Transcript: Mayor Adams Hosts 'Hear From the Mayor' Radio Show

September 22, 2024

Gary Byrd: Well, good morning. 62 degrees in the city. Well, as you know, each and every second Sunday of the month, we have the opportunity here at WBLS, and we are proud to welcome the 110th mayor of New York City and the second mayor of color, also the first hip-hop mayor in the history of the City of New York. It's time to Hear from the Mayor, Mayor Eric Adams on 107.5 WBLS.

Mayor Eric Adams: Hey Gary, good to hear from you and this is really a great show we're going to have today and I wanted to really welcome all the listeners to hear from the mayor and I'm your Mayor Eric Adams and if this is your first time tuning in, the purpose of this show is really just to have a good dialogue with New Yorkers, you can give me your observations, your thoughts, your questions and listeners should give me a call and hear directly from me and you can sign up to hear more from me by visiting nyc.gov/hearfromeric and you can sign up on our website to Text with Eric or talk with me on WhatsApp and you can also go to my podcast, Get Stuff Done Podcast, where we have a lot of different individuals come on and have a great conversation with us. But right now you can dial 212-545-1075. 212-545-1075.

Before we go to your calls, I want to really just engage in this talk today. I'm really pleased with my guest today. she really inspired me. Today I'm joined by Shaniqua, a real-life New Yorker who attended our kickoff hiring hall in Brownsville and she likes to say she walked in unemployed and she walked out with a job and we're going to hear her inspirational story.

But I'm also joined by you know one of my favorite commissioners, Commissioner Louis Molina of the Department of Citywide Administrative Services. Louis has just really transformed and moving to transform that agency with some good ideas. You're going to hear some good stuff from what he's going to be doing in the future. But again, welcome to the show, Commissioner and Shaniqua. And why don't we start off with you, Shaniqua. How did you find out about the hiring hall? And how did you decide that, you know what, I'm going to just walk in and have a leap of faith.

Shaniqua Rumph: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Good morning. I found out about the hiring hall through Eventbrite. Um, and I honestly went to this hiring hall with the mindset of I'm leaving out of here with a job. I'm going in there and I'm leaving with something.

I got to the hiring hall and I was drawn to the DOT table basically because of the long line that you know they had and it was a lot of like a long line of people and I said to myself what are they giving away something is going on and what I noticed is they were giving away a lot of opportunities there was a lot of positions and when I got to the front of the line and I spoke with personnel, they were very informative and very patient and I was like this is this is it, this is what I want to do in our interview. But thanks to Eventbrite and the hiring hall, I was employed.

Mayor Adams: What's interesting is that, as you stated here, you saw the long line. You didn't shy away from the long line. There was a line of opportunity. They weren't giving out free cheese. They was giving out a job so you could buy cheese. But when you walked inside and saw the different tables, I assume you saw that, wait a minute, there may be some opportunities here inside this place.

Rumph: There was many opportunities. There was two floors of opportunities. There were so many different city agencies, there were public sectors, there were private sectors. But again, when I saw the long line, I said, I don't know what Department of Transportation got going on, but I want to know. And I got on the line, and like I said, it was so many. It just, they gave away possibilities and opportunities for the positions that they had open. So you know, it was a lucky day, and it was a blessed day. I went to that hiring hall, and I left out with a job.

Mayor Adams: What were you doing prior to that? Were you employed? Were you doing stable employment?

Rumph: I wasn't employed at the time. Prior to DOT, I was working for the post office. I was in postal for about three years. I was a carrier. I was a window clerk. And I had little here and there jobs, but there wasn't stability. And that's what I needed. And this is the decision that I made to come back into a city agency, knowing that I would get the stability and the benefits. So it was a no-brainer for me.

Mayor Adams: And I always encourage people that city employment is a stable employment. You have a pension. You have health insurance. There are other opportunities and options that's available for your young people, your family members, your children. And that was the whole concept of it. The hiring halls, folks, started when I spoke with the head of DC 37, Henry Garrido. And we realized that we were trying to have people come to find jobs instead of going out to the community and bring jobs to them.

And we reached out to DCAS, it was Commissioner Pinnock at the time, to talk about, how do we start going into the local community centers, the churches, the schools, and bring jobs to people? And I want to bring in Commissioner Molina, because you picked up the baton. And what is the whole setup of the hiring hall? Can we even expand it now to not only city jobs, which are thousands of city jobs, but also private sector jobs.

Commissioner Louis Molina, Department of Citywide Administrative Services: No, absolutely, and thank you, and good morning to everyone that's listening. And the hiring halls have been amazing and expanded into NYC talent. And just so that we, the New Yorkers, know when the next hiring hall is actually going to be, it's right around the corner at the Jamaica Workforce Career Center, 168-25 Jamaica Avenue, from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm on Thursday, September 26.

And New Yorkers are looking for work, And you can also find work on jobs.nyc.gov and stay up to date on the hiring halls and all the work that's being offered, not only at the City of New York, but also with private sectors. So it's expanding to a public-private sector partnership where we're providing jobs to New Yorkers that want to live and work in New York. We're partnering with the small business services who's currently leading the hiring halls, and they're going to be doing that once a month. So like Shaniqua said, you're going to come, you're going to find not only opportunity, but also digital resources that can help you to improve your chances of finding employment.

Mayor Adams: And what I like about that, commissioner, is that we're also giving people training opportunities. It's more than just going in and trying to find a job. There are other opportunities that you're going to walk out with as well.

Commissioner Molina: Absolutely. I think, you know, the biggest takeaway is the digital resources give a lot of pointers for individuals that are looking for jobs. The other expansion is for employers that are looking for job seekers, we have resources for them and how they can partner us in the neighborhoods that are experiencing high unemployment so that they can also recruit for the jobs that they have available as well.

And you're building your capacity to network with other individuals that are looking for employment, city workers that have been and lived in the same experiences that you have lived in in your neighborhood and really beginning to change the trajectory of your life with a career opportunity with the city of New York or one of our private sector employers.

Mayor Adams: Many people don't realize we have over 300,000 city employees and workers. And they basically, it's a calling to go in and provide for your city. I don't care if you're a police officer, a teacher, a firefighter, a ACS worker, you are not sitting on the sidelines and saying, hey, why is the city not doing A, B, C, or D? You're getting engaged. and that's exactly what you did. Now, you've been with DOT, Department of Transportation, for how long now?

Rumph: I've been with DOT since June 10th. That was my start date, June 10th, so for a few months now.

Mayor Adams: Think about it, June 10th, liberation. You know, you got liberated. What do you enjoy about the work that you're doing now?

Rumph: What I enjoy most is the satisfaction that you get from the people. You know, I'm dealing with New Yorkers every day. I'm in the field every day. Whether it's a homeowner that's coming out that's happy that something was fixed on their block or if it's just a regular driver or everyday New Yorker that's saying, hey, thanks for making sure that this roadway was paved correctly. Whatever it is, you know, we're grateful for it and I take joy in seeing that.

Mayor Adams: Commissioner, you're really looking to do a lot of reforms over at DCAS and people don't realize how big DCAS is. That is a huge, huge entity that handles a lot of movement in our city. What are some of the reforms you're looking towards?

Commissioner Molina: You know, great question, Mr. Mayor, and thanks for your support and really helping us move the city forward. You know, one of the biggest tasks that we've done at DCAS was to review the qualifications for our municipal jobs.
We are aware that in many instances, previous requirements mandated a college degree or some sort of college credits, which automatically shut out many New Yorkers from municipal service. So we have been working for the past 18 months on reviewing our minimum qualifications.

Under your administration, Mr. Mayor, we've recognized that experience is more than just a college degree or college credits. Lived experience can be just as impactful as a four year college degree. We want everyone to have a path for themselves that want to join city service. And we've already expanded opportunities to New Yorkers, we've opened up 20,000 jobs.

Now someone with a high school diploma and valuable lived experience can qualify for a position that previously may have required only just a bachelor's degree. And with this review, we are opening the door for relevant work experience and practical skills to substitute for strict formal education. So it's really a change, it's an evolution, and it allows people of New York to be part of the change that they want to see in city government. It's extraordinary.

Mayor Adams: And those reforms are important, because a lot of people felt as though if they didn't have a college degree, they were locked out. There was no pathway. And we looked at some of these jobs, and you said, well, why do you need a college degree to do these jobs, particularly if you have life experience? Life experience is crucial. So by you examining that, it is opening doors for a lot of people who have felt as though a life has passed them by.

Commissioner Molina: Absolutely. And, you know, when you talk about lived experiences, when we talk about how come parts of our communities are cut out of opportunities is because the lived experience, person's points of view are not part of the policy decision making. And we want every New Yorker's voice to be heard, to involve the city to be the most equitable city in this country, and that's why that's part of this process.

Mayor Adams: I like how the hiring halls are targeting or zeroing in on those zip codes that are dealing with some economically challenging situations and finding those locations. I remember we did the kickoff in Brownsville. I believe that was the one that you went to. We did them in the Bronx. We did them in South Jamaica, Queens. So there's we're not just doing hiring halls just to do hiring halls. We're zeroing in on those locations we saw high unemployment.

When we came into office, Black unemployment was four times the rates of white unemployment. We have a 30 percent decrease in unemployment in Black and Hispanic communities. So we're seeing things like these hiring halls are really working. And I know you have some coming up in the future as well. How do people find out about them?

Commissioner Molina: Sure. So like I said earlier, our next hiring hall is going to be Thursday, September 26 in Queens at the Jamaica Workforce Career Center 168-25 Jamaica Avenue from 10 a.m to 2 and listeners can log on and go to our website jobs.nyc.gov. There's a number of not only resources there but our entire schedule for what we have hiring halls for the future and you can also submit an interest form via the website so we can stay in communication with you.

Mayor Adams: Our total number of jobs the city government is I think we have upwards of about 11,000 jobs that are available. So these are real opportunities. What do our numbers look like?

Commissioner Molina: Exactly. So over the last hiring halls, we've been able to actually take in 1.3 million applications over fiscal year 24. That is a record high for the city. In addition to that, we've engaged with over 8,000 individuals and connected them to jobs. And that's contributing to the overall jobs that we've had made in the city, which is over 4 million jobs. Right and that's reducing Black and brown unemployment by over 30 percent.

Mayor Adams: Excellent, love it, listen… we hear the music so we'll be back on the other side of the song but you can call us 212-545-1075.

Byrd: Well good morning, we are up to 68 degrees right now, it's Gary Byrd, wake up everybody time to express yourself, the program is Hear From the Mayor and the mayor wants to hear from you.

New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, wherever you're listening from this morning, but especially Manhattan, Brooklyn the Bronx, Queens, Long Island, Staten Island wherever you are, get ready, you have a chance to talk to the mayor at 107.5 WBLS. Good morning again Brother Eric.

Mayor Adams: Thank you. Thank you again, Gary. We're looking forward to hearing from our callers and online. We can call 212-545-1075. Why don't we open the lines up to the first caller?

Byrd: Caller, you're in the air, go right ahead, please. Good morning. Caller, you're in the air. Again, listening to your phone, not the radio. First name and where you're calling us from.

Question: Good morning. Good morning. This is Linda Woods calling from the Bronx, New York. I want to speak to the mayor, I heard about the passport program and I want to get into it because I had a passport. They did not give me my passport, talking about my name being Linda Woods. I don't know what's happening with that.

Mayor Adams: And this is the passport to travel, or the city has also?

Question: No, definitely. I want to go home to Africa that I've never been.

Mayor Adams: Oh, man, I love that. I remember my first time I went to Africa, to Sierra Leone, known as the Ivory Coast. You can walk into any post office. And our Brooklyn library also has a program there. but if they're giving you an identification problem, you also can use other forms of identification like your birth certificate and other items. But if you would call my constituent assistance unit, we'll help you navigate through that so that you can get your passport and you can get back to the motherland.

Question: Okay, because they call me female Woods on my, I'm a female, but that's not my name.

Mayor Adams: Right, we'll help you through it. We'll help you through it and we'll make sure you get your passport.

Question: And also I want to say, all the trouble these people give me they play a hater Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: Yes it is, we stay focused no distractions and grind you know so we're focused sister we're moving the city forward and we're going to continue to do so.

Question: Exactly you're excellent as a mayor.

Mayor Adams: Thank you.

Byrd: You're in the air. You're in the air from 107.5 WBLS good morning listen to your phone not the radio turn your radio all the way down as you talk to the mayor.

Mayor Adams: Yes you're in the air, yep we can hear you.

Question: Oh good morning, I'm calling because I'm hearing a lot of programs for you know the job fairs but I wanted to know is there any job fair for 55 plus community? Because I've been trying to find a position to get back into to be reinstated because of my pension. And I've been having difficulties.

Mayor Adams: Well, let us let us help you with that. Because I'm part of that 55 plus community, you know, so commissioner, can we talk about that?

Commissioner Molina: Yeah, absolutely. So you know, we take talent, you know, not only entry level workers, but also mid career professionals, those that want to get back into the workforce. We have a number of jobs under our Run This Town campaign. You can go to nycjobs.gov, and there are a number of jobs there. If you come to a hiring hall, we can also navigate you through that process as well amongst a number of different agencies.

Mayor Adams: And so don't think for one day that 55 means you're out of the game. You're just really starting the game. So come back. We could use your life experiences and of your former employment, those skills from that, not only in city service but we have a lot of private sector partners that are looking for mature adults to come into the workforce. So please come in and be a part of the business of running the city. Next caller are you in the air?

Question: Good morning Mayor Adams and the [inaudible] commissioners. How are you?

Mayor Adams: Quite well, quite well.

Question: Okay, my question to you, I'm not sure if you are aware about the license drivers and people who are driving actually in New York City who are obscuring their license plates by scratching them off, white outs, and there's a lot of hit and runs going on in the city and it's very disturbing.

Mayor Adams: You are, you're a woman after my own heart. I was just standing with Public Safety Deputy Mayor Phil Banks, Department of Sanitation Commissioner Tisch, Jessica Tisch and others where we started two initiatives.

Number one, we've been catching these plates and these those who are driving which was called ghost plates, covered plates, altered plates. We've been catching them at the tolling booth, but we just announced that we're doing a new initiative that we've been doing for about two weeks now where we're driving through the community at night to catch them while they park and we're towing them.

We already moved a couple of hundred, but you're right this was something that was being ignored for many years, and we're refusing to ignore it. Not only are they committing crimes with these cars, but if you are hit by them, they don't have insurance, they don't have proper registration, and the burden is left on an innocent person. So we are zeroing in on them and targeting them. We're really excited about it, we removed over 295 ghost cars in just five days. So, we're with you. I hear you loud and clear.

Sounds like the music, Gary? You know, listen, really enjoyed the conversation today. I hope people sign up for some of the hiring halls and you can learn more by going to newyorkcity.gov/hearfromeric. There are many ways to do so and we look forward to a continuing conversation. I'll see you in 30 days, Gary. Thank you, listeners.

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