FY 2027 Executive Budget Hearing

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Good morning. Welcome to the New York City Council Executive Budget Hearing on the Committee on Finance, joint with the Committee on Civil and Human Rights and the Committee on Parks and Recreation. At this time, please silence electronics and do not approach the dais. Any questions or concerns, please reach a sergeant at arms. Thank you for your cooperation. Chairs, you may begin.

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Good morning, everyone, and welcome to day two of the Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Budget Hearings. I am CM Linda Lee. Today's hearings will begin with the New York City Commission on Human Rights, followed by the Department of Parks and Recreation. I am pleased to be joined by my colleague CM Sandy Nurse, Chair of the Committee on Civil and Human Rights. We have also been joined today by our colleagues Deputy Speaker Williams, CM Marte, CM Wong, CM Hudson and CM J. Sanchez. And I am not missing anyone? No, I think that is it.

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Welcome. Commissioner Christine Clark and your team, and thank you all for joining us today to answer our questions. On May 1, 2026, the administration released... sorry, Fiscal Year 2026... no, 2027. I am so confused. I am sorry.

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It is only day two. Okay. The administration released the Executive Financial Plan for Fiscal Years 2026 through 2030, with a proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget of $124.7 billion.

The New York City Commission on Human Rights' proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget represents 0.01% of the administration's proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget in the Executive Plan. This is a decrease of $900,000, or 6%, from what was originally budgeted in the Fiscal Year 2027 Preliminary Plan. This decrease is a result of the administration's vacancy reductions, which decreased budgeted headcount by nine, as well as unrestored OTP funding. As of April 2026, the Commission's actual headcount was 29 less than their Fiscal Year 2026 budgeted count.

In the Council's Preliminary Budget response, we called on the Mayor to restore and baseline $410,000 for general operating support. This funding is essential to ensure that the Commission can adequately reach New Yorkers to inform them of their rights, responsibilities and reporting options available to them. We were disappointed to see that our request was not included in the plan. At a time when many New Yorkers feel uncertain about the state of their civil rights protections, it is more important than ever that the Commission on Human Rights is meaningfully supported. A reduction in the Commission's headcount raises concerns. New Yorkers would benefit greatly from quicker case processing, and maintaining and growing staff capacity is key to making that possible. We look forward to hearing from the Commission today about the impact of these budget reductions on its operations and how we can work together to better support the Commission's important work. I would now like to turn it over to my co-chair for this hearing, CM Nurse, for her opening statement.

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Good morning and thank you. My name is Sandy Nurse. I am the Chair of the Committee on Civil and Human Rights. The New York City Human Rights Law is enforced by bringing forward cases of discrimination as well as educating New Yorkers about their rights and obligations. This Executive Plan includes detrimental cuts to the Commission's budget. While the administration is instituting budget cuts across agencies, the Commission faces one of the highest cuts: 10.8% in Fiscal Year 2026 and 6% in Fiscal Year 2027. As Chair Lee charitably said, the Commission's headcount is down, which is extremely worrying given the Commission's charter-mandated responsibilities. The Commission also faces a high vacancy rate of 22%. At a time when there are no federal avenues for New Yorkers fighting human rights violations, it is essential that the administration restores and expands the Commission's headcount. I am eager to hear how the administration believes we can carry out all the work required here with less resources.

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Additionally, as Chair Lee highlighted, the Executive Budget did not include the restoration of $410,000 in Fiscal Year 2027 for general operating support, which is an extremely small amount given the size of the entire budget of this City. This funding is essential for the Commission's outreach and ability to educate New Yorkers on their rights and responsibilities. I am frankly a little concerned and disappointed that the Mayor will not uphold his campaign promise to expand the Commission's budget.

In addition to these issues, we will discuss the Commission's Preliminary Racial Equity Plan, which was published as part of the citywide Preliminary Racial Equity Plan. The Racial Equity Plan is meant to inform the City's budget, and I think we can all agree that there is a lot of concern to see many of the budget changes go against these established goals. I would like to thank the Finance staff, Committee staff, of course the Chair, and my own staff in preparation for this hearing. I am looking forward to the conversation. Thank you, Chair Lee.

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Thank you. Before we get started, I would like to take a quick moment to thank the entire Council Finance Division staff for their efforts preparing for these hearings, especially Ali Stole, Florentine Cab and Caitlin Hagen from Council Finance for preparing today's hearing, Committee Counsel Brian Storeford, my Senior Adviser, and all the Finance analysts and support staff who make it all work. As a reminder, for this year's budget joint hearings, we will take public testimony on all agencies' Executive Budgets on Wednesday, June 10, beginning at 9:30 a.m. I will now turn it over to Committee Counsel to swear in the witnesses for their testimony.

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Commissioner Clark: I do. And Chief of Staff Rios, Louisa: I do.

You may begin. Hello. Good morning and thank you all. My name is Christine Clark, the Chair and Commissioner of the New York City Commission on Human Rights. Thank you to the Chairs and the Committees for holding this hearing on our annual budget.

Since joining the Commission on Human Rights as part of the Mamdani administration, I have worked hard, supported by my talented and hardworking team, including the person I forgot to introduce, our Chief of Staff and Commissioner for External Affairs, Jose Rios. Supported by the talented and hardworking team I was lucky enough to inherit, I have worked hard to show up for New Yorkers every single day and to make real the hopes and dreams of the civil rights movements, ensuring that all the rights and privileges that come with being a resident of this great City are shared equally among all.

While the Department of Transportation fills potholes, we make sure that New Yorkers who use wheelchairs and service dogs are able to utilize the buses that drive over those now-patched potholes. While the City provides housing vouchers for people, we work to ensure that landlords do not turn those people away, so that the promise of those vouchers are fully realized in stable, affordable tenancies. While the City fights to create affordable housing, we fight to make sure that people can keep the jobs they need to pay for that housing, and that families can actually access that housing regardless of their race, religion, national origin, disability, pregnancy and more.

Under the leadership of Mayor Mamdani, we are working hand in hand with other agencies and community partners to make this City more affordable. Since beginning earlier this year, the Commission on Human Rights has obtained over a million dollars in restitution for victims of discrimination, almost all of whom are struggling to make ends meet in this City and to put food on the table every night. We have also obtained over $200,000 in civil penalties. We have obtained almost $350,000 in damages for

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victims of disability discrimination in housing, while ensuring that their landlords actually build the accessible ramps and rails that they need to stay in their homes.

We have obtained over $600,000 in damages for victims of employment discrimination, from race discrimination to pregnancy discrimination to sexual harassment and more. We have also reached a settlement that applies to every single public bus in the City to ensure that people with service animals are able to ride the bus without fear of harassment or intimidation.

Since I began earlier this year, we have also secured long-term affordable tenancies for 31 households who experienced discrimination by landlords because of their housing vouchers. Given that the cost of housing a family in shelter for one year in the City costs around $95,000 a year, by keeping these 31 families housed and out of shelter, we have saved the City nearly $3 million in averted shelter costs. We have secured another 70 set-aside apartments just this year that landlords have agreed, as part of settling an enforcement action with the Commission, to hold exclusively for rental by voucher holders. Each of those apartments and set-asides expands and preserves the stock of affordable housing in the City for the entire life of that tenancy. Another almost 1,000 apartments are currently either occupied by voucher holders or being held exclusively for such renters as part of prior settlements with the Commission. Again, had those families ended up in shelter, as happens to far too many housing voucher holders every year due to unlawful discrimination, the City would be paying over a hundred million dollars a year in shelter costs. The Commission's enforcement actions have saved the City those costs, while most importantly ensuring stable long-term affordable housing for families in need.

Since starting at the Commission, we have also begun systematically overhauling this agency's approach to handling complaints. From soup to nuts, we restructured the agency to move every available resource into intake, enforcement and training, making sure that we dedicate as many resources as we can to enforcing complaints, obtaining justice for New Yorkers and preventing future unlawful acts. In so doing, we are streamlining our intake and enforcement process to ensure that as many complaints are resolved as quickly as possible, and ensuring that our processes remain accessible to all people, no matter what language they speak or what resources they have. We are investing in our intake team, moving more resources into that department and frontloading much of our investigatory work there, to ensure that we are able to move faster and get people the answers they are seeking from us more quickly.

Similarly, we continue to invest in our spectacularly successful Pre-Complaint Interventions team, which focuses on resolving source-of-income discrimination, disability access discrimination and other forms of discrimination before litigation has started. These are some of our most successful programs, where we resolve someone's situation entirely, including getting voucher holders fully leased up, on average within three and a half weeks after they first reach out to us.

We are also looking for other ways to speed up our case investigation processes and ensure that we are able to bring compassionate, culturally competent and community and industry-specific expertise into our investigations process. As a result, we have moved some of our community relations experts into our enforcement division as non-attorney case specialists. This allows people with specialized talent in speaking to the public to lean into those talents in case investigations, and allows our attorneys to lean into their expertise in litigation and trials. Overall, this allows us to move cases faster, communicate more frequently and more accessibly to complainants, and allows us to better meet people where they are and provide them with the timely answers they are looking for.

We have also finally been able to fully staff up our impact litigation team, known as our Commissioner Initiated Complaints team, allowing for more targeted strategic enforcement. We are also growing our mediations program and are in the process of hiring a new Director of Mediations, who will lead the work of expanding and rethinking our mediation program to allow more people to receive just resolutions more quickly.

Finally, we are investing in providing more targeted and accessible trainings with a specialized training team, as well as creating deeper partnerships of trust with movement and community-based organizations to allow us to engage in more strategic outreach to specific industries and communities experiencing a disproportionate amount of unlawful discrimination.

In every change we have made, we have looked closely at the skills and expertise of our staff as well as our civil service titles. We have an incredibly skilled and dedicated team here across the agency, and we do not intend to let one ounce of their talent go to waste. Each and every one of these moves is an analysis of how we can squeeze more enforcement and more justice out of every resource we have, while providing better, more compassionate and accessible services to New Yorkers. We are rethinking the way that we write, the way that we talk, the kinds of notices we provide, ensuring that at every step of the process when people interface with us, they feel heard, they feel respected, they understand what is happening to them, they know what to expect and they feel included.

Of course, not everyone will get the answers from us that they are hoping for. Many terrible things that happen to people are not illegal, as any lawyer can attest. But the number one thing that everyone is looking to government to provide is to know that they have been taken seriously, that their concerns have been looked into, and where possible, that they received restitution. That is what we are overhauling this agency to ensure that everyone who comes to us gets back. We certainly could do a better job with more budget, reaching more people faster. That is just math. But we will do a substantially better job than we have done in the past with whatever we are given.

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Thank you. Okay, so I am just going to start with a few questions. I will go back later because there were a couple of things I wanted to ask clarification on based on the testimony, but I will start with the Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Plan questions.

So it includes a reduction of $200,000 in Fiscal Year 2026, and although this is a one-time reduction, the Commission's overall OTP budget is decreasing for Fiscal Year 2027. So what are the main ways this will prevent you from fulfilling your mandates? I know we talked a little bit about this in the Preliminary Hearing, but given everything that you just talked about in your testimony, there is a lot of work that is part of your mandate as a Commission, so I am just curious to hear your thoughts.

Obviously, we fully intend to fulfill our mandate under any circumstances. Unquestionably, with more OTP funding we could do more things that are funded by OTP: outreach, advertising, communications and things like that. But we intend to meet our mandate in any event.

Okay, so that I totally and fully trust that you will do. But...

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I guess let me rephrase the question a little bit. How is it going to sort of hinder or maybe slow down our process? Like, if you have more OTP, what are some of the areas or buckets of things that you do that would be super helpful?

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Yes, it is manpower.

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Sorry, can I talk about what we do spend OTP on? We spend it on things like outreach campaigns. Obviously we also partner with other City agencies to make use of their OTP budgets to work together, but that is the kind

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of thing we spend it on. The same with things like technology, computer systems. There is a lot of stuff that we spend our OTP budget on, but the vast majority of our budget is personnel.

Okay. Was the reduction part of the Chief Savings Officer exercise, and if so, how was this amount determined?

Yes, some amount of that was part of the Chief Savings Officer exercise. For example, one of the things that we canceled was a contract with a consultant on topics which is something we are not going to do in this fiscal year, but it contributed to the Chief Savings Plan.

Okay, great.

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And at the Preliminary Budget hearing, you testified that the Commission was still finalizing its budget request for the Executive Budget. So which requests did you submit to OMB and were any of them met?

We have submitted a number of requests to OMB since I started, so we are in regular communication and contact. There has been a lot of back and forth.

Okay, can you

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give some examples of things that you would want to prioritize?

We have been asking for help with a new case management system, a very exciting topic, but it is important. As well as obviously more lines.

Okay. A management associate request included $10 million in personnel services funding for a hundred new positions over three years. If allocated, do you anticipate being able to hire all roles within the anticipated timeline?

Yes, I think so.

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Okay. And which titles are most urgently needed?

Every title is urgently needed.

No, I mean, I know. I hear you. As I have said, we have restructured the agency so that it is more nimble with any budget allocation, and so we can staff up and staff down more effectively without dramatically affecting the workings of the agency. That has been one of our goals and I think we have been effective at it.

So it would be scaled up or down?

Yes, okay.

And I understand that your

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request also includes the need for new office space. Can you go into why there is a need for new office space, and how much funding would be needed for the move?

I cannot answer about the funding that would be needed for the move,

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You know, there are a couple of things. One is just basic organizational culture. We are trying to move everyone into the same space so that we can have more... a better workflow and we can involve everybody more in everyone else's work. I think that will squeeze more efficiencies out of our team. And then obviously we are right next to 26 Federal Plaza and that makes it hard for some people to come and visit.

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Us complainants in particular? Yeah.

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Very good point. And it also includes capital funding for a new case management system, which is what you mentioned. So what features are in a new case management system that the current system does not include? I could take up the whole... I mean, I think the most important thing is that the case management system we have now really was not built to be a case management system. It is just a database and it is extremely not user friendly to people who are not database experts. And so we just need a more user friendly system that makes it easier both to automate some of our communications with people, which I understand is one of those people's major complaints about us, which is totally fair. People want to hear about their cases more often, which would make that easier. I think we spend... our database is extremely cumbersome. It can take 20 minutes to run and that is just time we could spend doing something else.

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Because I remember it. I think I asked this question during the prelim hearing, but have there been conversations with especially some of the more nimble, smaller agencies to be able to tap into a pool with other smaller agencies around some of the costs like technology and database systems and things of that nature? Have you had conversations with OMB about that or the possibility of pooling resources together for that purpose?

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We do work with other agencies, particularly on things like communications and campaigns, which I think are important to do both from a principled standpoint to involve as many agencies as possible to have the same voice about what this administration stands for. And so we absolutely love working with other agencies and we do so to also make better use of everyone's budget. No, I think specifically for things like technology we are in conversations with OTI to see if there is capital funds available for this new system. The bulk of the price is the setting up of the new system and then the annual license fee, which would fall under our OTPS.

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Budget. I know that a lot of, especially with technology improvements, there have been a lot of creative solutions that are less expensive than what I have seen out there that have been helping government systems, so hopefully that is something they can look into. And just a clarification: what is the cost of the current database to your budget? I do not know off the top of my head. We can get back to you with what the annual subscription is.

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Okay, that would be perfect.

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And then the one-time addition of City funding of $310,000 in fiscal year 2026 for gender identity rights education in partnership with the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene. How was this program developed? So this particular program came out of legislation from this body. I think it was Int 0120 last year that called on the Mayor's Office for Racial Equity...

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Or equity, racial justice, to do a rights and resources campaign for New Yorkers. And we were named one of the partners for that.

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One of the things, as the Commissioner is talking about how we work with other agencies, is that not every mayoral office or agency has contracting capacity, but they have funds. So we partnered with what is now the Mayor's Office for Immigrant Affairs, who had the funds in their coffers to fund this campaign, and we provided the work and the art and those pieces. So we are very excited to launch that. I am not going to say the date, but soon, during Pride Month. This is on behalf of a larger campaign. This half is just rights for trans New Yorkers, to make sure that not only trans New Yorkers themselves see a message of affirmation that trans rights are human rights, but that also employers and housing providers hear and see that it is illegal to discriminate against someone based on gender expression.

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And do you anticipate continuing the program beyond fiscal year 26? We are having a conversation today about that, hoping to be able to leverage all of our sibling agencies' funds to continue the message. Great.

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Thank you. And I know our Deputy Speaker is going to have follow-up questions on that one. So, just really quickly, my last question is around source of income discrimination. You know...

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And I know I am preaching to the choir, you know this, but it is when the landlord refuses to rent to someone based on their income source, particularly when it comes to government assistance vouchers and things of that nature.

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What percentage of your total complaints filed were related to source of income? I am happy to get back to you with the exact percentage. But what I can share with you all is that it is the highest form of housing discrimination that we see at the agency. And right now, actually, this last fiscal year we are seeing a shift where employment discrimination has historically been the vast majority of our complaints and now housing is creeping up and they are closer than they have been in the past, which makes sense with changes in the federal landscape where folks can report...

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Discrimination. Okay, great. It is good to know that. And have you seen a change in the number of complaints related to source of income discrimination in FY26 compared to FY25? I think you pretty much answered that, but if you have, what do you believe are contributing factors? You just mentioned the federal government. Is there anything logistically that is challenging that? Because I know at least one of the complaints that we have heard, at least from the smaller landlord perspective, is that sometimes the vouchers and the payments through the City take a while to go through and so then they are left sort of not getting paid the rental income as well. And so I just wanted to hear your thoughts, and also the employment requirements. There are a lot of challenges with that too. So I just wanted to hear... I think the increase in source of income cases, I do not think it is...

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Bigger this fiscal year than last fiscal year in a sort of nonlinear way. I think it has been increasing over time...

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For a number of reasons. One of them, I think, being that people know about it more. I remember when it was passed. It was a very hard thing to explain to people how it works, what their rights are, and what landlords and brokers are obligated to do. Brokers are very adept at making people feel small for asking. And so I really think that there has been a huge push by...

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All of government and the nonprofit sector to make people know that that is a right that they have, and that has changed a lot. We do a lot of education with brokers and there is a small core of credible messengers among brokers who really push this as a legal issue. So I think there are other structural things going on, but I think one of the biggest ones by far is just education and letting people know.

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Which is good, and then we just have to make sure the back end of things keeps up with it. Okay, thank you. Okay, thank you, Chair.

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I just want to double down on your comment about the case management system because I know all of us handle an extremely high volume of case management. If it took 20 minutes to do a search I think we would all be revolting, so I think that is pretty abysmal. And I guess I am curious: if you go to OMB and say we have a record of long wait times, we are trying to address these cases faster, this would save us both money because it takes time, saves time for personnel and capacity to get their work done, what is OMB's response to that? Like I said, we are in a continuing conversation, but I am pretty confident about this one. I am confident that it would happen. It is clearly a need that we have. There is a lot of stuff on our end that we need to do to make it happen. It is not going to happen overnight, but I feel we have been in amicable conversation about it.

Okay, that is good to know. So human rights law has expanded, it was expanded well before last year. We keep adding on more rights, which is great for a city and puts us... makes us the world class city that we are. So how do we do all of that work now with $2 million less than you had last year? I imagine in your portfolio of work there is something you have to look at and some things that are going to have to be cut down on. So what are the specific areas that you are going to have to compromise on with $2 million less?

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Let us be totally honest. We do not intend to compromise on anything. We did restructuring that I think is going to be effective. Obviously in doing that restructuring we have prioritized enforcement over other things, but I think that is the appropriate priority given where we are with the Trump administration and the sort of federal rollback of civil rights. I think we have an obligation to focus on the one thing that we do that no one else does, which is providing justice for victims of discrimination, particularly those who cannot afford a lawyer.

We are also, honestly, I think you know I do not come from government and so I do not always know how to do things, but I might be doing things a little bit differently. Part of what we are trying to do is to avoid competing with other agencies in any spaces that we can. So we are leaning heavily on our other partner agencies to do things like outreach and to do things like joint education, and to do as much as we can so that we are not duplicating efforts. And so I really, genuinely, we do not intend to compromise on...

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Anything. So what I am hearing is... and I am drilling down not because I am trying to be aggressive towards you but because I want to be a partner towards you, because I care about this work. So you are restructuring and you are saying we are going to cut down on outreach and communications, which is in line with what advocates said in our prelim hearing, that you all did not have the capacity to carry out outreach and education campaigns, although you are saying this is one of the most effective things that we could be doing, which is letting New Yorkers know that this entity exists. So what agencies are you going to be working with most specifically?

As a long-time legal services lawyer I can say that holistic services are always the most efficient way to provide services. We are leaning heavily on the Mayor's Office of Civic Engagement to be the single point of contact for services throughout the City. I do think that is the most effective and efficient way to do it. I think for a long time this agency tried to do everything and I do not think that was working. It is not sustainable long term and I do not think it is the best use of our resources. So I really intend to lean on the Mayor's Office of Equity and Racial Justice. We are working closely with the Mayor's Office on your rights, et cetera, et cetera, to make sure that we are making the best use of our joint resources rather than us trying to duplicate what I think other agencies are very capable of doing. Heard. And so...

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I do not want to go too far down the rabbit hole because I have a bunch of questions. But when you are saying you are restructuring and focusing heavily on enforcement, what does that look like? In terms of our intake team, we now have a sort of team of non-attorney investigators to do more of the pre-litigation investigational work, so our lawyers can do more of the lawyering. And we now have a specialized team of trainers that all they do is compliance and know-your-rights and know-your-obligations trainings, which we intend to do with our community partnerships team to do more targeted outreach both to small businesses and to community-based organizations and movement-based organizations, trying to find the places where the most civil rights violations are happening so we can do more targeted and strategic outreach.

Okay. And then for headcount, I know the Chair talked a little bit about it, but what roles are you planning to reduce and are any of the vacancies that you currently have filled or in line to be filled? So if you are asking about the vacancy reduction lines that we are losing, the majority of those are attorney...

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Lines. So we have 13 vacancies currently, and those are a few attorney lines, but the bulk is non-attorney enforcement support.

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Folks on our hotline to take reports of discrimination, folks for this newly created role of civil rights case specialists who will help investigate discrimination of any kind, and then a few folks throughout the agency for support. And just a reminder, how many people are currently supporting the...

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Hotline. There are currently eight people and as part of the Commissioner's restructuring we are moving more folks in there, so after we hire up...

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Fully, we should have a team of 15. Okay.

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Between the preliminary budget hearing and today's hearing, have you hired any new employees? Yes, we have hired three new people since then. And then we have, I believe, four people pending approval.

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Okay. And I know we have talked a lot about the attorney positions and that it is hard to recruit and retain folks. What are some of the actions that HR is taking to make those positions more attractive for prospective...

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Employees. I will say that it was in the past hard to recruit attorneys. It is not currently hard because attorneys who care about this work are fleeing the federal government and federal enforcement agencies. But it is hard to retain them. Our salaries can make other jobs more attractive. We intend to retain those attorneys by, in our restructuring, creating more specialized roles that allow lawyers as they go through the lifetime of their career with us to take on more and more responsibility and get more and more litigation training. The thing that we offer that other public interest jobs in the same salary band do not offer is a ton of trial experience, a ton of litigation experience. And that is really what we are trying to do: train people up, give them a lot of real world experience and try to build in some pathways to advancement for them within the...

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Agency. So when folks get a lot of litigation experience and training but not the salary to go along with that, do they not most likely want to leave? Depends on the person. Okay, that is a nice answer. One of the available civil service titles you have is for an agency attorney intern, which has a minimum salary of just over $72,000. How many budgeted versus actual agency attorney interns does the Commission have?

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Agency attorney intern is like a term of art for lawyers who are not yet admitted to the bar. When they get admitted to the bar they do become agency attorney ones, is my understanding. So it is... I do not think it is a...

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Separate... correct, correct. So...

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When you look at agency attorney interns, it is at the bottom of a progression for attorney folks. So it is basically just how many attorney lines do we have funded. I believe we are somewhere around 20 attorneys currently. So at any point, any of those roles could be an agency attorney intern, agency attorney 1, 2 or 3. We do not hire agency attorney interns that we do not intend to turn into agency attorneys once they pass the bar and get admitted. And those...

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Folks actually have a clear pathway to full time.

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Yes, yes, yes. They are full time. Actually, the agency attorney interns are full time salaried benefit employees. They just have two years to pass the bar and be admitted. And then they are at that point eligible to be an agency attorney.

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And is hours and average caseload comparable to other fields? Yeah, I think it is...

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Pretty comparable. So the average attorney caseload is around 40. That is similar to legal services. Okay.

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Just a few more questions. Similar to talking about the attorneys, there are four levels of agency attorneys with minimum salaries ranging from $73,000 to just over $96,000. What type of attorneys do you need the most and which ones impact caseload the most?

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I wish there was a clean answer to this. People have different opinions about whether it is better to hire more mid-level people or just train up the people we have. But we do definitely have a need for more experienced litigators, some more senior level attorneys.

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And you said, how does this impact caseload? I mean...

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Not every attorney on our team does the same thing. Some people specialize more in complex investigations or contexts like impact litigation. So there are different people who have different kinds of skill sets and specialties. But you know, as a general rule, can more experienced attorneys take on more? Yes. Okay.

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I am going to talk about the racial equity plan and then I will turn it back over to the Chair. So in... they released the preliminary plan and the Commission submitted a plan which had short, medium and long term goals. The first goal aims to increase community outreach in the 33 Task Force on Racial Inclusion and Equity neighborhoods by the end of 2026. How many of those neighborhoods is the Commission currently conducting outreach in? Yeah...

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In fiscal year 26 we have conducted outreach in nearly all of them. Happy to give you back the hard data points of which neighborhoods specifically.

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We have been reaching out, but tree neighborhoods have been a priority for this agency for the past two years, and outreach. So with that goal, it was really to concretize and communicate the work that we are already doing. Which ones have you not targeted? Yes, you have a number like out of the 33. Do you think there are like six left or ten left? You have covered two thirds, 50%? Give you an exact

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number right now, but I am happy. I am confident that we have done more than the majority of neighborhoods — they have had direct outreach to them. And then separately, when there are those who do not have direct outreach, we have connections to who are placed in those zip codes.

(00:36:32)

Okay. So in relationship to the decrease in budget, how are you planning to continue that outreach to those remaining neighborhoods?

(00:36:40)

Yeah, I think as the Commissioner mentioned, we are really trying to build pathways with offices like the Mayor's Office for Mass Engagement, the Commission on Gender Equity, all of the agencies that have specific outreach branches that can help us do this work and are close to the ground. And then separately, with our newly created team of community partnerships.

(00:37:04)

We are focusing on having strategic partnerships with movements and organizations in those neighborhoods. The shift here specifically is where this agency wanted to be at the micro level of outreach. We need to be at the macro level of outreach, and we need to start working with folks who have trust from the community and do not have to go over that boundary of trust in government. So folks who are undocumented are more likely to go to someone that they trust, and so we need to be able to equip those with the tools and information they need to serve their community when they come in.

(00:37:40)

So that is the bit of the shift in the strategy. Okay, understood. And just in relationship to the first medium term goal of expanding commission initiated investigations, how many have you launched in fiscal year 26?

(00:37:56)

Our commission initiated team is finally, very recently, fully staffed. So we initiate — there are commission issued investigations and then commission issued complaints and then a whole universe of things in between. We have initiated a bunch of investigations. I am not going to say off the top of my head because I do not know the answer, but I know that we have initiated quite a number of investigations into pay transparency and pay equity issues as well as

(00:38:22)

I do not want to forget them. I think there is only one formal complaint. But when we initiate an investigation, there are really a number of purposes. It could turn into a complaint which turns into litigation, but we also do it as a tool to work with community groups and organizers to help support their work and their goals. So if we see what we think is a violation, we will open up an investigation as part of a larger effort to hold that landlord or that employer accountable. The goal is not always litigation. I mean, as any lawyer can tell you, the goal is almost never litigation. So we open up a lot of investigations, and I think

(00:38:51)

it is like our policy not to talk about them too much, but we have launched probably a dozen or so investigations this calendar year. Okay. Now that we have a fully staffed team, we will do more. And how many — what does a typical investigation require in terms of staff or personnel?

(00:39:09)

It totally depends on the complexity of the investigation. Some things, like a huge landlord like Parkchester, where we think that there are violations happening in like every unit in their portfolio — that is going to take an enormous amount of attorney time, both for investigations and for litigation and for enforcement post-litigation. And then other cases, you know, we are sending out requests for information, it may be only one or two lawyers. It fully depends on the scope and complexity. We intend to have more high impact complex cases that affect larger numbers of people, now that we have a team dedicated to that. That is sort of the whole goal of that team. Again, we intend to sort of work with grassroots organizations to determine what those strategic targets should be and to make sure that we are supporting their work and meeting them where they think we should be. Okay.

(00:39:55)

Understood. I think last question on attorneys — how many are currently on the enforcement team? I think we have 20 staff

(00:40:04)

attorneys now. That is like frontline attorneys, and then we have I think six supervisors and then senior management.

(00:40:11)

And what — in your dream world, what number of attorneys would you want?

(00:40:17)

I would never put an upper limit on that.

(00:40:18)

Or what did you request? What did you request over the three years? We requested for, but I do not know — I do not know.

(00:40:28)

I think I do not have the exact number, but I can tell you 80% of our request was for enforcement

(00:40:33)

staff, but that includes non-attorney staff as well. Correct. Okay, so it includes attorney and non-attorney. Okay. Well, you asked for more than 20, right? Correct. Right. Okay. I just have my last line of questioning before I turn it back to the chair. There are some more questions based on your testimony, but I will come back to you after we open it up. This is on CORE feedback. I am sure you all saw the score that CORE gave you — 24. And for the record, that means it has limited alignment with the racial equity rubric and has goals that lack specificity or measurable outcomes for community impact. So just curious, what is the plan to improve this score and have you started any conversations?

(00:41:22)

Yeah, we are reaching out to CORE to better understand the score. I think one of the things that stands out for us right now as we look at the score is there is no real rubric to measure where points are awarded or where points are taken off. So once we have those conversations, we are happy to align those pieces. But again, those were goals that were set in place as part of the process where I think the Mayor's Office for Equity and Racial Justice and CORE both had opportunities to comment along the process. So we have been in communication with them and we are happy to continue those conversations.

(00:41:52)

But as of now, we do not really understand the score. You take issue with the rubric is what you are saying. Just to understand it. I am just curious. Okay. So they had specific goals. I will not ask about every one of them, but the first one is to collaborate with relevant departments to create training programs for students in correctional facilities, dropouts, young adults, and handicapped or mentally disabled individuals. Do you all have the resources to implement this and the capacity to do it?

(00:42:33)

It is an interesting question. So I am going to answer this from the perspective of someone who only knows the department about educating students. We currently do not have pedagogical staff, so curriculum — we are doing everything we can. Part of the Commissioner's restructuring is creating a team that is dedicated to education on civil rights, so moving folks into roles where their sole job is to think about how we educate New Yorkers and how we disseminate information. As part of that work, there is capacity there specifically. But here is one of the things that I have been taking away from the Commissioner's reorganization: there are needs and there are wants. While wants are negotiable, needs are not. So we have to meet the needs of New Yorkers.

I will say in terms of training, one thing we need to do internally before we do things like that is to make sure our training is accessible. I do not know if you have taken one of our trainings recently, but an agency of fellow lawyers is going to lawyer, and we have to fix that. We have to be able to talk to people. So we are doing a review of all of our communications. I think for training, our goal is not that we are able to train everybody who needs to be trained. Our goal is to make trainings and partner with people so that those trainings can scale.

(00:43:51)

I am a huge believer in the train the trainers model. I think that is right. And as someone who has hosted many know your rights trainings by lawyers, I am always left translating what they are saying. Okay, last one — I had a question on the third recommendation, which is again to provide pathways for youth to report discrimination complaints directly. Have you all considered what this would look like and, again, do you have the capacity and resources to take that on?

(00:44:22)

We are definitely taking that 100% into advisement. So this one

(00:44:25)

— you agree with it, no?

(00:44:26)

We are looking at it. There are limits to, you know, minors filing complaints and such, so we are figuring out what we can do there and what the right approach is and on what basis. So we do want folks to know that anyone at any point can call and give an anonymous tip to the agency. Also, anyone can call us. But in terms of outreach, we have got to figure out what the most effective approaches are. I think there

(00:44:46)

is more to say on that one. Okay. Do you not think it is important? Okay, I will turn it back over to

(00:44:52)

the chair. Thank you. Okay, so we are going to go with a few member questions. Deputy Speaker

(00:45:01)

Williams. Thank you. I have a whole bunch of questions, but the thing I wanted to ask — I was actually reviewing the Mamdani proofing New York City document, and in his document he said that he would fund CCHR $21 million, which is significantly lower than what you have now. I just want to say that I am slightly disappointed by that because I know that combating hate crimes and discrimination across the board was such a pivotal component to his campaign. So I just want to say that, and I just want to say I feel like we went backwards, because we have been fighting really hard the last couple of years and we have had some successes with allocations throughout the last couple of years. So I do not know how we are going backwards. I do hear the restructuring piece and I do not know — maybe sometimes you have to take a few steps back to take a thousand steps forward. Maybe that is what you all are doing, but it does kind of feel like we have moved backwards with the funding.

And then just on the Mayor's Office of Mass Engagement — while I think that the intention of that office is amazing, I am just concerned about stability, because when another administration comes on board, what if they do not have an Office of Mass Engagement? And then what does that mean in terms of your engagement? So I do not know if you have thought about what that looks like if

(00:46:41)

you are relying more heavily on the Mayor's Office of Mass Engagement for outreach. I will say in this world of politics moving very fast, we think about sustainability of what we are doing all the time. It is one thing to change things when I am in charge and another thing if another administration comes in with different ideas. I think our agency is easily weaponized, so we do think about sustainability with what we are doing all the time and trying to make sure that we are not breaking something that works for us now and will not work in the future. So yes, absolutely, we think about that.

(00:47:15)

Okay. So I just want to turn back to some of the questions on the racial equity plan. I know the chair asked a few of the questions. So one of the medium term goals is to ensure current staff salaries meet New York City's true cost of living thresholds by the end of 2028. The true cost of living that was released alongside the preliminary racial equity plan states that the threshold for a single person with no dependents is roughly $70,000. What percentage of staff currently meet these thresholds? Again, I am happy to get back to you with the exact percentage, but I think the majority of our staff is over $70K. The thing that makes the threshold itself very difficult to calculate on a staff by staff level is because it includes household income, and so we do not know how many of our staff are married or have different variables. So what we want to do is focus on the salary, and we have very few staff who are on the lower end of that. We have been working since drafting that goal to move the staff at the lowest end of salary up.

And I know there was some discussion on attorneys, and I know in previous hearings we have always discussed the attorney titles within CCHR, which, sadly, are a bit lower than the Law Department. So I just want to know if there have been any discussions around applying similar Law

(00:48:36)

Department titles to it. We have had conversations about what other titles can be available to us, and so we are hopeful that we can have more titles in our pocket, I guess.

(00:48:50)

Okay. One of the strategies for this goal is to create a hiring committee to assess current hiring practices and operations. Who would be a part of this and would it be existing employees or specific staff for this

(00:49:02)

purpose? We already have a hiring committee, but we are also hiring a new Director of Mediations who will be leading that work along with all of our internal work. It will include our Deputy Commissioner of Enforcement and our Director of Operations and probably Jose. So it is going to include people from all the verticals of our team to make sure that we are doing a good job of applying our own principles to our hiring process. Jose cannot do all of the things, even though I know he tries. That said, will our current staff be compensated for the extra work or is it just going to be something else added to their

(00:49:45)

portfolio? The Director of Mediations role is fully within their job description. Okay. And then for folks who will participate, their workload is adjusted to accommodate it, so it is not additional. Yeah. Okay. One of your long term goals is to improve accessibility at each of CCHR's five offices by the end of 2028. To gauge accessibility, how will the rubric be developed and who will be included in informing the rubric? Has CCHR begun to develop the rubric and what is the deadline for the rubric to be created?

(00:50:23)

So as part of our Chief Savings Officer plan and as well as part of our restructuring, we are trying to centralize more people in the same office. Our borough offices had not been open to the public really on any kind of walk-in basis for a long time. So we are trying to come to people more often. We do mobile intake. We do intake at community groups and things like that. So we are trying to make sure that the offices that we do have open to the public are accessible, and we are working on that. But I do not think it is our plan to have people coming to our five borough offices. I will just want to put a plug in — as you know, the agency that enforces disability discrimination, we have a great team called Project Equal Access, super versed in building accessibility. So we are very excited and lucky to be able to tap into their expertise to help us accomplish this

(00:51:15)

goal. Okay. Just something with CORE — and I know we have had this discussion before about increasing public availability of disaggregated data. So of the data CCHR collects and reports on, how much and what is currently disaggregated? And what steps will you take to ensure that all data is disaggregated? So that is also communicating part of the need for a new case management system, so that we can better run data reports. Right now, our limit to how we disaggregate information is based on either area of jurisdiction or protected category. So we have no automated way right now to drill down into specifics of particular protected categories. We are hoping that with a newly designed system, we will have the capacity to be able to quickly drill down into our data. So that we can say — and when you say, Jose, I am making this number up, I see that 40% of your work is in gender discrimination — how does that actually translate? How much of it is discrimination against transgender individuals? How much of it is discrimination against women? It is so difficult to pull that data right now because it is manual. So with a new system, we are hoping to be able to build into it places where we can pull that type of data. We are also very careful about what data we collect because we are the government and we do not have attorney-client privilege with the people who come to us, so we try to be extremely careful about what data we collect and when we need to collect it.

(00:52:39)

Let me know. Yeah. And then just like a follow-up question on some of the first round of questions that I had about the restructuring of CCHR's engagement, which I do appreciate that approach because, as you know, I have had tons of questions about CCHR's engagement. I know you have a whole entire unit dedicated to community engagement. What type of regular cadence of meetings and collaborations with other agencies do you plan to have? I know, for instance, I remember having a lot of conversations about that and I know that exists already. But as you think to build similar partnerships with other agencies, what does that cadence look like?

(00:53:33)

Yeah, we absolutely want to build a relationship where we have regular standing meetings, whether that be monthly, quarterly or every other month. But then separately, what I think we are really hoping to do here is open the door to have ad hoc things happen and be able to meet more frequently and have relationships where communication just flows naturally. I think with Commissioner Clark, we are seeing that with some of the agencies that we are already working with, where the commissioner-to-commissioner communication is flowing really well. So we just want to make sure that trickles down to the staff level so that our community partnerships team and our intergovernmental affairs team are communicating regularly with folks.

(00:54:11)

Yeah, like when I think of source of income, as an example, I am wondering if a person is getting a voucher, do they also get a one-pager that says, if you have been discriminated against... So does that level, that micro level of coordination exist? We are definitely building that across the different agencies, and I think as well as, you know, pick up the phone...

(00:54:38)

...relationships and to make sure that we can get people the things that they need. So, for example, in source of income cases, we do not consider those cases closed until the person is fully leased up and the voucher is vouching. So we definitely make sure that we have the relationships we need to make that work for people. That is exactly the question, and it is exactly the spirit of the strategy of the reorg: to find people where the entry point actually is. So, like working with corrections for people who are re-entering society, so that there is a chance at housing, a chance at employment, those types of things, and catch them where they are, not where we want to find them.

(00:55:16)

Thank you. Great. I just want to recognize we have been joined by CM Hanif.

(00:55:20)

And with that, we are going to go to CM Hudson as well, and then Council Member... Thank you so much and good morning. I just have a couple of questions, but I wanted to make one note about your testimony. If my math is correct, it appears as though you...

(00:55:46)

...brought in, and maybe that is the wrong terminology, but saved perhaps, or recovered, $2.15 million, whether through restitution for damages or civil penalties. Plus you mentioned saving about $3 million in shelter costs. So first, thank you, great job. The other thing, though, that I did not hear mention of was that you have incurred an almost $2 million cut. I just wanted to note that on the record, because for a small agency that is saving as much money as you are and winning damages and penalties and restitution in the amount of over $2 million, I think the loss of that funding is perhaps misplaced. I will say that.

(00:56:41)

So I wanted to just ask a couple of questions about source of income discrimination, which, as you know, is when a landlord refuses to rent to someone based on their income source, particularly when someone will pay with government assistance. Can you share what percentage of your total complaints filed are related to source of income...

(00:57:04)

...discrimination? So I think we do not have the number on us, but I think it is somewhere around a third. But we can get back to you. Can HRA address source of income discrimination complaints from clients attempting to use City vouchers?

(00:57:26)

I mean, I think, like I said, we sort of... most of our work is with the landlords, to make sure that the landlords are doing the things that they need to do. We work with HRA sort of the same way an advocate would, I think, through the various home-based providers and also contacting them directly when we need to, to make sure that people get leased up. But primarily our enforcement is directed at the landlords and the brokers themselves. There is one direct example I can give you, just concretely: when folks have a voucher and they come to us but their voucher is about to expire, we can speak directly with folks to have those vouchers extended. That is one concrete way, and one way that we track how we help folks obtain housing opportunities.

(00:58:10)

Thank you. And to date, how many source of income discrimination complaints have been filed by people attempting to use City vouchers in fiscal 2026? Can you compare that to the numbers in fiscal 2025?

(00:58:24)

So I would say a healthy percentage of our source of income cases are not complaints that get filed. People call us and we intervene in our early intervention process. In those cases, it depends on what the situation is. If it is with a broker, we may not even know what kind of voucher it is, because it is sort of irrelevant to getting the broker to knock it off. So we definitely do not keep all of the data for every case. It depends, and I do not think we know off the top of our heads, but we can look at what we have and get back to you.

(00:58:51)

Okay, that would be great. And then I have just one last question. Have you seen a change in the number of complaints related to source of income discrimination in fiscal 2026 compared to fiscal 2025?

(00:59:03)

Yeah, we are in the process of pulling together the numbers for fiscal 2026, because what we do, and the Council knows this, is we submit our annual report in September to the Council, which really aggregates all of our work: how many reports we have had, how many pre-complaint interventions we have done, how many complaints have been filed. So we do that annually because, again, our case management system is hard to pull data from. We are at the end of the year, so we will pull the entire year and then we will run comparators to fiscal 2025. But I can just tell you that anecdotally, if you look at the past four years of our data, you can see the increase and you can see how housing is creeping up to be equal to employment discrimination.

(00:59:48)

Okay. And do you have any specific theories on what you believe to be the contributing factors?

(00:59:57)

I mean, I think it is largely on the issue of education, making sure that people know that it is illegal. I think part of what education does is it gives people the power to stand up for themselves. We get a lot more complaints from people who have videotaped their landlord and broker than we ever did before, and that is incredibly effective. So partially it is that. Partially it is the success of our pre-complaint intervention team. They are very successful. Most people, we get them leased up within three or four weeks. That means that more advocates send us more clients, and so part of it is the success of our program. But I think I do not want to pretend that it does not also have to do with the fact that there is more source of income discrimination.

(01:00:37)

Great, thank you both. Thank you. Okay, Council Member, thank you. Chairs, thank you.

(01:00:48)

I do not have a sense, based on reading your testimony, of how many cases you served in the year and what is the breakdown. Like, how many involve discrimination or antisemitism? Do you have that data?

(01:01:04)

Yeah, I am happy to share with you our annual report for fiscal 2025, and when fiscal 2026 is done, I am happy to share that with you as well. It will break down every report of discrimination we have received, including things that fail to state a claim under the Human Rights Law. It will have data for everything that we have done early intervention for. It will have data for every complaint that we have filed.

It will have data on the closures of our cases: how many would have settled, how many we have done a probable cause determination on, how many we have closed administratively, and the metrics of how much in damages we have secured for New Yorkers in that year, usually in the millions, and then how many civil penalties for the City of New York, usually in the hundreds of thousands.

(01:01:48)

Yeah. Okay, that takes me to my next question. With the proposed $2 million budget cut to your commission, how are you going to do your work if antisemitic incidents are up and so is discrimination complaints? How are you going to address that with this budget cut?

(01:02:11)

So, as I said, we have fully reorganized our agency to make sure that we are able to get more enforcement out of any amount that we have, and we do intend to do that.

(01:02:19)

All right. I want to follow up on the antisemitic complaints. Fifty-seven percent of reported hate crimes last year involved antisemitic incidents. What capacity does your agency have for Queens communities that are facing those incidents? Can you talk about that?

(01:02:42)

So I want to make clear that what we do at the Human Rights Commission is civil rights. So that is housing discrimination, employment discrimination, discrimination in public accommodations. We work very closely with NYPD to...

(01:02:53)

...refer hate crimes, but we do not actually handle things that are violent crimes. Part of, I think, the benefit of our intake line as well as our community partnerships is making sure that everyone who comes to us gets the resources they need to go to the place that can help them with whatever their issue is. We do take issues of discrimination, bias, hatred and bigotry towards Jewish New Yorkers very, very seriously, and we do have both the capacity to enforce those cases and we do a lot of outreach on those issues as well.

(01:03:22)

As you mentioned, you work with the NYPD hate crimes task force. So how does it work? Do they refer cases to you, or is it the other way around? We refer things to them and then they take over. We do not have the jurisdiction to be enforcing criminal statutes. So we refer things to them.

(01:03:41)

Okay, thank you.

(01:03:47)

Thank you. Actually, I had a clarifying question, a slightly different way of asking. I fully trust that you are going to fulfill the mandate given despite everything. But if you could give me a sense of what the caseload looks like, and I know it varies because some of them are short-term cases and can be resolved quickly... what is the caseload per person? At a very high level, the average is about 40 cases per person. Okay.

(01:04:23)

But, you know, again, that is not sort of reality in the sense that if someone is at trial with a very complicated case, are they also doing their other 39 cases? Probably not. Other people are absolutely able to be moving through cases because of that. And then with the reduction in the overall budget, how is that going to change the caseload per person? So again, as I am learning in government, there is a difference between headcount and actual physical humans in your agency.

(01:04:52)

Right. So we do not intend for there to be any changes. Okay, so the caseload...

(01:04:54)

...that you currently have right now was already being handled by the same number of folks that were already in positions.

(01:05:02)

And we have brought on a number of attorneys since I started. Okay. And because we have sort of moved... we now have a crew of non-attorney case specialists to do investigations, which will help move attorneys off of the... and to sort of get through their cases more effectively. So, if this is at all helpful, the way the Commission used to operate was that only attorneys were doing investigative work. So with part of the reorg, in trying to use every single resource available to us, including folks who are not attorneys, the enforcement work will also be sharing that caseload.

(01:05:40)

So now, while the average is 40 cases, we have more people who could have an average of 40 cases.

(01:05:45)

It is the same sort of model as, I guess, community health workers or peer support navigators who can help with that work so that the clinical folks can do the other more critical things that they normally do. So it seems to be the same kind of model, where now you are shifting their responsibilities, which is great because then hopefully it builds capacity. It is the same model that the Department of Labor at the federal level and other agencies are doing. There is no reason that lawyers needed to be doing everything.

(01:06:11)

Yeah, perfect. And I am going to pass it back to the chairs. Thank you. Just a couple of questions based on your testimony, and we have talked a little bit about it in prelim, in terms of the pre-complaint interventions team.

(01:06:26)

How many people are on this team now, and how many are you looking to increase it by? And where are we?

(01:06:34)

The restructuring is increasing it by one. Oh. So you have eight and...

(01:06:43)

...you are increasing by one. Okay. And I think you have talked about it before, but what are the types of complaints that are most successful when they go through this process?

(01:06:54)

So historically we primarily do physical disability access. That is like ramps and rails and handbars, as well as source of income discrimination. We are growing our disability access team. That is the one extra. And we are also, because we are bringing on our non-attorney case specialists who will also be able to do a little bit more of the source of income work specifically, because I think that is amenable to people who are going to be new to the investigations practice. We are trying to expand our pre-complaint intervention work to include things like pregnancy discrimination and fair chance housing and other things where early intervention can be very effective, where a phone call from the government saying you are not allowed to do this is helpful.

(01:07:38)

Okay. And then in the pre-mediation... actually, I was wrong about the numbers. It turns out our team is eight and now it is...

(01:07:45)

...nine. Okay, instead of six. Yeah, so eight increased by one to nine. We have our own terminology for everything, so there is like a late interventions team, which does not include our Project Equal Access, though that is also early complaint intervention.

(01:07:58)

So I totally understand. With regard to voucher holders, the pre-mediation team you mentioned normally gets complaints resolved in an average of 3.5 weeks. Are people in that period remaining in emergency housing, or where are those folks during that time typically?

(01:08:18)

It totally depends. So the three and a half weeks covers all different kinds of early intervention. Obviously source of income takes longer, which means that some of our other interventions are done faster. We do source of income for all different kinds of people: people who are in emergency housing, people who are in their housing and are trying to start paying with City Steps to Stay so they are still staying in that apartment. We do tell landlords that they have to hold those apartments. When it is someone who is looking to move into a new apartment, we put a sign on the door. We do everything that we can to make sure that that apartment remains available to them until we are done.

(01:08:51)

Just a few more questions. The new Director of Mediation role that you are looking to hire, what would the civil service...

(01:09:01)

...title be? It is, I believe, Executive Agency Counsel, and I think that is...

(01:09:04)

Right. Okay.

(01:09:08)

Yes. This is kind of interesting, understanding civil service, and in the restructuring I find it such a private sector terminology.

(01:09:16)

I know. I am like, what do we call it? I am like, yeah, is everyone keeping...

(01:09:26)

...their civil service titles? Okay. Part of what we were doing in the restructure is that we had a big mess of civil service titles that was not equitable, where people with different civil service titles did the same job. That is not what we want for people. It is not fair. So part of what we are doing in the restructuring is making sure that people with the same civil service titles are doing the same work, et cetera.

(01:09:46)

And then last question: for the community relations experts that are being moved into more enforcement-oriented roles as non-attorney case workers or case specialists, is this similar to a paralegal role?

(01:10:03)

No, so that is a great question. So the community relations specialists, some of them are becoming the community partnership specialists. That is, again, deeper partnerships. Some who were doing trainings as part of their prior job are now training experts. Some are becoming intake specialists and some are becoming case specialists. The case specialist role really is more of a case detective. It is taking testimony under oath during discovery. It is responding to litigation discovery requests for information, looking through emails...

(01:10:33)

...looking through everything and really trying to figure out and get to the bottom of the case before we decide whether to litigate the case and find probable cause or not. That is the goal. It is a much more involved, on-the-ground kind of work rather than supporting an attorney. It is really being the interface with the complainants and respondents as well. Part of the goal here really was to make sure, because our community relations specialists know how to talk to people and they come with expertise in the industries that we are often working in, that we are bringing that expertise into our case investigations rather than having lawyers, who are not always the best at talking to people, doing that sort of front-line interaction.

(01:11:13)

My questions, but I just wanted to double down on what the Deputy Speaker said in terms of the appearance that we were going backwards. I know she fought really, really hard over the last four years to move the funding dial forward and so I think, perhaps, a new organizational chart — if you could share that with the Council so we can also be part of helping to do that ongoing assessment of how did this reorganization create those efficiencies and how it is helping to sustain or decrease things like that.

I also just loved in your testimony that you brought dollar amounts in terms of what you are able to deliver for New Yorkers. I mean, just highlighting a few: a million dollars in restitution for victims of discrimination, $200,000 in civil penalties, $350,000 in damages for victims of disability discrimination, $600,000 in damages for victims of employment discrimination from race discrimination to pregnancy discrimination to sexual harassment.

I mean, this is life-changing work for people and so if we are short-changing this agency I am really, really concerned. I trust that you came in and you said I have got to take on this project of trying to find efficiencies, and I believe that you are doing it to the best of your ability, but I think that from our point of view whenever we see such cuts and see that you got like the second biggest decrease of all the agencies, that rings alarm bells for us, particularly given the broader political context we are in and the danger — the real danger — that people are facing. We really want to be a partner to you in making sure that we are not losing out on the gains that were made, particularly by the former chair here over the last four years, so that is it for me.

I just want to echo what the chair mentioned about putting dollar numbers to the savings, because I do not think a lot of people fully appreciate it. They are looking at the budget in terms of here and now, but I think what folks — and what I always try to look at — is: if we are investing this now, how much will this save us as a City later in the out years. So I think it is important to keep that lens, which I am glad you mentioned in your testimony. I just commend you on doing a lot with very little and I appreciate that you have been able to address a lot of the concerns and hopefully, moving forward, as the chair and Deputy Speaker mentioned, we can move forward with the budget and actually hopefully see improvement in investments versus going backwards.

(01:13:54)

All right. I think that is it on our part, unless the Deputy Speaker or anyone else had more questions. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you so much.

(01:14:24)

Okay, so we are going to take a recess until our next hearing on Parks and Recreation. Ladies and gentlemen, please settle down. We are going to begin shortly.

(02:00:46)

Thank you. Good afternoon and welcome to the second Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Budget hearing for the day, focusing on the Department of Parks and Recreation. I am CM Linda Lee and I am pleased to be joined by my colleague CM and Chair Ty Hankerson, who is chair of the Committee on Parks and Recreation. We have been joined by our Deputy Speaker Williams, CM Marte, CM Brewer, CM Morano, and on Zoom CM Sanchez, CM Narcisse, and I think that is everyone so far.

So welcome, Commissioner Shimamura and your team. Thank you all for joining us today to answer our questions. On May 1, 2026, the administration released the Executive Financial Plan for Fiscal Years 2026 through 2030, with a proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget for the Department of Parks and Recreation. The proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget represents less than 1% of the administration's proposed Fiscal Year 2027 budget in the Executive Plan, and this is an increase of 4.8% from the $654 million originally budgeted in the Fiscal Year 2027 Preliminary Plan. This increase results from several actions, mostly the baselining of previous one shots, snow removal overtime costs related to this year's blizzards and the Wildlife Conservation Society's funding shortfall.

As of April 26, Parks and Recreation headcount was 236 less than their Fiscal Year 2026 budgeted headcount, for a vacancy rate of 4.6%. In the Council's Preliminary Budget response, we called on the Mayor to add $27.7 million to the Department of Parks and Recreation's budget to invest in critical services, including forestry management, park rangers, stump removal — which is my personal favorite — the Green Thumb Program. Yeah, these are all amazing: City Park Workers, Park Enforcement Patrol.

During a time where social activities are rising in costs, parks remains free to our City residents and provides a space for activities, programs and fellowship. As we all saw, especially during COVID, it really was very, very important as a space for our communities. The Council remains committed to keeping such spaces free and accessible to residents. We were pleased to see that our request was partially included in the plan with some positions being baselined and we are grateful for that step forward.

Today we would like to hear from the Commissioner about the outlook for parks employees who are still uncertain about their employment status and how we can work together to ensure that they are supported. I now want to turn it over to my co-chair for this hearing, CM Ty Hankerson, for his opening statement. Thank you.

(02:04:21)

Good afternoon and welcome to the Parks and Recreation Committee's hearing on the Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Budget for the Department of Parks and Recreation. I am Ty Hankerson and I am the chair of the Parks and Recreation Committee. I would like to acknowledge my fellow Council members who are present here today, to which they were acknowledged already. Today we will be hearing testimony on the Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Budget, which totals a decrease compared to the Fiscal Year 2026 adopted budget. While we still have not reached the 1% mark that was promised by the Mayor during his campaign, this is absolutely a step in the right direction. There is money for tree planting programs, seasonal staff and the adding of more than 120 positions to the baseline. This means that more than 120 people will not have to worry about the existence of their jobs. But there is still work to be done to help the park staff that do not have that same luxury.

While I am very happy about the baselined positions, I do not want to fail to mention the other great parts of this budget: $1.7 million for additional seasonal positions to help out during the FIFA World Cup, $3 million baselined for management funding, $3.7 million for overtime for those parks workers that shoveled snow during the blizzards this year and more than $2 million for tree planting — all great things. But there is always more to be done. The Fiscal Year 2027 Preliminary Budget includes $27.1 million in new needs and other adjustments and $2 million in savings. I am personally very happy to see the expansion of several parks

(02:06:12)

jobs into the baseline and cannot wait to see the remaining one shots baselined as well. The committee is excited to hear testimony related to the Fiscal Year 2027 plan, specifically baselined one shots, lifeguards and concession revenue. Before we begin with testimony, I would like to thank Council staff for their hard work: our finance team, Owen Khodorkovsky and Michael Sherman; our committee staff, Christopher Satori and Pat Mobile; and in my own staff, my chief of staff Marisela Cano and my special adviser Cleave Destiny. I now ask the committee counsel to go over some procedural items and swear in the representatives from the Department.

(02:07:52)

Good afternoon, Chair Lee, Chair Hankerson and members of the Finance Committee and Parks Committee and other members of the Council. My name is Tricia Shimamura and I am pleased to be here today to testify as Commissioner of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation regarding the agency's Executive Budget for Fiscal Year 2027. I am joined today on this panel by several members of our agency's senior leadership. First, I want to recognize the Council for its continued support of our City's open spaces and for championing the importance of parks for all New Yorkers. Thank you for the opportunity to provide an update on our agency's efforts to build and maintain a healthy and thriving park system. The arrival of warmer weather and the spring means we are heading into our peak season when our City's green and open spaces truly come alive and more people get outdoors and take advantage of our amazing parks, beaches and pools to lead happier and healthier lives.

In the two months since we appeared before the Council to discuss the Preliminary Budget, we have been busy delivering results for New Yorkers, striving for excellence in the public realm and proving each and every day that our parks and open spaces are a crucial component to the Mayor's vision to make this a more affordable City, because parks are for everyone. Our playgrounds are for every child. So over the last month we have been proud to unveil the fully reconstructed children's play area at Hamilton Fish Park in Manhattan and the full renovation of Kyler Gore Park in Brooklyn, and break ground on a full reconstruction of Captain Mario Fajardo Playground within Casino Corridor Park in Queens. These projects are creating new play areas for different age groups and abilities, providing exciting new opportunities for children to explore, move and play together.

Our basketball courts are for everyone, and basketball is a lifeblood of the City — let's go Knicks. So we were thrilled to fully open two reconstructed basketball courts at Fort Fort Playground in Washington Walk in the Bronx, made possible from the support of Council and mayoral funds. We also unveiled the newly reconstructed Grant Park, also in the Bronx, a $17 million capital project made possible through the Jerome Avenue Rezoning Initiative, transforming a former road bed and unused lots into 4.7 acres of park with an open lawn area, basketball court and other amenities.

Our cultural institutions, including our City's incredible botanical gardens, are for everyone. So we recently completed a $4.4 million project to transform the pedestrian overpass over the Bronx River Parkway, connecting Bronx Park East residents to the New York Botanical Gardens, one of the world's most distinguished botanical gardens and a New York City cultural treasure.

Our City waterways and shorelines are for everyone and they are critical for the health and safety of New Yorkers and marine wildlife alike. So our Office of Marine Debris Disposal and Vessel Surrendering has been keeping our City waterways clear of marine hazards. We have just announced the expansion of our marine vessel surrender program so we can take in vessels that owners can no longer care for before they become derelict, building on the great progress we have already made in cleaning up over 120 derelict vessels clogging our waterways.

Our public art is for everyone. So we unveiled for the first time a new permanent commemorative public artwork in a New York City park in over five years, installed in Elizabeth H. Berger Plaza in Manhattan, to celebrate the literary legacy of New York's first Arabic-speaking community and shine a light on an often forgotten facet of our City's diverse history.

Our urban forest is for everyone and it serves as an essential living infrastructure to keep our City cool and resilient. So we were proud to stand alongside the Mayor's Office of Climate and Environmental Justice and other partners to announce the City's first ever Urban Forest Plan, a comprehensive roadmap to preserve our tree canopy, plant more trees and cultivate an ecosystem of stewardship. The plan laid out the City's goal of achieving 30% tree canopy cover by 2040 so that every New Yorker can enjoy the vital benefits that trees provide, advancing environmental justice, mitigating heat impacts and improving our quality of life.

Our recreation centers are for everyone. So we have been extremely gratified to see how quickly the local community has embraced the newly opened Shirley Chisholm Recreation Center in East Flatbush, Brooklyn, where we have already enrolled over 11,000 new members. Later this year we look forward to opening the brand new Mary Callie Dalton Recreation Center in Staten Island, as well as reopening well-loved recreation centers after extensive and much-needed renovations, including Lost Battalion Hall in Queens, Owen Dolan Recreation Center and St. Mary's Recreation Center in the Bronx and... Recreation Center in Brooklyn.

Last but not least, our City's swimming beaches are for everyone. Though the weather was not quite where any of us had hoped for this Memorial Day, it was still a great start to the season as we opened up all of our public beaches for swimming. Our tireless maintenance and operations staff are out in full force keeping our beaches and boardwalks clean and our dedicated Parks Enforcement Patrol officers are keeping swimmers and beachgoers safe, as are our incredible beach lifeguards. We are pleased to report that over the weekend, the agency's active lifeguard corps currently stands at 370, a significant increase over this point in time last year. As we continue to train and certify additional new and returning lifeguards, our staffing levels will increase, typically reaching their peak around the Fourth of July after our outdoor pools have opened, and we hope to ultimately exceed last year's staffing peak of 1,082 lifeguards citywide. We were especially thrilled to reopen the beautiful and historic Orchard Beach Pavilion to the public for the first time since 2014. A $14 million reconstruction project advanced in partnership with the New York City Economic Development Corporation restored the historic

(02:13:55)

Architecture of the landmark building, providing greater accessibility and revamped concession and community spaces, enhancing the visitor experience. We are proud to restore the pavilion to its historic glory with a level of investment that properly reflects this incredible beach's place in the hearts of Bronx residents and all New Yorkers.

Turning to the specific topic for this hearing, the Fiscal Year 2027 Executive Budget reflects the administration's ongoing commitment to fiscal responsibility amid economic and fiscal challenges facing the City, while maintaining critical services for all New Yorkers. The FY27 budget is $685.4 million, a $31.4 million increase from the preliminary budget, reflecting the addition of significant new needs expense funding, including, as you mentioned, the $15 million in baseline funding for what was known as one-shot funded staff lines in our natural forest management, maintenance and operations and ranger divisions. This is the first time in recent memory that this funding, typically provided one fiscal year at a time, has been baselined before budget adoption.

The FY27 Executive Plan also provides new funding for continuation of our in-house tree planting pilot program, so we can continue exploring ways to more efficiently green our City and grow our tree canopy, as well as an expansion of our seasonal staffing plan to support increased park usage during the summer's World Cup, Sail 450 and Sail 450 festivities. Our agency's ten-year capital plan is $12.1 billion, including over $93 million in new additional funding to complete necessary repairs on park bridges around the City, which will be managed by our sister agency partner, the New York City Department of Transportation.

Though I am still new in my tenure leading this agency, I could not be prouder of the dedicated Parks employees that give their all to make our park system the very best it can be. I could not be more excited about this coming summer. I will end my testimony with a short history lesson. In the summer of 1936, 90 years ago, New York City held a series of opening ceremonies for 11 new gorgeous outdoor pools, funded and constructed by the Work Progress Administration, a New Deal agency that employed millions of Americans during the depths of the Great Depression, lifting families out of poverty while delivering sorely needed public infrastructure projects to underserved neighborhoods. These 11 majestic pools are still beloved and enjoyed by local New Yorkers, but they stand also as a testament to what government can achieve when it marshals the political will and resources to deliver for its constituents — a level of commitment that our agency strives to honor and embody every single day.

We are going to be celebrating this historic anniversary in some very fun and unique ways as our outdoor pool season kicks off later this summer, so please stay tuned for more details. I hope you all can join us and enjoy some fun in the sun this summer. I want to thank the Council for its support in improving our parks and open spaces for all New Yorkers and for the opportunity to testify today. I would now be happy to answer any questions that you have.

(02:17:07)

Great. Thank you, Commissioner. All right, so let us just get right into things.

For years, I as well as the chair have always been concerned that there were hundreds of people working at the Parks Department whose jobs were funded through one-shot funding. It is very hard to plan, budget and do all of the things that we need to do — hiring, which takes a long time in and of itself — so we know there are a lot of challenges around the one-shot funding.

So in terms of the City park workers and rangers, I know that those were the ones that were baselined. The Parks Enforcement Patrol positions were not. I just wanted to get some insight, if you had any, from your conversations with OMB or the Mayor's Office, as to why those were not included.

(02:18:10)

You know, first and foremost, I want to just lay the groundwork and say that we all understand that this was an incredibly difficult budget year, and that this administration was really focused on delivering a budget that was transparent, fair and balanced. Most importantly, we knew that as an agency we also played a role in this, so I want to recognize first the staff that worked directly with OMB to talk about the needs of the agency, but also our role in overall delivering a balanced budget.

I want to recognize that the $15 million baseline is truly something that has not happened under an executive budget in anyone's actual memory here among Parks employees. So the idea that the Mayor and this administration would step up to baseline these items prior to the adoption of a final budget is really exciting. But certainly I think it was about just overall delivering a complete picture of what was allowed and what could be happening in this budget.

We are very excited. As you mentioned, the rangers — over 50% of our ranger program was in one-shot funding. To have that baselined is game-changing when it comes to this division. Our maintenance workers — we know how important every single maintenance and operations staff member is. I cannot emphasize that enough. So to have 73 additional staffers who are fully included in our ranks is absolutely fantastic news. We know very much the significance of these other divisions — Parks Enforcement Patrol, Green Thumb and others. I can argue all day that every single component of my agency is value-added.

In terms of the Parks Enforcement Patrol, the conversations we are having do sound promising that hopefully those things will get baselined, or if not, then I guess we have to go through the usual process.

(02:20:17)

Yeah. You know, I think our relationship with OMB has arguably never been better. We are very grateful. I think we hear a lot from the administration and are in regular conversations around the significance of all the divisions, particularly the ones that are still one-shot funded. So we are having regular, if not daily, if not twice-a-day conversations at this point around what these units are bringing to our park system and how incredibly valuable they are.

Okay, perfect.

(02:20:48)

And then in terms of the previous ranger one-shots, what was the per-year cost, and when they were baselined this year the total cost was $5.8 million for the same level of headcount? I just wanted to know if you could let us know what the delta of that is caused by.

Sure. I am going to probably defer to our Executive Financial Officer to talk about that shift, but I believe this is really just the same amount of rangers — this is just an increase in their overall salaries, benefits and related lines. But go ahead.

(02:21:21)

David, if you would like to add anything more to that... Okay, well, if I do not have to tell the truth... Okay, so yes. On the money — hold on one second. You have to be sworn in.

(02:21:49)

Yes. Okay. There are additional costs associated beyond the cost of the individuals — for bulletproof vests and equipment that they have, and it is very heavy. So they have actually increased that so we can cover those costs.

Okay, so it is not just the...

(02:22:05)

Personnel. It is also the equipment as well.

(02:22:07)

Okay, got it. Perfect. Thank you.

(02:22:10)

And is there any budget limitation for why Parks Enforcement Patrol officers cannot be baselined, from the best of your knowledge? Or is this something that could be included? I just wanted to get clarification on the baseline.

(02:22:27)

So there is nothing, I guess, legally, logistically or otherwise that would prevent them from being baselined.

Okay.

(02:22:32)

Perfect. Okay, now shifting a little bit to tree planting. The plan included a new need of $2.1 million and 19 positions for tree planting. Would you be able to break down how this money will be spent and how many tree plantings this will support?

(02:22:52)

That is a great question. So to actually provide clarity here, the positions that were funded in the Executive Budget were for forestry management. We have been running an in-house tree planting pilot for at least the last year, if not a little bit longer. This was done for a number of reasons. We are always paying very close attention to the overall contractor market, the cost of these contracts and the ebbs and flows of the tree planting industry, and we are seeing an overall uptick year after year of higher costs associated with tree planting.

Over the last two years we decided to undertake our own in-house tree planting pilot program to see if we could do this work ourselves in-house. It has been going very well. We have been focused in Queens Village with this, and it has been going very well. So we are very excited to have another year of this pilot to continue to see how running our own operation in-house really impacts the overall market.

(02:24:07)

I would love to hear more about that, whether it is more efficient and if you are finding there is less red tape. I am actually going to ask our Assistant Commissioner Ben Osborne for Forestry to come up, just to make sure I did not say anything incorrectly, but also to see if he would like to add anything about how the pilot has been going, since it has been a year and we are very excited to see it undergo another year.

(02:24:27)

Yes. Good morning. We have to swear you in. Yes, I am ready to be sworn in.

(02:24:40)

Thank you, Commissioner, and thank you, Councilmember, for the question and the interest in our in-house tree planting program. As the Commissioner noted, we began planning for this in-house planting program during a time when we were seeing contractor costs increasing and we wanted an alternative to contracted tree planting, partly as a way to control costs.

In the intervening years while we have been working out this plan, we have actually managed to stabilize and in fact reduce our contracted tree planting costs, which we are very proud of. We are also really happy with the initial success of this in-house planting program. To date, this team, which has consisted of 13 people so far, has planted over 1,800 trees in Queens Village, which is a high-need area.

With this additional funding — which covers the headcount as well as associated overtime pay — we are going to be increasing the number of personnel on the team, which will hopefully increase the number of trees that we plant. We are continuing to focus in Queens Village for the time being.

(02:25:51)

The Deputy Speaker and I both represent Queens Village. This is great news for us. And just to confirm, you said 13 positions — I believe the budget has 19 positions. So you are going to increase that. Do you know what the timeline for that would be?

(02:26:05)

We will begin hiring early in the fiscal year.

Okay, great.

(02:26:10)

And what specific titles will be supported by the funding?

(02:26:15)

Those are gardeners as well as supervisory staff.

(02:26:23)

Okay, perfect. Let me...

(02:26:26)

And then do you expect this to be one-shot or fully funded, or hopefully included in next year's budget? I think we are looking at the pilot for the second year, as we do with any of our other pilot programs, where we are very hopeful about the outcomes. We will continue to be in constant communication with OMB and the administration around the results of this, and we will happily bring you back the results as well after the second year.

(02:26:56)

Perfect. And then with the additional funding, because with 13 you are already doing 1,800 trees, how many more trees do you hopefully expect to plant?

(02:27:04)

We are hopefully going to be planting over a thousand additional trees every year.

(02:27:12)

And then just to flag as well — forgive me, but of course our planting season, while we have had some really wonderful planting years and frankly new high peaks in terms of our overall planting, it is always, of course, dependent on weather and the season and what the season brings us.

Okay, perfect. And then going into the savings program — as with all other City agencies, we know that you had to meet the targets that were laid out. Parks met its target through a combination of additional revenue and vacancy reductions. The plan includes additional revenue in FY27 and the out years from tree replacement fees. I just wanted to know how the agency will be updating its fee schedule to secure this additional revenue.

(02:28:05)

That is a great question. Thank you for that. Our goal was very clear from the administration: to look very closely at all the different operations that we have under our portfolio, to look at waste, to never reduce services, but also to look for efficiencies. In so doing, with our Chief Savings Officer, we recognized that some of the tree replacement fees that we were already receiving were not being actually credited as funds going into the general fund, even though they should have been. We are happy and very grateful to be working with OMB to properly give us credit for the funding that was already going into the general fund in order to meet those marks. So that is primarily where we are going. We are not actually increasing any fees across the board. This is really about correctly accounting for what was not being credited to us in the overall general fund.

Okay.

(02:29:02)

And then what is the current fee for tree replacement and what would make up that fee cost? Just one second, I am...

(02:29:10)

I am going to look to Ben while I look this up for you, just in case he has it faster. Go ahead.

(02:29:21)

Thank you. Go ahead. So the average citywide tree replacement fee now is $2,900. As I noted earlier, that is a reduction from previous costs — it is actually 18% lower than it was in fiscal year 2022. We do not know what the fee will be as of yet for the coming year because each fiscal year the fee is based on our contracted costs from the prior fiscal year. So we calculate that after the end of this fiscal year.

(02:29:51)

Okay. And when in the fiscal year does that typically take place?

(02:29:55)

We have to finish up our contracts and then it takes us a couple of months to make sure all those numbers are accurate and update the fees, so late summer, early fall.

(02:30:08)

Okay. And is the breakdown of the tree replacement costs available in terms of the contract cost versus the cost of the actual tree? I do not know that it is broken down in quite that way.

(02:30:20)

Obviously, when the planting funds are delivered to Parks to go ahead and provide those trees, staff is used in whatever way is deemed necessary. So I do not think the payments that are made for replacement are subdivided or broken down in quite that way.

(02:30:37)

Yeah, I was just wondering if you calculated it that way, because obviously there is the fee itself, but within that fee there are usually a lot of other things that go into it, like the cost of labor and other things like that. So I just wanted to know if you had a breakdown of that. We do not have it here currently, but that is something we can follow up on.

Okay, perfect. And then the last question is about the vacancy reduction. It is for 40 positions with savings in FY26 and then in FY27 and the out years. It was, you know, disheartening to see these vacancy reductions after years of the Council fighting against the previous administration's cuts and vacancy reductions at the Parks Department. We had hoped for the 1% of the budget going to the Parks Department, as the chair mentioned. But this is definitely something that the Council included on our side in the preliminary response, so...

(02:31:36)

Has the department decided which specific positions will be reduced, and if so, can you please provide that information?

I want to thank again the Council for their continued advocacy for, of course, increasing our budget. As the head of an agency, you love talking about bigger budgets and bigger capacity. The truth is, with these vacancies, we have been under the 2-for-1 hiring freeze for a while. We have been talking about vacancies for far before this administration, and so the vacancies that we had were not able to be filled. We have worked very closely with OMB to have a lot of close conversations about the positions that we have long had empty versus new ones that are coming up every month, and have come up with essentially a plan to move forward with the ability to fill our positions as they become vacant again.

We are very excited about getting rid of the 2-for-1 piece, and really what your constituents, what our City is feeling right now in terms of our Parks Department, they are not going to really feel any sort of difference in those vacancies because they have been gone for quite some time, since around 2021. You have the data for this, but since that was May 2021, how many positions have been reduced as part of the PEG savings plans and what level of savings were achieved by the

(02:33:05)

reductions? I am sorry, I do not think I have that information available. We will get back to you and follow up with you all.

(02:33:12)

Okay. And what is the current budget and actual headcount for FY26 and FY27? If you could break down the numbers by full time and part time, that would be great.

(02:33:22)

While I flip over to this... our agency full time budgeted positions for FY27 is 5,141. I do have a historical perspective on that for you as well, but that is significantly up. In terms of part time, we have around 3,000 full time equivalent positions, but that results in around roughly 5,000 additional employees, 5,433 to be exact.

(02:33:59)

So 3,050... would you say 5,000? Okay, perfect. Okay, I have a lot of other questions on trees and everything else, but I am going to pass it off to our Chair, Hankerson.

(02:34:13)

Thank you, Chair. Just a few questions. Going back to the one shots, can you please provide a breakdown of the remaining one shots that were not included in the executive plan, along with their funding amounts in FY26 and any supported headcount?

(02:34:30)

Sure. Of the remaining one shots that are still up for question, there are three real buckets: our Parks Enforcement Patrol, our Green Thumb program and stump removal funds, which we are very grateful for. Let me take them in backwards order.

For stump removal, it is approximately $2 million of stump removal. This has not yet been baselined and it also complements $1.4 million of mayoral baseline funding, for a $3.4 million total. The number of stumps that comes out to kind of depends year to year based on the type of removal, but it is somewhere roughly between 4,000 to 5,500 removals per year.

In addition to that, our Green Thumb program one shot funding was in FY26 $2.6 million. For OTP, our Green Thumb program has around 32 baseline year-round lines, and so these 15 additional positions do represent a significant portion of our workforce there. I am happy to talk more about the Green Thumb program and what that does. The one shot OTP funding for this program also goes to tree pruning and removal, or tree removals within the Green Thumb community gardens. I appreciate that. Let me just ask, would you like me to talk about the PEP?

(02:36:12)

No, not yet. Okay. Let us just say if Green Thumb does not receive funding in the adopted budget, what will Parks do with those employees who no longer have jobs? Will they be given jobs elsewhere in the agency or the City? Will they receive severance? What is the plan?

(02:36:30)

Yeah, we would typically in that case, which we hope is not the case, work with each of these individuals to see if they would be eligible to be moved into other open lines or any grant-funded lines we have. We have unfortunately seen this happen in the past where programs or portions of our department are not funded in another year, and so we work very hard to try to ensure that as many of our staff that can be accommodated in other portions of our agency can do so. It is, of course, based on availability of open lines and positions.

(02:37:03)

So if there are no open lines or positions, what happens then? Their lines are only funded until the end of the fiscal year.

They would be without a job. To be clear, will

(02:37:16)

baseline positions be filled

(02:37:16)

by those who are currently employed in those roles, or will they be open to the public to be filled? I am sorry, can you repeat that question? Will all baselined positions be filled by those who are currently employed, or are you opening it up to the public to apply?

(02:37:31)

By and large, unless there is some disciplinary infraction that is pending, which I do not know of any right now, yes, all the positions would be filled by those who have them now. Will Parks continue to push for expanded positions in those areas, or do you feel that you have an adequate amount with the current numbers?

(02:37:49)

As I have said before, more is

(02:37:50)

always more. In leading our agency, we are very thrilled to have the positions that we have. We are really excited about these $15 million of baseline positions, again historic and very, very promising, and a real indication of our value within the City. But of course, we would always welcome more resources whenever available.

(02:38:16)

Does the plan include additional beginning in FY27 for recreation staff? Which centers will these staff be stationed at? Can you provide a breakdown by title?

(02:38:28)

Sure, we are happy to give you a breakdown by title, but at a later date, for a couple of reasons. The plan is funding three different recreation centers: Owen Dolan, St. Mary's and Mary Kelly Dalton. Mary Kelly Dalton is still being built, so we will not be actually hiring until closer to when it is opening up. St. Mary's and Owen Dolan, same thing — we would be hiring a little bit closer to when these are opening up. They are all opening up very soon this year, which we are really excited about. There are a number of

(02:38:59)

lines when it comes to managing recreation centers. We have center managers, deputy center managers, recreation associates, PEP officers, lifeguards, IT folks who are there. So there are a number of different titles that we have, sometimes engineers, resident engineers, depending on new buildings like Shirley Chisholm and others. We are happy to give you that information as it becomes available. We will be making those decisions closer to when we are hiring so that we can really see how, particularly for those two rec centers that are reopening, how that balances out with our existing staff.

(02:39:30)

Is it the practice of Parks to hire from the local community that the rec center is in or being built in?

(02:39:37)

I mean, we would certainly try to as much as possible. I think that we have... I am very proud of my agency's relationship and how we engage with local communities. I think it is really important. I think that we should be continuing to not just rest on our laurels, but push ourselves further and harder to make sure that we are truly a community-based entity and agency that is rooted in the communities that we are very proud and privileged to serve. So certainly with Shirley Chisholm, which is my first big recreation center opening, our first big one in the last 10 years, we are very proud to be working hand in hand with the community. I think our center manager is actually from East Flatbush, if I recall correctly. Not that that is always a mandatory piece, but we are always looking for opportunities to engage more local New

(02:40:22)

Yorkers. We are also excited about the center that is coming to our Deputy Speaker's district very soon as well, so looking forward to that.

(02:40:30)

Groundbreaking this year? This year.

(02:40:33)

She said it, not me. Are there any additional part time staff that will be hired along with the staff that are currently...

(02:40:43)

at the centers? No, what we have presented to us in this year's executive budget is what we will be hiring for.

(02:40:50)

How long does the agency believe it will take to fully hire these positions?

(02:40:55)

I do not think it will take very long. This is something that we are good at doing. We will start the process, I believe, as soon as the new fiscal year begins, as we get closer to these openings.

Just on capital projects: Parks has one of the largest capital budgets of any department, $3.9 billion between FY26 and FY30, yet it consistently has long project timelines and issues with delays, which I know all my colleagues can probably speak to. I have seen this firsthand in my district with Police Officer Edward... at Woodburn Park, conversations that were funded by my predecessor's predecessor, and construction is finally starting next month.

What is the current budget and actual headcount for the capital projects division? Our budget headcount for capital is approximately 450 staffers. I think our actual headcount is 390, with 60 vacancies. 390 with 60 vacancies?

Are there any issues with hiring capital analysts, engineers, project managers, architects? I would not say issues, but there are certainly unique challenges in hiring for these specific positions. Most importantly, we are competing with the private industry when it comes to these roles that are highly specialized, and oftentimes even competing with other agencies for very similar positions. I would say that division is working to get completely staffed up and looking very closely at how we can, to your first point, shave down the time of these capital projects.

I completely agree with you. I think that our capital timeline, I understand the length of time, but I also think it is far too long. However we can work together, and we are talking to our sister agencies on this, because a lot of it does come back to regulatory responsibilities that we have in meeting other rules and laws. We are going to look very collaboratively at how we shape this timeline down. Is there anything that you could suggest?

(02:43:20)

Since, you know, we are here, and I believe most members, if not all of them on this dais, have the same issues when it comes to timelines with capital projects, is there anything the Council can do? Do you have any suggestions for

(02:43:33)

us? Yeah, I really appreciate the question. I think there are a few things. One is that we really should and would love to have an ongoing conversation with you about pieces of legislation that could be moved along. There are pieces of legislation from past administrations and past members of the Council who have talked about various efforts that could potentially shorten this timeline. Without getting too into the weeds, something like suggesting that a vendor gets registered with OMB once as a vendor, but not necessarily re-registered specifically for every project, could shorten timelines for registration, things like that.

We are working with our sister agency, the Department of Design and Construction, as well as right now under my leadership with Commissioner Garcia and others, to look at the SEQR process, which we know has significantly added to our timeframe both in time but also in cost. We are looking at ways that we can shorten that, be it through rule changes or just through maybe even having staffing from different agencies sit within our own agency so that we can streamline these processes. We will happily report to you more on that.

I would also say that a lot of times we see our projects expand in timeline because we see a lot of scope creep. We see a lot of times scope kind of expanding on projects. It is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does complicate the overall procurement and design processes and other things like that. In large part, I would say that is a good thing because we are rooted in community input. We start every capital project with community input. I think we are the only agency that does so, and that also means that because we are many times going back to the community, we are adjusting our designs every time, and that also can just add to the timeline.

One ask I would say is that just working in close collaboration with your borough commissioners and with our capital team would be very helpful, because we can help direct you on projects that we know are just over the line to get fully funded, or that have other ways that we can group these projects together to kind of move the needle forward a bit faster. So I would say close working relationships, as we are very grateful for with all of our Council members, and the capital team is a big piece. Happy to talk to you more about other pieces of legislation, and we will be continuing to come back to you to discuss ways that we are specifically trying to shorten this process. Thank

(02:46:08)

you. I do want to acknowledge we have been joined by Council Members Nurse, Hudson, Pierina Sanchez, Wong and on Zoom we have Council Members... and Brooks-Powers. I just have a couple more questions. I want to turn over to my colleagues and then I will circle back again with some more questions.

The administration has not baselined 100 PEP officers who are on expiring contracts. Roughly what percentage of the total PEP do these 100 positions represent? Would you say these positions are critical to the agency?

(02:46:47)

Uh, yes, absolutely. Our PEP officers, as anyone who visits our parks knows, are an absolutely critical component of our agency. They are peace officers first and foremost, but they also have an extraordinarily difficult job that they do very well every day. They are there to

(02:47:05)

essentially enforce our rules, and it is never fun to go up to a stranger and tell them that they are not following a rule or that they need to do something differently. But that is what our officers do. They also educate the public on all things around our parks and making the spaces welcoming for everyone. The 100 officers that were in one shot funding represent a strong component of our overall numbers. We have roughly 354 officer lines, and this is including those 100 officers.

(02:47:39)

Do they specialize in conflict resolution? Absolutely, yes.

(02:47:42)

They go through rigorous training, I believe it is 16 weeks, and much of that is in conflict resolution.

(02:47:50)

Would you say that without them, we would see an increase in crime in parks?

(02:47:55)

I would say that PEP officers are one of our best tools to enforce rules, keep people safe and engaged in our parks in appropriate ways. Thank you.

(02:48:06)

The administration has not baselined 15 positions for Green Thumb.

(02:48:11)

What do these particular roles do, and how many community gardens does Green Thumb serve? I believe, and I will double check, our Green Thumb program has around 500 gardens in our entire portfolio, although I can get that number confirmed for you. As I mentioned before, the 15 Green Thumb staff lines represent again a significant number of our overall units. They are 15, and then plus another 32, so 47 total. Our Green Thumb program is incredibly important and a very culturally significant program, because it allows everyday New Yorkers to have a very different type of relationship with the land and with our park system.

It is through our Green Thumb program that families, that New York residents, are able to cultivate the land. They are able to create spaces for their communities that celebrate community, the differences in our communities, and celebrate the diversity of our communities. These gardens have oftentimes been created when it felt like the surrounding neighborhood was in so many ways falling apart, and it is these gardens that have turned communities around. They have really become pillars in every neighborhood that they are in. So they are significant. They provide tremendous benefit way beyond... they punch well above their weight, I would say. Those staff members are incredibly valuable to our agency.

(02:49:47)

I just have two more questions and then I will step back. Where would you, Commissioner, like to see additional positions if additional one shots were funded by this...

(02:49:59)

Council, thank you for the question. As the leader of this agency, I do not necessarily like choosing between my children, so I will defer on that. But I would say that there is not one corner of my agency that is not being used to its full capacity. We provide an incredibly wide range of programs and services. You have heard me in my testimony talk about 30,000 acres of parkland, 14 miles of beaches. Reading up about this, we have 160 miles of coastline in our City that we are actually taking care of, our wetlands, our natural areas as well. There is not a division of my agency that is not absolutely serving New York and delivering on a very full, rich and diverse public realm. So I of course would welcome additional resources in any component of that. I am happy to talk about specifically these one-child positions or the other historical positions that were one-shot previously and now baselined. But every department I am extraordinarily proud of and can make a very strong argument that they are absolutely essential to our agency. Thank you. And my final...

(02:51:23)

question. The Mayor campaigned on a promise to get Parks to 1%.

(02:51:30)

What is the plan? Well, I certainly was very enthusiastic and very excited to hear that same promise of the 1%. I think what I would say is that we are in constant communication with the Mayor — truly, even earlier today — and every day we are talking about what it looks like to expand the Parks budget. We are talking about what the real, felt experience of what that looks like on the ground, and we are extremely grateful for our advocates and partners in this because we are in regular communication about not only what 1% means, but what it means to expand staffing across the board and what that will feel like when we are able to achieve that. In the meantime, I would say that our plan is always the same: to deliver the highest quality public realm possible to all New Yorkers, regardless of who they are, with the resources that we are getting.

(02:52:27)

Do you think we will get there?

(02:52:32)

I hope so. Yes.

(02:52:34)

Okay. Thank you, Commissioner. I am going to turn it over to our colleagues.

(02:52:39)

Great. So I also want to recognize we have been joined by Majority Leader Nurse as well as CM Krishnan, and we will start with our Deputy Speaker, followed by CM Brewer.

(02:52:51)

Hello. I have a few questions. I am going to be a little bit all over the place. The permit division — can you share how many people work in the citywide permit division? Sure. If you do not mind, I would ask Assistant Commissioner David Cerone to join us to give the specifics on our permit division. But while he is coming up, I would say that our permit division is divided kind of into two parts. We have our borough permit offices, which handle everything from your average birthday party to more run-of-the-mill events. When it comes to specialized, citywide or specialized permitting — be it large-scale events, or permitting that has special elements to it, commercial elements to it, or otherwise just big events — that goes to our citywide permitting office, which I think is probably what you are asking about.

(02:53:54)

Citywide. Okay, so I will turn to David then. The borough permits office is not the problem — great, as you know.

(02:54:14)

For the question — how many permit requests get funneled to the citywide division every year?

(02:54:20)

They are processing approximately a thousand.

(02:54:24)

Do you think that is an adequate amount of staff to process a thousand permit requests every year?

(02:54:31)

We are happy to work with the resources that we have. Of course, it is always helpful to have more resources, as you know, like every City agency. But we are going to continue to do the best with the team that we have.

(02:54:46)

Okay. A question about the PEP officers and Roy Wilkins. I know when my predecessor fought really hard to baseline about $1 million to Roy Wilkins, the PEP officers were specifically for Roy Wilkins. But as I understand it, the PEP officers are moving around multiple parks in Southeast Queens. As you know, we had that tragedy a month or so ago. I love my Queensboro Commissioner and I understand the thinking around having the PEP officers move around, considering there may not be a lot of activity in one particular park. But considering that Roy Wilkins specifically has a very large volume of young people that go there after school and in the summer, I just wanted to know if the Parks Department was thinking about increasing the number of PEP officers in Southeast Queens so that they do not have to rotate. Obviously, prior to my predecessor, I do not think there were any PEP officers in our area, so I just wanted to understand the thinking around that. How many PEP officers...

(02:55:59)

are assigned to Roy Wilkins?

(02:56:02)

Thank you for the question. Certainly we can look at this. We have our 354 officers for the entire City and we try to cover as much ground as humanly possible. When it comes to that specific funding, I am happy to look into this. We know how important Roy Wilkins is. We know how heavily used it is throughout really every season, but particularly during the summertime. So I am happy to look at that. In terms of overall staffing numbers, we are constantly trying to take a data-driven approach as much as possible towards deploying our staff, trying to cover our hot spots — the spots where we know a lot of people are. Officers also go to beaches and pools as well, so we just try to cover as much ground as we can.

And in Southeast Queens we are always one big happy family, so from my perspective it is fine to have the PEP officers rotate between the neighboring Council Member's district and mine. But what I do not want to see is that the resources that were technically supposed to be for one particular park get stretched thin, versus your department deciding to just invest a little bit more in Southeast Queens. That money was for Roy Wilkins and for the PEP officers in Roy Wilkins, which again I think it is fine for us to share, especially if the activity is not as much in certain parks. But I just want you all to review that and not continue to use the PEP officers that are technically meant for Roy Wilkins for other parks.

(02:57:41)

I have just one more question and then I will come back for round two, Chair. Okay. So the other question I have — I spoke to you, I cannot remember the title of the rec staff position that, which I did not even know existed, but that...

(02:57:56)

does the pickup play games in the park — like grounds associates?

(02:58:00)

Playground associates? Yes. Can you just share how many playground associates exist across the City? Because I never heard of that position. I do not think there are any playground associates in Southeast Queens, but prove me wrong. I think that is a low-key equity issue because I would love to know where the playground associates are and if they are equally distributed across New York City.

(02:58:28)

I am going to call on our Deputy Commissioner Margaret Nelson to give us a little more information. But while she is coming up, I am happy to talk a little bit more. The program that I think you are referring to is our playground associate program. It is the same group of people who are also helping staff our summer camp program. Last summer we had 73 playground associates. You will see them in yellow shirts — they should be wearing yellow shirts — and they are stationed throughout parks throughout the City. We will definitely get you a list of where they are located. We did come up with a list of locations by borough and we can give you that, but we can also give you a list by park after this.

How many parks do we have? Of course, we have thousands. And you only have 73 playground associates. Yes, so we do place them strategically. We pick the locations where there is a public restroom building, where there is some sort of water play, and we know that we are able to reach as many kids as possible. It is an incredible program and I am grateful for your question because it gives me an opportunity to talk about it in more detail.

We know that oftentimes — and I was one of those kids — where your parents work during the summertime and you just have no place to go, so you either hang out at home in the apartment or you go out in the parks by yourself. We know that for many kids and parents, myself included, it is a terrifying idea to have your kids go out there without any sort of adult presence. Our playground associates create that adult presence. They are there to engage kids in any sort of activity. They are there to make sure that they are drinking water, that they are cooling down. It is board games, it is basketball, it is playing on the side, it is playing, it is kicking a ball around on a soccer field — it is all of these things and more. They are out there keeping an eye out, looking for kids.

I am sure Margaret can give you some of the numbers, but when it comes to how many kids we are actually reaching, while it is a small program — 73 playground associates — we are reaching thousands, if not tens of thousands of kids every summer. It is tremendous. I want more families to know about this program. I am really enthusiastic about it. It is a tough job to be out there all day just looking out for kids, but that is what we do. It is meant to complement the number of other very affordable opportunities that we provide to New Yorkers. I believe that this is a network of services that is absolutely our job to provide and I am very proud of what this program brings. Margaret can give you some of the more specific numbers.

(03:02:19)

Thank you. I appreciate all the details and I would love to see it expanded because I agree that it is a good program and nobody knows that it exists. All right.

(03:02:30)

Thank you. We have you down for round two. CM Brewer, followed by CM Narcisse. Thank you.

(03:02:35)

Very much, and congratulations, Commissioner, on your hard work. I am aware of your hard work and it is showing. Thank you. On the PEP officers — I know you have 354. Hopefully we will get more included in that. How many do you really need?

(03:02:55)

Thank you for the question and thank you for your comments. Right now our PEP officers are, as the Deputy Speaker mentioned, really trying to cover as much ground as we possibly can. There are situations where we have them be stationary in parks, but we are trying to cover as much ground as possible. I would say again we would welcome as many resources as possible. We know the benefit of PEP officers here. It would be lovely to see as many as possible. Even Central Park needs them — they have their own ranger corps, but between the e-bikes and the 42 million people in other parks, similarly you need more PEP...

(03:03:33)

officers. So at some point I think you should tell us how many you need and then we should be advocating for that. Just a number. Two, trees...

(03:03:39)

You know I hate your tree program? Yes. So my question is — how much... we are never going to get another tree in. Maybe you answered this. I did not hear the answer. If I know it costs you in-house $2,900, I get that. But I cannot use you. So where else can I go? Do I go to New York Trees? Do I get someone to just put a tree in the pit? How do I get more? How does that work?

(03:04:10)

Thank you. We did answer your question but we are happy to talk about this again.

(03:04:14)

Well, you did not say how else I can get a tree. So...

(03:04:16)

There are a couple of ways. Constituents, or anybody — yourself included — can choose to purchase their own tree and they could work with us. We can help give directions on the type of tree to plant and the planting guidelines. We do like to advise on types of trees that are complementary to the trees that we have. You can also go to TreeTime, which is our partner in this, and that kind of fast-tracks trees being put in and planted in tree beds. Those are the two primary ways. I would also say, though, that in terms of the work that we are doing, I would remind you that it is not just about planting trees but also removing stumps and then covering up tree pits that are no longer viable for that reason.

(03:05:04)

I just want more trees. They are dying like crazy. So I guess what you are saying — I mean, I am still trying to get rid of your program and find a complementary program, something. I have the same question you need: a number. Like with PEP officers, how much do you need to actually have a real tree planting program that would plant 1,800 trees in every neighborhood, or whatever it is? Thank you.

(03:05:24)

I mean, in terms of our street trees that we have and that we care for, including also the landscaped parks, we are around 880,000 trees. So it is a tremendous amount of trees that we are caring for and are able to care for.

(03:05:40)

That many trees through a combination of contracted work and our in-house unit. Okay. Lifeguards — now I do not want them out of Chelsea, I mean out of the 60th Street Rec Center. And how, thanks to Iris...

(03:05:56)

Lifeguards are increasing. Yeah, I will give her credit. So my question is, do you have enough for the summer? Can you move them out — or are they moved out of — what is the name of that... the 60th Street Rec Center. Are they out of there? No, we are still... thank you. We are still certifying and recertifying our lifeguards. I will turn to our Deputy Commissioner to give us more information about this. We will be continuing to do this and get them all trained and get them out into our beaches and pools. Through the Fourth of July is where we will hit our peak. We right now are looking very good at numbers. We have hired more this year at this point in time than we were last year. We will be very excited to share with you the final numbers on the Fourth of July. But I will let our Deputy Commissioner talk about specifically the use of the 60th Street Recreation Center, where we are deep in training and recertifying our lifeguards at a number of our facilities. And I know the 60th Street Recreation Center is one of...

(03:06:55)

them. Yeah, we want them out of there. Go ahead, sir.

(03:07:00)

Thank you, Commissioner, Council Member. We are training and certifying lifeguards in all five boroughs. In Manhattan we are in Chelsea and the 60th Street Gertrude Ederle facility. We conclude training and certification right around July 1, into the Fourth of July right around there. After that we will be done with the training and certification.

(03:07:18)

Then we can get the team room back for the rest of the year, until we start training again in the fall. Okay. But I need that team room back because it is right next to NYCHA and nobody can swim there. It needs to have a lot of NYCHA residents swimming there. And the answer is the lifeguards are preventing that. So further discussion — I have been asking about it for about 10 years. Sure, okay. And then just finally, the other quick question is — how many... I have the number of 5,000 seasonal workers. Again, do they start winning because it takes a while, I think, to get them on board? Or do the seasonal workers start exactly when they are needed? That seemed to be a problem in Riverside Park. And then finally, the bathrooms — how are we going to fund some of these bathrooms?

(03:08:03)

Or, thank you. So let me take the bathroom piece and then I will turn to our first deputy commissioner to talk to you about the seasonal hiring piece. So certainly, as I said before, our capital... I definitely understand and hear the concerns around the timeline of our bathroom projects as well as the cost, particularly in your district but in many districts across the board. We see that these are not just bathrooms. They are bathroom-plus or bathroom-plus-plus that are historic landmark bathrooms with staff spaces associated with them, many of them embedded into hillsides. All of this actually adds a tremendous amount of cost. Now we certainly cannot... we are not making up the numbers in terms of the market, in terms of the overall cost. But where we do have some control, and where I believe that we should be focusing, is the timeline of these projects. I really want to see this timeline shaved down. I want to work collaboratively with our other agencies to try to shape down some of these processes, reduce inefficiencies and deliver capital projects faster. When it comes to the overall costs, I think we are all hands on deck and thinking through ways in order to do this. Certainly we have tremendous partners and I know that you have some infamous ones in over $13 million, and so we are working very closely with our partners to think through ways that we can deliver bathrooms faster and hopefully for less money. It is an ongoing conversation, but I definitely hear it.

(03:09:25)

Then for the hiring, I would actually say that we are one of the agencies that hires the largest seasonal component in the City. So we have become very good at this. We have become very nimble when it comes to seasonal hiring and have been working well. We have not had any hiccups, but all are accounted for.

(03:09:43)

I have heard differently. That is what I am asking. So go ahead. I have heard that it takes a while to get them hired and therefore the season kind of moves along.

(03:09:51)

But go ahead. Thank you. No, we have no issues, no constraints with hiring. We are very efficient at it, as the Commissioner said. We have three tranches: we hire in mid-April for spring startup, in ball fields May 1 for beaches and June 1 for pools. So the last of those three tranches will be coming on within the next week because we open pools at the end of June. So each of the tranches comes on about a month before their work is needed.

(03:10:17)

About what I call horticulturalists, or seasonal workers, the people in the parks — that would be April for...

(03:10:24)

April 15. People start today and they start for the whole summer. They are already on an April 15 six-month alliance to begin April 15. All right.

(03:10:33)

Thank you.

(03:10:33)

Okay, great. So we have been joined by CM Won as well. So we have CM Won. Thank you, Commissioner, and thank you for the leadership and everyone that is here. It seems like the question I was going to ask somebody is for the leadership here. Do we have enough staff or do we need funding to make sure that all the things that we... because I am going to ask what we need in our...

(03:11:03)

...district and New York City at large. Do we have enough funding? Do you feel like you are going to be able to run the parks safely with efficiency and everything?

(03:11:15)

Thank you for your question. I will again say that I am extremely proud of the work that we are doing with the staff and resources that we have been provided. I, of course, would always welcome more resources and more staffing. However, we also understand the mandate that we have and the responsibility that we have to deliver a safe, welcoming, open park system that is well cared for, and we will continue to work on doing that with the resources that we have.

(03:11:40)

You know we love parks, right? So in 2024, in the adopted budget, we had a plan where we had $800,000 for a pilot program to provide menstrual products in the parks bathrooms. Can you please give me an update on that? Sure, I will turn to our first deputy commissioner. Do you have any... yeah, my recollection is that, in a series of PEGs, that might have been... I cannot remember the exact plan, but my recollection is that the funding for that pilot was withdrawn before the pilot started. Okay, so we are not going to have menstrual products in our bathrooms the way that we expected. That is not an okay standard to move forward.

We talk about pools in this City of New York, you know, that in a lot of areas we do not have any pools, including mine. One of the goals, because we talk about Shirley Chisholm a lot, which I spoke to the Commissioner about, is the rec center. It is just like a preventive approach when it comes to so many problems we are dealing with in New York City with our youth. So in terms of planning, from a standpoint right now, I pushed very hard to get a study done and it is in DC right now, so I want to know...

(03:13:10)

How, Commissioner, can I push forward to make sure it happens not in 10 years, but right now? What can we do to make sure it happens?

(03:13:21)

Thank you for your question. Let me just reiterate to you that I too believe very much so that our parks and recreation centers are absolutely a part of, and should be part of, the public health discussion and should be part of the public safety discussion. So much of what is happening in places like Shirley Chisholm, places like Mary Collie Dalton, the work that is happening at Walter Gladwin and other places in the Bronx and across the City, really does result in safer, more operating neighborhoods, creating more opportunity, more upward mobility and so many other things. It is a joy and a privilege to be able to do that.

I am grateful for your $500,000 that you have allocated to look through this and I am very happy to work with you on this. As you know, with something like Shirley Chisholm, we saw funding coming in from the City and the State in terms of making this a reality. I think that we should continue to have conversations, particularly now, because we are able to show communities what can be possible when you have purpose-built spaces, when you have new spaces being built for modern-day recreation. And when we say recreation, we know we mean so much more than just an athletic basketball court or a gym, which is great, but we see so much more. We talk about arts, technology and culture and other pieces to this.

So we are happy to continue to work with you in terms of spreading that narrative of what recreation centers, what New York City Parks and Recreation centers actually mean, which is way more than your gym space. We are talking about economic development. We are talking about safer and healthier neighborhoods and I am happy to work with you and to champion that narrative.

(03:15:02)

Yeah, thank you. And I would like to be the catalyst of that process because this is so long. Everything that we have to do in parks just takes forever and that is the reason I am with my colleagues. What can we do? Because we feel like we are sitting and waiting and things are just happening. It is just frustrating to some level. Look at Shirley Chisholm — you have 11,000 new members already.

(03:15:29)

I was there. It is a beauty. So we can continue doing that. That is what I am saying because I am here, ready to work with you and even further. Places like, we are talking about the trees — 2,900. If we can help, if we have some kind of organization locally, maybe we can help speed up the process. That is what I am saying. So thank you for your time and thank you, Chair.

(03:15:51)

Thank you. Okay, CM Won followed by CM Brooks-Powers.

(03:15:54)

Thank you so much. Really good to see you, Commissioner. I have a few questions on some of my parks. So first and foremost, the capital tracker for parks is broken and is never updated. It is extremely frustrating for myself and all my constituents. So Murray Park was found to have severe remediation issues. It is the only dog park and playground in Court Square and we are still waiting for that park to come online. Can you give us a clear update on when that park is going to come online and when it will go into construction? Because it has been four years. Yeah, thank you, Councilmember. I appreciate the comments on the capital tracker. I will tell you first and foremost I will have to get back to you specifically on the updates, which we will. We have a very good track record of following up with every request when it comes to these, so we will happily give you the update. I will happily look into this myself. But I wanted to tell you about the capital tracker — I hear you. We want to make sure that that information is up to date, but also that it is realistic on our timelines. Of course, sometimes we see those timelines slip back for whatever reason, but we will look into this specifically and make sure that the information is as updated as possible. Okay, because it is...

(03:17:01)

...extremely important that that park comes back online and that all the soil is remediated. And next, as part of the Anable Lines rezoning project, the City committed to developing five acres of new public open space under the Queensboro Bridge by 2031, including $97.3 million in capital funding. The capital plan states on page 213 that this commitment is funded through four different projects with planned commitment dates starting from FY31 to FY33. In correspondence with members of the Parks planning team, we received confirmation that this funding was supposed to begin in FY31, so it is severely behind. The project numbers are LIC-QP-TO and QC-QS-OSB. Can you clarify the start date for the capital funding for new open space under the Queensboro Bridge as promised? Will the funding timeline present any delays in the City's commitment timeline to complete the new open space by 2031, which is what we are assuming because of the dates that you printed? And do you expect any additional funding to complete these projects will be needed, given the timeline has been pushed back according to your latest print?

(03:18:17)

Sure, we will have to again — thank you for the specifics — we will have to get back to you specifically on where those projects stand. However, I will tell you that I was just... and thank you, frankly. Let me just also say thank you for your advocacy. I think the additional open space is always really exciting. I know that you fought very hard for this and were specifically very involved. I think that, to my knowledge, and I was just briefed on this project recently, I have not heard of any delays here. So we will have to get back to you to be sure of that. Sometimes we get that funding and it is allocated for funding in out years, so that may be when funding is coming to us. But I have not heard to date any sort of delays with these projects. I know that they are...

(03:18:56)

...very important. They were a big win for you and we will continue to give you updates on them. Okay. And then the City also committed $30 million in renovations to renew Queensbridge Park as part of Anable FY28, and the capital plan states on page 213 that this project is funded with planned commitment dates of FY32. So again, another delay far beyond what was promised to us and committed to. In correspondence with members of the Parks planning team, we have received confirmation that this funding was supposed to begin at FY28 through to FY32. The project number is D-BE. Can you clarify the start date for the capital funding to renew Queensbridge Park? Will the funding timeline present any delays in the City's commitment timeline to begin design in FY28? Do you expect any additional funding to complete this project will be needed? Because Speaker Adrienne Adams, the former Speaker, has also committed $12 million to this project and this is extremely vital for the largest public housing community members to have access to this park on...

(03:19:56)

...time. I will interject here just for a moment to clarify. With every financial plan, the agency works closely to go through what we call a rationalization exercise, which is when the capital fundings are actually placed in the fiscal year in which they are expected to be registered. So the vast majority of a capital project's budget is spent during construction. Therefore, when the project begins, that means it starts design, but then there is the expected design time, expected procurement time and other additional time. So it is very common, and in fact necessary, that the relevant funds — the bulk of the relevant funds — will be placed in an out year. So, as the Commissioner noted, just to provide additional clarity, that sort of spreading out of capital funds is extremely common, not specific to those projects whatsoever. It happens throughout our capital portfolio.

(03:20:46)

Great. I just want to make sure that it is on record that the open space under the Queensboro Bridge will be completed by June 2031 and also that Queensbridge Park itself will begin design in FY28 to be completed by FY32. So I just want to have that on record and I will follow up with you via email to make sure that we continue to keep this project accounted for. Thank you so much. Okay, great. Unfortunately, we have lost quorum. So we are going to have to skip ahead to CM Won followed by CM...

(03:21:21)

Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner, for coming. We will be chatting later on the phone. Yes. Some of my first round questions are regarding the biggest park in my district, Juniper Valley Park, particularly the bathrooms and the capital project that is involved. Right now, Juniper Valley Park currently has zero functioning bathrooms. One building is out of service due to an active capital project and the other closed recently due to unforeseen circumstances, something to do with the sewer line. This park is heavily used by seniors, families and children, especially during the summer, and we have an upcoming concert in a couple of days this Thursday. We need the bathrooms. Can your agency give this Council today a confirmed completion date for the station house bathroom near the tennis court? Because we need it.

(03:22:31)

Sure. Yes. Thank you for your question. I will just say I mean, we are incredibly proud to be the largest agency that operates the vast majority of public restroom buildings throughout the entire City — over 700. That is more than there are Starbucks in the City. It is a tremendous responsibility that we take very seriously. So we will get back to you specifically on the updated date of the restroom project that is going on in your district. But I also want to flag that I would love to work with you, Councilmember, offline to see about... I am, of course, concerned about big gatherings happening in the parks when there is no public restroom building available. We can look at whether some sort of port-a-potty situation or something else could be arranged there. Oh, there are already some? Great. So it sounds like we have some port-a-potties or some other temporary toilets there. It is not ideal and it is certainly not the long-term strategy, but we want to make sure that we are also working closely with you to accommodate these big events when they are happening.

(03:23:33)

That is my next question, because it took me many phone calls to finally get the temporary sanitation facilities. And the answer I was told was that the cost of these temporary port-a-potties is not tied to any capital projects. And then how would park attendees go to the bathroom if there is no budget for these port-a-potties? In this case it is serious because this is a huge park and both bathrooms are closed. First we asked and only two port-a-potties were provided, and only recently another two. We are still asking for more because at an average concert we have 4,500 people going and two port-a-potties is clearly not enough. And that is my question: why are port-a-potties not budgeted in capital projects? Because it makes no sense.

(03:24:36)

I really appreciate the question and I am glad to hear that we are working with your office and we work with others. I was just talking to another CM — I think Avilés — about port-a-potties in her district too. What we have... it is our contracts, because I do not actually know if that is a capital-eligible piece. It is not. And then not every park project is different in the same way. We have a park where we have one capital project going on where it does not require it because there is another public restroom building in that park, so people would be able to find facilities elsewhere. While some we think are going to be handled in the wintertime where we think it can be managed, versus others where unfortunately, at Juniper Park, you have unfortunately all the bathrooms down at one time. So it is difficult for us to predict and it is also not capital-eligible. It is unfortunately not something that we are able to do. But I will say that we are very sensitive towards wanting to make sure that even when these capital projects are happening, communities are still able to use their parks. So in cases like this, I am very happy to hear that we are providing those temporary public bathrooms. It is not the ideal situation, but at least there is something there.

(03:25:53)

So we will talk later about this and there are some other issues to resolve with you. Thank you. Thank you, Jeff.

(03:26:02)

Great. Thank you. And next, CM Nurse, and then the chair will be asking CM Powers questions. Thank you.

(03:26:10)

I am going to talk about my district parks because that is what we do at parks hearings, but I want to say Highland Park — amazing. Thank you. I always love the maintenance and attention given there. Tiger Playground — great. I have no issues. My issues are at Irving Playground, Irving Square Park and Bushwick Playground behind Bushwick Campus, and that is where I need — at least for Bushwick Campus — extraordinary attention this summer for enforcement. I have done years of walk-throughs. There are a thousand emails to you all. You all know about this area. Last summer we had a couple of stabbings. It was really bad all the time. It was a source of nonstop complaints. Bushwick Campus, that park — we really need attention this year. So I do not know how many

(03:27:04)

PEP officers you have in Brooklyn. Every time I call it is like only 12 in the whole bureau or whatever. I do not know where we are at now, but we do need extraordinary attention this summer. I am only asking for one park to have attention and it is that park. The 83rd precinct does what they can for it, but we really need attention there.

(03:27:24)

Irving — it is less about enforcement, but I do often see a lot of our volunteers pushing non-electric mowers to mow the grass. It would be great if we could get the grass cut on time. I do not know if there is a schedule, but I hate to see that. I mean, I love people doing their part, but I do not want these folks having to mow the grass in our little park. And then we have a bathroom there now, so I would love to talk with you all about a playground associate there and also making sure that that bathroom is stocked on a regular basis, because we have gotten a lot of complaints about that.

(03:28:01)

Thank you so much, Council Member. Let me just thank you so much for your comments. I really appreciate it. We can certainly look at Bushwick and Irving — I wrote those down. I just want to clarify that for our PEP staffing, we have 53 staff members that are baseline for Brooklyn, 53 in the Bronx, 53 in Manhattan, 53 in Queens and 32 in Staten Island. Again, that is for the entire borough. So how many are assigned to North Brooklyn? I would have to get back to you. Yeah, I would love that. Every time I call it is like we only have five people — I just can never get anybody there. I am always calling the precinct, calling the precinct, and the precinct is busy. Absolutely. And I will say also that I know it does not feel the same — it has a very different feeling as well. We also see our CUP officers who cover our pools and our beaches and so they do cover a lot of ground and we are very proud of that.

I understand. You had mentioned in terms of bathrooms and mowing — so certainly we do have a regular schedule. I will look to our first deputy commissioner to share a little bit more about that regular schedule for grass cutting. If there is anything in particular that we are not seeing, we appreciate your feedback. I always let the Brooklyn commissioner know when it is time, but it would be nice to not have to do that. And then for the bathrooms, our first deputy commissioner can also speak on this, but we do monitor everything from soap to toilet paper to working fixtures in our public restroom buildings. So we will certainly look at this. We want to do this on a regular basis and we are happy to have the first deputy commissioner speak more to this.

(03:29:46)

Council Member, the sites should be mowed on a two-week cycle, so we will look into it. We track the data and I can look at a dashboard. As the commissioner said, our public restrooms — we have three touch points a day at every one of our public restrooms because we unlock them in the morning and check to make sure they are stocked. They are cleaned at least once a day, if not more times, and then obviously at the end of the day we close them. So there is a minimum of three touch points. There should not be any moment in time when we have gone out of stock, but you know it happens.

(03:30:19)

Regularly, I understand. Sometimes you go in there and clean it and an hour later it does not look like that. I get it. I am just advocating for attention there. There have been many nights we have had events there. We have let Parks know — hey, we are going to have an event there, can you make sure the bathroom is open and make sure it is stocked. It is not open, it is not stocked. We have got to chase people for an hour. It is just some baseline of maintenance I think would be great, especially when we

(03:30:48)

proactively let you know about certain things going on in the park. We really would love just some attention this summer because I do not really ask much for parks — just those two. Thank you. Thanks.

(03:31:01)

All right. I am going to, with the timer on, ask questions on behalf of CM Powers who was online. The executive plan includes a baseline increase of about $121,000 of City funding beginning in FY26 for lifeguards, covered by additional compensation funding. How many vacant lifeguarding positions remain across New York City? If you can just answer very quickly. So we are funded for 1,400 lifeguards — that is our pre-pandemic height. We had last year a little less than 1,100. We will not have our final numbers until later on, but things are looking very good. We are very optimistic about hitting a higher number than we were at this point in time last year. By comparison, right now we are at higher numbers, so we will be able to fully answer that by the Fourth of July.

(03:31:58)

With this baseline increase, does Parks intend to increase the number of staff lifeguards?

(03:32:02)

I am sorry, could you repeat that?

(03:32:05)

Does Parks intend to increase the number of staff lifeguards?

(03:32:11)

Yes, I believe it was a collective bargaining agreement — essentially a pay increase, so not a headcount change.

(03:32:18)

Given the recent drowning deaths on Rockaway Beach, how does the Parks Department intend to prioritize staffing for the Rockaway Peninsula this summer? Sure. Let me just say before I pass it over to our deputy commissioner who oversees the lifeguard division that we are incredibly saddened to see this. Regarding the drowning that happened, I want to thank the NYPD, Emergency Management and of course our lifeguards who were all there. I want to use this as an opportunity — because I have yet to say it — to thank all of our elected officials for helping remind everyone that it is only safe to swim in our water when there is a lifeguard sitting in a chair and when they are saying that it is okay to swim. Otherwise you should not be in the water. It is incredibly important to remember this as a simple rule of thumb.

When it comes to our overall water safety plan, this is something that has been truly honed over years of experience, years of working with colleagues and looking at other operations across the country. We truly believe in our water safety plans and our water safety protocol. We are looking to fully follow through on our lifeguard plan that we had last year, which was tremendously successful. I look to our first deputy commissioner to give more

(03:33:39)

details. Council Member, as I mentioned earlier, as of today we have 153 lifeguards at the Rockaways, which is more than twice the next closest beach, which is Coney Island. We traditionally staff all of our beach lifeguards — which is about 600 when we are at our peak — with over 55% of them going to the Rockaways. The remaining 45% cover the other seven beaches, so the majority of our lifeguards always go to the

(03:34:04)

Rockaways. Thank you. How much funding does the Parks Department have allocated for the trees and sidewalks program to repair severe sidewalk damage caused by root growth? We have heard from constituents that the wait time for this program takes years. What is the agency doing to

(03:34:18)

expedite this service? Yes, thank you so much. We do have a program that deals with trees and sidewalks concerns for qualifying applicants. The funding is $13 million, which allows us to repair approximately 1,300 sites per year. Are you planning to explore the implementation of an emergency alert system along Rockaway Beach? We have had a lot of

(03:34:54)

conversations about this. While we are always interested in looking at additional ways to get emergency alerts out there to increase water safety, Rockaway Beach is particularly difficult because there is not, to our knowledge, a system that can allow for the five-plus miles of boardwalk to receive notifications through the system that has been discussed. We are happy to continue to look at this. We do have an audio system at Orchard Beach, which is much smaller. So if there is a system out there that can provide this, we are happy to continue to look into it. Rockaway Beach is a very large beach and in order to cover all of that, the size of it makes it really difficult to find a system that can work across all of it. Our first deputy commissioner had more to add.

(03:35:39)

I would just note that we are always pushing notifications out through Notify NYC for folks that subscribe to that. We really emphasize that frequent beachgoers, particularly folks in the Rockaways, should subscribe to Notify NYC. Also, as you are aware, we are purchasing new emergency response vehicles specifically for our lifeguards to use on the sand to respond to emergencies.

(03:36:05)

Thank you. Final question. This is from CM Shanel Thomas-Henry. The executive plan includes an additional $17 million for 200 additional seasonal positions due to the World Cup. The Queens Fan Fest is in her district at Flushing Meadows Corona Park. How many of those positions are for this event in particular and is any effort being made to hire locally for those positions?

(03:36:27)

So we are very excited about this and I am grateful for the 200 positions that we will be able to bring on board at the start of the fiscal year. We always use a data-driven approach when it comes to deploying staff, looking out for our sites that are most in need and that we know are going to be hot spots. So we will continue to be in communication around where those staff will go. I want to say a huge thank you to the administration for understanding that our parks are where everybody is going to be this summer. It is going to be an incredibly busy summer in our parks — it always is — but a lot of the best viewing locations are going to be in our park system. We will be continuing to have close communication with NYC FC and others about where we expect to see the largest crowds.

(03:37:15)

Thank you, Commissioner. I am sorry, there was one more question. Final question from CM Brooks-Powers, and I want to turn it over. On May 12, the Council sent a letter to the Parks Department regarding compliance with Local Law — I believe it is Local Law 2 of 2023. The law requires the City to survey City-owned property that may be suitable for the construction of new public swimming pools and release survey results by October 1, 2025. Despite repeated outreach by the Council's compliance division to the agency and City Hall, the Council still has not received any report, nor has the administration told the Council which agency will be responsible for the implementation of CM Brooks-Powers' sponsored local law. Can the agency please provide an update on compliance with this law? Yes.

(03:38:03)

Thank you for the question. My recollection is that the Bill as passed required the Mayor's Office to designate an entity to lead the effort. We are going to circle back to the Mayor's Office and get an update. My understanding is that an entity at this point in time had not been identified. Okay, great.

(03:38:22)

And next we have CM Krishnan before we go to round two. Thank you, chairs.

(03:38:31)

Good to see you, Commissioner and team, as always, and all the parks staff and kids here. I just had a couple of questions to follow up on some points that were already discussed. My first one is it is concerning to see the underfunding of PEP officers in the budget so far. I just want to understand — so normally we have PEP officers, which we know are not enough for the whole city. With the executive budget only 200 have been funded, when we in the Council are pushing for another 100 on top of that. Is that...

(03:39:08)

Your numbers are almost there. So 354 officers total — that is including 100 of our one-shot officers. In the case where we would hope would not happen, but in the case where we would not get that one-shot funding either as baseline or as a one-shot, then we would lose those 100 lines. But currently I think

(03:39:33)

the discussion has been whether or not those 354 — those 100 officers — could be baselined fully into our ranks, and then of course we would always welcome additional PEP officers through new one-

(03:39:47)

shot funding. Right. Okay. And right now those 100 officers — their positions are funded only through June 30 of this year, correct? Yes. And then without a one-shot or without them being baselined, their positions would not exist after July 1, right? I mean, I know that Parks will make every effort to find places for them, but I just want an understanding of what that would mean for PEP after July 1. Sure.

(03:40:11)

I mean, that is the case with every single one-shot position. We are only funded through the fiscal year and after that there is no more funding.

(03:40:18)

Yeah. I mean, obviously first and foremost — and I have always said this about the Parks budget, which is fundamentally a workers' budget — I know they are all, as workers, very concerned about their positions. What have the conversations been like with City Hall, the best that you can share? I know with all that is going on in our parks — and you are hearing it from everyone — whether it is the World Cup, whether it is other park celebrations and things like that, it is concerning that we have not been able to get the PEP officer count much higher. So what have the conversations been with City Hall so far and how does Parks plan to adequately staff the parks across the boroughs when there are basically at best 60 officers per

(03:41:06)

borough? Yeah. Thank you for your question. Our conversations have been pretty robust, ongoing and overwhelmingly positive, I would say. I believe that this administration understands the impact that our PEP officers bring. I am very grateful for the advocacy of the Council — yourself of course included — and many parties know how much you have fought for us and so we are grateful to you.

I think we also understand that it is our absolute goal to serve our City regardless of the actual number of resources. So whether it be with our current ranks now or, unfortunately, in a situation where we would have fewer staff, we will continue to meet the mission that we have. I would say overwhelmingly this administration understands the absolute incredible impact that parks have and the vital role that we play in creating an affordable City and an incredible future for our City. I am very proud to continue to uphold that. Thank you and

(03:42:07)

I look forward to working with you all and City Hall to make sure we get that number to where it needs to be. And then just on the hiring freeze — at preliminary budget time we talked about the hiring freeze. What is the status of lifting that hiring freeze at this point? How is that looking so far and what more can you share?

(03:42:27)

Honestly, we were — as many other agencies I am sure will say — very excited about having the 2-for-1 hiring freeze lifted and having the ability to actually

(03:42:41)

fill the vacancy spots that we have when they become available. I am very grateful. We had a lot of conversations about the 40 positions that were vacancies in our ranks and are very much looking forward to being able to fill them. Right now we are pretty much full, but as we also see on any given month, just through the nature of attrition and retirements and things like that, we see empty seats come up across the agency. It is very exciting to think about a world in which we get to fill those seats. Great.

(03:43:18)

Glad to hear it. And then just concluding by saying I am glad to hear the progress on the lifeguard issue. It is a big crisis and there is a lot more to do on that. Any way that we can work together to keep increasing the lifeguard count — one of the things that I have been focused on, and we can talk more about it later — is not only fully staffing our pools and beaches, but I also feel like our pool and beach season is too short given how warm it is getting earlier in the year and how warm it stays later in the year. It would really help a lot if we can extend the pool season. I think it will also improve water safety because you would have lifeguard staffing at times when it is hot and people want to swim where right now the beaches are closed. So I hope it is a conversation we can continue having to find a way to staff up and then also look at expanding pool and beach seasons.

(03:44:06)

Sure, I appreciate it. This came up a lot and I would happily continue to have conversations around it. I will point out that this particular summer is going to be our longest beach season ever. I think it is four full months, 16 weeks of open beaches. A part of regrowing our lifeguard ranks has also included... we rely heavily on a college and young person workforce that is only available when school gets out, and so a lot of these factors definitely factor in. Of course, our training starts in February to train new lifeguards and to bring them on board. I do not think a lot of people — of course, Council Member, you know this very well and we are grateful for that — but when we talk about making shifts to that season, we really are talking about making shifts to essentially six months of our operation, because that is how long it takes to really roll this out.

But of course, I have loved in my first few months getting a better understanding and learning all about our beaches. It is an insanely complex operation that I am so proud of our team for doing. So I am always happy to talk about ways that we can get more people to the water safely and keep everybody safe in our public realm.

(03:45:28)

Absolutely, and expand that pipeline as you are saying. Well, thank you for your work. Thank you for your leadership and I am looking forward to continuing to work together. Thank you, Chairs.

(03:45:36)

Great. And then we are going to kick it over to Chair Hankerson for round two.

(03:45:43)

Okay, we are going to go around to round two. I am going to somewhat speed through this. As they say in church, the time is well spent, so let us see if we can get through this quickly. As I am sure you know, I have been incredibly focused on equal pay. This came up when I raised the issue of park staff being paid less than sanitation staff for clearing snow during the series of blizzards that we saw earlier this year. It is entirely unacceptable that our park staff not only had to sleep in rec centers, but were also not paid in parity with other City agencies. Will the Parks Department support pay parity with sanitation workers who performed the same work but received greater pay? This is an issue of fairness — equal work for equal pay.

(03:46:30)

Yeah, thank you for your question and thank you for your advocacy. I am absolutely always on board with all of my staff getting paid more money and getting recognized for the incredibly difficult work they do. I will just point out that during the snowstorm — I think it was day negative one or negative two for me, right at the beginning — it was tremendous. Hundreds of our staff worked alongside thousands of our staff going out and clearing our perimeter sidewalks. I am incredibly proud of the job that our park staff do 365 days a year, but really during those snowstorms they really showed up. I am very proud of them.

When it comes to their salary, that is something that is negotiated largely by the City through labor. So of course we are always happy to engage, but when it comes to their specific titles — and I will just flag that there are different titles involved for those who were out clearing — that is all negotiated beyond the Parks Department, really with labor and the City. I am going to say that so: will Parks support pay equity in the next round of contract negotiations? I am always thrilled to champion additional funding for our workers, and I appreciate that.

(03:47:55)

Additionally, Parks had to move $3.7 million in this plan to cover the cost of snow removal overtime since it was not previously included in the budget. Will Parks have a snow removal overtime budget in the future to better prepare for potential snow? I think this is one where I am very grateful because they also recognized Parks's role in this. It was a very exciting conversation to hear that we were going to receive additional funding and recognition for the overtime that was spent during that snow. Whether it be through a different budget line or working directly with the administration, I am not sure if there is that much difference there as long as we are continuing to get support from our City in terms of our response, which I am extremely grateful that we did receive.

So will Parks be willing to change its budget for snow removal and preparations, similar to how DOT and DOE change their future snow budget based on previous expenses? I think in terms of our overtime, we will be using all of our overtime budget — there is no question about it. We will likely be going over that and working with OMB. This is not something where we are necessarily saving some and then spending less later, because ultimately we know that people are using our parks every season and so we will have our staff out every season. Again, I am always happy to discuss this. I will just say that the conversations we have been having with the City and the administration around their support of our overtime during the snowstorm and their continued support — as seen in this budget around the staff needed to respond to increased usage of our parks this summer — I am going...

(03:49:56)

...to jump to the Deputy Speaker really quickly before I continue my questions. Thank you so much, Chair. Just a few questions on the racial equity plans, and I really want to thank our Council staff for preparing these questions. We are excited about the racial equity plans and their use in these budget hearings. One of the goals of the Parks Department in the preliminary racial equity plan is to establish human capital practices that support and accelerate equitable hiring and staffing in close collaboration with senior leadership. This is listed as a medium-term goal to be completed in 2028. Under section one, it states that identifying race and ethnicity is optional in a footnote. Can...

(03:50:42)

...you please explain how demographic analysis focusing on race can be done if identifying race and ethnicity is optional?

(03:50:52)

Thank you so much for your question, Deputy Speaker. The way that we are gathering this data is through our office that does an annual survey of our employees. In that annual survey we do give them the option of identifying based on their race and ethnicity. They can identify or they can choose not to, and that is what we are reporting on. Is that what your question is referring to?

(03:51:21)

I am sorry — essentially you all established this goal around equitable hiring, but it is not a requirement for people to identify their race. So we are just... I want to just clarify. In addition to the survey, every City employee, through the employee self-service portal, also has the option to report. Again, it is voluntary and self-reported, but that data is also available through that mode as well. And the percentage is actually about 93% of Parks employees do report, so we would argue that is a pretty healthy base of data to attempt to assess from. Yeah, and I think also looking at title — there have been many reports about various positions in City government where, unfortunately, lower-wage titles tend to be held by Black and Brown people while executive-level positions tend to be held by white people. So I just want to understand how you are doing that analysis and making sure that the Parks Department is equitable from the top to the bottom.

(03:52:40)

Absolutely. This is something that is very near and dear to my heart. I frankly do not believe that I would be in the position that I am in now without people believing that people who look like me and people who come from my background were able to be in these roles, and so I take it really seriously. We are going to start to disaggregate this data and start to break it down by title. We have a lot of titles and a wide range of workers in our agency, but I am very much looking forward to building this in because I do believe it is not just about those entry-level jobs — we have to be building pipelines. We have to be building ways to elevate workers of every background, and so I am looking forward to digging into this further.

(03:53:28)

And why will the review of the demographic data take almost two years?

(03:53:33)

You know, again, this is where I am hoping that we can deliver something sooner rather than not. We do have a lot of titles and a lot of different categories, and we are looking at the breakdown of who is reporting this data. We are doing this on an annual basis, but I would love to see if we can speed this up.

(03:53:53)

Do you have any insight on any areas of significant disparities of race and gender within the agency?

(03:53:59)

I only have right now our agency-wide numbers, and I am happy to share a little bit of that data if you would like. Any current demographic breakdown of the agency? Sure. Based on our last annual report, 33% of our agency identifies as African American, 28% Hispanic, 23% white, 6% Asian American, 7% did not disclose, and then we have a breakdown of 63% male and 36% female. I also think the Commission on Racial Equity just put out scores for every agency and I saw that we ranked 66 out of 72, which is a good thing because 72 is the best in this case. So again, I think we need to dive deeper into this data to look at the specific titles and the specific roles. I would love to see opportunities for growth and professional development and promotion in every kind of title that we have, so I would love to work with you more closely on this and bring you back additional information.

(03:55:08)

Yeah, I would love to also know, out of that breakdown, the demographic data by job function as well. So where are the roughly 50% of Black and Latino workers — what type of positions do they have within the agency? And where is the 6% of Asian employees — where are they working?

(03:55:32)

Sure, and we will happily provide you that information as we continue. Thank you.

(03:55:40)

Just sort of out of curiosity, I guess, continuing in the line of questioning — are there pathways to promotion in the department, and if so, what are they?

(03:55:54)

Absolutely. I think I am going to ask our Deputy Commissioner Margaret Nelson to come up. Between our Deputy Commissioner for personnel and our Deputy Commissioner who represents some of our biggest units within the agency, I am sure they can talk about it. So Margaret, come on up. But let me just say that some of our... I mean, Iris Rodriguez Rosa was well known within this agency. She started, I believe, as a recreation specialist and worked her way up. You talk to a lot of people who have been around for 32 to 40 years and a lot of the time that has been the upward trajectory for many people to find those pathways for promotion. We do see, like with our Playground Associates Program — which is a very tough but very exciting job — you get a lot of on-the-ground experience working with the public and working with kids, and you oftentimes see those playground associates, which are seasonal jobs, getting turned into full-time recreation staff.

(03:56:51)

And not to interrupt you, but I think to the Deputy Speaker's line of questioning, I think it leans more towards not those who have worked their way up, but those who are being hired at executive and management levels from the start. So I would be interested in the data that you provide to her as well.

(03:57:13)

Sure. Those who end up in likely leadership positions. Yes, no problem. And I mean, that is a super important point. Even looking at the staff who are here, I know many have worked their way up in the agency under different commissioners and have served different roles, moving their way up. So there is definitely that culture at Parks. But I also want to say, to the Deputy Speaker's points, that I truly believe we should and can be doing more. I think that pipelines, particularly for underrepresented workers — workers of color or women, particularly in a male-dominated agency like ours — that is extremely important to name outright and to think about fully. I think that we should be looking at this data as closely as we can. I am quite frankly very proud of the 93% reporting rate. There is always an opportunity for someone not to identify — I myself have opted not to identify sometimes when I take those types of surveys — but I think 93% is a good enough number to know that some of the data we are looking at is showing some truth, and I am very eager to continue to look at this. I take this really seriously.

(03:58:28)

Thank you. And just really quickly, just for context and as a reminder, promotional opportunities also exist within the ecosystem of the civil service system, right? So there are exams and promotional opportunities, so it is a very important overlay — these promotions are not necessarily done at an individual's...

(03:58:45)

...discretion. Absolutely, and I understand that. But when I say pathways, I am...

(03:58:47)

...referring to whether there are programs to assist folks. For instance, the NYPD recently had a panel for Black and Brown officers who are looking to get promoted. So that is what I mean when I say pathways. But I do appreciate that answer.

(03:59:04)

Yeah, and we do have... there are a lot of people who want to talk about this just because we have a lot to say about this topic, which is very good. So I am going to look to Margaret really quickly to share a little bit more about that promotional track, and then we also have Joy on our team who can speak a little bit more to... we have internships and other programs. We have a Parks Academy that helps with professional development skills. There is a lot here that we do and we are very enthusiastic about it. I would love to continue that conversation, but we only have five minutes. So briefly: we have apprenticeships, we have Parks Academy, we have professional development trainings, and we have our own group of rising stars that we want to promote and develop with additional training and investment throughout the year. Go ahead...

(03:59:54)

...Margaret, and share a little bit more about recreation. Sure. In recreation and in PEP, I think in the summer with our beaches and pools we also have a year-round pipeline. We often pull from them to become permanent PEP officers and then they go through the academy training and become peace officers, so that is one of the pipelines. I will say, even though we are working hard to reduce attrition for our PEP officers and we want to keep them in PEP, when they do leave they are not necessarily leaving to go to other law enforcement — they are staying within our agency and going to other divisions. So you see a lot of people who started out in the PEP division who are now in other divisions of our agency and moving up. Given that we are a large agency, it is really nice to see people move around and work their way up that way.

And then obviously in recreation, when we hire seasonally for our PA or camps, that is a good pipeline into year-round work and then moving up — recreation specialists, then deputy center manager, center manager, then borough recreation. Again, we have people who start out in recreation and maybe move over to another division based on their skill set, and again stay in the agency but move into different positions. Thank you.

(04:01:17)

I am going to try and combine these last two or three questions. The executive plan includes $11 million in additional revenue from a park concession expansion. The Council's preliminary budget response included a proposal to expand parks concessions to generate additional revenue. How many concessions are currently operated in New York City parks? Can you please explain how Parks plans to collect this additional revenue and does the agency have any plans to expand the number of concessions in parks?

(04:01:50)

So we have around 400 concessions in our parks and they really have a wide range — everything from ice cream and sandwiches to major circuses and big events, to pizza fests and everything in between. We expanded the amount of revenue going into the general fund from this and in part it is because we have already achieved that. We know that this is what our concessions are building in. It is also baked into our contracts with those concessions. We know with a high level of certainty that this is where our concessions will be giving in because it is baked into their contracts.

That being said, I also should have started out this way, but I want to make sure to be clear about my view on concessions. This is not about monetizing our parks. This is about creating amenities and additional activations that really serve to complement the user experience. As a mom of a three and a six year old, I could not stay in the park longer if I did not have the ability to buy a sandwich for my kids, or when I am stuck and it is raining outside, to find a way to get my kids back into the parks through some sort of concession event. It is a really special experience to allow me to be in the parks with my family 365 days a year if I wanted to.

So that is really where we are looking to complement the park system and make sure that we are serving the needs of New Yorkers who want to see a little something extra. We are really excited about that. There was a report recently talking about additional revenue building in and we are really excited to be following up on that. We have, I think, 19 new concessions starting in the next year and we are very eager to see more of these spaces activated in very creative ways.

I also want to point out one major win this year for us, and a true honor, was to open up the Workers Justice Project delivery system, which will be fully operating soon. It is technically a concession, but it is a very low income concession that we do not expect to really be generating a ton of money, but it really serves our New Yorkers and serves our workforce in a way that I am just so incredibly proud of. I am very proud of the entire team. I want to see if David has anything to add — I hopefully did not misspeak any of that. I hope that answers your questions. David, if I missed anything, please say so, but I am really excited about the future of concessions in our parks. Did you want to add anything?

(04:04:28)

To add anything?

(04:04:29)

You covered it. Very welcome.

(04:04:31)

I am here just in case. So I do not get in trouble, I want to ask this question. As part of the contract that Parks has with the Wildlife Conservation Society, Parks reimburses them for any revenue shortfalls at the end of the fiscal year when revenues are lower than expenses. The executive plan includes $10 million in FY26 with a new funding shortfall. How does this total compare to previous years? Are there any efforts by WCS to increase revenue? And can you provide a breakdown of revenue and expenses at each site? Actually, do not worry about the last one.

(04:05:04)

Okay, sure. So the WCS contract — the Wildlife Conservation Society's relationship with Parks is one of the oldest relationships I think that we have. I actually think the Arsenal Building used to be part of the zoo way back when. I could be mistaken, but I think it was. We have a very longstanding relationship and yes, this is pretty standard across our budget. This is what we have had for some time. Actually, I think the agency did notify our Council partners that last year they did actually increase the ticket cost a touch.

I can say this with a lot of experience: the zoos are a beloved way to enjoy our parks. It was at one time a part of the Parks Department, believe it or not. We know that our partners at the Wildlife Conservation Society do some incredible work with our public schools and with low income programming to really make sure that this is accessible to as many New Yorkers as possible. It is a point of pride and we are very excited to be close partners here. But that budget piece of the $10 million has not really significantly changed over the past several years and we are very keenly looking at ways to slightly increase revenue while still making sure that it is as accessible as possible to New Yorkers.

(04:06:30)

Thank you. In my final question — this one is a little off script since this is your first budget in this capacity. My question to you, and I am

(04:06:43)

going to ask you this probably in three years as well: what do you want your legacy to be in this agency?

(04:06:51)

Oh, thank you. I want New Yorkers to understand the incredible significance of this agency in their lives. I want it to be valued as such. I want New Yorkers to understand that we are not just a place that should come to top of mind after Memorial Day weekend and when Labor Day hits. I want the entire City and all of our Council and our administration — everybody — to understand that this is an agency that is full of essential public workers that are really creating excellence in the public ground for free, because everybody deserves the park.

(04:07:38)

Parks for everyone. Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you.

(04:07:41)

Great, thank you. And I believe that is all for now. That concludes our second day of budget hearings. Thank you.