this situation. I think that's appropriate.

There should be further investigation, further evaluation of what happened here. Even though I think there are subtleties and problems here, it's not an open and shut from what I can see. The goal in all these cases is to in any way, shape, or form, avoid the use of deadly force. This deserves a fuller investigation. This deserves action by the Civilian Complaint Review Board.

Brian Lehrer: I'm going to give the listeners a little more on this because the case doesn't get much publicity in the media. Here's part of what ProPublica reported from the body cam footage. Officer Herbert Davis, the more experienced officer, told officer Brendan Thompson, "We aren't going to tase him," as Trawick stood about seven feet from them. Thompson fired his taser anyway, as can happen in rage. Trawick, who ran toward the officers, officer Davis again tried to stop his partner, this time from shooting his gun. Officer Davis briefly pushed officer Thompson's gun down saying, "No, no, don't, don't, don't, don't." He said don't five times, but Thompson fire three times anyway, paused for a moment and then fire a final shot.

Trawick died almost instantly, according to ProPublica citing the body cam footage, et cetera. Considering that Commissioner Shea decided no discipline involved, you're concerned, as you're expressing it right now. What does this say about keeping the final authority with the police commissioner to make these disciplinary determinations rather than with a Civilian Complaint Review Board?

Mayor de Blasio: Again, first of all, if you look at all that footage, there's a lot going on. I can understand anyone who says there was numerous efforts to de-escalate. There was, unfortunately, an individual with a weapon and it was a dangerous situation. This is not, again, open and shut. I understand anyone evaluating that who says the officers did what they could do, but the bottom line to me is this still not what we should ideally have. That's what we have to aspire to something better. I don't think he should be dead in the end, and we need something better. This is why we have the Civilian Complaint Review Board.

This is why it is civilian, because they will bring a civilian perspective, and that's why we have oversight. Here's what we need to remember. There is now a discipline matrix. There is now an MOU, a Memorandum of Understanding that Commissioner Shea signed along with the chair of the CCRB, Fred Davie. It binds the NYPD to the due process led by the Civilian Complaint Review Board and to the outcomes that the matrix delineates. I really say to all your listeners, if you care about these issues, read the discipline matrix and this MOU. It's quite clear. I've said and Commissioner Shea said, "We are bound by it. We are sticking to it," period. If that leads to a new outcome, Brian, that will be the ultimate outcome here. I understand why people say because state law. We did not write the state law. I would be entirely in favor of changing state law to make very clear that the matrix is binding. State law still puts, in all police commissioners around the state, the final authority. What Commissioner Shay has done is said he defers to this MOU and to this process with the CCRB and the discipline matrix and that was the right thing to do. This case will now go through that approach.

Brian Lehrer: Maria in Brooklyn you're on WNYC with the mayor. Hi Maria.

Maria: Good morning, Brian. Good morning, Mr. Mayor. Thank you for your successful contact tracer program. I worked for your COVID tracer initiative assigned to the DOE situation room, contacting phobic school staff and parents. My colleagues and I each talk to more than 80 households daily and hear about the financial impact on working mothers due to work absences caused by back-to-back quarantines because of their children's exposure to positive COVID cases, forcing moms to miss work and stay home with minors who cannot be left alone.

We hear about the students' mental and academic distress due to absence from the school environment, from their teachers and classmates. The solution, Mr. Mayor, asking you to increase the current 20% COVID testing in schools to 80% to prevent daily exposures and the revolving quarantine. To identify more cases quickly and prevent the spread from community to schools and schools to poor immigrant families in low-wage jobs and limited English proficiency, who don't understand the messages sent from the schools regarding quarantines.

Some households with multiple kids in the same schools have gone to four quarantines. I know you can't run again, but this is the worst time for you to be leaving us, without seeing through this COVID tracer program. We need your help. These families need your help, please.

Brian Lehrer: Mr. Mayor?

Mayor de Blasio: Yes, Maria, thank you. First of all, thank you for passionately advocating for these families. I really appreciate what you're saying, including folks who really are trying to understand what's happening. It's hard to get the information they need or a language barrier creating a challenge. Thank you for being there for them and thank you for being part of our situation room and our test and trace effort. This effort is going to continue. First thing I need to say, the test and trace effort is going to continue until COVID is done and then it's converting into our new public health corps, which is very important because we're going to take a grassroots approach to public health, going out to communities, educating them in multiple languages, going forward post-COVID.

Maria, please give your information to WNYC so we can follow-up with you on some of the specifics you're hearing. I do want to tell all your listeners, Brian, today in New York city we have 1,632 schools open. Literally every single school open, 1,632. We have a handful of classrooms quarantining. The total number of students right now in the school system quarantining is 955 out of the hundreds of thousands who are going to school today. What has changed profoundly? We got rid of the problematic two-case rule. Obviously, everyone together has been fighting back COVID, the testing programs have worked, tests and trace has worked, situation room has worked, vaccination drive has worked.

Kids are in school now, and it's not being disrupted almost ever anymore because of COVID. That's the good news, but any place that we need to do additional testing, we automatically increase the testing of schools where we see a challenge, but the good news is we're seeing fewer and fewer challenges each day. The positivity level in schools as of yesterday, 0.27%, Almost no one, thank God, with COVID in our public schools right now.

Brian Lehrer: I have a COVID in schools question too, one that's been coming up recently from a number of news organizations. I see a report on Chalkbeat, the education site, that says, with 60% of families still choosing fully remote learning after the recent opt-in period, some of those families will want the option for next school year if they don't trust the department of education's protocols or have vulnerable, sick or elderly relatives at home, et cetera. They say you won't so far give them a clear answer about whether a fully remote option will be an option for students for next year. Can you give them an answer now?

Mayor de Blasio: I'll give them a positive answer. Opening day of school in September is about four months away. I just told you we have the lowest COVID positivity of six months and it's plummeting downward. I think we're going to be an entirely different and better situation already in July. I said July 1st, for a reason, based on all the projections of our medical team, CDC, et cetera, we expect July to be substantially better than now and September to be an entirely different environment. The Chancellor and I have talked about this, we've talked about it with the healthcare team.

We are planning for every single child to be back in school, that is the plan. We'll monitor, and we'll talk to parents and we'll talk to health experts, and we've got a lot of time to make adjustments as we go along, but the plan is for every child to be back in school.

Brian Lehrer: People will react to this however they're reacting, but are you stating today there will be no full-time remote option in September?

Mayor de Blasio: No, I'm saying the plan is for every child to be back in school. Four months is a long time. I think here's the question, the parents want to know if there's going to be a seat for their child in September. I guarantee you right now, there's a seat for your child. We can accommodate every single child. We are moving full-speed ahead with that plan. I think parents should want their kids back in school, honestly, because the entire situation is better now and it's going to be, I think, night and day between now and September. We have a lot of catching up to do. We're planning for every child to be back.

We will pay attention in the meantime to what happens with the healthcare situation, what our healthcare team says. We'll certainly be engaging parents, but it's plan A. Plan A is every single child back in school.

Brian Lehrer: Last caller, and it's a teacher. In fact, while we're on education, excuse me, John Carlo in Brooklyn, you're on WNYC with the mayor. Hello, John Carlo.

John Carlo: Good morning both and yes, I am a teacher and I am looking forward to a full return and full-live instruction next year, but that will mean classrooms that are much more full with limited insulation, sometimes only one door. Briefly, right now students who do not have their measles, mumps, rubella vaccinations are removed from school. Will you pledge with the DOE, now that the vaccines will soon be approved for age 12, will you pledge that students not COVID vaccinated will face the same restrictions as those who do not have the MMR?

Mayor de Blasio: John Carlo, first and very importantly, thank you for the work you do because teachers have been heroic throughout this year. No, honestly, I'm not going to pledge that at all. Right now, we're seeing extraordinary success without yet being able to vaccinate younger kids. We are very, very hopeful, and Brian I'm sure you're talking about this, that very soon we'll be able to vaccinate ,even as early as next week, 12-year-olds to 15-year-olds with the Pfizer vaccine. We're going to act on that the second we get full sign off, and I think a lot of parents are going to come forward.

Then we're hopeful we'll get to the point soon where we can go to even younger kids, but without the benefit of being able to vaccinate kids at that younger level, we're seeing the schools extraordinarily safe right now. We're talking about what's going to be happening in September, fully four months from this day. I feel very good that we're going to be able to have a safe environment with a lot of people vaccinated, a lot more people vaccinated between now and then, but without a requirement. I think that's the right way to go and we'll watch and we'll pay attention to the science. We might make adjustments, but at this moment I think we can achieve it based on all the progress we're making.

Brian Lehrer: John Carlo, thank you for your call. With that, we are out of time except to say that a little birdie told me that tomorrow might be your birthday. Is that true?

Mayor de Blasio: The birdie is right, and it's a challenging birthday, but I'm moving forward with life Brian. I'm enjoying this last day of this phase of life and you know what? It's a beautiful sunny day. Counting my blessings.

Brian Lehrer: May the eighth be with you.

Mayor de Blasio: Well done, well done, thank you Brian.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks, as always talk to you next week.

 

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