OnPoint NYC’s supervised drug-use centers in East Harlem and Washington Heights claim to have averted nearly 2,000 fatal overdoses in four years, saving New York an estimated $55 million—and a fair share of ambulances. Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani, de…
New York’s Big Apple Connect now brings free Wi-Fi—and, less advertised, direct NYPD access to public housing cameras—to over 200 NYCHA complexes, drawing raised eyebrows in Harlem. While City Hall bets on surveillance and Microsoft-fortified databases for safety, local groups like Street Corner Resources still wager on boxing gloves, trust, and emotional skills. We suspect the cameras might catch a lot, but not a sense of community.
Ride Health, based in New York’s Flatiron District, raised $15m from 21 investors to grow its medical ride-sharing platform, which links patients with rides to appointments via providers and partners like Uber and Lyft—sometimes footed by Medicaid or health systems such as Memorial Sloan Kettering. With billions in public pilot funding at stake, this business hopes that smoother trips might, in turn, smooth hospital discharge headaches.
Washington has tripled its “exit bonus” for undocumented migrants to $3,000, dangling cash and a free flight home for those who self-deport by December 2025 via an upgraded CBP app. The Department of Homeland Security claims this is cheaper than standard removals, with Secretary Kristi Noem warning laggards they will be “found” and barred for good—not exactly the gold-star loyalty program most travelers dream of.
New York’s Mayor Eric Adams unveiled plans for a 280-unit affordable apartment block with a public pool, fitness center, and basketball court on a vacant West Village site, managed by Camber Property Group and the city’s parks department. Preservationists lament the demolition of the Tony Dapolito Recreation Center, but officials say repairs are futile—leaving history at the deep end while locals brace for the splash of the new ‘Hudson Mosaic.’
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has unveiled new glass subway fare gates—designed by Conduent and Cubic—at Broadway-Lafayette and, supposedly, 42nd St.-Port Authority as part of a $1.1 billion upgrade to curb the $400 million annual loss to fare evasion. New Yorkers, undeterred, are already plotting acrobatic workarounds; innovation, it seems, remains a two-way turnstile in the city that never pays.
Clearing a legislative logjam, Governor Kathy Hochul signed 73 bills, including rules for more prison cameras after violent deaths and fresh AI safety mandates for developers, while wielding her veto pen on another 49—mostly citing state budget worries. Lawmakers sought bolder prison oversight, but settlement yielded more cameras and a token ex-inmate on the board—Albany’s idea of turning the page is apparently just adding a footnote.
A CBS News poll conducted with YouGov finds 50% of Americans say they are financially worse off due to Donald Trump’s policies, with 45% fearing their fortunes will fall further by 2026; only 27% expect improvement. Trump’s economic approval rating has dropped to 37%, while 65% think he favours the wealthy—a number rising faster than inflation, though perhaps not the president’s self-confidence.
After a federal judge sided with plaintiffs, Representatives Dan Goldman and Adriano Espaillat finally examined the much-discussed migrant holding cells on the tenth floor of 26 Federal Plaza—a Lower Manhattan courthouse better known for its immigration hearings than for its impromptu accommodations. Video had earlier revealed grim, unsanitary conditions for detainees, but officials’ delayed access left us wondering which came first: the scrutiny or the clean-up.
