Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Holds Media Availability

June 30, 2020

Mayor Bill de Blasio: Well, good afternoon, everyone. We're at a different time today, because this is such an important day for our city – the day that we close down our City budget for next year. The Council – the City Council will be voting later on this afternoon as we prepare for the year ahead. A very, very important day every year, but this day, this year – different than any other way face in decades in this city. In many ways, the toughest budget challenge this city has seen in a long, long time. Remember, we started this discussion with a painful reality. Because of the coronavirus, because of the economic crisis, because of so much that has happened to us – layer upon layer, crisis upon crisis – we have lost so much, particularly in human terms in this city, but we also lost to people's livelihoods. We've lost so any things, including the money that helps our City government to run, including the revenue we depend on to provide basic services to our people. $9 billion evaporated – gone in the course of just a few months. And that's what we've had to deal with here. And it was a challenge when you suddenly are missing $9 billion to come to an agreement to figure out the priorities. It's not easy, but I do want to report that we have reached an agreement with the City Council. The vote is going on later today.

It's been a challenging, but very productive process. I want to thank the City Council. I want to thank Speaker Cory Johnson, the members of the Council, the staff of the Council. Of course, want to thank everyone here at City Hall and our team at the Office of Management and Budget. Everyone worked really, really hard, literally around the clock to get this done and to make sure this was a budget that was, of course, balanced – we were going to live within our means – we were also going to do the things that matter most protect the things that matter most. I always say four things we're focused on now, your safety, your health, putting food on your table and a roof over your head. That's what we need to focus on at this moment of history given all the challenges facing us, that's what this budget does. And this budget also sets our foundation for us to continue the restart of our economy, continue our recovery, but do it in a way that just doesn't bring back a status quo that existed before, but helps us to become a fairer city. So, a lot getting done here, even with the challenges.

So, we're about to start Fiscal Year '21 tomorrow, and the Fiscal Year '21 budget will be $88.1 billion. Contrast that to the budget that I announced at the time of our annual preliminary budget presentation in February, a time that feels like a long, long time ago. At that point, the budget was projected to be $95.3 billion. We've lost so much for the new fiscal year. We lost so much during the fiscal year ending now, but we're still going to move forward together.

So, how did this happen? With some very, very tough decisions – very deep cuts to city agencies. A lot of savings had to be found. Of course, we drew on our reserves, which we never want to do, but this was the moment in history that we needed to do that. So, we had hoped – for months and months, we had hoped there would be a stimulus bill voted in Washington to help New York City, to help cities and states around the country. We thought it would happen in May. We thought it would happen in June. It hasn't happened. We don't know when it will happen. We have to move on without the stimulus. We've hoped for borrowing authority for all from Albany, did not happen. We had to move on without it. New York City on its own, doing what we could do with what we have – something New York City has had to do before in our history, we're doing again. So, we put together a budget that will work within that budget is a billion dollars in labor savings. And I want to be very clear, we're going to get to work with our labor unions to find that billion dollars. We're going to keep working on trying to get that stimulus in Washington, that borrowing authority in Albany. But if we cannot find a way, then October 1st looms as the day we would have to put into effect layoffs. And that's the last resort, to say the least. We do not want it to happen. We're going to fight hard to make sure it does not, but we did have to include it in the budget as a last resort because we had no other options. So, with all these challenges, we still found a way to get to a budget that, again, focuses on your health, your safety, putting food on your table, making sure you have a roof over your head. That's the focus. And let me give you examples – the expansion of NYC Care. NYC Care, guaranteeing that hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers who don't have health insurance or can't get health insurance will still have a primary care doctor and will only pay that which they can pay and will have health care available to them across the board – that now is coming to Manhattan and Queens. This year, in just a few months, will be in all five boroughs. The creation of specialized clinics in some of the communities that have been hardest hit by COVID and clinics that will focus on making sure we stop the spread of disease in some of the areas where it's been most prevalent – this includes Jackson Heights and the surrounding area of Central Queens; Treemont, in the Bronx; Bushwick in Brooklyn, those new clinics coming. And then of course the efforts to feed hungry, New Yorkers. I have to tell you, I've talked to so many people who do this important work. Everyone reports to me, those lines, growing, growing for people who need food. Folks who lost their paycheck, lost their livelihood, and now need food. This has been a primary focus in this budget, and I know the City Council feels the same way. The amount of money we are now committing between the efforts in the fiscal year just ending now and the new fiscal year is approaching a half-billion dollars. That's how much we have had to spend to keep New Yorkers fed, to make sure we do not have a hunger crisis in New York City – $450 million so far and I expect that that number will grow. And I'm sorry that number will grow, but we have to keep fighting to make sure people have the food they need. Their families have the food they need until the day that, thank God, one day our economy will come back, people's livelihoods will come back and we'll be able to see people go on to a much better situation.

So, this budget is about all those basics. And it's also about change, it's also about progress. It's about ensuring that we act in the spirit of social justice. I hear the voices all over the City, calling for justice. I know the City Council does too and we're acting on that call for justice. I believe it is our mission to redistribute resources, to those who need them the most, to act on our values, to say that the community has been hardest hit by the coronavirus and so many other challenges need more. And the truest act of equality is to take resources and give them to those who have the greatest need. And it's time to do the work of reform, to think deeply about where our police have to be in the future, where the NYPD has to be in the future, how we reimagine what the NYPD does to make it ever more connected to the communities it serves. We have done that with neighborhood policing and we need to go farther now in new directions that will keep the City safe, but also really create the trust that we need between the NYPD and our communities. So, look, as we've looked at the question of public safety, I had three ground rules, when we went through all these discussions with the Council to figure out the right way forward. I said, we have to keep the City safe. We have to protect the levels of patrol strength throughout our communities. And we had to make sure that we were really doing something to refocus resources on young people and on communities hardest hit, that we were reinvesting in ways that would help us address a lot of the root causes of the problems we face. I am confident that this budget does exactly that. $1 billion is shifted away from the NYPD in a variety of manners. We will be canceling the upcoming recruit class that would have started in July. And we're going to make sure that patrol strength is consistent by reassignments from administrative duty to patrol duty, by ensuring that the NYPD will make revisions in some of the functions it performs, ceding certain functions to civilian agencies. We're also going to focus on overtime. This has been an area of real concern with many agencies, but obviously with the NYPD. And so, we're going to make sure there are major reductions in overtime expenditures, use that money for other important needs. And we'll be reducing non personnel costs and contracts. All in all, a variety of actions to take a billion dollars and move it to other needs, other approaches. Now, where are we going to focus those reinvestments? Well, particularly on young people. So, summer youth programming – this has been an issue – such an important issue. Look, back in April, we didn't know what the future would bring. We didn't know whether the City would be able to reopen. We didn't know what things would look like. Now, we know that we can really energetically recreate a variety of types of summer youth programming, whether it is online or in-person, summer youth employment, or community centers and youth centers. So, we're going to ensure summer programming for over 100,000 New York City young. That's going to be an investment of $115 million. Another $116 million will go to education. Another $134 million will go to social services and family services in the communities hit hardest by the coronavirus. And another crucial piece – so, this is something I felt very deeply about. You remember back in my State of the City of remarks in February, before the coronavirus. I said, let's focus on young people, let's focus on community centers, recreation centers for young people, let's invest in a way that gives young people more positive options. This is why I think it's so important that we take money from the NYPD's capital program and put it into the needs of our young people and our communities, and particularly young people who are in public housing.

So, $450 million, will go to youth centers and recreation centers focused on communities of greatest need. And this will include money redirected from the plan for a 100th – excuse me, for a new 116th Precinct in Southeast Queens, that money will be redirected to a new Roy Wilkins Community Center in Jamaica, in Roy Wilkins Park. Also, $87 million will be moved to create widespread broadband service in NYCHA for families that don't have it now, that don't have access to the internet. We want to make sure that families and particularly young people are able to bridge that historic digital divide. We're going to invest to answer, to give young people and families the service they deserve in that developments that don't have it now. So, this is real redistribution. This is taking resources and putting them where they're needed most with a particular focus on our young people. And look, it fits what we've been trying to do for years, and it fits the fact that New York City has been leading the way for years in a vision of redistribution, a vision of focusing on young people, a vision of change and reform. These things have been working and now we will go much farther. We can be a safe and fair city. This is the same discussion we've had from the beginning – can safety and fairness walk hand in hand. I've said for most of the last decade, yes, and we've proven it. We're going to prove it again, and this budget will allow us to do so. Two more points today that are not about the budget but are very, very important to note, and then we'll turn to our colleagues in the media.

So, the very important while we are doing this work, many, many New York City graduating high school seniors have a whole different thing on their mind. Their families are thinking about tonight, the virtual graduation ceremony, never before done, obviously nothing on this scale is ever been done before. And we want to honor the class of 2020 that have gone through so much, fought so hard, fought their way to graduation, no matter what was thrown at them, we want to honor them tonight. There will be that extraordinary citywide telecast to show our graduating seniors we care about them. There'll be a number of special guests and performers, and there will also be two keynote speakers and I'm going to announce them now. One deserves the title legend in New York City legend the pride of the Bronx, she makes us proud with everything she has achieved in her career. And the other is famous for his achievements on the baseball diamond, not someone we think of first and foremost coming from our City, but he had the wisdom to become the fiancé of the New York City legend from the Bronx, J-Lo and A-Rod will be our keynote speakers for the virtual graduation. We thank them both, and it's going to be exciting to not miss it tonight at 7:00 PM. We want to thank PIX channel 11 for a broadcasting live. Thank you so much. And you can also watch online NYCclassof2020.com. And again, congratulations graduates, we are very, very proud of you.

Finally, I do what we do every day, our indicators. And as we're dealing with the budget and so many other challenges, this is a great day in terms of our indicators. And it's attributed to all of you for the hard work you have done. So, indicator number one, daily number of people admitted to hospitals for a suspected COVID-19 threshold is 200, today it is 40 patients. Number two, daily number of people in Health + Hospitals, ICU threshold of 375 today's report, 301 patients. And most important, percentage of people testing citywide positive for COVID-19, threshold to 15 percent, today down to one percent, which is wonderful. Congratulations, New York City. A few words in Spanish –

[Mayor de Blasio speaks in Spanish]

With that we will turn to questions from the media. Please let me know the name and outlet of each journalist.

Moderator: Hi, all. Just a reminder that on the phone today, we have Budget Director of Hartzog and Senior Advisor. Dr. Varma. With that, I will start with Dave Evans from ABC7.

Question: Hey Mayor, this is Dave.

Mayor: Hey Dave, how you doing? Dave, I'm hearing phone trouble. Hold on, try again. Dave, try again Dave

Question: Hey, can you hear me now?

Mayor: There you go.

Question: Okay. Sorry. [inaudible] so I pulled over. I want to ask you just a couple of questions. First of all, the police budget, when we talk about a billion dollars, and I know that it's been called a cut, but talking to several Council members, especially those who are no, so far on the budget for tonight. They're saying it's really not a cut, they're just basically shifting money from other things. For example, the reduction in overtime, which you really don't know if you can do. The school safety agents transferring that to the education department, that's really not a billion dollars in cuts. So, could you address that first of all?

Mayor: Yeah. Dave, with a number of items here and they all are savings from the NYPD, and they all represent changes and reforms. First of all, we are doing something that we had to do a lot of work to make sure we could do effectively and safely, which was canceling the July class that does reduce the head count for the NYPD we are able to address that with a number of reassignments and ways of finding efficiencies and changing some of the responsibilities of the NYPD to focus on that, which they do particularly well and moving other responsibilities to the civilian side. The changes that we're talking about many people have said, how do we reimagine— school safety? We're doing that with this plan, how do we reimagine the functions? Where can civilians better do the work we announced previously, moving off the vendor enforcement, there's going to be changes now in homelessness enforcement, a whole lot of things that are fundamental reform. The over half-a-billion dollars that we're taking from the NYPD capital plan and putting into youth centers, recreation programs for young people, broadband access for young people and families.

This is a lot of redistribution, but it's still done in a way that is safe for this city, that is the balance that I said we had to strike, and we have struck this balance.
Question: Mayor, my other – my other question has to do with the Education Department. I've been told that it's you're not laying off teachers, but we're not replacing those teachers who are retiring, and we do have a lot this year because of everything that's going on. And that would save about a billion dollars or the overall cut to schools will be a billion dollars this year. Can you comment on that for me please?

Mayor: Dave, we obviously – and I'll turn to our Budget Director, Melanie Hartzog, in a moment – we are dealing now with a really complex situation with our schools, because we are trying to bring back schools to the maximum on September 10th. We still don't have all the information we need to know the final approach, cause that will have everything to do with what's happening with the coronavirus. We know that there are some kids who are not going to be coming back to school right away, some teachers are not going to be coming back to school right away, there's a lot we have to balance here.

So, there's still work to be done on how we're going to approach the needs we're going to have for educators for September 10th. That is a separate question from the fact that we have a billion dollars in labor savings that are now formally part of this budget, that billion dollars in labor savings, again, that's the equivalent of 22,000 City employees. We're going to work with every union to see if we can find alternative savings and avoid a situation where any of those folks have to be laid off. And again, hoping and praying that we get support from Washington or Albany or both, but that situation is still an open question and that level of layoff would affect obviously every agency. So, let me turn out to give some additional insight to our budget director. Again, thank you to you, Melanie, and your whole team at OMB for extraordinary hard work in recent months. Why don't you pick it up from there?

Melanie?

Director Melanie Hartzog, Office of Management and Budget: Hi. Can you hear me?

Mayor: Yup, there you go.

Director Hartzog: Okay. So, as you said, Mayor, there is no projected layoffs that are included in any of our savings programs pegged for the Department of Education. What we did in the executive budget was actually put a freeze on new hires and actually asking of the agency DOE to hire from the ATR pool for any new positions that are needed within the schools.

Mayor: Thank you.

Moderator: Next we have Matt Chase from Newsday.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. A federal judge on Friday ruled that you must allow outdoor religious observance of any size and 50 percent capacity indoors. Are you now allowing worship under these terms for everyone? Now, to the extent you say your answer is we look to the State, you were a named defendant and have been personally ordered to let worship happen under those terms. And to the extent you say, you're still reviewing the decision you've been under injunction since Friday. So, I'm wondering if you plan to obey a federal judge, or I should say, are you obeying a federal judge at this time?

Mayor: Matt, I appreciate that you gave the question and a series of answers – I'm impressed. We're certainly reviewing the case. We review every case. It's just a very recent decision and a momentous decision. We are coordinating with the state because we coordinate everything with the state when it comes to how we manage the coronavirus crisis. The last I've heard from our lawyers, Matt is by definition when there's a federal judge's decision under these circumstances, it is in effect in the immediate term, but there are still a lot of open questions and obviously the question of how we want to deal with it going forward in the legal process. So I can have our law department update you afterwards on the nuances, but when we're instructed to do something by a federal judge and there's no action to stay that decision, then of course we abide by it. But, in an emergency like this, we still need to keep coordinating with the state to make sure even a federal judge's order still has to be interpreted pragmatically because we're in an emergency situation. Go ahead.

Question: Now, on the budget, what will the NYPD's head count be at the end of 2020? And can you give an example of an NYPD overtime shift that will not happen, that would have happened?

Mayor: Yeah, the case here is that there has to be a reduction in overtime. This is something we talked to a lot of agencies about and we've actually made some real progress with the NYPD and other agencies, reducing overtime. Good management – and we have very good management at the NYPD now – finds ways to use overtime when absolutely needed, but not overuse it. So, there's still going to be a very substantial overtime budget. Look, let me say, I want to make a clear statement that if something absolutely exceptional happens, God forbid, you know something happens an act of God, you know, a disaster, anything like that, it's a whole different discussion when overtime needs go up for very objective reasons, but under normal circumstances, the goal is always to keep reducing the reliance on overtime and I'm convinced it can be done. The, and it's just, again, smart management. You use fewer officers in a certain situation, or you find a way to use the existing officers rather than have people go on an overtime basis.

In terms of the head count, the head count change is that the class in July, and I'm going to double check the number, but I believe it's 1,163, since that class will not proceed – that is the reduction in headcount for the agency. How that gets compensated for, in terms of patrol strength is by reassignments from other types of roles like administrative roles that uniform officers are playing now and by changing some of the responsibilities, if you don't have to do vendor enforcement, if you don't have to do homeless enforcement and a whole bunch of other things, you keep freeing up officers for other types of patrol responsibilities. Final point, Matt, remember that, that class, we couldn't do an April class because of the coronavirus. July was going to be a big class, but the July class was not going to be on the streets until January 1st. So, everything that we're going to do in 2020, there's no impact of the academy in 2020 at this point because of the conditions created by the coronavirus. Everything we're going to do to keep people safe in 2020 is going to be through re-deployments

Moderator: Next we have Yoav from The City.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. I wanted to stay on the NYPD overtime issue essentially, because this is not the first time we heard that their overtime will be kept and I can't recall a time when it's worked successfully. So, what is different this time? What, what measures are you instituting to ensure the cap is kept to? And also, can you provide specific numbers here? What was the overtime initially planned for the amount and what, by how much is it being reduced?

Mayor: I'm going to do the broad stroke because I don't agree with your assumption and then turn to Melanie Hartzog on any details that she has now. Yoav, no, first of all, this broad brush respectfully saying it's never worked before - I disagree; there's been plenty of instances where there was a mandate to reduce overtime and it did work. It's a constant effort. I I've been working in government a while and I can say that I see constant efforts at efficiency. The things we used to do in the past that we don't do anymore is a very long list; much more modern, much more efficient, much more use of technology. There's all sorts of examples of where government's gotten more modern and effective, but also uses overtime less as a result. Also, good management, the NYPD is particularly well-managed today. It has gotten better with every decade and every year and Commissioner Shea is a very smart data-driven modern manager. He is going to find ways to make things happen. I'm just convinced. So, I'm not as – I don't blame you for being a little cynical, but I'm not cynical. I know we can find really substantial savings here.

Melanie?

Director Hartzog: So, the total uniform overtime budget for Fiscal Year 2021 was $523 million and we're going down by $296 million. I believe that answers your last question.

Mayor: Go ahead, Yoav.

Question: Okay, thank you. I also wanted to ask you about that health report from 2017, the draft that, that, that provided the larger number of police of law enforcement related killings in the city from 2010 to 2015. Your administration released that report and touted the transparency of releasing it, but the health department is refusing to provide the names of the 105 or so people who were killed and, and I'm wondering why that is, and if you will kind of allow them to release that information?

Mayor: Yeah, I'm not familiar with the details, Yoav. Obviously, I want maximum transparency if there's a particular privacy issue or something, we obviously have to look at that, but we know, look, this comes back to the central question; are we constantly reducing use of force? I remind you in 2018 the number of situations in which the NYPD used or fired a weapon in an adversarial circumstance was 17 times in the course of the entire year because of the de-escalation training because of the constantly training, the police force and the quality and the professionalism of the officers. So, we've been changing every single year. We've been reducing use of force constantly. Unfortunately, there obviously are some times where to save a life separate from any instance where something happens that we're not comfortable with or was not appropriate. There are instances where an officer to save a life has to use their weapon, but we will make sure that whatever can be made public is made public. I think it's important that there'd be a full accounting.

Moderator: Next we have Christina from Chalkbeat.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor. Thanks for taking my question. My first is about summary youth programming. Can you specify how many slots will go to SYP and how many will go to camps and what the funding for each of those buckets is?

Mayor: Thank you, Christina. So, let me again go the overall number – over 100,000 New York City teenagers will be served this summer with one initiative or another, including Summer Youth Employment. Melanie, we'll go over some of the details in a moment, but the important point here is City Council cared very deeply about this, and I give them credit for that. They want to see the maximum investment in young people. We all were dealing with extraordinarily challenging health conditions and logistics, but as the health situation has improved, we're able to do a lot this summer with young people and some things we'll still have to do virtually, but it still will be good to for young people to have that engagement and to have the financial support that can come with it. So, over a hundred thousand kids will be served. It's I think going to really help as these young people are getting ready for the school year in September, and it's going to really help them because I've gone through so much with the coronavirus. Go ahead, Melanie, on some of the details.

Director Hartzog: Sure. So, SYP/Summer Bridge is about 35,000 slots. Summer camps are 81,000, and then we have our social distancing program, which is 500, and then leading from summer into early fall was our Work-Learn-Grow program, which is about 2000. So, over a hundred thousand spots.

Moderator: Christina, did you have a follow-up?

Question: Regarding the transfer of school safety officers? Can you say what powers, if any, they'll have, can they still make arrests and will they be supervised by principals now?

Mayor: So, Christina, we're going to work through the details with the Department of Education and the NYPD. What's important to understand here is in the first year of the transition there will be a growing leadership function played by school leadership, officers will be trained by the DOE. There'll be a heavy focus on restorative justice social, emotional learning, deeper dialogue with young people. You know, we believe strongly this is an administration that has radically reduced the amount of suspension. I believe it's over 40 percent reduction in suspension. I want to see it keep going down. We've invested a lot in restorative justice, a lot in social-emotional learning. I believe strongly and things like peer mediation, and I think school safety will be more effective if it gets more deeply trained in those approaches and in deepening the dialogue with young people and their families. So, there's going to be a lot of change of approach in the first year and then the full transition and the second year. There still, well, of course, be the ability for NYPD to deal with a situation that is violent or criminal, but the goal here, because that's not the majority clearly the vast majority of situations at school safety deals with can be dealt with in a very different manner is to move more and more to those modern and sort of reform minded practices and to train the agents in how to do that.

Moderator: Next, we have Erin from Politico.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor, is there an NYPD hiring freeze in this budget or is there another class besides the July one that's expected to be hired in this budget?

Mayor: Yeah. Thank you, Erin. So, the July class won't exist. That again takes 1,163 officers out of the head count. The next class is scheduled for October.

Question: That will go forward as normal?

Mayor: Yes. Yeah, yeah. The answer is yes.

Question: And then my other question was aside from the NYPD, can you tell us some of the most significant cuts representing as you've mentioned on several billion dollars since February?

Mayor: Yeah, I'll start and I'll pass to Melanie Hartzog. I mean, we've had to re-examine every agency and ask them to dig deep and find savings. Some savings clearly came from things that just couldn't happen because of the coronavirus but others were more programmatic. So we particularly asked the Department of Education. It's our biggest budget within the city government is the Department of Education. We asked them to dig very deep and we had to add it up of course, to billions of dollars. So, it took pretty consistent, constant effort, but Melanie, you want to give a couple of highlights?

Director Hartzog: Sure. So just in total, across all of the city agencies it's about a 1600 head count reduction, which totals $100 million annually, roughly from fiscal years '21 and out. Mayor, as you mentioned, DOE had savings of $400 million over two fiscal years. Most of that is tied to remote learning and also taking a hiring freeze on central office functions, and then there are some programmatic impacts for instance, in the Department for the Aging. We had initially for senior centers given that they're not operating; we have taken savings there of a couple million.

Mayor: And Erin will get you a more extensive list.

Moderator: Next we have Shant from the Daily News.

Question: Yeah, good morning, Mr. Mayor, or I should say good afternoon. Just wanted to loop back to some of the specifics on the NYPD budget. I mean, the document I got suggests some of these are not real cuts. I mean, $350 million in overtime, I guess it's subject to debate, but then there are items without going into too much detail, like fringe costs for school safety officers being transferred out of the police, as well as crossing guards. You know, that's being counted as about $130 million, but I understand that wasn't really – fringe costs aren't part of the NYPD budget in the first place. So, I guess to translate this into a question why add these costs, which may not be real cuts to say that there's a billion dollar cut and you know, what's the importance of saying there's a billion dollar cut happening as opposed to like $750 million or $2 billion?

Mayor: Shant, look, the most important question here is what are we trying to achieve? And again, if we're talking about the expense side and then talking about the capital side and the impact on people, it's actually $1.5 billion, and the impact on people is going to be very profound. That half billion going to create youth centers and recreation programs, and broadband access for NYCHA residents, particularly young people is going to have a very lasting impact and a positive impact on their lives. It's pure redistribution to those who need it most. It's also another way of fighting crime, and our police leadership will tell you this, anytime, we're investing in young people, we're helping to fight crime a different way, and that again was something I focused on a lot in my State of the City remarks in February. I think the concept of how you find savings is a pure concept. If you are not spending the money on that agency, if money that agency was planning to spend is no longer in their budget, that is savings by any measure. Some is pure headcount reduction, as we said the 1,163-member reduction in headcount, some is reduction in overtime. That's the money that will not be spent. Some is shifting functions to free up officers to do other work so that we can compensate for the reduction in headcount, changing roles. There's not just a question of money. There's the question of reform desire to see roles that can be handled by civilian agencies done that way rather than by the NYPD, the changes in approach to school safety and where school safety will ultimately reside – at the same time, focusing on how we keep kids safe in school. These are all reforms and changes and savings. So, we put together a package that responded to the real concerns of the Council, and it's always been this way, the back and forth between the Council and the executive branch. I was a Council Member. I respect the Council's role. This was something that they thought was crucial to achieve. I said, we can achieve it if we can meet three standards, if we can ensure the city will be safe, keep the actual patrol strength, the real patrol strength consistent, and of course, redistribute money to youth programs and social services. We were able to come together and strike that balance.

Question: Yeah. Thanks for that. Switching gears a little bit, I think a lot of nonprofits are bracing for pain with council members' discretionary funding being reduced. The complaint I'm kind of hearing is we provide vital services. We might, we're looking at getting killed. Why not spread the pain elsewhere? Why not do furloughs or pay cuts for city employees? I mean, I gathered the city layoffs are off the table, but why not find another way to reduce you know, spending on city salaries. Thanks.

Mayor: Yeah. Thank you, Shant. It's a fair question. I just disagree with the assumption. I honor the nonprofits – we've done a lot to invest in nonprofits. They play an extraordinarily important role in this study and I've put my money where my mouth is for seven years on this front, but we're in a crisis unprecedented in the history of the city. The last time we were dealing with this many fiscal challenges was the 1970s fiscal crisis. This has got to be a multi-year challenge and our city workers have been asked to do more and more and more in the midst of this crisis. So no, I'm not turning to city workers and say, take a pay cut, when I'm asking them to save lives and keep this city going. We do have to consider layoffs and furloughs, but not layoffs and furloughs so we can take from our public workforce, which is the essence of how we keep the city going and turn that money over to a nonprofit. That's not the way I see it. I want to give the nonprofits all I can, but I am really concerned Shant that not too long from now, October 1st is not a long way away, if we don't get some combination of labor savings, stimulus, borrowing capacity, then we're at a point where 22,000 city workers no longer have their job, and I don't want to see that happen. That would be the single worst thing that could happen for New York City. So deeply respect the nonprofits, but my focus is going to be on keeping city services, going and city employees in their jobs.

Moderator: Next, we have Marcia from CBS.

Question: Good morning, Mr. Mayor. my question has to do again with police reform and the fact that a lot of the reform groups are saying that the money that you're taking out of the NYPD budget is basically a gimmick fiscal sleight of hand, and they're not happy. What do you say to them?

Mayor: Marcia look, some people are never happy and I'm doing the work every day to make sure that we change the city, that we do real reform, that we listen to the honest desire of people all over New York City for more respect, more social justice. But also, and I know, you know, this Marcia, the deep desire in our neighborhoods for safety and how we strike that balance. I've talked to people all over New York City, not only in the last few months on this issue, but for years and years, they want safety and they want fairness. They want respect from the NYPD but they also want to give respect to the NYPD, they want both to happen. So what we're doing here, I think is profound. When you add it all together, $1.5 billion, money clearly going from the NYPD to youth programs, the way we said. There is a head count reduction. That's a major, major issue, but we're compensating for in a smart way to keep patrol strength consistent. It won't be easy. We're asking a lot of the NYPD. We are, it's a time in history where we're asking a lot of everybody and every agency, but in this case, particularly asking a lot of the NYPD, but the NYPD is up to the mission. I don't have a doubt in my mind. They will find a way to be more effective and efficient, they have for years, and they will keep us safe. And we all understand, we have to answer the real concerns of this moment that people want to see our society progress. And I think by doing this work of reform, it actually also helps us heal. So this is a real world way forward. And Marcia, are they going to be critics on all sides? Of course, but I'm convinced this is real change.

Question: So, Mr. Mayor, I actually have another question that's unrelated. I know you announced that the graduation, J-Lo and A-Rod are going to be performing. Are they going to be performing from Florida where they've been holed up or are they going to be here in New York?

Mayor: I don't know the exact location and I think it's more of a keynote remarks than performing. We will get you those details for sure. But I will say to you, you know, again, I think for our young people who are looking for inspiration after an incredibly tough senior year, like none of us has ever been through this class has been through the hardest, I think to have a woman who came up from the grassroots in the Bronx and has come so far and, you know, amazing, amazing achievements, including the last Super Bowl show, I think it's going to be inspiring for them in particular to hear this daughter of the Bronx who has a great example of what a New York City public school kid or New York City kid can achieve. So I think people would be really, really happy that both of them are a part of it.

Moderator: Next, we have Henry from Bloomberg.

Question: Hello, Mr. Mayor, how are you doing?

Mayor: Good, Henry, how you doing?

Question: I'm doing good. I want to congratulate you for doing – for getting this done. It had to be really hard and I – you know, you take a lot of lumps. I'm going to congratulate you for getting this thing done.

Mayor: Thank you, I appreciate that Henry.

Question: But at the same time, you didn't say that A-Rod is really a son of the Bronx. I know –

[Laughter]

Mayor: Henry, I will not count that as a question. I will simply comment you know, A-Rod. I really respect his achievements and he's doing a lot now as a business leader as well, but I want to differentiate and give full respect to the daughter of the Bronx as someone who's going to be particularly inspirational to our kids.

Question: All right, so that will count as a question because I know people hate how long I take. Here's my question, and it goes to back to the police spending, the overtime amount that's going to be cut just sounds completely unrealistic. I mean, the cops, I believe, drew about $115 million in overtime just from the last spate of protests in the city. So the amount that you're cutting in overtime is a very nice goal, but how are you going to achieve that?

Mayor: Yeah, look, we're going to have some exceptional moments and we're going to have to deal with those unto themselves. What we're talking about is the kind of overtime that is normally relied upon. I had this conversation with the Speaker of the Council and he and I both believe that of course we can do better, and in a big way do better on overtime because historically we know that agencies still have more to give when it comes to overtime. And this has been an ongoing effort, we've seen progress, but look, we're in a massive fiscal crisis, unprecedented since the 1970s. To turn to any agency and say, you're going to have to do things differently because we just don't have it is fair and the NYPD is a very well managed organization, it's one of the best managed agencies in all of city government, one of the best managed agencies anywhere in the country.

So to say to them, guys, you've got to find a way to do better here, it stands to reason. It will be tough. And again, let us pray, there's not an extraordinary circumstance that affect that number, but I know that they can do a lot. I really do. And we got to set that goal. And by the way, that's to get us to the next step. Henry, I think the cloud hanging over all of this is that this is not the end of the budget discussion. We're going to go through the year ahead and we are praying revenue does not go down more, but it might. We are praying for help for help from Washington and Albany. We have no guarantees. I used to think the stimulus was effectively a guarantee as something substantial would happen, I don't believe that anymore. I just have not been shown any evidence. And then we've got the following Fiscal Year, which we already know we're going to be in a deficit of $5 billion or more. So we better do some things differently if we expect to get through all this

Moderator: Last two for today. Next we have Dana from the New York Times.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor, two questions for you. First what – can you talk about why it is you decided to cut $65 million from the Fare Fairs program?

Mayor: Yeah, I'll start and then Melanie Hartzog can join me. It's – I just think the reality of that program, which is a great program, it was an effective, important program. At a period of time, MTA ridership was down to 10 percent of what it had been on. That was a prolonged period of time. I think the whole underlying concept of the program got just disrupted profoundly by the coronavirus and we're not going to see that turnaround in the short term. So Melanie, you want to add? Melanie?

Director Hartzog: I would only add you're exactly right and it was a right sizing and we worked in partnership with the Council, particularly around what the estimates should be.

Mayor: Thank you. Go ahead, Dana.

Question: Thanks. And then my second question is why does it make sense from a, I guess, budgetary or policy perspective to implement a hiring freeze city wide, but not at the NYPD which we'll still see a new class of officers in October?

Mayor: Dana, I hope there's not a misunderstanding here. Hiring freezes are an important budgetary tool. When you have a head count reduction, that's actually even more serious. We're saying very clearly 1,163 fewer officers, because there will not be a July class. That number doesn't get compensated for that class. It's going to – and I'm sorry, because again, under normal circumstances, we absolutely would have wanted to have that class and I know there's a lot of people who are anxiously waiting to join the NYPD and I'm sorry that circumstance has forced this on us, but you're talking about a head count reduction, not a hiring freeze, a head count reduction. And we are able to compensate for that in terms of patrol strength with a variety of other moves, getting people out of desk jobs and on to the street, taking some of the responsibilities, like I said, the vendor enforcement, the homeless enforcement, a bunch of things will change so that we can make the patrol strength work. Won't be easy. We're asking a lot of them NYPD but no we're talking about hiring freezes for agencies across the board in the case of the NYPD, it's a headcount reduction.

Moderator: Sorry, next we – last question for today, we have Julia from The Post.

Question: Hey, good morning – I'm sorry, good afternoon, Mr. Mayor. I'm wondering if counterterrorism within the NYPD is at all taking any hit in the budget cuts, given that there's an ongoing threat to the city and what the PD has done to stop attacks before?

Mayor: You'll remember Julia, that on my watch, we deepened the work of our counterterrorism initiatives, and even though we've been focused on so many other things in the last few months with the coronavirus and so many other challenges, we cannot dismiss the threat of terror. We're still the number one terror target in America. So, we're making sure in this budget that we are protecting our counterterrorism capacity. We have to, in everything we do, figure out how to be as efficient as possible not only because of the challenges as I said in this immediate budget, but what's coming up ahead. And again, if we don't see a stimulus, it's going to be really, really troubling what that's going to mean for this city. But we have to protect the kind of counterterrorism capacity we need for the current circumstance. That is an absolute requirement.

Question: Okay, you said we have to protect it, but will the division or any of the divisions see any cuts whatsoever?

Mayor: Well, again, the focus here is on the, what we've done with the class, which is not the same thing as obviously what we do with counterterrorism. Right now, the way we're finding savings is to cancel the July class, to reduce the overtime that does not directly affect the counterterrorism work. We can get you more detailed, but the essential answer is no, it does not undermine our counterterrorism capacity. I think that's two questions. Okay.

Everyone, let me just finish up here. I want to focus on what has been so much of the discussion in recent weeks and yeah, of course, it's been about the coronavirus. It's been about disparity and a history of unfairness. It has been about the question of policing. It's been about health care. There are so many things that have come together in recent weeks that are deeply, deeply in our mind and certainly the mind of the City Council as we come together on a budget that will make a lot of change in this city.

But if there's one thing that has, I think, struck a chord that has been deeply felt by New Yorkers across the board, it is what our young people have gone through. It is that our young people have experienced something that we would never have wished on them that has been extremely trying for them, even traumatic for a lot of them. And we need to uphold our young people and help them through this moment in history and they're going to inherit this city. We've got to be there for them now. As we all have fought this virus back, and we're not there yet, but we've come a long way. We're in a position to do a lot more for our young people and this is something that city council really passionately said, whatever happens in this budget, we're going to have to shift resources to young people and that's what we're doing.

And I want to be clear. I said it back in February in the State of the City remarks, we need to think differently about how we support young people in this city. We made a lot of changes before, but we need to go a lot farther. The NYPD is going to refocus on helping young people with the same vision that Commissioner Shea put out months and months ago before the coronavirus, the NYPD engaging young people, positively, productively, helping them avoid problems, working with their families. That's going to be a lot of our future. The youth centers that we're now going to open, that we're making a budget priority, taking money from policing, putting it into youth programs.

What I said in February rings true now. Our young people need to be reached, not policed, reached. We need to help them. We need to connect with them. We need to figure out what they need to move forward, how to overcome the challenges and traumas, how to nurture them and support them. And we can do that. We must always have safety and we will in this city, but we're also going to amplify both safety and fairness by reaching our young people more deeply than ever before and that's what this budget is all about. Thank you everyone for continuing to do the amazing work you do every day. I hope you're proud of today's health indicators. It's all because of you. And it's a good, good sign for the future of this city. Thanks very much.