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Brian Lehrer: It's The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC. Good morning, everyone. We begin today by meeting the brand new second most powerful person in New York City. Some of you are familiar with her, some of you are not. She is Adrienne Adams, the newly elected New York City Council Speaker, who now takes her place beside Mayor Eric Adams, no relation, as the two main policymakers in the city for the foreseeable future. You probably all know the names of the last three speakers just as an indication of the importance of this position, Corey Johnson, Melissa Mark-Viverito, and Christine Quinn.

Like Eric Adams, Adrienne Adams grew up in Southeast Queens. Like Eric Adams and me, she attended Bayside High School. She went to Spelman College, has backgrounds in both corporate training and early childhood education, maybe I'll ask her who's harder to train, three-year-olds or CEOs, and later became very active in community affairs, becoming the chair of Community Board 12 in Hollis, Queens and nearby neighborhoods before being elected to the Council in 2017. She now becomes the first Black New York City Council Speaker and gets to preside over the first majority-female council. With that as some background, Madam Speaker, Congratulations, and welcome to WNYC.

Adrienne Adams: Good morning, Brian. Thank you so much for having me. Great to be with you this morning.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners and screeners, heads up. Here's what we'll do on the phones with Speaker Adams. Let's see if we can make this work because she's only represented one district before. We'd like to get one call from each borough with one issue you would like the new speaker to know about from your neighborhood. 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. Got that, folks?

We're looking for one call from each borough. Obviously, we can't touch every neighborhood in one half-hour segment, but we can at least touch every borough today with one issue from your neighborhood that you would like the speaker to know about. 212-433-9692. Listeners, don't think we're censoring you if we bump your call. It's not about you, it's about me. We just need to make sure we get calls lined up from every borough, and we only have a limited number of lines. Let's see if we can do this.

Staten Island, are you in the house? The Bronx, good morning. One call from every borough for the New York City Council Speaker, Adrienne Adams. Let's see what issues we get. 212-433-WNYC, 433-9692. Be nice to the screener if they tell you we have too many calls from your borough. All right. Madam Speaker, would you like to introduce yourself to our listeners a little further and maybe on why and how you first got into politics and public service or anything like that?

Adrienne Adams: Oh, sure. I'd love to. First of all, thank you again for having me on. My beginnings are pretty humble. As you said, like you, I attended Bayside High School. We traveled in the same circles, and I just want to make sure that the listeners know, Brian. I found this out recently that March 19th is actually Bayside High School day as of 2016. Congresswoman Grace Meng proclaimed March 19th as Bayside High School day, but I digress.

I was very, very active in my community prior to becoming local into my seat right now as a Council Member for District 28 that I call The Great 28. I was a Community Board 12 education chairperson, where I got my feet wet in learning about three educational districts in my community in Southeast Queens. I have lived in Southeast Queens all my life, raised in Hollis Queens, and have lived in Jamaica, Queens for almost 30 years.

When I got out there and realized that there was a lot of inequity in our school systems, particularly realizing that communities of color under former Mayor Michael Bloomberg were being closed and/or co-located because of "non-performance", I became very concerned about that, and I noticed a pattern.

I attended pretty much every single panel for educational policy meetings where those decisions were made for different high schools and schools across the city, whether or not they would remain open, closed, or co-located. I noticed that during those meetings, they were held everywhere from Staten Island to the Bronx to Brooklyn to Queens, students would stand at microphones before this panel who didn't necessarily look like them, and I'm talking about students of color, and they would beg this panel to have their schools remain open.

The panel would not really pay too much attention. They would look at their BlackBerries then and take phone calls or messages or whatever, and the students would pour their hearts out, some of them in tears, letting the panel representatives know that the schools were their home, and this is a place that they were thriving and valued their educators and their administrators, and yet the majority of these schools were indeed closed.

I developed a fire for our students across the board. I became very vocal in my community board. I ran subsequently for Community Board 12 chair, and I spent three terms as chairperson for Community Board 12, turning a community board in chaos, quite frankly, into a community board of success. I ran for City Council, and I became elected to New York City Council in 2017. Here I am today, in 2020, as my colleagues elected me to be the first African American speaker during our charter meeting on January 5th, and I'm really, really humbled by the faith they've placed in me.

Brian Lehrer: Yes. Congratulations again. It's so interesting that you bring up that education issue of closing schools when kids didn't want them to close as the first thing. This is the 20th anniversary year of the No Child Left Behind bill in Congress that was a bipartisan thing between President George W. Bush and Senator Ted Kennedy, that I think started that whole ball rolling that trickled down to Mayor Bloomberg and how many schools he closed, which some people consider a great success, especially with the closing of the really big high schools that, in many cases, were having very low graduation rates, very low academic achievement rates, and always with racial and ethnic disparity, and opening a lot of smaller schools instead. The supporters of that say maybe it doesn't matter if the kids felt at home in the schools, if they weren't getting educated, then Mayor Bloomberg did a good thing. What's your take on that?

Adrienne Adams: It's interesting because I see it a little bit differently. Having being out there in the trenches, what I saw was really no investment in our schools. I saw, in some cases, educators that were brought in that were not necessarily successful in other places being brought to communities of color to then teach students of color that they weren't necessarily invested in, if you know what I mean, in their education and in their success as students.

My take on it is that if the former Mayor were to have provided more resources to this school and quality educators and bringing in the tools. I can give you an example, one of the high schools in my district, August Martin High School, didn't have a library, Brian. How does that happen? When a high school does not have a library, my community board then comes in as a partner to August Martin High School, and my community board then provides that resource to the school.

How are we now relinquishing the duties of the administration, of the Department of Education to the community partners of our schools and communities of color, to be the responsible entities for our students? How does that happen? My take on it is a little bit different. Had we invested in our students in a lot of these schools, maybe not all, but in a lot of these schools, I think the difference would have been a little bit different, the perception would have been different, the outcome would have been different if we were to have prioritized our schools and communities of color instead of throwing them away and closing a lot of these schools that these students valued.

Brian Lehrer: Let me ask you one more education question, and then we'll start taking some phone calls because we had a nice laugh about how we both went to Bayside High School and the Mayor did too. As I mentioned to the Mayor, I was one of those white kids who live literally around the corner from Bayside High School and I walked to school, he was bused from South Jamaica.

Adrienne Adams: We both were.

Brian Lehrer: Exactly. I asked him if that experience informed his policy or what he thinks his policies might be toward integrating our schools, and he said, "We must integrate our schools. I'm going to be aggressive about doing that." I'm curious how the busing experience influenced your policy approach today to education and if you expect the Council to be hawkish on integration in any particular way.

Adrienne Adams: That's a great question, and the Council is going to move forward. I'm really proud of our brand new education committee chairperson, Rita Joseph, who comes out of the school system as an educator for quite a number of years. I would say that I do agree that our schools-- New York City schools, as we know, are some of the most segregated schools in the entire country. We've got to do something about that.

I realize as well, that in the prior administration, it was attempted. We had some resistance that I noticed in some communities that didn't necessarily welcome the idea. It goes back to resources as I was just speaking about some parents were saying, well, just give the students in the communities that don't have the resources, give them the resources and leave our schools as is, but I think that an overall well-rounded education for any student really, really gets to the next level of excellence.

When we have diversity in our schools, when we have the experience of many, many, many cultures learning from each other, many experiences, I came from Bayside High School that was predominantly white. The Mayor and I both were bused from our neighborhood buses to the Q31, which was, I believe it still is, the bus that gets us to Bayside High. We had at least one or two buses to get us to, possibly even three for some students, to get us from our homes in Southeast Queens to Bayside High School.

Now, the education experience at Bayside was tremendous. The overall experience was tremendous, but also, I noticed that we weren't necessarily, and I'm saying we, I'm saying students of color weren't necessarily led into the college experience either, necessarily, as other students may have been. I know some friends of mine that were led into other places, "Oh, you're going to graduate and you're going to go and do X, Y, and Z," instead of leading them into a college, or even for myself who ended up at an HBCU, some in college eventually.

Brian Lehrer: Form of discrimination.

Adrienne Adams: There you go.

Brian Lehrer: Low expectations.

Adrienne Adams: There you go. Experiences, again, are critical. I do believe, like the Mayor believes, that our schools have to be integrated, and we really do need to take a look at it. It's quality education for all students, not just students of color, but all students need the experience of multi-cultures. That's what New York is.

Brian Lehrer: Well, to follow-up, you went from mostly white Bayside High School to Spelman, which is a historically Black college for women down in Atlanta. Was it something about your high school experience that made you want that particular kind of college environment?

Adrienne Adams: It absolutely was, but before I landed at Spelman, I actually did a year-and-a-half at York College as well. I was a CUNY student as well. I started out majoring in music theory, and then I changed my major to psychology and went on to Spelman where I did get a degree in psychology, but yes, I wanted the experience. I wanted that cultural experience, and I'd heard great things about Spelman. It was a dream which actually became a reality.

When I went to Spelman, the classes seem to be headed by people that look like my relatives, my aunts, my uncles, my grandparents, totally, totally different experience. It was a familial experience for me. Something that quite frankly, I'd never experienced before in education, but I also recognize the fact that timing is everything.

As a high school student, then college student coming into college experience at the age that I was, I think for me, timing was everything in getting that unique experience at Spelman. As you said, a historically Black college for Black women, which was spearheaded by African American individuals, African American descendants, completely different, totally needed at the time in my life, by the way, and an experience that I will never forget.

Maya Angelou was the keynote speaker at my graduation. Cicely Tyson got an honorary degree at my graduation. I walked behind, literally behind Sammy Davis Jr., who was very old as she was going for a performance at Sisters Chapel at Spelman College, and many, many others that remain countless in my memory. I was in school at the same time as Dexter King, Dr. King's son who went to Morehouse, "the brother college", of Spelman College, very, very unique time in the middle '80s when I was at college and one that I will never forget and truly, truly treasure.

Brian Lehrer: Listeners, we're getting to know the brand new speaker of the New York City Council, Adrienne Adams, from Queens. We're going to try to get a call in from each borough in our available time. We'll start close to home. Annette in Laurelton, you're on WNYC. Hi, Annette.

Annette: Oh, hi. Congratulations to you, Ms. Adams.

Adrienne Adams: Thank you.

Annette: I think you know Queens, and I'm sure you familiar with Laurelton. I'm a person who wants to make our community more greener and what happens in my area, I happen to live on Francis Lewis Boulevard between the 130th and 131st. We have these long grassy mediums.

Adrienne Adams: Yes.

Annette: You know exactly where I'm coming from because some of the sites do have--

Adrienne Adams: I sure do.

Annette: Yes, they have beautiful ones, but they don't have the traffic and whatever that we have here, and now the president of our block associate, Mr. Glover, he knows. Now, the person who's helping us in the parks department, because I'm in Planboard 13, is Justin Arthur. He's wonderful, but I think we need more funding because these mediums that we have, at least at seven or eight, he does the best he can, but I think if you can get more funding for especially the part of the park department called Green Street, that they can do more to help those with all these mediums because in order to make-- we have a wonderful neighborhood, but we need more upkeep with these grass and mediums. I think that I would like to see more funding for the parks department.

Adrienne Adams: Annette, thank you so much. I am very, very, very well-acquainted with Laurelton, beautiful part of Queens, and we'll work very closely with your Council Member. I believe that's Council Member Selvena Brooks-Powers, who's very committed to her district, by the way. We'll work together to get the particulars of the funding. We'll work with parks department to find out what's going on with those mediums. We will keep Laurelton as beautiful as Laurelton has always been. Thank you, Annette.

Brian Lehrer: Annette, thanks for your call. Interesting, maybe because we started with education, we're getting a lot of education-related calls. Let's go from Queens over the-- well, take your pick, Throggs Neck or Whitestone Bridge to Raymond in the North Bronx, you're on WNYC with the new City Council Speaker, Adrienne Adams. Hi, Raymond.

Raymond: Hi, good morning, Brian, and good morning, Madam Speaker. Congratulations to you. My question--

Adrienne Adams: Thank you. Good morning.

Raymond: Good morning. Not my question. My suggestion is my wife and I are alumni of a program in Brooklyn called Brooklyn Workforce Innovations. In that program, they teach various trades and things in the film industry and such like that, and then even the opportunities end up being in Brooklyn.

My suggestion is that if that as a template could be done in each borough to provide opportunities for people in each of those borough and in then incentives for business owners to bring business in those boroughs to hire the graduates of such a program instead of just from each borough going to Brooklyn that each borough have something like that for the communities of each borough.

Adrienne Adams: Fantastic, Raymond, thank you so much. I'm sitting here just in awe of everything that you just said. We definitely need more programs like that. My suggestion, if you would go to the City Council website, send us an email on the organization itself and outline your recommendations for such a template.

I think that would be fantastic because you're right, not all students are geared or interested in going to college. We need to take a look at how to employ our students because students are brilliant. They're coming out of school with wonderful ideas, and we need to continue to plant those seeds of success. If you would please share that with us at the Council, I think that it would be remarkable for us to follow through. Thank you so much.

Brian Lehrer: Thanks for your call, Raymond. As we go around the boroughs, hopefully, one from each, that we can get in in our available time with the new City Council Speaker, Adrienne Adams. We have a Staten Island line available, so if you're listening on Staten Island right now, and you have a question, get in real quick, 212-433-WNYC, 212-433-9692. What one issue from your part of Staten Island, whatever that is, would you like the new City Council Speaker to know about, 212-433-9692. Good morning, Staten Island. Madam Speaker, you are running the first majority-female City Council, how do you think or hope that makeup will affect policy for the better?

Adrienne Adams: Oh, my goodness. Well, I can tell you this, Brian, for sure, women definitely govern differently than men. I'm so proud to be the speaker of the first women-majority City Council. The overall makeup of the body is more diverse as we know, it is more reflective of all of the boroughs, all of the districts representing here.

I think that we're going to be able to understand issues through a different lens. We're going to see how policies impact New Yorkers, our families, our children in a totally holistic way, and we are positioned to offer comprehensive solutions. We're going to bring an approach to legislation and oversight that focuses on equity. All of the members are going to bring their unique experiences to the Council, and I think that that is going to make our approach to tackling the challenges confronting our city even more thorough in our approach.

Brian Lehrer: You are the first Black City Council Speaker here, what do you think is the significance of that for the Council or the city?

Adrienne Adams: Oh, my goodness. I don't like to compare myself to the Vice President Kamala Harris, but we are sorority sisters, who both come from HBCUs. For me, it's, and I've heard it, I've heard it from mothers, from grandmothers with tears in their eyes over the past couple of weeks or so, this is the most humbling experience that I've ever had in my entire life.

Hearing from mother, I just got a chill when I said that, hearing from mothers and grandmothers that look like me saying that we have someone now that "is ours" to be proud of, and something to attain to and aspire to that's never been done before. I'm so humbled by the experience, but I take a look at, to be honest with you, this is the year 2022, and we're still talking about first for people of color, first for African-Americans, first for Latinos, first for Asian-Americans, and so on and so on and so on.

While I tremendously cherish the moment that I'm living in right now, part of me takes this as a little bit of a bittersweet pill as well, because we should be far more advanced, particularly as New Yorkers, than a lot of other places in our country than to say that we are still experiencing firsts in placing people of color in leadership roles like this, but again, to hear people saying, "My daughter is looking at you right now, and she's sitting in her classroom and she's bragging about you right now."

For me personally, Brian, my own grandchildren sitting in their classrooms going, "This is our Nona." It's a great, great feeling for me to be that Nona to my grandchildren and to be that mom for my beautiful grown children as well, to be that role model for them, something that we never looked for, asked for, expected, but through the grace of God, here we are.

Brian Lehrer: We've done Queens, we've done the Bronx. Here's Tonya in Brooklyn and I think still on education. Tanya, you're on with the new City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams. Hi.

Tanya: Hi, and thanks for taking my call. Congratulations, Ms. Adrienne Adams. What I love in this expression from her is that she's saying she knows that we got to invest in our schools. That's what I love about it. My daughter, Canarsie High School. Canarsie High School used to be so reputable, and then now it came to the case where when I was sending my daughter to school, it was like high schools that used to be good before are not good as they used to be and I agree with her. It's about investing in our areas. If you want to integrate, it's great.

My daughter goes to St. John's College right now, an integration school. She wishes she went to HBCU, but she regrets it now, but it was a good thing for the experiences there because St. John's showed her the world, but you still see that holding her back. She's been on the dean's list for all four years, but you still see that systematic racism with going to college with other races that she's experiencing as becoming a pharmaceutical graduate. I wish we just invest more and believe more in our kids, because we are great people and we have been here so long. Just give us a chance and be fair with us. That's it.

Brian Lehrer: Tanya, thank you.

Adrienne Adams: Great point. Oh, Tanya just took my heart away with that. It sounds like Tanya knows what she's talking about as a parent of a daughter that has done great things, but then we hear again, resources, and it is a pattern, and she's right. We can't be afraid to just say and call it out for what it is, it is institutional racism and it impacts every walk of life that we have, from our schools, to our policing, to our healthcare. I'm just really excited again about the committee chairs that I've appointed in the New York City Council. Most of them are women. We are going to crack some of those barriers like nobody's business, and we're just happy to meet the challenge. Thank you, Tanya.

Brian Lehrer: You mentioned and she mentioned investing more in education. Along those lines, I read that you and the Mayor both want to see a universal daycare program. I guess like de Blasio introduced universal 3k and pre-K, can you describe your vision for that, and how it would be funded or whether it'd be means-tested or anything?

Adrienne Adams: Yes. This is an incredible opportunity for New York because affordable and accessible childcare is such an issue to so many families. Many of our new Council Members are parents, young parents, and they have expressed the need for better solutions and they feel strongly about the issue, and I wholeheartedly agree. It's the same concern, Brian, that I had when I was raising my own children years ago. It hasn't gotten any easier for parents over these years.

The proposed investments in childcare in the governor's budget are very positive, and we're grateful for that also. We need to work together, the Governor, the Mayor, the Council, to advance these solutions for a better system of childcare, and that system has to aim to meet the unmet needs of our working families. We're going to work together, all levels of government, to do what we can to actually pass a universal childcare system for New Yorkers. I think we deserve it and it's way, way overdue.

Brian Lehrer: Universal or for lower-income people?

Adrienne Adams: Well, lower-income families are certainly the priority to look at first, but overall, we have families that need this system, we need families that need childcare, we've seen through COVID, low-income, middle-income, across the board. Families need childcare, and it's something that's been overlooked, we've stepped on it, we've just kicked it to the curb, but we need to bring it out in the open, we need to talk about it, and we need to get it done.

Brian Lehrer: Lee on Staten Island, you're on WNYC with the new City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams. Hi, Lee.

Lee: Hi, thanks for taking my call. First of all, I'd like to say we sure have something in common in that I also went to a single-gender college, and it makes so much sense, I think, for women to go to a single-gender college.

Adrienne Adams: Indeed.

Lee: Isn't it amazing?

Adrienne Adams: It really, really is. Great, great experience, and it's something that we can truly appreciate.

Lee: Absolutely, and I'm sorry that there aren't more of them and that there aren't more women who take advantage of them. Staten Island, so many problems. Basically, I feel that the Council doesn't understand that Staten Island is different from the other boroughs in many, many ways, but the thing I called about is transportation.

Everybody seems to forget that we don't have a subway system. Constantly talking about the subways and the subways and when new buses are purchased by the city, Staten Island doesn't get the new buses, they get the old ones from the other boroughs and they don't get the bus fleet increased in any way. We have a lot of traffic because there is no subway system, more people depend on cars. I'm one of those people, I'm disabled, I can't use the bus anymore, so I depend on my car for as long as I'm able to drive.

The speed cameras, it's pretty well acknowledged that the speed cameras are there as a money-making operation and not really as a safety situation. I think there should be a more equitable or more considered use of the speed cameras and not just willy-nilly handing out the tickets.

Adrienne Adams: Oh, what a great call. My goodness. Thank you so much for that call you have brought up. I always likened Staten Island to Queens. Learning from my colleagues over the past four years who have been in the City Council and spoken up about Staten Island, former Council Member Debbie Rose, former Council Member Steve Matteo, and still our Minority Leader Joe Borelli, who is there still, and now also Council Member, Kamillah Hanks still, we'll be champions for Staten Island. I wanted to make that clear as well.

We have a lot in common. My Staten Island colleagues have said very, very loudly that Staten Island, we are here, we don't have a transportation system, and we feel like we truly, truly are the island. Well, I can assure you that through this council, Staten Island is going to have a voice, a larger voice in bringing those needs forward and getting some of those things rectified. As far as the transportation system, we've got a very, very strong transportation and infrastructure chairperson in Council Member Brooks-Powers. I know that your advocacy for Staten Island is going to do nothing but grow within this new City Council.

Speed cameras, we're going to talk about that as well because we happen to be sharing the same concerns here in Southeast Queens and that they're not necessarily around school zone,s and we're going to take a look at that also. Wonderful call, and I thank you so much for it.

Brian Lehrer: We'll complete the all borough five sector now with, I think, another transportation-related call. Connie in Manhattan, you're on WNYC with the new City Council Speaker, Adrienne Adams. Hi, Connie.

Connie: Hi. I'm a senior, and it's very, very dangerous for us to be out in traffic with the electric bikes, and bicycles, and people that ride on two-wheeled vehicles, even including scooters, don't seem to pay any attention at all to the traffic laws. I have once in my life seen a police ticket a bicycle for going through a light. It's impossible to walk on the sidewalks as well. I live on 3rd Street in the Lower East Side. There's a hub of delivery bicycles on my corner, and they incessantly ride up and down the sidewalks--

Brian Lehrer: Let's get a response. I apologize, Connie, but we're running out of time in the segment. You know, Speaker Adams, that we get calls like this every day, if we did that topic every day, we get calls like this all the time.

Adrienne Adams: Yes, when I share the concern, it's something that, this, in particular, the safety of New Yorkers has been on the front burner, particularly with the Mayor, with the administration over the past couple of days. We've seen some of the tragedies that have taken place that have really, really impacted on New Yorkers.

We are going to have to really, really take a look at overall, the former administration had vision zero, we saw a lot of holes in that. We're going to have to take a look at with the new administration, ways to really, really put safety first for New Yorkers. We're going to work with the administration to do something about this. My heart breaks for our New Yorkers that continue not to feel safe where they should absolutely feel safe, as we've called it in the past, the safest city in the world, we need to recreate that and make that our reality once again.

Brian Lehrer: Connie, thank you very much. I know you got to go. You want to give us just a quick take on the way out the door about being in your second term, which makes you a veteran under the city term limits law, so much turnover this year because of term limits. Do you know how many of your 51 members are freshmen and what that presents in terms of opportunities or challenges for legislation? You have people, some of the press coverages, we have people more to the left now and more to the right now in City Council, how do you lead that?

Adrienne Adams: Yes, well over 30 members are brand new, a lot of whom have never been in a seat of government before. We've got a lot of members that are coming in with tremendous experience in their field. We've got lawyers, we've got nurses, we've got educators, we've got business people, a lot of folks with a lot of experience out there that have lived this New York life, and that's what makes me really excited about this new City Council.

Yes, while we have a lot of folks that are not experienced in government, per se, they've got a lot of New York life experience, business experience, and other experiences as well. I feel that my leadership for this body is going to be one that is prioritizing the districts. All of the districts have similar needs, yet different needs.

My conversations and my work with my colleagues is going to make sure that we are a member-centric Council, that we are a district-centric Council, and that we are more focused on outer boroughs, which are the majority that make up New York City. We're going to do a lot of things that are nuanced in the Council. Again, our focus is going to be for the entire focus and blanket of New York to make sure that all New Yorkers feel included in this council structure, in this council makeup, and in the work that we do in the New York City Council.

Brian Lehrer: The new New York City Council Speaker, Adrienne Adams, congratulations one last time. We look forward to having you on many times.

Adrienne Adams: Would love to be back. Great to be with you, and thank you, Brian.

 

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