New York City Mayor Eric Adams holds an in-person media availability at City Hall on Tuesday, November 26, 2024 | Photo by Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office
Working-class New Yorkers are our city’s backbone; they keep it safe, healthy, and clean and help us take the world’s greatest city to new heights. These dedicated workers deserve the chance to build a better future for themselves, their children, and their families. It includes securing good-paying jobs, affordable homes, and a world-class education for their children. That is why, from day one of our administration, we have focused on making New York City more affordable for working-class New Yorkers.
We have done this by helping New Yorkers save more than $30 billion through programs that help them get ahead, like the “Earned Income Tax Credit,” which gives families and working-class people more money to pay for groceries, bills, and rent. We have helped New Yorkers in public housing access free high-speed internet and basic TV through Big Apple Connect, and we are on the path to eliminating medical debt for 500,000 New Yorkers — saving them an estimated $1.8 billion.
We have created homes that working people, families, immigrants, and young people need with back-to-back record years of affordable housing construction; this includes nearly 29,000 affordable and public housing units just this year. We signed two historic agreements with our labor partners that allowed us to build more and faster, all while creating good-paying career pathways and apprenticeship opportunities for New Yorkers living in New York City Housing Authority housing or low-income zip codes.
“As someone raised by a single mother who worked several jobs to support our family, I know the struggle many face. That drives me to make sure that hard-working New Yorkers can get the chances I was given to get ahead.”
But we’re still delivering for New Yorkers. Later this week, we will continue to advance the generational Willets Point transformation, which will provide new, resilient infrastructure, the largest 100 percent affordable housing project in 40 years in our city, over 20,000 square feet of retail space, a 250-key hotel, and the city’s first-ever soccer-specific stadium for the New York City Football Club.
Also, this week, the City Council will vote on our historic “City of Yes for Housing Opportunity” proposal, allowing us to build a “little more housing in every neighborhood.” By enacting this plan, we can see how to create a new generation of affordable housing for our city, including seniors, families, young people, unhoused neighbors, and so many others. It will allow us to take on the long-running housing crisis that has made life far too complex and unaffordable for many New Yorkers.
We have expanded FutureReadyNYC, our learning program that connects public school students to real job credentials and paid work-based learning and puts our students on pathways to good-paying careers. Now, 36 schools will participate in FutureReadyNYC, bringing the program to 135 schools across the five boroughs. It means that 15,000 students will have the chance to receive real-world experiences in tech, education, business and finance, and health care.
As someone raised by a single mother who worked several jobs to support our family, I know the struggle many face. That drives me to make sure that hard-working New Yorkers can get the chances I was given to get ahead. We want to make and keep New York City affordable so that all New Yorkers can build their dream here in the greatest city in the world.
