Last week in Harlem, the neighborhood where generations of Black families have flourished, I reported to New Yorkers on the state of our city and outlined an ambitious agenda to make New York City the best place to raise a family.
When we came into office three years ago, COVID, crime, and chaos had thrown New York into uncertainty and pushed too many families away. I told you then that we would not just bring our city back; we’d make it better than ever.
That started with keeping families safe. We put thousands of new officers onto our streets, took nearly 20,000 illegal guns off them, and launched a $485 million action plan to prevent gun violence. These efforts have paid off, with murders and shootings down by double digits since we took office.
We put over $30 billion back into your pockets and delivered hundreds of millions of dollars in tax relief. Last year alone, we broke new records for the most jobs and small businesses in city history and enrolled a record 150,000 young people in our early childhood education system. We also continued to deliver for our minority-and-women owned business enterprises, awarding $6.4 billion in contracts.
We shattered affordable housing records two years in a row, unlocked billions of dollars for public housing, and, after decades of inaction, passed the most pro-housing zoning proposal in city history.
The state of our city is strong.
But there’s no denying that New Yorkers are anxious about their future. Extreme costs are forcing too many families to make hard choices. I know because I’ve been there.
My mother worked several jobs to raise six kids by herself. But even though the odds were stacked against us, Dorothy Mae Adams never stopped fighting to provide her family with a better life, and that is why I will never stop fighting to do the same for you.
To make America’s safest big city even safer, we are adding hundreds of new officers to our subways and making the smart, upstream investments that prevent crime in the first place.
This year, we will begin a $163 million expansion of five of our most successful programs that connect young people to careers, college, and counseling. We know that if we do not educate, we will incarcerate, which is why we will expand these programs to reach 8,000 young New Yorkers.
When we came into office, we said the days of letting people languish on our streets and subways were over. We moved 8,000 New Yorkers from our subways into shelter and committed to caring for those who could not care for themselves. But we need to go further.
Last week, I announced a $650 million investment to bolster that work and tackle street homelessness in New York City. We are going to add 900 more Safe Haven beds that offer people on our streets extra support and specialized services; open a new facility to care for unhoused New Yorkers suffering from serious mental illness; and launch a new program to connect soon-to-be parents applying for shelters with permanent housing, because no child should ever be born into our city’s shelter system.
To make sure more families can afford to live across the five boroughs, we’re launching “City of Yes for Families.” We’ll work with city agencies and with the City Council to build more family-friendly neighborhoods; that means more family-sized homes and homes for multi-generational families, so parents, grandparents, and grandchildren can live together. It also means building more homes alongside schools, libraries, grocery stores, and playgrounds so families have everything they need close to home.
To put more money back in your pockets, we put forward an ambitious proposal to eliminate city income taxes for working-class families making 150 percent of the federal poverty line or less. Our “Axe the Tax” proposal will give over $63 million back to 582,000 New Yorkers and their dependents to help you make rent, afford groceries, and cover the cost of childcare.
And to lay the foundation for a lifetime of financial freedom, we set a new goal of making sure every student can learn how to save and spend money by 2030. We are going to put a financial educator in every school district to provide workshops, counseling, and curriculum, and we are going to open new bank branches in city schools to give students hands-on experience creating a bank account.
Finally, from Central Park to Flushing Meadows, our city’s parks are where families come together, so this year, we are going to open up more playgrounds for use on nights, weekends, and during the summer to put another 20,000 New Yorkers within a 10-minute walk of a park.
No matter what challenges New York City faces, I promise you this: no one will fight harder for your family than our administration will.
With these investments in public spaces and public safety, housing and financial freedom, we will make sure that the greatest city in the world is also the best place to raise a family.
