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Brigid Bergen: The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergen, senior reporter in the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom, filling in for Brian today. On today's show, we'll cover a landmark climate case from Montana where a judge decided that the state has to take into account climate change mitigation efforts whenever it weighs future fossil-fueled projects. It may provide a roadmap for climate change law in New York state as well. Then, we'll turn to South Africa, where five countries, Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa, are meeting this week to discuss a path for greater influence on the global economy. We'll end the show today with your stories of how your relationship with your siblings has changed over the years. Has it changed, stayed the same, and what do those relationships mean to you? First, it's been a busy summer for New York City Mayor Eric Adams. He's currently on an international trip visiting Israel. Today, he's expected to meet with representatives from the country's pro democracy protest movement and with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who leads a far-right government. This trip comes, of course, as the city struggles to find ways to care for tens of thousands of migrants who have come to the city from other countries in search of shelter and a new life. The mayor has been calling on President Biden and the state to provide the city with more support, but it's been a persistent challenge facing his administration.

Another headache for the mayor relates to some ongoing investigations into fundraising for his campaign. Earlier this summer, Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg indicted six people in a straw donor fundraising scheme. In short, people were reimbursing alleged donors and using those donations to secure more public matching money from the city's Public Campaign Finance program. To be clear, Mayor Adams is not personally under any sort of investigation, but it's fair to say that his campaign is facing heightened scrutiny of its donors and how his campaign funds were raised. My next guests are covering all of these issues. Katie Honan is a senior reporter at The City where she also co-hosts the FAQ NYC podcast. I'm also joined by The City's George Joseph, also a senior reporter with the investigation teams. They were both on a story with six by-lines from the city taking a closer look at some of the Adams campaign donors. Katie, George, welcome back to WNYC, so great to have you here in the studio.

Katie Honan: Thanks for having us on, Brigid.

George Joseph: Great to be here.

Brigid Bergen: Listeners, we have time to take a few of your calls. We are talking about Mayor Adams' very challenging summer, and we want to hear from you. Do you have a question about this latest story from The City about his campaign donors, or is there another issue in your neighborhood that you think the mayor needs to handle differently? Or, maybe you want to shout out something you think Mayor Adams deserves a little more credit for doing right despite this very tough summer. Give us a call now. The number is 212-433-WNYC, that's 212-433-9692. You can also text us at that number, again, 212-433-9692. Okay, so, Katie, you wrote about those indictments back in July when the Manhattan DA charged six people with that straw donor scheme. Without getting too into the weeds, remind us what the Manhattan DA's Office has alleged was going on there.

Katie Honan: It was straw donations is what they allege. A group of people based throughout the city, one person was an acquaintance or a friend of Mayor Adams, but obviously, Mayor Adams was not. At this point, we're unclear if he was involved. They say there was no proof that he was involved at all, but actually, interestingly enough, they picked up this scheme because they had a wiretap on another thing they were investigating, which I found interesting. A group of people wanted to maximize their donations to Mayor Adams, to then candidate Adams, so they would fill out the $250 donation, which in 2021, was the first time we had an eight to one matching with $250 being the max for a mayoral candidate.

It was them giving, but they would say put your sister's name, put this person's name, fill out the documentation for them and then we'll get it all done. They wanted to get credit for that as well to show the then candidate like, "This is how much money we've raised for you." I think that's what happens with a lot of these schemes where people want to carry favor with someone who they believe could be the next mayor of New York City. This was one way they can do it and get around that. The matching funds are paid for with city dollars, so that's where that corruption comes in because this is our money that's being used improperly.

Brigid Bergen: Just to be clear, you said 250 is the max for matching funds, right?

Katie Honan: Yes, I'm sorry.

Brigid Bergen: [inaudible 00:05:13] [crosstalk] donations is 2100 I think.

Katie Honan: Right, that's for the matching funds. We can get into all the kinds of-- You know it very well-- [crosstalk]

Brigid Bergen: We'll get into the nitty gritty, but we won't try to bog people down with it, but just point of clarification. Katie, you also did a story that focused on one of the individuals facing charges, a retired NYPD inspector, what can you tell us about him?

Katie Honan: He had worked with Mayor Adams, Mayor Adams office, he was in the NYPD, he was involved in 100 blocks of law enforcement, a lot of other fraternal organizations, so the mayor did know him from that. Again, there was no indication that the now mayor was involved in this, but they knew each other and they were known to each other. There was also, through the Manhattan DA's investigation, a former top aide to the mayor Rachel Atcheson was also in communication with these donors as well.

Brigid Bergen: George, I'm going to bring you into this in just a moment, but Katie, you have said, I have said, we'll say it one more time, the mayor is not a target of these investigations at this point, but to what extent has he been asked to comment on them, and how has he responded?

Katie Honan: He hasn't really responded directly. He's led his campaign consultants, spokespeople, whatever their title is, to talk about that to really say, "We are not involved in this." He's not been investigated. When the mayor has been asked directly about it, he said, "Look, a lot of people gave." They had a number of individual $250 donors, those individual donors that were matched eight to one, so that is where they're at now. I think the mayor until there is any indication that he was involved in this or he's even being looked at as a potential person involved in this, he's going to brush off a lot of the questions.

Brigid Bergen: True. George, let's shift a little bit to this latest story that came out late on Friday. The headline of the story is New Questions Arrives Over Adams Donors. One says she was reimbursed, others say they never gave. It feels like you were picking up on that earlier investigation. How did you begin reporting this story?

George Joseph: Yes, exactly. After the indictment dropped in July, several reporters at The City were curious, was this an isolated incident, or are there other suspect donations that we should be looking into from the Adams mayoral campaign? Again, in the Alvin Bragg indictment from Manhattan, they were saying that a group of defendants were getting people to fill out contribution cards for donations in their name, then reimbursing those people so that they could get eight to one or multiple times matching funds from the public coffers. What we started looking at to see if there were similar suspect donations, were donations that went up to or close to the line of the maximum matching threshold, $250, for example. When you see a pile of donations from the same place that are all designed to maximize matching funds and which have very scant information about the contributors, for example, people that are just listed as unemployed, housewife, et cetera, people that aren't registered to vote, people that usually aren't very active in city politics, but all of a sudden, on the same day with a bunch of similar people with very little information are said to be donors, all of a sudden, it raises questions. What we did was we found two different clusters like that from the 2021 campaign and we started knocking on doors and asking people, "Hey, there's this donation card in your name, it has what's purported to be your signature, did you make this donation?"

Brigid Bergen: Tell me a little bit about what you heard through the reporting.

George Joseph: We spoke to several dozen people, and we tried to be really careful to go over these donation cards with them, go over the handwriting on the cards with them, go over the checks or money orders that were enclosed in those cards to really make sure, maybe you just forgot about this. Do you remember this? That kind of thing. We spoke to several people who said, "I did not make a donation to the Adams campaign even though my name is on this card." One woman said that she has never worked at a restaurant where she was listed as a restaurant delivery man, though she is a woman, and that restaurant doesn't do delivery, but she was listed as working at that restaurant and donating $245 to the Adams campaign in August of 2021, though she says that she never donated, that she doesn't use Chase Bank, which was the check that was on the donation card, and that that wasn't her handwriting on the donation card and the check. Another person, a young man told me in an interview that he never signed a $250 money order that went to the Eric Adams campaign back in 2019. He said that the signature on the money order was forged, and he also said that another money order in the name of his father, which was from the same day, was also forged. His father, by the way, was listed as a housewife, and his father has publicly filed signatures from property transactions in previous years that looked nothing like the signature on the money order.

Finally, there was also a woman who worked at a mall that we looked into who said that she did give money or did sign a check for the campaign but then was reimbursed by someone who had come to visit her workplace with her bosses looking on, which would be a straw donation.

Brigid Bergen: Sure.

George Joseph: There are several donations that we documented and spoke with people that raised serious questions about their validity, and also many more that are in a bit more of a murky area where people told us in person that they didn't understand what they were giving to or that they gave because their bosses told them to, without necessarily understanding what it was for.

Brigid Bergen: Let's just take one step back here. The New York City's Public Campaign Finance program is the oldest in the nation. It's really considered the gold standard to incentivize sometimes, as you said, people who maybe traditionally have not participated in political campaigns from getting involved, so first-time donors, people who maybe aren't registered to vote, but have a stake in the political process. There have been a lot of changes to the program in recent years, particularly to the matching formula. Just to put a fine point on it, Katie, can you talk a little bit just again, how this program works and why it's held as this gold standard?

Katie Honan: I think it's just, as you said, it is designed to allow people who aren't rich but who still want to be involved in this democratic process to give. If you want to give $10 and you know that because you're a New York City resident and because the candidate you're giving to has qualified based on a long number of qualifications of money they've raised and establish-- If you want to give to that candidate, that $10 can become $80. Right? My math is right, eight to one, yes, I'm trying to do the math. It's just eight to one, so it's eight times what you're giving. That other money is funded through the city. This is just some stats from the 2021 report. $126.9 million was paid to 308 candidates, and that was matched from $18.3 million in contributions from New Yorkers, and that is the spirit behind it, to allow for people to give and maximize their money, and it allows for a candidate who isn't loaded, who doesn't have fancy fundraisers, who doesn't have lots of money and deep-pocketed donors to actually engage their voters and their constituents to raise money.

Brigid Bergen: George.

George Joseph: Just to follow up on that, it's great when people of all backgrounds and income levels give, and we want a system in which everyone feels empowered to give. The concerns that we heard from people though, were that they didn't know or understand what they were giving to, or they were being manipulated or pressured into giving when they didn't understand what their money was going for, or their names were ripped off altogether by people who had their own interests in mind rather than respecting the democratic process.

Brigid Bergen: If you're just joining us now, I'm Brigid Bergen, senior reporter for WNYC and the Gothamist newsroom, filling in for Brian today. I'm speaking with George Joseph and Katie Honan, both senior reporters at The City, the online news website, and we've been talking about the challenging summer for Mayor Adams. We are starting the conversation by talking about this latest investigation published by The City on Friday related to some new questions about donors to the Adams campaign. We've said it before, we will say it again, Mayor Adams is not a focus of the story per se, but the donors to the campaign are, and the cconduct of the campaign is. George, you've talked a little bit about the questions it raises related to the individuals. What are some of the other implications that you think this story raises in terms of how the program operates, how campaigns operate, and what are you going to be watching going forward?

George Joseph: One of the red flags that we noticed was in one of the clusters which mostly came from one day in October of 2019, there were several money orders that were used to make donations, and most of the money orders were at $250, again, the max that can be extracted for public matching funds. Campaign finance experts told us, "Look, it's very common for campaigns maybe to miss a check that has some red flag on it, but a money order is really a red flag because it's a rare form of payment. It's not as common as a check, and it's much harder to trace." It suggests that you should be paying attention to that more because oftentimes, people use money orders when they don't really want to have the source of the funding be tracked thoroughly. In this bundle of money orders from that day were at least two of the donations that a young man said was forged in the name of him and his father. The Adams campaign received that bundle of donations and submitted that paperwork to the Campaign Finance Board, but when we asked them for further information about how that money was collected, who delivered it, who sent it, that kind of thing, the Adams campaign was not forthcoming with information about that particular cluster. While yes, we understand there are thousands of donations and campaigns are really hectic, complicated processes, campaign finance experts told us, when you have such a red flag, you definitely need to look into it. One of the questions that our reporting raises is how much did the Adams campaign look into these red-flag donations.

Katie Honan: In speaking with the representatives for the Adams 2021 campaign, they explain that in one instance, one cluster was at a house party, and the other one was the 2019 event that George was just speaking about. That was a campaign-sponsored event. These are, I don't want to say loopholes, but these are within the own Campaign Finance Board's restrictions and regulations. For example, if you throw a house party, if you want to have a party [chuckles] for someone in your home, if you own the home and you only spend up to $500 on food, cookies, or whatever you're serving people, and all the people give up to a certain amount, you don't have to disclose that. That was how they explained one of them, but I know when George and another colleague went out, no one mentioned a house party. It was a house party on Long Island, so there's some questions about how many of those donations, even though the campaign is saying it's traced to that, we're unsure of how true that is because no one mentioned a house party way out on Long Island where this allegedly happened.

Brigid Bergen: We have lot more to talk about here. I'm speaking with George Joseph and Katie Honan from The City about Mayor Adams, his challenging summer, his campaign fundraising. Listeners, we have time to take a few of your calls. If you have a question about this latest investigation from The City, if you have another issue related to all the stuff that's been going on in the city this summer, or maybe you want to give Mayor Adams some credit for something you think he's not getting credit for, give us a call. 212-433-WNYC. That's 212-433-9692. We have to take a short break. We'll be back with much more on this and your calls after the break.

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Brigid Bergen: It's The Brian Lehrer Show at WNYC. I'm Brigid Bergen, senior reporter in the WNYC and Gothamist newsroom, filling in for Brian today. I'm speaking with George Joseph and Katie Honan, both senior reporters at The City, the online news website. We've been talking about Mayor Adams, their latest investigation into his campaign's fundraising, and the broader issues facing the city. We're going to get into more of those in this part of the segment, but let's go to Eli in Brooklyn. Eli, welcome to WNYC. Thanks for holding.

Eli: Thanks so much. Big fan of the show and of actually of FAQ NYC too. I guess my question is not so much about integrity in the Adams administration, but about competence. If we're talking about challenges this summer, I think the climate is just screaming out as an overwhelming challenge, and I don't see the focus and commitment that I think is needed to address this challenge coming from this administration. The person in city government that I see is most focused is Brad Lander, the comptroller, but I wonder if your guests think that the Adams administration is taking the climate crisis with the due urgency that it needs.

Brigid Bergen: Eli, thanks so much for that question. Katie, you want to kick that off?

Katie Honan: Yes. I think the issue that we saw this summer that the mayor received a lot of criticism about was the air quality from the Canadian wildfires, which obviously, is climate related, and the fact that they really didn't message how bad this was going to be until what seemed to be the last minute seemed like a mistake within the government. Whether it was the Adams administration with the mayor's office or the Office of Emergency Management, just not letting people know what was going to happen. I know there are some questions about whether they should have allowed students to go to school, whether they should have closed public school. I think that is a concern. Of all the topics, I think with this summer and since last spring when we've seen such an influx of more than 107,000 asylum seekers coming into New York City, that's taken a lot of energy and focus away from other topics. The mayor, obviously, has been very focused on crime. That was one of his big campaign issues. I think someone like Brad Lander, some other members of the city council, are really leading the charge on understanding what climate change will do and already has done to New York City.

We're a city surrounded by water. We don't have to look that far. You could look to the remnants of Hurricane Ida and see what happened there at neighborhoods across the city that they're not oceanfront or waterfront neighborhoods, but they still flooded very dangerously, and it was deadly. I think that's a fair criticism of the mayor, and maybe he'll take that on and figure out some initiatives to mention.

Brigid Bergen: Let's go to Jay in Brooklyn. Jay, thanks for calling the Brian Lehrer Show.

Jay: Yes, hi. Thanks for taking my call, Brigid. My comment is I supported Mayor Adams somewhat reluctantly, and I've been very disappointed. I just think he has more in common with Trump than I realized. He just tries to project strength instead of leading with competence. That's evident with the asylum seekers that he's turned into a crisis, and it didn't need to be that way. His relationship with ethics leaves so much to be desired. With the police commissioner, the way he bullied her out of her job. It's just been a very big disappointment.

Brigid Bergen: Jay, thank you so much for that call. Katie, Jay put a lot out there, some change in the administration, and certainly, the ongoing migrant crisis, which we're going to talk some more about. This morning, Siena College put out a new poll. Not great news there for Democrats writ large. President Biden, Governor Hochul, Mayor Adams all not facing great favorability numbers. One of the major issues is the migrant crisis. 54% of those polls said it was a very serious issue, and that, of course, smacks up against persistent issues with homelessness across the city. Katie, on that podcast, FAQ NYC that you co-host last week, you spoke with the Coalition for the Homeless and Legal Aid. What did they say the problem was here?

Katie Honan: They were actually more critical of Governor Hochul and said that she could've declared a state of emergency at any point over the last year to expedite a lot of changes. Like you said, there's been a homelessness crisis long before the migrants came. We have an affordable housing crisis in New York City. All you need to do is look at any rental video on a social media site to see just how insane rents are and how expensive it is to live in this city that's already always been expensive to some degree, but the housing costs are really astronomical. It just exacerbated these problems. They were most critical of Governor Hochul in that saying that the state could have done a lot more. If she declared a state of emergency and really just ordered a lot of these counties upstate and in western New York that have said they don't want any asylum seekers there, she could have, as governor, really forcefully ordered them to at least take some people from-- There's places upstate that historically have always taken asylum seekers. You look at a place like Utica and they have a large Burmese population because they have asylees from that place, so it's not unprecedented. Their criticism was really for them-- Obviously, there's been criticisms of Mayor Adams' rolling back of the city's right-to-shelter mandate, but a lot of it was against the governor. I was interested by Jay from Brooklyn saying that he was a reluctant Adams supporter. Message me offline, Jay, that was fascinating.

Brigid Bergen: [laughs] Well, let's talk a little bit about the news from Governor Hochul yesterday related to the migrant crisis. She signaled that the federal government may be ready to allow Floyd Bennett Field to be used as a place for migrant tents. That's a request that goes back to May. Katie, you and I know this area very well. How much relief do you think this is going to bring, and what new set of political challenges are you going to be watching for?

Katie Honan: Governor Hochul said more than 2000 people could be housed at Floyd Bennett Field. It's unclear now how much it will cost, what the setup would be like. It's a bit of a desolate area. There's one bus in and out, the Q35 bus. I don't know if they would provide other transportation. I don't know what the utilities are like at Floyd Bennett Field. I guess they would be on the airfield. Also, we see what happened on Randall's Island. There's a lot of recreation there. There's football leagues and soccer leagues. There's a ice skating rink. I don't know how this would affect things. Obviously, housing people takes precedent over a soccer league or a soccer game, but at the same time, it doesn't really generate a lot of goodwill for people who are trying to live their lives. This might impede with things, or at least that's what they feel. It'll likely be a tense structure like we've seen on Randall's Island, but it's unclear when it could happen. This is not a done deal yet. It was a tentative agreement that they finally said that they would do, but there's a lot of questions.

Brigid Bergen: We've been getting a lot of texts in. I'm going to read a couple of them. One listener texts, "Mayor Adams speaks about wanting to help asylum seekers, but the city has not provided any funds to local nonprofits or mutual aid groups who are working directly with the immigrants. All the funds going to the homeless shelters are not set up to help with filing asylum claims. When will the city reach out to all the nonprofits who have been working with immigrants for years?" That comes from Nula in Jackson Heights. We have another message critical of the mayor's expansion of the police. This listener texts, "I'm concerned about Adams' police expansion, not just the increase in budget, but his use of "robo-dogs" and the public clearly rejects paid for with civil asset forfeitures and the encryption of police radios that limit the accountability and limit the ability of journalists." More on the migrant issue, more on that issue of being able to provide oversight of the administration. George, I know this is an area that you have done a lot of reporting in over the years. How concerned are you about that issue, whether it's the encryption of radio technology or other ways to be able to make sure that we can keep sunshine on an administration that's accountable to all of us?

George Joseph: Well, the encryption of police radios was a really interesting issue for me, particularly because of the trajectory of the Adams administration. When Adams was campaigning, he was constantly running on how important of an issue crime was and how he was going to address crime. Then, upon coming into office, he was constantly amplifying stories by going out to crime scenes, going out and talking about crime and crime, crime, crime being his main message.

Crime is an important issue. It affects people's lives. Nothing wrong with that inherently. However, recently, the administration moved to shut off radios, and there's a perception that that's because the administration now doesn't want the media to focus on this issue that they had been trumpeting at the beginning of the administration. There's probably some really interesting reasons for that, including because New York City relies so much on people coming into the city for tourism dollars, for people filling up our offices in midtown for our commercial real estate tax base. All of a sudden, that thing which was really helpful politically expedient in getting him elected and establishing his theme as mayor is now a liability. It's hard for us in the media though, to then deal with the consequence being we're going to try to shut off your access to radios and information about policing and crime because we need that to be able to actually report on what New Yorkers are dealing with every day.

Brigid Bergen: Absolutely. Certainly, the Adams administration has made a pretty significant shift in how it does all of its public-facing communications. Just last week, elevating someone who used to be the press secretary, Fabien Levy, to now a deputy mayor status. Katie, what do you think that that signals about how this administration wants to communicate with the public, with the media, and has anything changed as a result of it since that time?

Katie Honan: Well, I think with this administration, there really has been less transparency. I point to a story that our colleague [unintelligible 00:29:31] broke about the Department of Correction not wanting to release the names of detainees who die in city-run facilities. Their reasoning was, "Well, it's disrespectful to the families." No, that is completely trying to hide what's going on in city jails from the public and from the press. I don't know what a deputy mayor for communications, he's in Israel right now with the mayor, so I guess he can't hear this, but I don't know what he's going to be doing to some degree. I think he's supposed to be coordinating with other agencies. I saw it again on Twitter this morning. They shared the same video, every single governmental Twitter agency sharing the same video, a video about city's response to asylum seekers. As a reporter, and George can agree, I think we want to get information that's correct in a timely manner, and sometimes that actually is a challenge with this administration, whether it's from the mayor's office or from a particular agency.

Brigid Bergen: I'm going to bring another caller in. We're going to take another topic into this conversation. Leaf in Manhattan, thanks for calling the Brian Lehrer Show.

Leaf: Yes. Hi. Can you hear me?

Brigid Bergen: We can hear you. Go ahead.

Leaf: Okay. Thank you for having me. I'm very upset with the mayor because he conducted what he calls a public hearing just minutes before he was signing into law Bill Intro 31-C. There was only two people that were there to speak at this so-called public hearing. One was a restaurant lobbyist that was encouraging the mayor to change the law he was [unintelligible 00:31:10] so that they could dine year-round. That was one. Two, there was another member who was there speaking that I honestly don't understand why they had them there because it appeared to me that the mayor or his team knew that the person comes to every single thing that the mayor does and challenges every single law. There was nobody else from the public there, there was no adequate notice given, and it just, to me, had all the earmarks that the mayor was checking off a box that he had a so-called public hearing that was not a public hearing [crosstalk]--

Brigid Bergen: Leaf, let me get our reporters in on that particular issue because I think you gave us the bill number, but for our listeners who don't follow bill numbers, we were talking outdoor dining, and Katie, it comes with any bill signing that there has to be a public hearing, but generally, at that point in the process, if there's a public hearing, it's likely to be something that the mayor is signing. Correct? This is not where the debate usually happens.

Katie Honan: Right. The debate happened in the city council chambers as they were going through this bill. I was at that bill signing as well. As Leaf said, there were two members of the public there. Both were sort of opposed to the bill as it stood. One person owns a cocktail bar in Williamsburg, and he said, "I would love to have this open year-round. I'd be willing to pay a lot more money." The other person also it was unclear exactly his criticisms, but I think yes, this is the bureaucracy and what's required. These things are listed in the city record. I don't expect regular listeners of WNYC to be reading the daily city record to find these things out.

Brigid Bergen: Oh, I bet some of you do. I know some of you do.

Katie Honan: No, there's criticisms even when you saw the way the council voted. Some of the people who voted against the bill voted against the bill because they didn't think it went far enough in terms of allowing restaurants to have outdoor dining. It has become a real flashpoint for so many parts of the city whether you are rah-rah for it where you want it year-round, bigger or better, or if you don't want it at all or if you want something in the between, but yes, that is what happens. It's usually like a 9:00 AM thing in the blue room at City Hall and it's not very well attended.

Brigid Bergen: Let's go to Minnie in Manhattan. Minnie has a question. Thanks so much for waiting, Minnie. Welcome to WNYC.

Minnie: Hi. I am very curious about why Eric Adams has not implemented a vacancy tax on apartments all over the city, specifically very rich areas. Instead of focusing on office buildings, which yes, we should handle that, where is this action when it comes to really sticking it to the landlords who are being insanely greedy?

Brigid Bergen: Minnie, thanks so much for that question, that comment. I will shout out my colleague David Brand who had a story just yesterday about more than 13,000 rent-stabilized units in New York City that are sitting empty. That was thanks to data from the Independent Budget Office. We know that there's a housing crisis. Katie, is this something that you could imagine the mayor weighing in on, a vacancy tax on landlords, particularly given that he does get a lot of support from real estate?

Katie Honan: The previous mayor Bill de Blasio in his 2020 State of the City address, which ironically was called Save Our City before COVID even came, he had suggested a vacancy tax, but I haven't heard a strong push from this mayor on it. He has focused on this return to office, getting the city back from COVID. He's also, compared to the former mayor, much more real estate friendly than the previous mayor. I think if he does suggest something like that, it would probably be done differently or maybe he would approach it a little bit differently. Yes, like Minnie said, we have a severe housing shortage in New York City, and if there's some way our colleague at The City [unintelligible 00:35:15] had also reported on empty apartments sitting throughout the city and what needs to be done and if anything can be done to have people living in them.

Brigid Bergen: I want to read a text that we got in and then ask you both to weigh in on it because it links back to the migrant issue that we have been talking about. This is the text, and I'll make a point of clarification in it. The listener wrote, "Why would the Adams administration put people in tent cities at Floyd Bennett Field right before hurricane season begins? The mere mention of this idea shows how little they're thinking about the humanity and safety of these refugees, let alone a holistic integration into the systems and organizations in day-to-day reality of New York City." Now, we'll make clear that it is not just the Adams administration that has sought to use Floyd Bennett Field. That is something the state also wanted. The point stands that that is an area that was hit hard certainly during Hurricane Sandy. George, Katie, I know you both covered the aftermath of flooding and storms in the city. What are some of the issues you think that that raises, and what will you be watching for as we move into the fall? We're shifting into a new season here where the peak of hurricane season is going to be upon us. Is this a new concern that potentially this solution could be causing a new problem?

Katie Honan: Well, we saw it when they had set up tents at the Orchard Beach parking lot. It wasn't hurricane season, but when it rained, there's just pooling of parking lots, and it's not an ideal situation. Obviously, when they build tents, they put floors on them and stuff, but I think with Floyd Bennett Field, I don't know how far along we are in even constructing these tents. Again, it's a tentative agreement, so I don't know all the steps that the city needs to go through and the state to get these things done. I think the mayor has made it very clear, we are desperate for space, we have run out of room, and whether or not this is one attempt of saying, okay, well, we're going to just put people in tents here, this is what we think might be a good idea, the text asking about the humanity of people I think there's a lot of questions about that. We saw the hundreds of people sleeping outside the Roosevelt Hotel a few weeks ago. There was questions of whether the Adams administration allowed that to show how desperate this is because even in his statement yesterday about the authorization of Floyd Bennett Field, the mayor still said we need more help from the feds, we need money, we need work authorization.

George Joseph: I just wanted to pick up on that. New York is a city of immigrants. New York is taking care of many people coming in here. Many people, nonprofits, mutual aid groups, and city workers are working tirelessly to help with the influx of people and get them services. There's real questions about how much the state government and the federal government is leaving New York City to deal with it on their own. We have a lot of high-ranking members of Congress, Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries who have been in office for years and often brag about their influence in Congress, and New York City obviously is a solidly democratic city for our federal majorities, and yet both the White House Congress have done very little in terms of financial support for this issue. Mayor Adams has been begging for months for more support. It's not only something that the city can deal with on its own, and that's a fair point from Mayor Adams.

Brigid Bergen: If we were going to talk for the whole hour, we would shift now into a conversation about how that's going to affect the politics of the upcoming election season, which is going to be heating up starting in September, but we have to leave it there. My guests have been Katie Honan, a senior reporter at the nonprofit news site The City where she also co-hosts the FAQ NYC podcast, and The City's George Joseph, also a senior reporter on the investigations team. Thanks so much to you both for joining me.

Katie Honan: Thanks for having us.

George Joseph: Great to be here.

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