LOWER MANHATTAN (PIX11) — Mayor Eric Adams will deliver his second State of the City address on Thursday, outlining his vision for New York City in 2023.
Now in his sophomore year at City Hall, Adams is expected to focus on initiatives to fight crime and reduce joblessness and homelessness, with the latter issues in turn partly related to the city’s ongoing migrant crisis.
Adams, who served in the NYPD before getting into politics, made public safety a key part of his platform and has continued to stress its importance in both reality and New Yorkers’ perception.
But while the city saw declines in homicides and shootings in 2022, it also experienced a collective 22.4% increase in the seven index crimes historically used by the NYPD to gauge overall crime in the city: murder, rape, robbery, felony assault, burglary, grand larceny, and grand larceny auto. The city has faced a rash of crimes in its public transit system and a number of violent incidents involving teens, both as victims and alleged perpetrators.
The Adams administration also continues to grapple with homelessness and joblessness. Not including those who live outside the city’s shelter system, there are currently about 70,000 people in city facilities, with about half of them migrants who have arrived in recent months.
Projecting the new arrivals to cost the city more than $1 billion in the current fiscal year, Adams has repeatedly requested financial and material aid from the federal government, while continuing efforts to find sufficient space to shelter them in New York City.
The issues come as the city continues to recover from the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and faces a drastic shortage of housing, setting the stage for Adams to have a busy second year in office. He will address the city Thursday at noon.
