Housing advocates said even the smallest issue — like a burned out light bulb during an apartment inspection or a typo on a form — can delay a family moving out of a shelter and into an apartment by weeks. The pitfalls can happen at nearly every step of the process: from the moment a household applies for rental assistance, to finding an available unit, to the nearly 70-100 pages of paperwork and forms the city requires before giving a final OK. “ We're talking about people's lives,” Mann said. “Every day in shelter is a day too long for a family.” Housing advocates said the municipal voucher program is unnecessarily convoluted, trapping New Yorkers who desperately need a place to live in shelters for too long.

When Daniel Cho crosses the finish line of this year’s New York City Marathon, he’ll join more than 18,000 first-time runners to do so. But this time last year, he was part of a different statistic.

What's a lawyer's obligation to provide the best defense to the worst people?

The time-honored tradition of wagering on elections

The critic Richard Brody presents “Chameleon Street,” a neglected masterpiece of independent film, at WNYC’s Greene Space.