Koch Money: To Take or Not to Take?

Opera lovers who caught a matinee of La Bohème at the Metropolitan Opera House last month later received emails from the Met Opera letting them know that one of their fellow attendees had measles, the opera house has confirmed.

The Met Opera sent a longer, more detailed email to those seated in the person’s immediate vicinity for the April 25 performance, in accordance with guidance from the city health department, said Jen Luzzo, a spokesperson for the Met Opera. The letter advised recipients to get vaccinated against measles if they weren’t already and to keep an eye out for potential symptoms, including a fever and rash.

“If you think you or your relatives have measles, stay home and call your healthcare provider or local health department right away,” read the notice, which the Met Opera shared with Gothamist. A shorter notice emphasizing the importance of vaccination, which was also shared with Gothamist, went out to the other attendees.

It typically takes 11 to 12 days for symptoms to potentially appear after exposure to the measles, and the virus can be contagious up to four days before a rash shows up, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The person who went to the opera with the measles also ate at two Manhattan restaurants and was treated at health care facilities in the borough. City officials said the person is an unvaccinated adult, who tested positive for the virus after international travel.

The health department opted not to issue a broad public alert disclosing the dates, times and locations of these potential measles exposures, instead asking each individual business to communicate with those who might have been affected. City health officials said they are taking this approach because of the low overall risk to the general public due to high vaccination rates and the businesses’ ability to notify employees and patrons.

“There continues to be no reports of secondary cases or local transmission despite the infected person visiting multiple locations,” Chantal Gomez, a spokesperson for the city health department, said Thursday.

The agency confirmed earlier this week that one of the restaurants the person with measles patronized was Norma, an Italian eatery in Hell’s Kitchen — but only after Norma posted about the potential exposure on its Instagram story and caught the attention of news outlets.

Gomez said the Met Opera was able to email attendees who had purchased tickets from the venue, while Norma made a more general Instagram post because it didn’t have diners’ contact information.

Gomez said the city determines whether to issue a broader, citywide alert about a disease exposure depending on factors such as how the disease spreads, immunity levels and businesses’ ability to notify those affected.

Nina Schwalbe, who’s running for office in New York City’s 12th Congressional District on the Upper West Side, posted about the measles incident at the Met Opera on her Instagram story, after speaking with a woman in the neighborhood who said she’d received an email from the opera house about being exposed to the virus.

Schwalbe has had a long career in public health, including as a former professor at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health. She said best practices for alerting people who have been exposed to a virus can vary depending on the circumstances. If it’s possible to directly contact everyone who was exposed, it might make more sense to do that rather than putting out a broad public alert, she said.

“There is a balance between panic and responsible public health,” Schwalbe said. “That's where it really depends on the details of the case.”

Five cases of the measles have been confirmed in the city so far this year and city health officials said all were linked to international travel, not local transmission. Statewide, there have been 10 measles cases this year, including one reported in an unvaccinated child under five in Nassau County earlier this week.

In New York City, the coming of summer can be sensed as much by the warming temperatures as it can by the increasing number of lineup announcements for outdoor performances.

SummerStage released its lineup late last month, and now the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival — the city’s other significant and long-running source of free outdoor music each summer — has also made its lineup public.

Highlights of the 2026 season schedule include “Queen of Percussion” Sheila E., Brooklyn-born father-son DJ duo Saint James Joy, and Grammy-winning rapper Common. The few ticketed benefit shows (which are still free for those within earshot to listen to) include performances from “Godmother of Soul” Patti LaBelle and Gen X rock legends Sleater-Kinney.

In all, Celebrate Brooklyn’s 47th season will feature 15 free shows and three benefit concerts from June 4 to Sept. 19 at Prospect Park’s Lena Horne Bandshell. Entry works on a first-come, first-served basis, but festival organizer BRIC Arts Media encourages attendees to RSVP for shows online beforehand.

The full 2026 Celebrate Brooklyn! schedule below:

• Thursday, June 4: Sheila E., Leon Knight, and DJ Spinna
• Saturday, June 13: Antibalas, KidsRead with Kate Yamasaki, and DJ Marc Bars
• Friday, June 19: Infinity Song, Annie and the Caldwells, Victory Boyd, and DJ Duane
• Saturday, June 20: Wayne Wonder, Lila Iké, and DJ Gravy
• Friday, June 26 (benefit show): Patti LaBelle
• Friday, July 10: EMEL, Mai Elgizouli, Nesrine, Yacine Boulares and the Habibi Festival House Band, and Yalla! Party Project
• Saturday, July 11: Saint James Joy, Pahua, and Puppetmobile
• Saturday, July 18 (benefit show): Royel Otis, and Ax and the Hatchetmen
• Friday, July 24: Cindy Blackman Santana, The Patricia Brennan Septet, and Lucía. (This show takes place on Park Place between Brooklyn and Kingston avenues.)
• Saturday, July 25: BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! at Brower Park with Black House Radio
• Friday, July 31: CARRTOONS & Hailé Supreme, Sofía Valdés, and Julia Zivic
• Friday, Aug. 7: DakhaBrakha, Yeison Landero, Sally Baby's Silver Dollars, and Sunju Park
• Saturday, Aug. 8: BRIC Celebrates Aaliyah: One in a Million
• Friday, Aug. 14: Lyricist Lounge 35th Anniversary
• Saturday, Aug. 15: Yola, Dom Flemons and the Traveling Wildfires, and Cleo Reed
• Friday, Aug. 21: Sasha Velour's NightGowns
• Friday, Aug. 28: Common and Special Guests To Honor the Social Justice Legacy of Harry Belafonte
• Saturday, Aug. 29: Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso Presents Dominican Night at the Bandshell
• Saturday, Sept. 19 (benefit show): Liz Phair & Sleater-Kinney, and The Flannel and The Fury 2026

Gov. Kathy Hochul says she’s reached a “general agreement” on a New York state budget — but major policy proposals still aren’t settled, including Democrats’ plan to tax pieds-à-terre in New York City.

The Democratic governor said Thursday that she has had productive talks with leaders in New York City, but it’s proven tricky to determine a method for assessing the high-value second residences that she and Mayor Zohran Mamdani seek to tax.

As a result, basic details like the rate of taxation or exactly how many housing units will be affected still aren’t settled, the governor and her aides said.

What was supposed to be a victory lap instead laid bare the difficulty of taxing wealthy individuals who employ accountants and lawyers to minimize their bills.

“They have certainly managed the tax system at all levels to their benefit,” said James Parrott, a left-leaning economist and senior adviser at the New School’s Center for New York City Affairs.

Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, a Bronx Democrat, said he had “no details” about the tax. He criticized Hochul for prematurely announcing a budget agreement.

“Even on the policies that she put out there today, some of these things are still incomplete,” he said.

Heastie and Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins had both supported a tax on pieds-à-terre before Hochul said she wanted to tax residences worth more than $5 million whose owners live outside the city. The plan would capture Russian oligarchs who own property in the five boroughs, as well as President Donald Trump, who has a gold-plated triplex on Fifth Avenue, Hochul said.

Parrott, who sat on a commission convened by former Mayor Bill de Blasio to examine the city’s property tax system, said these kinds of properties are generally assessed at a lower value than they sell for.

Hochul described the city’s current property tax system as “bizarre” and said she was trying to find a new way of determining the values at which to apply the new tax. The goal remains to raise $500 million for New York City, she said.

“Properties that are worth $200 million, for example, could be assessed at $7 million,” she said. “We’re looking at the difference between what is currently assessed but also market value.”

James Whelan, president of the Real Estate Board of New York, said the difficulty should give state lawmakers pause. “Poorly designed or hastily implemented taxes risks reducing, rather than increasing, overall revenue for the city, state and the MTA by discouraging investment and transactions,” he said.

Mamdani said he will propose an executive budget on Tuesday. He’s relying on the state to help fill a $5.4 billion deficit, and said that he was satisfied things are moving in the right direction.

“A lot of those conversations are ongoing, and we've said time and again that we're confident in that [pied-à-terre] tax's ability to raise half a billion dollars a year, which will be critical in putting the city back on that firm financial footing,” the Democratic mayor said.

Progressive groups cheered Heastie and said the still-unfinalized budget provided an opportunity to push for income tax hikes and more spending.

Hochul acknowledged that there is no agreement on whether New York taxpayers will pick up the tab for nearly 500,000 people set to lose state-backed health insurance because of a federal law passed last summer.

“We have yet to see details on how New York will close the budget gaps of cities across the state, raise progressive revenue, or stop New Yorkers from losing their healthcare coverage,” Working Families Party co-Director Jasmine Gripper said in a statement.

Fiscal watchdogs said Hochul’s announced $268 billion price tag was too high.

“The governor provided a smattering of details on state finances — but to be clear, we have yet to see a budget,” Citizens Budget Commission President Andrew Rein said. “What we do know is that the budget is bigger, but not likely better for fiscal stability.”

In addition to the question of extending healthcare coverage, another major unsettled variable has to do with sweetening pension benefits for public employees hired after the Tier VI retirement law passed in 2012.

Unions are seeking changes that would let people retire with a full pension at 55 instead of 63 and reduce their required contribution rates. Their plan has a $1.5 billion price tag, much of which would be borne by local governments to which the state is sending bailouts.

Hochul proposed moving the retirement age to 60 and reducing contribution rates by half a percentage point, according to three people familiar with her negotiations with legislators. That idea was rejected, two other people familiar with the talks said, and lawmakers are now trying to reach an agreement on pension sweeteners that will cost around $500 million.

The governor said she is trying to balance the ability to recruit public employees against additional costs.

“We are willing to look at this and make changes, but a much more scaled-back, monetarily, proposal,” she said. “We'll release those numbers as soon as it's absolutely done.”

Jon Campbell, Brigid Bergin and Samuel King contributed reporting.