This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. A bill guaranteeing paraprofessionals a one-time $10,000 pay bump became law automatically on Wednesday after Mayor Zohran Mamdani declined to sign or veto it. Paraprofessionals, school aides who typically support students with disabilities, are among the lowest-paid employees of the city’s public school system […]

The post $10K Bonuses for NYC Paraprofessionals Become Law Without Mamdani’s Signature appeared first on The City Reporter.

A bipartisan group of City Council members excoriated the Mamdani administration on Tuesday for ditching a gripe-filled hearing on the botched rollout of the mayor’s new pied-à-terre tax. Meanwhile, the number of households the city now admits were wrongfully targeted for the hefty surcharge continued to rise from 1,906 a week ago to 2,318 as […]

The post Team Mamdani’s Pied-à-Terre No-Show Has Lawmakers Fuming appeared first on The City Reporter.

Brooklyn Cyclones management acknowledged they had failed to pay employees the appropriate amount of tips and reimbursed at least one employee for lost wages, following a recent investigation by The City Reporter. Just before the Cyclones faced the Jersey Shore BlueClaws last Thursday, team management addressed the findings of the story with staff, according to […]

The post Brooklyn Cyclones Admit They Dropped the Ball on Worker Tips appeared first on The City Reporter.

Amazon and more than a dozen of its subcontractors in New York City and the suburbs face union allegations they flouted a state law that protects employees from mass layoffs or closures. A complaint submitted to the state Labor Department on Tuesday by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters charges that Amazon and 13 subcontractors violated […]

The post Teamsters Hit Amazon Over Delivery Worker Layoffs, With Millions at Stake appeared first on The City Reporter.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani has frequently spoken about his hopes of streamlining city government, cutting through the red tape and bureaucratic roadblocks that stymie progress. According to his Commission on Government Efficiency, one place he could focus is the thousands of data-heavy reports city agencies are legally required to publish on a regular basis. These reports […]

The post Mamdani Wants To Speed up NYC Government. He Could Tackle Cumbersome Agency Reports. appeared first on The City Reporter.

Chrissy, Katie and Harry take a summer week to consider Mamdani’s political winning streak as a new poll shows Zohran Mamdani is only more popular now than when we was elected mayor, and to note what his approach does, and does not, have in common with the one then-new mayor Eric Adams took just four […]

The post LISTEN: Here’s What It Takes to Keep NYC Moving appeared first on The City Reporter.

This story was originally published by Documented. Sign up for their newsletter at documentedny.com/newsletter. At Fleur de Lis Beauty & Esthetics in Flatbush, Brooklyn, clients typically arrive with an appointment. But in the nearly 10 years the luxury medical spa has been in the community, co-owner Wendy Jules says daily walk-ins weren’t unusual. “You would get like at least […]

The post Flatbush Businesses Report Less Foot Traffic Amid Trump Immigration Crackdown appeared first on The City Reporter.

A federal judge has allowed the lawsuit of a prominent NYPD critic who alleges police officials leaked details of her sexual assault to move forward, bucking the city’s attempts to have the case tossed. In a decision last month, U.S. District Judge Frederic Block sided with advocate Dana Rachlin on several counts, allowing her lawsuit […]

The post Activist’s Case Against NYPD Survives Challenge, Alleges Leak of Sex Assault Details appeared first on The City Reporter.

Millionaires who captured more than half of all of New York City’s income growth since the pandemic. A poverty rate that keeps climbing and is much higher than the nation as a whole. Stratospheric Wall Street profits. Record numbers of New Yorkers receiving cash assistance and SNAP benefits. The image suggested by these data points […]

The post Inside NYC’s K-Shaped Economy: A Few Do Well, Most Do Not appeared first on The City Reporter.

“What you’re looking for… is the person’s soul, the essence, what their perspective on the world was, as well as what people thought of them and what motivated them… One of the things I always try to do is find the ‘Rosebud’ moment in a person’s life that changed them, that made them who they […]

The post LISTEN: Sam Roberts Digs Into the Art of the Obit appeared first on The City Reporter.

New York City is expanding outreach to homeowners in flood-prone areas of Queens to see whether they would consider selling their homes to the government as part of a climate adaptation program. The program, called Resilient Acquisitions, targets neighborhoods where flood mitigation measures are limited. The increased outreach started this summer in Hollis, which sits […]

The post NYC Targets Homeowners in Flood-Prone Areas of Queens for Potential Buyouts appeared first on The City Reporter.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. This year’s startling collapse of New York City’s reading scores, followed by last year’s big gains, has some experts asking: Did something go wrong with the test itself? There is no clear evidence there is a problem, experts emphasize, but the unusually wide swing in scores […]

The post Experts Question State Reading Test After Plunge in NYC Student Scores appeared first on The City Reporter.

“A most bewildering and frightening awareness of man’s position in a technological society he found he neither understood nor controlled… brought fears and a sudden exhilaration. In every man there is a corner of rebellion against the machine, and the blackout allowed us a brief period of freedom from its dominance. We were all delighted […]

The post LISTEN: NYC’s Darkest Hours appeared first on The City Reporter.

Henry Hudson’s ship, a trio of possible oystermen, and a helmeted woman bearing sword and shield.  They’ve been elements of the unofficial borough flag for Staten Island for more than a decade, hanging at City Hall in Manhattan and Borough Hall on the island. On Thursday, it became official.  City Councilmember Frank Morano’s bill to […]

The post Maiden, Sword, Ship: Staten Island’s Borough Flag Is Now City-Certified appeared first on The City Reporter.

Nearly 2,000 homeowners who the Mamdani administration threatened with a new pied-à-terre tax have already been told they won’t have to pay because their primary residences were erroneously tagged as possible second homes, city officials admitted this week. They were among the 4,290 owners who got pied-à-terre tax warning letters early this month and immediately […]

The post NYC Homeowners Escape ‘Scary’ Pied-à-Terre Tax Threat appeared first on The City Reporter.

New Yorkers can once again enjoy dining in restaurant roadside sheds year-round and enclosed sidewalk cafes during the coldest months of the year under a package of bills the City Council passed Thursday in a move to expand outdoor dining.  Many of the city’s streets were lined with curbside tables during a pandemic-era outdoor dining […]

The post Bon Appétit: Year-Round Roadside Dining Set To Return to NYC Under Newly Passed Bills appeared first on The City Reporter.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. When New York City officials launched a big shakeup in reading instruction three years ago, they had a key ally at their side: the city’s teachers union. Now, shortly after a plunge in reading scores, United Federation of Teachers President Michael Mulgrew is threatening to […]

The post NYC Teachers Union Threatens To Oppose Reading Curriculum Overhaul Without Reforms appeared first on The City Reporter.

ICE belatedly confirmed the death of a third immigrant at the Delaney Hall Detainee Hall detention center in Newark, more than a week after a local member of congress told the public he was informed of the man’s death. In a statement sent on Thursday night, a spokesperson for the Department of Homeland Security said […]

The post ICE Belatedly Confirms Death of Third Delaney Hall Detainee appeared first on The City Reporter.

New York City’s Taxi & Limousine Commission is looking to give its 180,000 drivers a break on costly fines that are stacked on top of license suspensions for missing required drug tests or vehicle inspections. The new proposal floats the possibility of eliminating $200 fines against already-suspended drivers who are more than 30 days delinquent […]

The post ‘Just The Beginning’: Mamdani Administration Moves To Cut Extra Fines for Taxi Drivers appeared first on The City Reporter.

Brooklyn Cyclones concessions workers have been getting stiffed on some of their paychecks this season, as tips disappeared under new management, according to interviews and records obtained by The City Reporter.  Summer frequently draws long lines of spectators buying hot dogs and beers to the city-owned Coney Island stadium, where customers are automatically prompted to […]

The post Brooklyn Cyclones Withheld Tips From Concessions Workers, Records Show appeared first on The City Reporter.

A leading organization representing retired New York City civil servants living across the country is reviving a push that would block any future effort to shift the city’s 250,000 retirees and their dependents to a privatized Medicare plan. The bill, which is being re-introduced by Councilmember Christopher Marte of Chinatown on Thursday, would prohibit the […]

The post New Council Push to Save Traditional Medicare for Retirees appeared first on The City Reporter.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani may have capped rents for tenants in stabilized apartments, but for the rest of the city, the cost of renting just keeps going up. Average, median and average per-square-foot rents rose to a record in Manhattan in July, with the median rent reaching $5,000 for the first time, 6.4% higher than a year […]

The post Wait, How Much? Manhattan and Brooklyn Rents Hit Record Highs appeared first on The City Reporter.

Wedged in a corner of Kips Bay, near the East River and NYU Langone hospital, four low-slung buildings contain 40 apartments. Most are empty. Michael Heletz, founder of Queens-based Excel Development Group, has for a decade had a plan to knock down these buildings and in their place construct a tower with up to 160 […]

The post The $1.5M Holdout: Kips Bay Fight Pits Tenant Rights Against NYC Housing Development appeared first on The City Reporter.

Every Tuesday, the Encore Aging Through Arts Center in Midtown bustles with activity and laughter as seniors sit at round tables, pen and paper in hand, playing bingo.  This is no accident. On Tuesdays, the center serves its weekly plant-based meal, which the city has required at all its senior centers since July 2023.  Worried […]

The post ‘BYO Hot Sauce’: Senior Centers Struggle With Mandatory Plant-Based Meals appeared first on The City Reporter.

Nearly six months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a raft of President Donald Trump’s tariffs, few New York City small businesses have benefited from tariff refunds, even as they struggle under new import levies.  Importers across the country have claimed $121.75 billion in refunds since the landmark February decision that struck down Trump’s emergency […]

The post ‘I Know About Tariffs’: Small Biz Struggles With High Costs, Trump Chaos appeared first on The City Reporter.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. New York City has long failed to quickly provide special education services even after families won legal orders for them, generating more than two decades of litigation. Three years ago, city officials embraced a federal court order requiring dozens of reforms to more swiftly provide services […]

The post NYC Misses Legal Deadlines in Most Special-Education Cases, Auditors Find appeared first on The City Reporter.

The digital age is dawning for older bus riders who refuse to dump coins for the MTA’s new fare-payment methods. With OMNY now in use on 92% of paid bus trips, according to the MTA, the transportation authority is nudging golden-aged holdouts who still drop loose change into fareboxes to switch to the tap-and-go technology […]

The post For Some Older NYC Bus Riders, Change Comes Easy. Just Not OMNY. appeared first on The City Reporter.

A New York punk scene legend was killed by a mail truck while walking home after performing at an East Village watering hole on Friday night.  Chester “Chet” Mazur was a “torchbearer for sleaze rock,” one friend said, a staple of an ‘80s and ‘90s underground music scene laden with black leather, late-night pierogi and […]

The post Stunned Friends Remember an East Village ‘Torchbearer for Sleaze Rock’ appeared first on The City Reporter.

“If you live in New York City, pay the New York City price. It sucks, I get it. Insurance is expensive here, but that’s the deal.” Even a “slow’ August week in New York City is stuffed with stories about who pays and who benefits, and about who’s watching who.  Co-hosts Katie Honan and Harry Siegel […]

The post LISTEN: Big Brother is in the Big Apple appeared first on The City Reporter.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at ckbe.at/newsletters. Reading scores sank in New York City last school year, with a nearly 14 percentage point decline among third graders, according to preliminary data released Friday. Among students in grades 3-8, about half were proficient in reading, a decline of 6 percentage points. That […]

The post NYC Student Reading Scores Tank on State Exams, Undoing Progress Seen in Prior Year appeared first on The City Reporter.