In his fourth State of the City speech, Mayor Adams vowed Thursday to double down on developing housing and combatting street homelessness for the remainder of his first term — and continue on the same track during a possible second.
Adams, who’s up for reelection this year, announced he’s looking to invest $650 million in new homelessness and mental health initiatives over the coming five years and is committed to building 100,000 new homes in Manhattan.
He also used the speech to tout what he views as some of the major accomplishments of his first term, such as driving down some crime categories and getting his “City of Yes” housing plan passed by the City Council.
The speech painted a broad picture of the mayor’s priorities, but did not go into detail on a number of the initiatives, some of which would likely require support from the Council.
That may present a challenge. Adams and the Council’s Democratic leaders have sparred of late over various policy disagreements, including over questions of how much say the Council should have over mayoral appointments.
The mayor is also heading into strong legal and political headwinds, with his trial on corruption charges slated to begin in April and a packed field of Democratic opponents taking him on for the party’s mayoral nomination in June.
Adams didn’t directly address his reelection prospects during his speech — although he did acknowledge he has faced calls to step down as mayor, but repeated that he will “step up” instead.
“Despite all we have accomplished, I won’t stand here and try to tell you our work is complete,” Adams said in the roughly hour-long speech at The Apollo in Harlem.
“Now is the time for renewed dedication and continued action, because no matter what challenges we face, I promise you this: No one will fight harder for your family than I will.”
Homelessness
Adams pointed to a rise in street homelessness and a dearth of housing as being among the most pressing issues facing the city. Adams promised the city would over the next five fiscal years put $650 million in city budget funds toward getting people off subways and into housing.
According to a City Hall press release, that money will go toward funding 900 new Safe Haven shelter beds — which are tailored for unhoused individuals suffering from drug addiction and mental illness — and building a new transitional housing facility designed to provide support for those experiencing chronic homelessness. City Hall did not immediately have details available about locations or timelines.
“We must do more to help people struggling with serious mental illness,” he said. “We can’t just walk past them and act like they can take care of themselves when they can’t. We know that too many New Yorkers cycle between the hospital and homelessness.”
A rash of high profile crimes in which the accused suffers from some sort of mental illness have left New Yorkers on edge.
The $650 million Adams is proposing would need sign-off from the Council, whose speaker, Adrienne Adams, issued a statement after his speech voicing frustration with how budget negotiations have fared with the mayor’s administration over the past four years.
“Far too often, we’ve faced resistance from the administration when it comes time to negotiate the budget,” said the speaker, whose later this month set to start talks with the mayor’s team on this year’s budget. “We will continue to work with all stakeholders to achieve these priorities for our city and will also hold the Administration accountable to delivering for New Yorkers.”
As a broader goal, the mayor vowed to work toward making sure no more children in New York City are born into the shelter system. To that end, he announced a pilot program to connect expecting parents with services to help find permanent housing before their child is born.
In 2017, the most recent year for which data is available, more than 1,000 kids in the city were born into shelters.
Housing, swimming, parks
The mayor also used his speech to announce a new plan, dubbed “City of Yes for Families,” intended to build more units specifically for families through zoning changes and expanding rent payment assistance programs.
“I promise you this: No one will fight harder for your family than I will,” he said.
As part of that, Adams said the city would build 100,000 new units in Manhattan — a massive 11% increase for the already densely-packed island where local residents often push back on new housing and zoning changes. City Hall did not have specific details on the plan.
The mayor also vowed to expand free swim lessons to 4,800 second graders living in underserved communities across the city each year. That’s on top of the roughly 13,000 kids who currently get free swim lessons from the Parks Department.
Adams also addressed the issue of cleanliness in the city’s parks, saying the city would add a second cleaning shift to spots at over 60 parks around the city. He also announced plans to open more schoolyards in underserved areas.
The parks push comes after Adams faced some heat last year for not reversing budget cuts to the city Parks Department that were first enacted to offset spending on the city’s migrant crisis.
In contrast to his State of the City address last year, Adams only touched briefly on the asylum seeker crisis that has cost the city billions of dollars since it started in spring 2022 shortly after he was first inaugurated as mayor.
“When Washington refused to take action on a broken immigration system; I stood up for our city and pushed back while still caring for hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers,” he said. “But we know we still have more work to do and more people to help. Too many families are still facing the same struggles my family did.”
Opponents, union criticize Adams
To kick off Thursday’s speech, Adams thanked his deputy mayors and other senior officials seated in the theater’s front row. The mayor has seen many of his top advisors resign in recent months after they were ensnared in various corruption investigations of their own.
“The hardest job in politics is working for Eric Adams,” he said, nodding to his aides.
Adams also used the speech to point to his record on public safety and the adoption of the “City of Yes” plan, which is estimated to create about 80,000 new units of housing over the coming 15 years. He touted crime numbers showing Brooklyn has seen the “lowest amount of gun violence” in its history and that overall index crime dropped citywide in 2024 as compared to 2023.
His political rivals — some of whom were sitting in the audience listening to the speech — slammed the speech.
“New Yorkers know that our city is neither safer nor more affordable,” Comptroller Brad Lander, who is running against him in June’s primary, said in a statement. “New Yorkers want honest, effective leadership, not pomp and circumstance and empty promises. They want a Mayor who is focused on their problems, not his own.”
While some categories of crime are down, others, like felony and misdemeanor assault, are up. Homelessness has also increased during Adams’ term and the city has experienced spikes in poverty.
Progressive mayoral challenger Zohran Mamdani sat in the gallery and live-tweeted reactions to the speech. “Just incredible to hear a Mayor who’s raised the rent year after year on more than two million stabilized tenants talking about the ‘hard choices’ families have to make just to get by,” the Queens Assembly member wrote on X.
Advocates also called attention to budget cuts Adams made to pre-K and 3-K.
“If New York City is the best place to raise a family, that’s news to the thousands of families moving out each day due to the cost of child care,” said Rebecca Bailin, executive director of New Yorkers United for Child Care, a prominent advocacy group that helped fight the early childhood cuts last year.
Ahead of the mayor’s speech, dozens of members of the NYPD sergeants union, known as SBA, gathered outside The Apollo to protest what they view as the Adams administration’s refusal to address pay disparities that leave them earning less than some of the officers they supervise.
In his speech, Adams addressed that request: “We are going to settle a contract with the SBA, trust me we will.”
Protesters from the “Close Rikers” coalition and Make the Road, an immigrant advocacy group, also rallied outside.
