Rep. Nydia Velasquez heads rally to support Social Security

Tax day help for last-minute filers

Power & Politics: Unpacking the Hudson helicopter crash, Dominican Republic roof collapse tragedies

Congress members on board plane that clipped wings with another aircraft on ground in DC

Trump pauses tariffs on most nations for 90 days, raises taxes on Chinese imports

Appeals court clears the way for the Trump administration to fire thousands of probationary workers

bronx

News 12 Staff

ASKTHEADV414B

Thanks so much for staying with us here on Ask Your Advocate on News 12 with New York City Public Advocate Jumani Williams. Ready for more callers? We've got a few lined up on the line, so we'll kick things off with Cynthia who has dialed in from Co op City this evening. Cynthia, thanks for the call and what's your question tonight? Um, yes, and this call is based on personal experience. I know that we take great pride in getting people out of shelters and into homes, but have we thought about maybe giving them skills to keep their home or to take care of themselves once they're there? Um, I have a nephew that went from a shelter into a home, but he would always run out of food, and I'd have to either go buy him food or, you know, or send food to him and I was saying, you know what, he doesn't have any home economic skills whatsoever. So I was just wondering, would would that be something you guys would consider putting into the program of the shelters to, you know, as they say, you know, you can. Um, give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. You teach him how to fish and he'll eat for a lifetime. Well said, Cynthia and great question. No, we see a lot of spaces where this type of um just assistance on um the the skill set that everyone needs to, to, to make it through, where we can just provide some more of these, whether someone coming out of a shelter, someone returning home. For, uh, maybe serving some time, um, it's often not where we spend as much resources as we, we could, and then when we we wonder why folks didn't make it out. So I do think this is the type of program we could do. I don't know. I don't something you wanna make mandatory to get resources, but you can make it optional, and I think a lot of people, if you describe a type of program, hey, this is some information that you, uh, may not understand, uh, because you haven't been in a situation before that'll help you move forward. I think it's a great idea. I would say my guess is there are some, uh, areas of community organizations that do provide some of this kind of services and so I'd be happy to connect, uh, Cynthia with some of those services. Depending where her nephew lives, and I know that a big push of this current administration has been to build more supportive housing specifically for those transitioning from one place into permanent housing that's something that you support? Do you think we're seeing it at the scale that we need to to address the real issue here in this city. We're not seeing we're not seeing housing in general the scale that we need to. We definitely need to see particularly some more supportive housing for those who uh severe mental illness or uh who are. Substance, uh, substance abuse, um, but I it sounds like Cynthia is talking about someone who may not even follow those categories who just hasn't, you know, been on their own and may not have gotten the skill set that people have gotten depending how they came up, uh, how they grew up, who they were living with, and so that just might be missing just just because you grew up a little differently than some folks, and I think that's a, that's a nice space I think you may not be thinking about, uh, and, and putting resources in, uh, because sometimes the air's a rush just to get the housing. The housing, get the housing. You wanna make sure somebody can stay in there. You wanna make sure they can take care of themselves. So I, I, I really like the question, um, and I'd love to connect it with, with, with some community groups that may be doing that or maybe, uh, they should be and need a little bit more resources to do it. I always said that reflecting on my school journey that asked me to do long division today, I can't do it, but I wish they would have taught some financial literacy because that would have been a big game changer. So maybe it starts even earlier and something in I think everybody can use. Financial industry, um, uh, most it's not something they teach in school, something you kind of figure out, um, and depending, you know, someone can have could have grown up in the foster care system. Someone could have grown up bouncing around, um, and where do they get that kind of organically, at least a little bit that we have, you may not, so it's, it'd be great to have organizations filling in the gap here. Alright, let's get to another caller. We have Tony who has called in from East New York tonight. Tony, thanks so much for your call and what's your question? Yes, hi, I'm calling from Brooklyn, New York, and I'm concerned the #3 train that runs from Brooklyn at Newlands Avenue to 148th Street in Manhattan. For years it never, ever, ever have any heat. It comes to the point when you're riding that train, sometimes you have to get on the 2 at a certain point when you come into Brooklyn to have a little heat because when you get on the 3, there's no heat. And in the summertime it's freezing, so could that be looked into? I've been riding this line since 1974. And it's still the same problem, but you still have to pay full fare. Mhm. Talk about a persistent issue from the 70s to now that she's been dealing with this on the 3 specifically, it seems like it's one line. Yeah, that's, that's, yeah, I mean, so I love to look into it. That's that, that's a lot of years we going with no heat, you know, MTA obviously has um a lot of issues, a lot of, a lot of problems. We have a lot of folks running for office, so we'd like to speak to some of them. I would. Remind folks that MTA is a state issue even though Andrew Cuomo said it wasn't when he was the state, it actually is. I know he's running for governor now, so I'd love to hear, you know, some of the things that he has to say about it, but they do need additional attention. They do need additional resources, um, so we're looking to see what's what's going on there. It isn't a city issue, um, it is a state issue, but we can reach out to the MTA and some of our state representatives, see what's happening over there on the 3 train. It's interesting that it's just happening on a 3 train. I wonder if she's taking the same. Train, uh, at the same time maybe it's a car or something like that, but that's, it's a lot of years it's a lot of years. When we talk about the MTA, you know, we talk about fare hikes like she said the price just keeps on going up even though the service stays the same, congestion pricing, all of these pushes to really inject more money into the system to in theory address some of these issues. Do you think that money will ultimately go to where it's needed for things like this and of course bigger projects as well? Um, two things are happening. You need more money. You need, you need better management. I think part of the issue is MT uh has not shown that they should be trusted with everything in the whole time, and that's a real thing that they need to answer to what it is about. They need to show where and how they're spending that money, and I don't think that they've done that well, so there's a lack of trust. Even still, there's a lot of money that's that's needed to keep us where we need to be going and you know I I just my folks this is this is a public service that's actually needed so uh at some point I actually I think you know this is a service that should be free for folks to get back and forth because the city just can't, can't survive without it but we're a long time from that, but at minimum needs to be more invested in it, um, just regionally what. The system does for our region and for the country. I don't think people even understand the impact. You have to make sure everybody has access to safe, quality, uh, service. Yeah. Mills rely on it to get from point A to point B every single day. All right, the conversation will continue right after this quick break. Stay with us here on News 12 here on Ask Your Advocate.

https://vod.prod.alticeustech.com/transcode/098d0714-56eb-4343-a6b0-2311bc3c17c3/098d0714-56eb-4343-a6b0-2311bc3c17c3.transcribe

ASKTHEADV414C

Thanks so much for staying with us here on Ask Your Advocate, a reminder if you have a question tonight for Public Advocate Jumani Williams, the number to dial is 718-861-6800. Public Advocate, so often, a lot of the calls that we get regard these quality of life concerns, and just last week, the NYPD. Announced that it's creating a new division specifically to address those quality of life issues, those phone calls that they get. This is a pilot program. I believe it's only in a few precincts right now, but what are your thoughts on involving the police in these quality of life issues or calls that people are making? Well, you know, one, I think the, the commissioner has done, uh, a, a, a really good job on so many spaces when it comes to NYPD. There's some areas that we have some disagreement. Two, I'm glad it's a pilot program. I'm, I'm a fan of pilot programs to see how things work out, see if we can expand. 3, I do have concerns that uh law enforcement is at the lead of it. Many of our problems come in because we ask law enforcement to take the lead on issues. That they are not the experts on, so the tools that they have to immediately solve a quality of life issue. May not be the one we need. It may be a different agency that comes in to tries to address it first. It may be a community group that comes to try to address it first and maybe meeting with the stakeholders at an area and say this is a problem we need the community to try to address it. If not, then law enforcement has to come in and so I'm always concerned when law enforcement is the first to call because it, it always is OK until it's not and when it's not it's a very big thing, you know it. The broken windows uh that was tried before and didn't have success and I spoke to, uh, George Kelly, uh, who passed away about broken windows, and he believed in the broken windows, but he also said it doesn't have to be the police that fixed the window. uh I think that's what get lost sometimes so I'm gonna watch to see what's happening. But I do have some concerns that they're the lead as opposed to supporting um other groups or organizations or agencies or communities themselves and letting them try to take a first crack at addressing it uh but it shouldn't be ignored so I think that's what we have an agreement these things can't be ignored but who takes the lead first I think is uh unfortunately still uh uh a thing where people disagree. I know the New York Civil Liberties Union said that they worry referencing that. Broken windows policing policy that this could lead to police harassment and racial profiling are those concerns that you share? It probably will it always has in the past. This is just about how long it will take. I'm concerned about any major incidents. I'm hoping that the commission and others will listen that maybe we can frame it in a different way to try to prevent that from happening. Yeah it is just a pilot program at this time we'll see where it goes from here. Stay with us we'll be right back right after this.

https://vod.prod.alticeustech.com/transcode/2a6053fe-caf4-405d-aea5-ca4cf29d5c07/2a6053fe-caf4-405d-aea5-ca4cf29d5c07.transcribe

ASKTHEADV414D_2025-04-14-20-05-38

Thanks for staying with us here on Ask Your Advocate on News 12 with New York City Public Advocate Jumani Williams. Already got a lot of callers lined up and ready to go, so time to get to those questions right now, and we'll kick things off in this segment with Christine who has dialed in from East Flatbush. Christine, thanks so much for the call and what's your question tonight? My question is when is the city going to start enforcing double parking rules, because we have on Nostrum Avenue between Avenue D and Foster, you have people who just stop in their cars to go to the grocery stores, what have you, and there's nobody in the cars and nothing is being done. Sometimes at the bus stop there's a Um, select bus there and depending on the day, whatever, you can't even pass because they double parking and the bus is there, so you have to wait to Uh, drive, and then we also have um people stopping at crosswalks. So you can't even cross the street when the light changes because cars are double parking and nothing is being done. Yeah, Christine, this is a frustration that I'm sure a lot of drivers in the city can share. Admittedly, me, myself, and I, I got double parked and blocked in for 25 minutes a week and a half ago and it was like no end in sight, so I, I understand the frustration, yep. They're being blocked in if you're double parked, can't move or the bus can't pull in, um, unless you're the person just running in and. It's gonna take 5 minutes and you just and you come out with a ticket. So I always try to balance those things out and people want the more enforcement, more enforcement, but then they complain about the more enforcement. I do lean toward, uh, this call that it's a problem, so we just, we do have to enforce this a little bit more, uh, people double parking and people in, in bus lanes or what have you, but I just wanna remind folks that that that means you too. And so when it's you double parking just running in for a quick second. That means you might get hit too when it's just you uh on the in the bus bus stop because you just, you know, want to run into the store, pick something up, it affects you sometimes people just want it to happen to the other person. It's just gonna happen to to all of us, uh, but I agree it's a problem. We just have to step up and practice what you preach if you wanna come and complain and, and understandably so, I believe the Department of Transportation at some point was having conversations about potential. piloting um some sort of surveillance program much like the bus lane enforcement with the cameras, yeah, I will say and my office is trying to look into this, we're all, we're all concerned of where, you know, often these tickets are sometimes it's not equity in the neighborhoods, so we're worried about that as well. We wanna make sure that there's equity, uh, and when we're doing this type of enforcement, but look, I think, um, if we can find a way to do this. You know with the technology we have it's, it's coming anyway we just wanna make sure that it's, it's fair and equitable, um, and I think they're trying to experiment on that. Alright, and more to come. We'll see if they do decide to launch that. So Christine, there could be help coming on that front in the future. Let's get to Tony who has called in from Bensonhurst this evening. Tony, thanks so much for the call and what's your question tonight? Hello, yes, Tony, we got you. Yes, referring to, yes, um. Hi, I'm calling about um Affordable housing. Um, there seems like there's been a, well, there's actually a problem. I've tried Housing Connect and there's no luck either I make too much or I make too little. Um, I'm just trying to get some outlook on that, get some questions or answers. Yeah, Tony, thanks so much. I think it's a struggle that many New Yorkers share trying to navigate that housing lottery. You see a new building pop up. It looks affordable and then you can't even get in the door, although sometimes I was gonna say those prices are also sticker shock too. So you know, I'm sorry, Tony, the number one thing call we get in office is about housing and it's probably the toughest. I would say you look at some of the folks who's running for office. Again, any issue you care about, and this is probably another conversation, you know, Andrew Coleman was made worse and the housing is a part of that, and I'm just talking about his record as governor. He cut a lot of the programs and services that would have assisted Tony, even this mayor, um, you know, there's a law that, uh, Speaker Adrian Adams passed with the city council. To help people get more uh connected to vouchers, Mayor Eric Adams refused to honor the law and so we do have some things that are out there that could make this a little easier and people aren't doing it. Uh, even the governor hasn't seemed to wanna put more money into our voucher system, um, so our leaders do have to do, uh, a lot better. The Green Guidelines Board under Eric Adams has raised rates twice higher than we've seen in 20 years. And so I think there are steps that we can be taking uh for Tony's individual case, it's something we have to look at and see what he's tried and what he hasn't. Uh, there is a, a space financially sometimes that people are stuck making too much, uh, and not enough at the same time, and that's a gap that we gotta try to fill and because a lot of people fall into it, but most of all we gotta bring these housing prices down. Folks like me have been screaming at the top of our lungs for the past 1520 years or even more that this crisis was only getting worse and it seemed all we cared about was making some folks be able to make money off of this, uh, and this is a right that people have and they should be able to find affordable homes and affordable housing and, uh, income target housing in particular is just not there on the low income community. People are seeing buildings going up. They call it affordable, but when you look at the AMI, the area median income, it's so high, it's quote unquote technically affordable, but it's not at the price range for the Tonys of the world. Yeah, some of these buildings requiring six figure salaries just to be able to get into the door and they're calling themselves affordable. What advice are you giving? People like Tony, those who are calling your office and saying help us navigate through the system right now. It's so complicated. You know there there are some programs that people don't know about. There are some waiting lists that they may not have applied for, so we just wanna make sure that they applied for everything they possibly can, uh, and unfortunately sometimes you have to wait, um, but that sometimes runs against when. We're trying to get some rezoning in neighborhoods where people don't want the additional housing that causes another problem. So I mean, but again this is, you know, human nature. People know what the answer is. You just want it over there, um, so we just gotta figure out how the conversation we absolutely need to preserve. The housing that we have whether it's Michelama or Section 8, whether there's ***, but we're not gonna get out of this problem unless we build more units, um, and that has to be a large part of, um, those a large part of those units have to be income targeted at the lower income, um threshold. You mentioned preserving the housing that we currently have I believe last week that. You were rallying alongside some tenants in the Bronx who live at Davidson Avenue who have been long complaining about negligence from their landlord given their activists, uh, what they've been able to raise their voices, they were able to get the city to foreclose on that property. Now they're trying to become resident owners of that building. Can you walk me through how they were able to achieve this, and I'm sure people at home watching who live in deplorable conditions go, how can we do the same thing that's, you know, it's a fantastic. I'm glad you brought that up. So we um, that landlord has been on our worst land list a few times, so I'm glad to see people using our worst land list as an organizing tool. Um, it takes a long process, but they connected with some of the community groups in the areas and, and some attorneys as well to walk them through it, and this is what we want to see happen. We wanna see these properties taken from these owners. Uh, we saw, uh, an owner go to jail for the first time in probably a couple of decades and now we're seeing another owner. Getting the building taken from them and we wanna put owners on notice that this is what's gonna happen. We are coming from you. We are very specifically coming for you, um, because they collect the rent and don't provide the services. People deserve hot water. They deserve heat. They deserve not to live in spaces like what we're seeing on top. Can you imagine living in these areas, um, and then people wanna evict you if you're not paying. Right, um, so you wanna connect with these community groups. You're a local elector can help you if you don't, uh, if you don't have, um, if you don't know who they are, uh, and you can look on our website, see if you're a landlords on our, um, uh, worst land list worst landlord worst land watch list um.gov that you can go on and just check and see and help organize that way. Now what the next step is we wanna make sure these tenants. are able to own that property and we wanna make sure tenants uh in these situations have the right of first refusal to purchase their own buildings uh and manage. I think that's the way to go, and we have some bills in the city and the state, TOA and COPA, whether it's tenants or co-ops, to be able to purchase their their building in a situation like this. All right, we'll continue to follow their journey as it plays out for sure and hopefully that provides a glimmer of hope to people in similar situations that change can be achieved. I do want to shift gears real quick and touch on some political happenings that unfolded last week quietly, an executive order was signed that allows ICE, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, to have an office on Rikers Island. What was your reaction to hearing that that had happened? You know, the administration is disgraceful and it's gonna go down in disgrace, um. I, I now understand that the reason the mayor may not have thought what he did was a quid pro quo even though the judge in dismissal absolutely said that it was a quid pro quo. He skips over that, uh, when he reads about the case, um, it's because I think he believes some of this. I think he's just a MAGA wearing, MAGA hat wearing Trump supporter, so he feels if I would have supported this anyway, it's not a quid pro quo. Uh, it is very disturbing and I just wanna remind folks that uh the city. And law enforcement already coordinated with ICE on about 177 felonies, um, that's already here. They're gonna put people on ice so they can coordinate outside of those 1770 families, people who haven't been convicted of anything, people who may have done something smaller than that, a lot less than that, or people who may have done nothing. They could have been arrested by accident. We see people losing their legal status. We see people's green cards being revoked, uh, uh, uh, we have a deputy president in the city hall who was helping. The president with his immigration machine after all the things that we've heard someone's in El Salvador know by accident right now and they're fighting to bring him back. The mayor gave ICE and Honan a thumbs up. This is the mayor of this city, an immigrant city. It's disgusting and he's disgraceful. OK, we're gonna continue this conversation right after this quick break. Stay with us. We'll be right back.

https://vod.prod.alticeustech.com/transcode/61d7de7f-6458-428c-a959-9f829d4d73f2/61d7de7f-6458-428c-a959-9f829d4d73f2.transcribe

ASKTHEADV414E

Thanks so much for staying with us here on News 12 for Ask your advocate with Public Advocate Jumani Williams. We're gonna get to more calls that we have lined up on the line and we'll kick things off with Ronald who is dialed in from Castle Hill tonight. Ronald, thanks so much for your call. What's your question? Thank you so much, Channel 12 News. This message, this, um, question is to Honorable Williams. How you doing, sir? My question is, why is it, this is a this is a compound question. Why is it like 5 bodegas on one street in the Bronx? There's several, like it's too many bodegas, and there ain't no black bodegas. Um, well, one, get, get to the heart of New York City right now. Bodegas, is, is where it's at the corner store in the middle of the block, uh, so, uh, that is a quintessential New York. So I often wonder how all of them can exist on the same block and still make money, but they seem to, I think people have their favorite bodegas. I don't know where you get your Doritos at midnight or after the club, you wanna get something, so, um, I'm not sure how they survived. What they do in terms of uh uh black owned bodegas you're probably correct that there's not a lot I think uh there's uh a space to talk about um economic development for communities that have been left out of these spaces for a very long time, uh, so not just bodegas but other ways of, um, you know, wealth creation and economic benefits that have been left out of communities and so we do try to have these conversations with folks who focus on communities. So there's black communities, immigrant communities, um, that have been left out of the space and then try to show them how they can actually get into these spaces. There's a lot of barriers. Do you know if there are any programs at the Department of Small Business Services perhaps sponsors that really are aimed at creating more opportunities for a diverse, uh, set of business owners here. For some reason we think diversity is a bad word now from, uh, coming down from from high unless it's money then they talk about diversity. All the time, uh, but there are programs I think that are aimed uh to try to help people around small businesses. 20 years ago, I think when I had my, uh, my cafe, my, uh, restaurant, I actually went to a restaurant boot camp through small business services. I'm not sure if they still have it anymore, but that was a great, uh, help to try to get us off the ground. So they have a great, uh, program through SBS. There's also, um, uh, borough, uh, based, um, organizations. Uh, chambers of commerce that people can reach out to, um, that have some great services for people who are just looking, uh, to try to get involved and particularly communities that may not have be have the same injury and there are a lot of barriers there so we have to be honest about that, but connecting with these folks can help, yeah, and support our small businesses and our bodegas too, Ronald. Alright, thank you for the question. We also have Percida who's on the line. She has called in from Hunts Point. Percita, thanks for your call and what's your question for the public advocate? Yes, hi, good evening to both of you, and thank you for taking my call. I am from the Hunts Plain area in the Bronx, and we are very concerned because we want to know the community here, what can be done so that the dog species can be controlled by their owners and I don't know, government officials like enforce the regulations that are not being met or kept by these owners, and we have to walk in a maze in the streets, and it's not fair. The sidewalks are overwhelmed with dog species all over. The rules are not being followed or imposed. What can be done? Great question and it comes down to really wanting to be proud of the community that you live in and others not treating it with that pride. I mean how aggravating is it when you freaking walk in some dog poop and you gotta try to scrape it off or you didn't know and all of a sudden you have a smell and you're trying to figure out what's going on, um, you know, gum is the only other thing I think that annoys people, but I, I have to choose the gum over the poop, um, but. At some point, people just need to take pride themselves and like I just, it's so frustrating if you're walking your dog, just pick the poop up. And places now even have some spaces where you have like I'll see the the the container that has a bag for you and you still have the poop there. Like you should think about your fellow New Yorker sometimes and it's unfortunate that people don't, but I do think there are times where you have to step up enforcement and I'm all for that. Step up enforcement in these areas. Uh, I know we have limited resources, but at times we just have to divert a little bit. If there's an area we know this is happening, if Hunch Point is happening, just gotta step up enforcement there and catch some folks. Maybe you catch them one time and then they'll think about it the next time. But this is, it's just, it's absurd the irresponsibility I've seen with some of our, our dog owners and this, if you want to have a, a, a, a pet. You gotta come with the responsibility of taking care of the pet and it's unfair for everybody else. I got to imagine that this is exactly the type of call that that new NYPD Quality of life division should be responding to. Yeah, I mean, I, I, I do think that we can find some ways to get some other agencies involved, um, for this one. It's a long time and so some I do think I mean it doesn't have to be NYPD that provides all the citations uh that folks might get but I do think some citationing of folks are what's needed at this point, uh, whether it's a first warning or you know, uh, a small amount, uh, uh fee just to have you thinking about. Picking the dog poop out of your own dog. It, it's like, you know, when you drive in a car, you get the ticket once you're a little less likely to do it again. You get the ticket once maybe with the dog, and then you're grabbing the bag the next time you're out the door. Those bags, they're pretty easy to walk around with now. Oh, they come on the leash, everything. No excuse, no excuse. We were talking a little bit about. Trickle down impacts from the federal government when we were talking about diversity just a few minutes ago and right now I think all minds are on the tariffs and the back and forth we saw unfold last week what ultimately could come of that? How do you think New York ultimately feels the way that that unfortunately we confuse wealth with intelligence um I think this president is good at branding and bullying. But that's not intelligence for the type of leadership that we need. Also, we have a mayor who refuses to say what he's gonna do to protect New Yorkers, so that particularly is concerning to me, uh, because the mayor seems to more just wanna be like Trump as opposed to protect New Yorkers. There's a lot of concern here. We don't even know what it is, so it changes from day to day. they're pretending like you know they they this is a sport and it's not this is the world economy, uh, and it is going to hurt New Yorkers. I don't even think the the president just might be learning what a tariff actually is as opposed to what he try he thinks it is, um, and New Yorkers are gonna be hurt and elections have consequences, so I'm hoping people are really paying attention to them and hopefully we'll get a mayor that really wants to protect us, not be a deputy president. Oh, a lot to come from now to June and then from June to November. Stay with us. We'll be right back.

https://vod.prod.alticeustech.com/transcode/43d00eb0-80c7-441c-aeb7-4284fd79169a/43d00eb0-80c7-441c-aeb7-4284fd79169a.transcribe

ASKTHEADV414F_2025-04-14-20-06-07

Thanks to all of you for sticking with us through another edition of Ask Your Advocate here on News 12 with Public Advocate Jumani Williams. We were just talking finances before we went to commercial break, and right now actually the state budget, it's late by more than 2 weeks, and it seems like there are really 3 key points that are holding up the negotiations starting with these reforms to discovery laws that had just uh. Been passed back in 2019. Now the governor wants to roll back. This was all initially done in an effort to improve transparency. Now she's saying that it's getting cases tossed on technicalities. What's your take? I mean, they're the, the, the thing they do is sometimes they put nuggets of truth, uh, but the response is not the correct one we wrote an op ed all about this and so we used to have the 4th worst discovery in the nation. A tremendous amount of uh some of the innocent folks we saw released were based on discovery that if they've gotten the information they wouldn't have been jailed to begin with. What we have seen is some uh some increase in areas where people are being, uh, are having dismissed. um, we have recommended that that that we codify something that's already in law just basically codifying the judges know they have the discretion to say that this thing um cannot doesn't have to prevent a. A a case for moving forward that's something they already have from something called the people versus Bay case, but some judges are confused or may not think that they can do it. So we said let's codify that. And if you codify that, it actually gets to the dismissal case that everybody's talking about, but they wanna go a step further which may tip the pendulum back and we're very, very concerned about that. And so some of the things that they're asking, we don't need to do to get to the dismissal part and so I have been focused on yes. If this dismissal is happening because of technicalities that's not what we want, uh, but we also wanna remember justice doesn't always mean jail time doesn't always mean guilt, uh, so that's something that we, we, we're looking at hopefully, uh, we see our legislation is pushing back on that, uh, we also wanna make sure they don't do anything too much when it comes to involuntary, uh, hospitalization, which is something that we absolutely need. This is something that we already do, uh, what is actually missing is the continuum of care. After the hospitalization, and that's where the focus should be on, uh, but unfortunately, they seem to be focusing on how to get more folks hospitalized, which if they do, it's fine, but we had over 7000 people involuntary hospitalized last year and, and, and a large part of them over half. Um, they found that they shouldn't have been so we just wanna make sure we don't make mistakes just following the headlines instead of trying to actually solve the problem. Yeah, a lot of negotiations still to come on that, and we'll see where it lands real quick before we let you go. Knicks playoff bound. I know you're a big fan.dictions for how we end the season. We top 50 again. Uh, this is 51. I just want to get a second round. Knicks fan for life, but let's just get out of the second round. All right, Knicks, you know who's rooting for you and who's in your corner. We'll see you next.

https://vod.prod.alticeustech.com/transcode/f396cbaa-b9b6-4f3b-af87-68ed9a75082a/f396cbaa-b9b6-4f3b-af87-68ed9a75082a.transcribe

News 12's Amanda Bossard sits down with New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams to answer YOUR pressing questions in this month's edition of Ask Your Advocate.

Ask Your Advocate Jumaane D. Williams: April 2025

News 12's Amanda Bossard sits down with New York City Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams to answer YOUR pressing questions in this month's edition of Ask Your Advocate.

More Stories

Rep. Nydia Velasquez heads rally to support Social Security

Tax day help for last-minute filers

Power & Politics: Unpacking the Hudson helicopter crash, Dominican Republic roof collapse tragedies

Congress members on board plane that clipped wings with another aircraft on ground in DC

Trump pauses tariffs on most nations for 90 days, raises taxes on Chinese imports

Appeals court clears the way for the Trump administration to fire thousands of probationary workers

Rep. Nydia Velasquez heads rally to support Social Security

Tax day help for last-minute filers

Power & Politics: Unpacking the Hudson helicopter crash, Dominican Republic roof collapse tragedies

Congress members on board plane that clipped wings with another aircraft on ground in DC

Trump pauses tariffs on most nations for 90 days, raises taxes on Chinese imports

Appeals court clears the way for the Trump administration to fire thousands of probationary workers

More from News 12

Ask Your Advocate Jumaane D. Williams: March 2025

Ask the Bronx Borough President: February 2025

Ask the Bronx Borough President: March 2025

Ask the Bronx Borough President: January 2025

Ask Your Advocate Jumaane D. Williams: February 2025

Ask Your Advocate Jumaane D. Williams: January 2025

Privacy Policy

Terms of Service

Ad Choices