Crain's New York Business

POT OF GOLD?

The state is launching its recreational cannabis industry with a mission in mind, and its success—or failure—could reverberate across the economy and the country

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State of the City: NYC recovering but still short of housing, health goals

The mayor promised to rezone Midtown, provide health care for the homeless and ratchet up MWBE contracts

BY NICK GARBER

Mayor Eric Adams outlined what he called a “working people’s agenda” in his State of the City address ursday, headlined by plans to rezone part of Midtown for more housing, provide free health care to people in shelters and

boost city contracts for minority- and woman-owned business enterprises to $25 billion by the 2026 scal year.

e address included pledges to expand composting to all ve boroughs, launch an “apprenticeship accelerator” to build workforce skills

Fairstead violated contentious affordable housing tax break by overcharging tenants, lawsuit claims

BY EDDIE SMALL

Fairstead Management has been overcharging its tenants at an Astoria building and violating New York's contentious 421-a affordable housing tax break in the process, a new lawsuit against the developer claims.

The suit, filed last Wednesday in Manhattan state Supreme Court, accuses Fairstead of violating 421-a regulations at 11-15 Broadway in Queens by improperly using rent concessions. Under the program, the initial rent registered has to be what the tenant is actually charged and paying, and all increases must stem from that figure. But tenants' rental concessions were not included in their initial registrations at 1115 Broadway, according to the lawsuit.

For instance, one tenant who moved into the building in November 2020 allegedly received a concession worth two months of rent, effectively lowering his rent from $2,625 per month to about $2,200 per month. When it was time to re-

new his lease, Fairstead raised the rent to about $2,700, equating to an increase of more than 20%, much higher than what the Rent Guidelines Board allows, according to the lawsuit.

“It’s got all the trimmings of a classic bait-and-switch scheme in our view,” said Lucas Ferrara, an attorney at Newman Ferrara and a New York Law School professor who is representing the tenants with fellow Newman Ferrara attorney Roger Sachar, “the inducement being, ‘Hey, I'm giving you a supposedly reduced rent,’ and the diversion being the wrongful circumvention of rent regulation.”

‘Tax cheats’

The lawsuit stemmed from an investigation by the Housing Rights Initiative, a watchdog group that has helped generate similar suits before.

“Our investigation into Fairstead uncovered a systematic scheme to defraud rent-stabilized tenants and taxpayers by cheating on a multimillion-dollar tax benefit,” the group’s founder, Aaron Carr, said in a statement. “New York City’s unwillingness to revoke tax benefits from tax cheats has predictably resulted in widespread tax fraud.”

FINANCE

New York’s 421-a program, which provided landlords with a tax break in exchange for making 30% of the units in their buildings affordable, expired in mid-June. The initiative was very controversial, and critics cited a lack of enforcement as one of the main problems with it. Mayor Eric Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul have both called for restoring some version of an affordable housing tax break as part of their ambitious housing plans. Adams wants to construct 500,000

homes in the city over the next decade, while Hochul wants to build 800,000 homes across the state. However, it remains unclear whether the state Legislature has an appetite for developing and passing a replacement plan this year.

Repercussions

The behavior described in the lawsuit is very common in 421-a, and it would be better for the state to focus on enforcement than on coming up with a new program, ac-

cording to Ferrara.

“Why don’t you just enforce the laws that are out there?” he asked. “When there's a violation, there should be repercussions.”

Fairstead did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

Fairstead is a giant in New York’s affordable housing world. The firm teamed up with Invesco in late 2021 to purchase roughly 2,000 affordable housing units across 48 Bronx buildings, a deal valued at more than $350 million. ■

Phone-activated-locks maker Latch reveals more accounting errors and replaces top management

BY AARON ELSTEIN

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Days after a number of its senior leaders departed, Latch, a maker of phone-activated locks that went public via a special-purpose acquisition company, said its accounting problems were more extensive than first thought.

The Chelsea-based company said last week that audited financial statements from 2019 and 2020 should no longer be relied on, as the result of “internal control deficiencies” and revenue-recognition errors. The disclosure came after Latch warned in August that financial statements for 2021 and the first quarter of 2022 contained material errors.

The company went public in 2021 by merging into a SPAC founded by Tishman Speyer CEO Rob Speyer, who remains a shareholder and board member.

Latch announced this month that co-founder and CEO Luke Schoenfelder resigned effective

Jan. 11. Its interim chief financial officer and chief accounting officer also departed.

Schoenfelder is entitled to $708,000 in severance, Latch said, and remains an adviser.

A turnaround specialist from AlixPartners, Jason Keyes, was named interim CEO.

Latch didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

Rosy forecast

Latch marketed itself as an unusually fast-growing enterprise when preparing to merge with the Speyer SPAC two years ago. It predicted revenue would grow from $18 million in 2020 to $877 million by 2025, for a 91% compounded annual growth rate that would dwarf the 59% rate produced by Facebook at the same stage. The rosy forecast didn’t come true, and, like many SPACs, Latch’s stock now trades for less than $1 per share.

Speyer’s investment remains profitable because he paid 0.003

cents per share for 8.6 million founder shares, according to a regulatory filing. That’s a typical arrangement in SPACs.

An investigation by the Latch board uncovered a series of errors pertaining to how the company recognized revenue. Management failed to adequately assess whether sales were collectible, and staff members didn’t disclose “relevant terms” negotiated with customers. The investigation also found errors in bookings and other key performance indicators.

“The description of the errors and issues is solely based on the results of the investigation conducted to date,” Latch said in a regulatory filing, “and the errors and issues are

subject to further analysis as the company completes the restatement process.”

Working with accounting firm Deloitte & Touche, Latch said it will file amended financial statements “as soon as reasonably practicable.” ■

“IT’S GOT ALL THE TRIMMINGS OF A CLASSIC BAIT-ANDSWITCH SCHEME”

Newark’s reviled Terminal A nally gets its $2.7B replacement

BY CAROLINE SPIVACK

As recently as September, air travelers ranked Newark Liberty International Airport dead last among North American airports in a J.D. Power satisfaction survey. e Port Authority of New York and New Jersey has been working to overhaul the airport’s dismal reputation and this month moved closer to that goal with the launch of a gleaming, $2.7 billion replacement of the airport’s Terminal A, which rst opened in 1973, when Richard Nixon was president.

e new Terminal A building is an airy, million-square-foot space featuring 33 gates to handle larger, modern aircraft. It has four lounges and high-tech security check-in systems.

Port Authority o cials said they expect it to serve 13 million passengers annually, up from the 9 million the outdated facility accommodated.

“ is is an important step forward in our vision to transform the airport into a state-of-the-art gateway to the world,” Rick Cotton, the Port Authority’s executive director, said in a statement.

Terminal A’s upgrade, a milestone in the three-terminal air-

port’s $3.3 billion redevelopment, represents the largest New Jersey investment in the Port Authority’s history.

e project has been marred by delays, however. Renovations to the terminal began in 2018, with plans to open the rst phase in 2021 and the second in 2022. But supply-chain disruptions during the Covid-19 pandemic made it harder to procure components, and the war in Ukraine caused delays because workers in that nation who were making the terminal’s glass were enlisted to ght, Port Authority o cials said.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy held a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the terminal in November, but its opening was again delayed, this time due to approvals needed for its re-alarm and security systems.

Now that it’s open, the terminal is expected to generate $4.6 billion in annual regional economic activity.

“ is building and the experience in this building will literal-

ly transform what people think, and how they think, about New Jersey,” Murphy said during November’s ceremonial false start.

Terminal A is 20% larger than the original hub. Currently 21 of the 33 gates are open for arrivals and departures—served by Air Canada, American Airlines, JetBlue and United. e remaining 12 gates will be used by Delta and open in roughly a year, o cials said.

Travelers visiting the terminal are likely to notice its emphasis on Garden State pride. e space features sculptures and murals from 27 New Jersey artists, including two eye-catching suspended sculptures hanging from 50 feet high, as well as a lineup of local food vendors such as Bang Cookies, Carlito’s Barbecue Taqueria and Jersey & Co. Gelato.

e Port Authority said it plans to craft a vision to modernize the rest of Newark airport. e similarly dated Terminal B is next on the agency’s list.

is month’s terminal opening factors into a $25 billion effort to revitalize the three major airports that serve the New York metropolitan area. LaGuardia Airport in June debuted its $4 billion Terminal C as part of a nearly complete $8 billion redevelopment. Meanwhile, the Port Authority is in the process of a lengthy, $18 billion overhaul of JFK airport. ■

The new facility is expected to generate $4.6 billion in annual regional economic activity

“THE EXPERIENCE IN THIS BUILDING WILL LITERALLY TRANSFORM WHAT PEOPLE THINK ABOUT NEW JERSEY”

A NEW LOOK: Newark Liberty’s revamped Terminal A features sculptures from New Jersey artists, 33 gates, four lounges and high-tech security systems.

UWS co-op re-enters the market after taking a beat

George Soros’ ex-wife hopes to sell a unit near Central Park for about half of what she first listed it for 10 years ago

BY C. J. HUGHES

After a long pause, Susan Weber, an ex-wife of billionaire financier George Soros, is trying again to find a taker for her palatial uptown co-op.

The 6,000-square-foot apartment, No. 19EF at 115 Central Park West, has an asking price of $27.5 million, according to an ad that appeared Jan. 20 on StreetEasy. Weber paid $25 million for the co-op in 2006, records show.

Though the current price may be steep for the sluggish co-op market, the figure is about half of what Weber sought when she first tried to sell the home about a decade ago.

Weber, director of Manhattan’s

$27.5M

LISTING PRICE for No. 19EF at 115 Central Park West

spond to a request for comment.

The apartment, which features seven baths, direct elevator access, 900 square feet of outdoor space and living areas styled in dark woods and tiles, is on the 19th floor of its 29-story building. Central Park unfolds to the north and east.

From 1997 to 2004, hotel developer and nightclub impresario Ian Schrager owned the apartment; he hired designer Philippe Starck to style it.

WEBER LISTED THE CO-OP ON CENTRAL PARK WEST FOR $50 MILLION IN 2012

Bard Graduate Center, listed the coop for $50 million in 2012. But after showing the place for two years, during which time she cycled through three brokerages and slashed the price to $32.5 million, Weber appears to have taken the co-op off the market.

At least it doesn’t seem to have been publicly marketed for the past nine years, although there’s always the chance that agents have been privately shopping it around.

Why it has apparently come back on the market now is unclear. Lisa Lippman, the Brown Harris Stevens agent with the listing, didn’t re-

The two-towered 115 Central Park West, known as the Majestic, is an art deco landmark that has attracted many business-world players.

Past and present residents include developer William Lie Zeckendorf, former Bank of America director Sallie Krawcheck and hedge fund manager Bill Ackman. It has 238 units.

In 1991 Weber founded the Bard center, a Ph.D.-level school for the study of decorative arts that’s on West 86th Street. In 2005 she and Soros divorced, and she bought her Majestic pad in an off-market deal the next year. Weber tacked on a separate staff room in the building, No. MR16, for $650,000 in 2010, although she does not appear to be parting with it by way of the current listing. ■

‘Succession’ star Snook snags a Williamsburg pad

BY C. J. HUGHES

Her power-curious character Shiv Roy on Succession might prefer pricey penthouses, but when it comes to her own real estate, actress Sarah Snook seems to gravitate toward apartments that are closer to earth. The Emmy-nominated Snook has purchased a two-bedroom condo on a modest block in Williamsburg for $1.83 million, in a deal that closed Jan. 5 and hit city records last week, records show.

for a little less than $1.8 million, according to a listing on StreetEasy.

The 4-story, eight-unit 42 Devoe was developed by Black Diamond, a builder that specializes in small but artful Williamsburg condominiums. Similar offerings are at 117 Ainslie St., 34 Maspeth Ave. and 150 Richardson St.

THE 4-STORY, EIGHT-UNIT BUILDING WAS DEVELOPED BY BLACK DIAMOND

Snook, an Australian, had been renting in Greenpoint, in a building whose backyard reportedly was the site of her 2021 wedding, when she married comedian Dave Lawson, a fellow Aussie.

Peter Sansone, Black Diamond’s owner, did not respond to an emailed request for comment.

Critics’ fave

A hit with critics and fans since its 2018 debut, Succession follows the maneuverings of wealthy people who own a powerful right-leaning media company as aging family patriarch, Logan Roy, plans to hand off control to one of his four children (or not).

The apartment, at 42 Devoe St., a new boutique building near Lorimer Street, had been marketed

Carolina Gontijo, the Corcoran agent marketing the building, did not return a call. Snook could not immediately be reached.

The HBO series can seem a barely veiled dramatization of the Rupert Murdoch dynasty, the billionaire owners of News Corp. and Fox News.

Though Snook has yet to win an Emmy, she has twice been nomi-

Succession has scored about a

NO. 19EF AT 115 CENTRAL PARK WEST, a 6,000-square-foot co-op, features seven baths and 900 square feet of outdoor space.

nated in the Supporting Actress in a Drama category for the show, whose fourth season is set to air in the spring.

dozen other Emmy wins in the past five years. Among the winners was Matthew Macfayden, who plays Shiv’s put-upon husband, Tom Wambsgans. ■

42 DEVOE ST.

SNOOK

José Tavarez President, Bank of America New York City

Amazon’s notice on local employee layoffs reveals where the secretive e-commerce giant has been working

BY CARA EISENPRESS AND C. J. HUGHES

Atiny fraction of Amazon’s mass layoffs will affect New York workers this spring, according to a notice the company filed with the state. But the job losses come at a sensitive time for landlords trying to hang on to each and every tenant.

Of the 18,000 workers that the Seattle-based behemoth earlier this month announced plans to release, 299 are located here—less than 2%.

The news comes from a mandatory “dislocated worker” notice filed with the state. Many of the affected employees work in cloud computing, artificial intelligence and online advertising, the notice said.

Amazon declined to share specifics about the location of the local teams. But it did reveal that the job losses are spread among seven Manhattan locations, which represent hundreds of thousands of square feet of office space. Hollowing out the offices could have implications for their landlords, including CIM Group, Vornado Realty Trust and SL Green Realty, which recently have faced other vacancies.

Pinpointing those offices also pulls back the curtain on a company that has often been less than forthcoming about its holdings.

From a real estate perspective, 1440 Broadway seems to have the most to lose from Amazon’s news.

Of the 299 employees being cut, 243 work at the 25-story prewar office building at West 40th Street, which CIM bought in 2017 for $520 million, records show. WeWork, the beleaguered coworking provider, appears to be the main tenant in the tower, with 236,000 square feet across seven floors. A question sent to a CIM spokesman about whether Amazon’s employees are leasing WeWork’s desks was not returned by press time.

No. 1440 does not ever seem to have been publicly identified as an Amazon workplace.

Another affected site is 7 West 34th St., which will lose 38 employees, according to the notice. A 477,000-square-foot former department store owned by Vornado, 7 West 34th was among Amazon’s earliest New York locations and also the site of one of its short-lived forays into brick-and-mortar retailing.

An Amazon bookstore opened in

a ground-floor space in 2017 but closed last spring. As of about a decade ago, Amazon also reportedly controlled 11 upper floors of the building and today is listed as its single office tenant in Vornado marketing materials. Vornado had no comment.

Amazon also apparently has a presence at 1350 Sixth Ave., a 600,000-square-foot postwar office building at West 55th Street, even though owner SL Green does not name the company on its website. Named tenants include Casdin Capital, KPMG and Raines Feldman. Two Amazon employees were laid off at the location.

Last year Amazon reportedly retreated from plans to expand at 5 Manhattan West, a two-block-long former industrial building at 450 W. 33rd St. owned by Brookfield Properties. In 2017 Amazon signed a 360,000-square-foot, 15-year lease across two floors at the Hudson Yards site.

Other office properties that will soon have slightly smaller Amazon footprints include 410 10th Ave., where the company leased 335,000 square feet in 2019, the same year it bailed on its second headquarters

in Long Island City. A handful of employees will lose their jobs there too, Amazon said. SL Green sold the 638,000-squarefoot prewar building in 2020 to 601W Cos. for $953 million.

Amazon also has offices at 950 Sixth Ave. and 37 E. 18th St., according to the filing. Each location is shedding a worker.

Workplace culture

AMAZON’S MANHATTAN FOOTPRINT

Recently announced layoffs will be spread across the tech giant’s real estate portfolio.

Some Amazon locations so far appear unaffected, such as 424 Fifth Ave., the former Lord & Taylor department store in Midtown. Amazon bought it for $978 million in March 2020, as the Covid-19 pandemic began slamming New York, with plans to open the 630,000-square-foot building as an office by this year.

The recent filing also provides a glimpse of Amazon’s workplace culture. Employees in New York appear

to work for teams named for area airports, perhaps to emphasize the company’s shipping prowess. Every Manhattan office is designated internally as either an “LGA” or “JFK.” One of the few LinkedIn posts written by a local laid-off Amazon worker came from Brooke Colbus, a recruiter and trainer. “This is something I was preparing for since November,” she wrote. “But the confirmation itself makes it sting hard right now.”

The layoffs are scheduled to take effect April 18. ■

CREATED WITH DATAWRAPPER

What Hochul accomplished with the LaSalle pick

Gov. Kathy Hochul made history recently: She became the first governor to see a nominee to the state’s highest court shot down in a state Senate committee. By a vote of 10-9, Democrats successfully blocked Hector LaSalle, a state Supreme Court judge, from getting a full floor vote. Hochul has vowed legal action—she might argue in court that the Senate is required by the state constitution to hold a floor vote—but her success is unlikely. The LaSalle nomination looks dead.

Why does it matter? LaSalle was Hochul’s pick to replace Janet DiFiore, the retired chief judge on the Court of Appeals. The chief judge oversees the state’s entire court system and is influential on the seven-member Court of Appeals, which rules on a wide range of matters pertaining to real estate, criminal justice and consumer affairs. In recent years the court has had a conservative bent under DiFiore, a former Republican prosecutor. Left-leaning and socialist Democrats in the state Senate had hoped to tug the court leftward.

ON REAL ESTATE

Landlords should no longer view tech firms as sure bets for sprawling office campuses

tiatives including a plan to upzone the suburbs, build out a light-rail project in Brooklyn and Queens, and index the minimum wage to inflation. Expending so much political capital on one judge who does not have the support of the Senate is political malpractice.

ROSS BARKAN

Hochul, meanwhile, elevated LaSalle, who is more of a moderate and drew the ire of the left and organized labor for several rulings he made pertaining to abortion rights, labor unions ,and smaller consumer protection and civil liberties cases. Although Hochul garnered support from prominent members of Congress including Adriano Espaillat and Nydia Velázquez—because LaSalle would have been New York’s first Latino chief judge—she failed to line up the necessary votes among Democrats in the state Senate. It was striking how little work ahead of time Hochul put in to win goodwill from state lawmakers.

If Hochul wasn’t willing to whip votes, she could have simply put forth a judge who had the support of the broad Democratic conference. Hochul, a center-left Democrat, didn’t merely alienate progressives; she also drew the ire of large labor unions, which supported more moderate Democrats against LaSalle. In the end, Hochul found little support for her pick where it counted.

Now she wants a floor vote, but even if she gets one, it’s unclear the full Senate would confirm LaSalle. Hochul could hope to win the vote of all 21 Senate Republicans—the GOP lawmakers, largely, have been warm to LaSalle—but would still need to secure 11 Democratic votes.

The LaSalle battle has been a strange detour for Hochul, who recently announced in her State of the State address some worthy ini-

Early on in the pandemic, one of the best pieces of news for the city’s real estate industry came when Facebook officially signed its lease for 730,000 square feet at Vornado’s Farley Building near Penn Station. This was back in August 2020, when New York’s very survival was still up for debate; the massive deal was broadly viewed as a vote of confidence in Manhattan and a sign that the tech giants would continue to be reliable tenants for the city’s landlords amid so much upheaval in other sectors.

Suffice it to say, things haven’t exactly panned out that way.

should not expect to see the types of sprawling work campuses these firms made famous before the pandemic bounce back anytime soon.

building seems like a much likelier ceiling for their plans following almost three years of remote work.

LaSalle’s defenders are right that his fiercest critics have misrepresented him—he’s not a rightwing judge, by any means—but they must understand the environment has shifted since the fall of Roe v. Wade

Now state senators are behaving like U.S. senators, who have long applied ideological litmus tests to Supreme Court nominees and tried to confirm judges who agree with them on policy. Democrats in the state Senate might not hold ill will toward LaSalle, but they aren’t convinced he would be much different from DiFiore.

Hochul would be wise to retreat and move on. She can consult with Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate majority leader, about another nominee who could pass muster in the conference. If Hochul instead continues down her current path, she might only strengthen the Legislature’s resolve to oppose her.

Moderate and socialist Democrats united against LaSalle. If that was Hochul’s real goal—convincing ideologically disparate lawmakers that she’s the problem—then she succeeded.

Quick takes

● Mayor Eric Adams was livid at mild criticism lobbed at him from Brad Lander, the city comptroller, over how he’s handling the migrant crisis. Adams has gotten relatively soft treatment from Lander so far. If this is how he reacts now, imagine when Lander decides—if he ever does—to get aggressive.

● Is there a reason Adams wants to cut library funding? Public libraries are a relatively small part of the city budget. If Adams wants to save money, he should look elsewhere. He should not trim crucial resources for the working class and the poor. ■

Major tech firms including Alphabet, Amazon, Twitter and Meta (Facebook’s parent company) have all recently laid off or announced plans to lay off thousands of employees. The impact this will have on their local real estate holdings remains unclear, but with Meta already closing its office at 225 Park Ave. S. and Amazon letting go of 243 workers in its office at 1440 Broadway, it seems unlikely to spell good news. At the very least, landlords

To be clear, layoffs and more general upheaval at many of the large tech companies does not mean the entire sector is in a doom spiral. Smaller firms such as hospitality-focused ResortPass, whose CEO is committed to in-person work, and QR codemaker Beaconstac have both raised more than $20 million in funding recently. And health-tech firm Progyny is opening another floor in its Midtown South office, indicating that growth and an accompanying appetite for office space have not totally vanished in the city.

But companies at this stage of development still may be years away from needing the amount of office space necessitated by corporations like Meta. In fact, given that they are raising this money in an environment where hybrid work has become the norm, it seems unlikely that they will ever seek to amass a real estate portfolio the size of that of the current tech giants. Simply becoming an anchor tenant in an

A reasonable proposition

In other words, the future of office space for tech firms is starting to look a lot like the future of office space for pretty much any type of company. Given the recent cycle of tech firms’ rapid growth followed by large-scale layoffs, targeting a firm to take a few floors at a property on a 10-year lease is a much more reasonable proposition for landlords than waiting for one to, say, announce ambitious plans to build a large second headquarters somewhere in the U.S. and choose Long Island City, only to then back out amid fierce pushback over the deal it received, to pick just one totally random and hypothetical scenario. The major tech companies are facing challenges that go far beyond how much they can or can’t help New York’s office market, and the size of their footprints in the city is likely not among their top concerns. The pipeline of new office leases in the sector is unlikely to dry up completely, but anticipating more deals where tech takes on hundreds of thousands of square feet is no longer a smart bet. ■

Ross Barkan is an author and journalist in New York City.

LASALLE

EDDIE SMALL

NYC LAWYERS ASSOCIATION

Mayor pivots to workforce readiness, which is good news for business

As Mayor Eric Adams gave his second State of the City address last week, he demonstrated a new emphasis on workforce readiness. Adams pivoted from the public safety mayor to the jobs mayor, and that’s good news for business. Of course both are essential. But his new workforce and job-creation proposals are salves for a city that is lagging the nation in employment since the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic. Especially for people who came of age during the lockdown years, there is a need to nd a solid perch in the work world.

accessible to all New Yorkers. As Adams noted, the unemployment rate for Black New Yorkers is at least three times as high as for white New Yorkers.

ADAMS delivers his second State of the City address

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Done right, workforce programs can help connect more New Yorkers to viable career paths and high-demand jobs while providing employers with the talent they need. Additionally, job training and workforce development programs can help create a more equitable economy by making employment opportunities more

THE PANDEMIC DISRUPTED TRAINING AND DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITIES

Among Adams’ initiatives are the Apprenticeship Accelerator, which aims to connect 30,000 New Yorkers to viable career paths; mentorships for aspiring nurses; and programs to connect people who have disabilities to high-paying jobs. e mayor announced investments in the CUNY 2X Tech program, as well as a new biotechnology hub at the Brooklyn Navy Yard. He also discussed plans for cannabis shops, including enforcement against unlicensed outlets, and a new loan fund to help New Yorkers impacted by the so-called war on drugs start businesses. In addition, he said, the city will boost the amount of money awarded via city contracts to minority- and woman-owned business enterprises.

e pandemic accelerated opportunities for digital learning, remote work and other exible arrangements, but it also resulted in economic disruption that made

OP-ED

it harder for employers to provide training and development opportunities. e pandemic also highlighted existing disparities in access to education and job training, with low-income and minority communities being disproportionately a ected. Let’s ensure that New York

comes back in full force. Adams is right to emphasize investing in opportunities for New Yorkers who haven’t recovered from the pandemic’s e ects.

Workforce programs might take time to show results, but their long-term bene ts are certain to be bountiful. ■

Northeastern farmers—and all who rely on them—need a robust agriculture bill

BY NED SULLIVAN

The 80,000 farms in the Northeastern states supply the freshest, healthiest food to 43 million people, contribute $70 billion to the economy, sustain nearly 340,000 jobs and can play a big role in addressing climate change. at’s some impact. Yet the U.S. Farm Bill—the federal government’s chief means of support for farming—provides relatively little aid to Northeastern farms, which are primarily small and midsize family operations.

E orts are underway to change that.

e Farm Bill is up for reauthorization by Congress this year. e Northeast Carbon Alliance, founded by environmental organization Scenic Hudson to advance natural climate solutions, is uniting farmers, farm organizations and groups that conserve farmland. e alliance is looking to ensure the upcoming bill addresses the concerns

of Northeastern farmers and the long-overdue need for strengthening opportunity, equity and diversity in agriculture, especially for Black and Indigenous farmers.

ough the alliance focuses on helping farmers and other land managers adopt practices that sequester carbon, it recognizes that to be part of the climate solution— and meet growing demands for locally produced food—farms must remain viable.

at depends on confronting issues such as turbulent markets and supply-chain bottlenecks that make farming in the region so unpredictable. Another imperative is lling the void created by the large number of farmers approaching retirement age, making their elds and orchards more vulnerable to development.

Listening to farmers

A bill providing more robust investment in tackling those issues and encouraging climate-friendly

farming and forest management is essential. Kicking o a collaborative campaign to secure it, Scenic Hudson and the Northeast Carbon Alliance held an event in November that brought together a broad mix of stakeholders including Robert Bonnie, the U.S. Department of Agriculture undersecretary, who is responsible for implementing climate-related provisions in the 2018 Farm Bill; Richard Ball and Amanda Beal, agriculture commissioners of New York and Maine, respectively; and then-Rep.-elect Marcus Molinaro of Dutchess County.

e leaders listened to farmers— large and small, conventional and organic, urban and rural, vegetable and livestock—about their aspirations for the bill. ey heard how it could support a shift to practices o ering climate solutions, through nancial aid and training, while helping to keep farms thriving. From urban farmers the stakeholders learned about the need to

pay living wages and make grant applications more accessible to people of color and members of other historically underserved communities. An Indigenous leader urged support for Native people’s e orts to restore environmental health through agroforestry— growing and cultivating food on forested lands.

e event illustrated that the number and diversity of farms in the Northeast, coupled with their proximity to metropolitan areas, positions the region to be a national leader in advancing climate solutions as well as strengthening equity, opportunity and economic stability for current and future farmers while meeting the rising demand for fresh food.

We’re urging congressional leaders from the Northeast to join with us to secure Farm Bill funding that will support our goals. ■

Ned Sullivan is president of Scenic Hudson, based in Poughkeepsie.

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chairman Keith E. Crain

vice chairman Mary Kay Crain president & ceo K.C. Crain

senior executive vice president Chris Crain editor-in-chief emeritus Rance Crain chief nancial of cer Robert Recchia founder G.D. Crain Jr. [1885-1973] chairman Mrs. G.D. Crain Jr. [1911-1996]

The conventional wisdom and negativity about the commercial real estate industry is dead wrong

BY DOUGLAS DURST

There’s a surge of doom and gloom coming from pundits about the future of New York City’s office market. Almost every day I click through stories about the industry’s “drought,” “crisis” and— my favorite new hyperbole—“doom spiral.”

I’ve been in the business since John Lindsay was mayor. I’ve read countless postmortem headlines for our city and industry from the 1970s recession, the ’87 panic, the aftermath of 9/11, the Great Recession and now the pandemic.

And I can say with confidence that the conventional wisdom about commercial real estate today is dead wrong.

workers who are in three or four days a week. On any given Wednesday during the past few months, our buildings have seen 80% of their prepandemic workforce coming through the doors—with more arriving each month.

That’s almost twice as many as suggested by the wider weekly surveys you might read about in the headlines—which are dragged down by the Friday work-fromhome phenomenon and limited data sampling.

The clear takeaway is that our tenants prefer to have all, or at least a majority, of their employees in the office at the same time for purposes of collaboration, mentorship and corporate culture.

That’s a critical mass that still ensures a robust overall demand for office space.

TEnanTS PREFER TO HAVE ALL EMPLOyEES IN THE OFFICE AT THE SAME TIME

It’s true that fewer workers than before the pandemic are back five days a week, but that’s not the number that ultimately matters for the long-term health of the industry.

The metric we in commercial real estate focus on is the number of

OP-ED

Beneath the surface of the emerging weekly rhythm is the dominant trend driving fresh growth for our industry: a “flight to quality” movement.

Instead of maximizing the number of workers in a given space, tenants are increasingly upgrading their spaces and seeking offices with more amenities.

That customer shift was well underway before the pandemic, and it has been accelerated by the return to office.

Flight to quality

Flight to quality is now the driving force behind the leasing activity buoying the market’s finest office properties.

In the third quarter of last year, leasing volumes posted the stron-

gest quarterly gains since 2019, and a record number of leases were signed for more than $100 per square foot in 2022.

At The Durst Organization, our net effective rents for new leases since March 2020 are higher across the commercial portfolio compared with the two and a half years before the pandemic. Vacancy is down compared with prepandemic figures at some of our top-tier prop-

erties including 151 W. 42nd St., 1155 Sixth Ave. and 1 World Trade Center.

Remote work continues to be a part of the toolkit for employers, but just as schools discovered remote learning’s limitations and pivoted back to in-person instruction, employers are recognizing the importance of their office space.

Yes, there’s real pressure on owners of Class B and C office buildings to upgrade their spaces, innovate a fresh story, attract different kinds of tenants or consider converting offices to residential use to meet shifting preferences in the market.

Those trends were well underway a decade ago, and many owners were already responding before the pandemic by making new investments or repositioning their assets.

Change is the only constant in our business, and as long as I’ve been around, there’s never been a time in the commercial office market where we’ve had the luxury of standing still.

The pundits might see clouds on the horizon, but I see the future of commercial real estate in New York coming into focus. And I like what I see. ■

Here’s why New York needs a ‘builder’s remedy’ to solve its dearth of affordable housing

BY JAMES LLOYD

To kick off the current legislative season, Gov. Kathy Hochul laid out the solution New York needs to solve its housing crisis: the New York Housing Compact. It would be the first statewide housing/land-use policy in our history and our most ambitious housing endeavor since the Urban Development Corp.

New Yorkers should wholeheartedly support the compact because we need to build an enormous amount of housing to escape our crisis. Consider a recently published analysis from the Regional Plan Association showing that New York needs to build 817,000 homes during the next decade.

The compact can help us get there, and we cannot afford to delay.

The way the plan handles the suburbs is particularly compelling. Many of New York City’s suburbs are considered high-opportunity

areas—which means they have great schools, a healthy environment and connections to transit. In other words, they’re places where families thrive. The suburbs are ideal communities for affordable housing, but restrictive zoning and exclusionary politics have turned them into havens of single-family homes.

Denser affordable housing in those neighborhoods clearly would benefit those in need of an affordable home, but the plan also makes economic sense. It is much more cost-effective to allow duplexes, townhomes and moderate-density housing near Metro-North and Long Island Rail Road stations than it is to focus entirely on the five boroughs.

New York City banned woodframe construction in the 19th century due to concerns about fires; it is still forbidden today. Sprinklered wood-frame construction, however, is the most common form of multifamily development in the U.S. in low-rise areas, and for

good reason: It’s much less expensive than steel-and-concrete construction.

Inside New York City, affordable housing construction costs run about $400 per square foot. Outside the city, where you can build sprinklered wood-frame apartments, costs drop to about $250 per square foot. For a 750-squarefoot, one-bedroom apartment, that’s a $150,000 cost difference. When facing an 800,000plus home shortage, every dollar counts, so there is clearly an economic advantage to building more suburban multifamily housing.

Every community needs to do its part, which is why the compact includes a strong “builder’s remedy.” The process allows affordable housing projects to apply for permits notwithstanding local zoning in communities that have failed to adequately allow such housing.

The proposal is controversial, but there are precedents in other states. Massachusetts has an appeals board for areas with inadequate affordable housing, though it also has an eight-month local process before an appeal is allowed.

In California, lawmakers institut-

ed a much more direct builder’s remedy. When a municipality’s housing plan is out of compliance with state law, anyone can apply to build a mixed-income or affordable project. Such applications vest if submitted during a period of noncompliance, meaning they can proceed regardless of what a municipality does later. Projects, however, still must undergo an environmental review, which often is used to delay projects.

With those examples in mind, New York’s builder’s remedy should

have the following elements: the ability to “vest” by submitting applications during periods of noncompliance, a streamlined environmental review and an expeditious process.

We have an amazing opportunity to build our way out of the housing crisis with cost-effective construction in high-opportunity communities. Let’s not miss it. ■

Douglas Durst is chairman of The Durst Organization

James Lloyd is director of policy at the New York State Association for Affordable Housing.

aMaZInG OPPOrTunITy TO BUILD OUR WAY OUT OF THE CrISIS

PEOPLE ON THE MOVE

CONSTRUCTION

Swinerton

Sloane Brown joins Swinerton as Operations Manager for the Northeast market. She brings to the New York City team her expertise in managing talent and employee resources, estimating and preconstruction, eld operations, business planning and development, and corporate responsibility. In her new role, she oversees that all operations are executed safely with quality work and within budgets; develop self-perform capabilities; and ensure proper execution of all corporate initiatives.

LAW

Vinson & Elkins

Stancell Haigwood has been elected a partner at Vinson & Elkins in New York. She advises private equity funds and their portfolio companies and other private and public companies in all aspects of their business and investments, with a particular focus on complex corporate transactions, including M&A, strategic investments, SPACs and IPOs, and general corporate needs, including advising on securities law and corporate governance.

LAW

Vinson & Elkins

Todd Triller has rejoined Vinson & Elkins in New York as a partner in the Mergers & Acquisitions practice. Todd returns to the rm from The Carlyle Group, where he was Managing Director and CoHead of Energy Credit. He has 25+ years of experience advising and overseeing investment funds in M&A and alternative nance transactions, particularly in the energy and infrastructure sectors. He received his JD from the University of Virginia School of Law and also earned a bachelor’s degree from UVA.

COMPANIES ON THE MOVE

To place your listing, visit www.newyorkbusiness.com/companymoves or contact Debora Stein at917.226.5470 / dstein@crain.com

LAUNCHES / BUSINESS LINES

Hodgson Russ LLP Buffalo, NY 716-856-4000 hodgsonruss.com

CONSULTING RIVERON

Sarah Anyieth, Managing Director, has over 14 years of experience in accounting and nancial leadership roles, including leading largescale transformation programs, adoptions of new accounting pronouncements, and targeted close acceleration/cycle reduction projects focused on the record-to-report process. She has signi cant experience with public and private companies across various industries, including nancial services, retail, energy, consumer products, manufacturing, and agribusiness.

LAW

Vinson & Elkins

Christy Mazzola has been elected a partner at Vinson & Elkins in New York. She advises a wide range of real estate clients, from institutional investors to family of ces, on commercial real estate matters including mixed-use development projects, portfolio and single asset acquisitions, dispositions, nancings, joint ventures, ground leasing, real estate funds and workouts and restructurings.

LAW

Vinson & Elkins

Steven Zundell has been named counsel at Vinson & Elkins in New York. He focuses on all aspects of restructuring and reorganization work, including the representation of debtors, creditors, and equity holders in both chapter 11 cases and out-of-court restructurings. He also represents clients in contested matters and adversary proceedings before the state, bankruptcy, and federal district courts.

Hodgson Russ LLP is pleased to announce the launch of its State & Local Tax (SALT) Practice’s new podcast, “State Tax Talks with Joe Tantillo.” In each episode, nationally-renowned lawyers from our SALT Practice will join Joe Tantillo for a conversation about the State’s tax rules. Whether you’re trying to establish residency outside of New York State, or collect sales tax at your business, “State Tax Talks with Joe Tantillo” will guide you through the laws and explain how they came to be, and in some cases, show you how Hodgson Russ attorneys helped shape those rules.

“State Tax Talks with Joe Tantillo” is available on Apple, Spotify, Amazon Music, iHeartRadio, and Podbean.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS

EisnerAmper New York, NY 212-949-8700

eisneramper.com

Lindsay & Brownell CPAs & Advisors (“LB Advisors”) has joined global business advisory rm Eisner Advisory Group. Founded in 1992, and based in La Jolla, California, LB Advisors provides tax, accounting and business consulting services to individuals, nonpro ts, closely held businesses, trusts and estates. The combination bolsters Eisner Advisory Group’s presence in the key Southern California market.

INFORMATION / TECHNOLOGY

Wavicle Data Solutions

Wavicle Data

Solutions is pleased to announce Raj Nalla as Financial Services Practice Leader. Nalla works with banking, capital markets, and insurance clients to maximize value for their data analytics investments. From frontline operations to internal audit, Nalla empowers clients through scalable, self-service data analytics that accelerate time to value and reduce costs. Nalla’s 20 years of experience includes leading global teams at EY where he advised C-suite nancial services executives.

LAW

Vinson & Elkins

Zach Swartz has been elected a partner at Vinson & Elkins in New York. His principal areas of practice are capital markets and securities law, private equity, fund and joint venture formation, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate governance matters. He has particular experience advising on corporate and securities transactions involving equity and mortgage REITs and SPACs.

LAW

Windels Marx Lane & Mittendorf, LLP

Jason Frosch joined the New York of ce of Windels Marx Lane & Mittendorf, LLP as Partner. He focuses on real estate litigation with a concentration in matters involving the Loft Law. He has a JD from New York University School of Law and a Bachelor of Computer Engineering from the University of Florida. He’s admitted in New York and the U.S. District Courts for the Eastern and Southern Districts. He joined with a team including Kacey Sou (Special Counsel) and Kathleen Kelliher (Associate).

Keys to a budding market

NEW YORK’S recreational cannabis industry is just starting to get off the ground, with multiple players eyeing how to break in and make money.

The city’s rst state-sanctioned adult-use dispensary opened in December. Meanwhile, smoke shops are popping up on seemingly every corner, and medical marijuana dispensaries are holding on to prime real estate as both await what they hope will be their turn in the licensing process. To get the lay of the land, and to analyze the business challenges ahead, Crain’s turned to sister publication Green Market Report to tap its expertise on the local cannabis business.

For this month’s Crain’s Forum, GMR reporter John Schroyer outlines the holdup in getting more businesses licensed as well as concerns about the tax rates associated with the legal market. Reporter Adam Jackson explains why the existing medical marijuana rms in the state can’t enter the recreational market just yet, and GMR Executive Editor Debra Borchardt goes behind the scenes of the second storefront to open from an equity-focused applicant.

Let us know your thoughts as we continue the conversation at CrainsNewYork.com/ forum.

— Telisha Bryan, managing editor

An uphill climb

Major hurdles and unknowns abound for New York’s recreational marijuana market, but stakeholders remain optimistic

BY JOHN SCHROYER, GREEN MARKET REPORT

The New York state cannabis market is projected to be one of the biggest in the world, with some industry estimates forecasting sales to surpass $2 billion within just a few years. But the slow rollout and uncertain regulations—after all, the rules are still in draft form—leave many wondering if a large chunk of sales will continue going to unlicensed dealers.

On top of that, the state’s unclear timeline for when licenses will be issued and storefronts will be fully operational as well as concerns about how much consumers will be willing to spend once potency and excise taxes are baked in, among other hurdles, have given some stakeholders pause about how successful smaller players will be in the market.

“ is is a very optimistic time, but the business owner in me is very stressed out every single day on how I’m actually going to make this work,” said Brittany Carbone, a board member of the Cannabis Association of New York and the CEO of Tricolla Farms, near Ithaca. “ ere could be thousands of millionaires rather than a few billionaires created through the New York market, and the rst step is getting more people licensed.”

Cultivation licenses were the rst to be issued, but they were restricted to existing hemp farmers who could convert to growing marijuana to supply

product rich in THC, the chemical that provides users with the sensation of being high, when the adult-use market launched.

ere’s a long way to go, however. As of early January, the New York O ce of Cannabis Management had awarded 354 conditional licenses, made up of 279 growers, 39 processors and 36 retailers, on top of the 10 registered organizations, or ROs, that are allowed to sell medical cannabis.

at includes 26 new adult-use retail licenses for four of New York City's boroughs and Long Island. (Brooklyn was one of ve regions where licensing has been delayed by litigation.) Each of those licensees can open three stores.

In addition, Manhattan, Queens, the Bronx, Brooklyn and Staten Island are already home to eight medical dispensaries, including three in Brooklyn.

It’s not clear when authorities will grant more permits; 903 applications were led for the rst round of retail licenses alone last year, so timing is a major question mark.

Not only that, but the sheer price di erence between the rst legal retailer in New York thus far— Manhattan’s Housing Works—and the enormous number of unlicensed dealers have some fearing that many companies won’t survive.

See HURDLES on page 12

The go-to source for cannabis industry news and analysis

Founded in 2017, Green Market Report delivers original, unbiased cannabis business news with a focus on analysis at the global, national and local levels. Its readers, made up of founders, insiders and investors, rely on Green Market Report’s award-winning coverage to make educated decisions for their operations—decisions that a ect the entire cannabis industry.

Under Crain Communications ownership, Green Market Report has expanded its coverage. e team, led by Executive Editor Debra Borchardt, holds more than 40 years of combined experience in the business of cannabis. Before launching GMR, Borchardt spent years in the investment world, experience she now leverages to provide others with a deep understanding of the money behind businesses.

Green Market Report o ers several ways to get the latest, no- u content on the cannabis industry. GreenMarketReport.com is the go-to source for up-to-date industry news and analysis. GMR also sends daily and weekly newsletters focused on providing the news readers need when they need it, and GMR’s social media channels help the cannabis community connect.

BUCK

ENNIS

BAUTISTA says small players like himself have a “ rst-mover advantage.”

HURDLES

“It is an uphill battle, but again, it’s always an uphill battle when you don’t have massive capital, no matter what industry you’re in. But when you throw in the illicit market side, it makes it even harder,” attorney Jason Klimek, a member of the New York Bar Association’s cannabis law section, said when asked how he thinks the market—which is centered on small mom-and-pop businesses—will perform.

e most immediate obstacle for many New York cannabis hopefuls is getting licensed and operational, but the timeline on that front is painfully unclear.

e state has no limit on the number of business permits it will award—in theory—but regulators have been painstakingly slow on that front, particularly for retailers. e rst round, which is so far only partially completed, will award 175 retail permits, including 150 for “justice-involved” individuals and an additional 25 for nonpro ts.

e longer those retailers have to wait, the closer they’ll get to the three-year deadline, at the end of 2025, when the 10 multistate operator ROs will be allowed to fully enter the recreational cannabis side of the market. For now those behemoths are relegated to wholesaling cannabis products to licensed adult-use rms.

Most industry observers agree that the 10 will likely start dominating quickly because they’ve got an edge that no other retailer will have: vertical integration, their

support each other and be able to have each others’ products. e way the regulations are set up, I don’t think we could do that,” said Vladimir Bautista, CEO of New York City–based cannabis lifestyle brand Happy Munkey, one of the contenders for a retail license.

ere’s even more uncertainty about the licensing rollout because of ongoing litigation that has held up at least 18 retail licenses thus far and has the potential to delay the permitting even more.

Other obstacles

e New York cannabis law has additional hurdles baked into it, such as the THC-based potency tax and the 13% excise tax, which some observers say could undermine the entire legal market because gray market cannabis is far cheaper. at’s just one legislative priority that CANY is dedicated to changing during the upcoming legislative session in Albany.

“ e illicit market has always had cheaper cannabis. e people who really go to dispensaries are tourists, super-wealthy people and people who just don’t know better,” Joe Lustberg, managing partner at Upwise Capital, said.

Hopeful retailers are also faced with a tougher fundraising landscape, because in November the OCM issued draft rules that prevent companies from selling equity stakes to anyone who owns a piece of any cannabis company anywhere in the world.

ough the rule is meant to keep larger companies from taking over smaller businesses, some industry insiders say it may become an Achilles heel for small startups, because capital requirement estimates range from several hundred thousand dollars to $1.5 million.

“A lot of companies face this Catch-22. You need to have your supply chain in order to attract investors, but you need money to develop your supply chain. And it’s the same with licensing and investment,” said attorney Lauren Rudick.

BY THE NUMBERS 13%

own in-house supply chains and branded product lines.

All the other retailers are prohibited from building such infrastructure or even having their own brands—another complaint of some license hopefuls.

“ at is not good, because the only way we can level the playing eld is for the smaller players like myself … to be able to

One of the biggest capital hurdles is real estate, said David Feder, an attorney with Weed Law. at’s because originally the OCM required retail applicants to go through the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York, which is in charge of a special multimillion-dollar fund dedicated to prepping retail sites on behalf of the rst 150 retailers.

at plan, however, has gone sideways. After DASNY failed to secure locations quickly for the 36 retailers who won licenses in November, the OCM pivoted in December and told licensees they would be allowed to nd their own retail storefronts.

e pivot could pit licensees against DASNY, because under state law, retail cannabis shops cannot be located within 1,000 feet of one another.

“So now there’s a major race to put your ag down,” Feder said. “ e main question in play is, will it happen fast enough so that these licensees are not boxed out from otherwise ideal locations?”

ere are still a host of unanswered questions about how the legal cannabis market will even work, seeing as regulators have authorized marijuana delivery but

haven’t given clear guidelines on how it’ll be governed. ere are also questions about enforcement against unlicensed sellers, rules for consumption lounges and plenty more.

Stakeholders still bullish

Despite the myriad reasons for pessimism in New York, many insist that cannabis companies in the Empire State are poised to do well.

“I am very optimistic about this market,” said Happy Munkey’s Bautista. “It’s far from perfect, but the reality is, it’s the rst

BUCK ENNIS

ENNISS GARY GERSHOFF/WIRE IMAGE

THE AMOUNT of the excise tax to be levied on legal cannabis sales, which is in addition to a THCbased potency tax

THE YEAR the 10 giant, multistate cannabis rms can fully enter New York’s recreational market

NUMBER of applications the state received for the rst round of retail licenses last year

“THERE COULD BE THOUSANDS OF MILLIONAIRES RATHER THAN A FEW BILLIONAIRES”

KING says Housing Works is already looking for its second and third local locations.

WHEN HOUSING WORKS Cannabis Co., the rst recreational cannabis dispensary in the city, opened on Dec. 29, customers lined up around the block.

LARGE MEDICAL marijuana rms such as MedMen cannot enter the recreational market until 2025.

state I’ve seen that lets smaller players like myself get a rst-mover advantage.”

Lustberg echoed that and said he believes the New York market will be a booming success, as long as regulators carefully limit the number of permits—retail or otherwise—that are issued.

“I see the [New Jersey] dispensaries doing millions of dollars a month—out the gate doing $1.5 million a month in really good locations, seeing upwards of 500 to 2,500 customers a week,” Lustberg said. “ e fact that it’s happening in Hackensack, New Jersey, makes me think that a

Potency tax could be a major buzzkill for sanctioned retailers

Worries abound that there’s a limit to how much above street prices shoppers will pay for legal weed

BY JOHN SCHROYER, GREEN MARKET REPORT

One of the most controversial aspects of New York’s new recreational cannabis market is its tax system, which some have worried will undermine licensed businesses by driving consumers to cheaper underground dealers.

A white paper published in December by a pair of New York tax attorneys, just weeks before the formal start of recreational marijuana sales on Dec. 29, warned of that very possibility. It predicted—and was proven accurate after sales launched—that a legal eighth of cannabis ower in New York with 30% THC would cost about $75.

tition by state authorities, King said.

It’s a big undertaking, as many illicit operators already have brand recognition by o ering legally produced but illegally shipped cannabis from California and Oregon, such as the famed SoCal brand Jungle Boys. at’s one brand name New York City resident Joe Lustberg, managing partner at Upwise Capital, said he ran into recently at a smoke shop.

store on Broadway is going to double that. Housing Works is probably going to do $40 million to $50 million this year.”

Housing Works CEO Charles King declined to share sales numbers to date, but he said he’s absolutely con dent that his nonpro t has a model for success.

“If we really want this path to be pro table, we’ve got to build volume. And that’s the only way we're going to make it successful,” King said, noting that Housing Works is already looking for its second and third locations, the maximum allowed for any adult-use retailer under state law. ■

Prices at Housing Works—the rst state-sanctioned cannabis retailer in the ve boroughs—proved to be not far below that, with prices uctuating because taxes are based on THC potency. According to the nonpro t’s online menu, an eighth of cannabis ower ranges in price and potency from 19% THC for $40 to 27% for $60. With the 13% excise tax added, out-the-door prices would be between $45 and $68, respectively.

But if customers remain price-sensitive, as data from other mature recreational marijuana markets suggest, then they’ll broadly be willing to pay only as much as 10% to 15% above prices on the unregulated market, according to the paper, authored by attorneys Jason Klimek and James Mann.

By contrast, unlicensed street vendors in New York City last month were peddling cannabis eighths for between $10 and $45, Green Market Report found.

Combine that with overall lax enforcement to date against the underground market, and the situation has the potential to undercut state-licensed retailers—particularly smaller and less-capitalized businesses—before they can truly get o the ground, Klimek and Mann asserted.

Charles King, the CEO of Housing Works, said in early January that he doesn’t think the situation is that dire, and companies such as his will be able to survive as long as they stick to a solid retail business plan and tap the immense tourism market.

“I think people know that you’re paying for quality, you’re paying for the taxes and all the rest of what goes with the regulated, licensed market,” King said.

Still, there will have to be more of a focus on enforcement against illicit compe-

“For some cannabis operator who’s competing with the smoke shop next door [that is] able to sell California eighths for $30 [and] that’s better weed than what they’re selling at Housing Works, it’s tough,” Lustberg said. e tax structure also might be altered by the Legislature, because making the system more business-friendly is a top priority of industry interests in Albany, including for the Cannabis Association of New York.

“I do feel con dent that the state is very much aware of the issue with the potency tax and, at the very least, open to reform,” said Brittany Carbone, a board member of CANY and a cannabis farmer upstate. “It’s been well proven that more reasonable tax structures actually result in higher rates of purchase in legal dispensaries, which results in a net positive win for the state, in terms of tax revenues.”

Even if the tax structure doesn’t change, cannabis attorney Lauren Rudick said, the THC-based potency tax will probably encourage the creation and sale of a more diverse range of cannabinoid products that don’t rely only on THC to please consumers. And that could be just what the burgeoning industry needs: more product variety. ■

SOME LOCAL SMOKE SHOPS sell Jungle Boys products shipped illegally from California.

CUSTOMERS make purchases during the opening of Housing Works Cannabis Co.

Medical marijuana rms left warming the bench

BY ADAM JACKSON, GREEN MARKET REPORT

When New York gave the sale and use of medical marijuana the green light, o cially permitting it in 2014, the rms that vied for a spot as one of the state’s 10 vertically licensed operators envisioned the true golden ticket to be early entry into the eventual recreational cannabis retail market.

at expectation was ampli ed when the state passed the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act in 2021. Investment dollars poured in, and medical licenses traded at high valuations on the secondary market, bolstered by the idea that those who bought in early would be able to capitalize on both adult-use and medical retail sales, cultivation and manufacturing.

However, under draft regulations released in November, those companies will have to wait at least three years from the o cial launch date of adult-use sales just to apply for a recreational retail permit. Final rules have yet to be published.

“ ey were hit with a bait and switch by the state regulators,” said Tom Adams, principal analyst and CEO of Global Go. “You know, ‘Come to our state and help apply your expertise and your capital to building out this incredibly limited medical-only market that you’re clearly

not going to make any money at anywhere in New York.’ ”

So the multistate operators came.

e proposed rules, however, also established a two-tier system that prohibits growers and manufacturers from participating on the retail side—and vice versa.

at means those same players who helped establish the medical cannabis industry “got sort of the back of the hand from regulators” and now must accept that they cannot implement the business models they’ve used in other states, Adams said.

ose who invested in medical operations in New York early on expected, if not “the rst bite at the apple ... at least a rst bite at the same time as the other licensees for some of these retail adult-use licenses,” said Brandon Kurtzman, a partner at cannabis law rm Vicente Sederberg.

Both Adams and Kurtzman said the pivot now is to develop product brands through the cultivation and manufacturing side to sell to retailers and social consumption lounges.

Boxed in

e $138.9 million write-down Torontobased RIV Capital took after its acquisition of New York’s Etain, one of the 10 local medical cannabis license holders, illustrates the conundrum. RIV Capital agreed

to pay $212 million in cash and $35 million in stock for the small, women-led medical cannabis company.

But instead of being able to capitalize on its existing business structure, Etain has been forced into a single channel. With heavy investment already sunk into cultivation, the company appears to be boxed into being a grower—the less lucrative side of the cannabis business.

e price paid for Etain was so troubling to RIV Capital’s largest shareholder, JW Asset Management, that the rm asked for a special meeting of shareholders to replace ve of the seven directors on RIV’s board.

In New York, Adams said, having a brand on store shelves “is probably more valuable than anything else” an operator

can do, as there is not much real brand dominance yet among the plethora of cannabis companies out there.

Despite the rms seemingly being last in line, nothing is completely set in stone.

“It’ll be very interesting to see what happens with these draft regulations, see what the comments look like and if there’s going to be any compromise between what they put out [and] what [medical operators] are looking for in this market,” Kurtzman noted.

“ e goal here is to provide access to consumers,” he added. “I think you do that by allowing new licensees but also allowing the existing licensees to participate, because that’s more or less what you told them they were going to be able to do in the law.” ■

First dispensary from social equity applicant launches in Greenwich Village as a pop-up

will be stationed in critical areas.

BY DEBRA BORCHARDT, GREEN

Smacked, the rst legal cannabis dispensary from a social equity applicant directly a ected by the War on Drugs, began sales at its in Greenwich Village location Jan. 24. Owner Roland Conner had been incarcerated for possession of cannabis and had marijuana-related convictions dating back to 1991.

e store on Bleecker Street opened as a pop-up until it undergoes construction for a few months to transform it into its permanent iteration.

Reuben McDaniel, president and CEO of the Dormitory Authority of the State of New York and a board member of the Ofce of Cannabis Management, noted that the permanent store was waiting on a nal design from the California-based Temeka Group, which is handling store design for the social equity applicants.

e idea of a cannabis pop-up is unusual considering how other states tightly control security requirements. e current con guration doesn’t allow for standard security features, such as access cards to enter secure areas. Instead, armed guards

“What we decided to do with the assessments and stu we’re doing with the properties takes time to get the plans done. So the thought process was, let’s do the popup and get sales going," said Mike Wilson, founder of Temeka Group. " at also acclimates Roland and the team on how to run the store, because there’s a lot of pressure.”

Wilson said that the pop-up store would be compliant with the rules and regulations established by the OCM.

e store had a small selection of products in cases and two ATM machines near the front. It will be equipped with retail software from Dutchie, which said it was providing software for free to the social equity applicants.

ough the OCM has said the licensed stores would be spread out, Smacked is only a 10-minute walk from the rst licensed dispensary by the nonpro t group Housing Works. at store, meanwhile, has received several negative reviews on Yelp for the expense and quality of the product.

A second chance

At the press event announcing Smacked's launch, Conner and his family were visibly emotional to be opening a store selling a product for which he had once been arrested and spent time behind bars. His wife shed tears, and his son was on hand to hear about the store having the

potential to create generational wealth.

Conner noted that he preferred to describe himself as an entrepreneur versus an ex-con.

“New York is doing something amazing. Everybody deserves a chance," he said. "You do your time; you come out. ey should not hold that against you. I served my time, and now I’m here."

With regard to competition from unlicensed operators, Conner said, “I come from that. At the end of the day, they should be supported. [ e state] should give them the opportunity to make the transition from illegal to legal. ey should be helping them to do that. "

Former basketball star Chris Webber, a

Detroit native, was on hand for the opening announcement. He helps lead the fundraising e orts for a $200 million fund to support the social equity applicants.

“Roland has done a great job," he said, "and his empathy transcends the walls of his store.”

However, when asked for speci cs on the current status of the fund, which has been questioned for its lack of transparency, Webber noted that the only conversation happening that day would be about the opening of Conner’s location.

“Today we are opening the rst social equity store in the state of New York, and I think that’s a pretty big update," Webber said. ■

The companies entered the market rst with eyes on recreational sales, but now they’re last in line

The Bleecker Street store will undergo construction when its design is nal

MARKET REPORT

CONNER said Smacked could help his family build generational wealth.

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YORK’S LEGAL CANNABIS INDUSTRY MUST

ACCESSIBLE TO THE LATINO COMMUNITY

AS DISPENSARIES begin to open and New York makes meaningful progress to launch its adult-use cannabis industry, one demographic that cannot be overlooked is the Latino community. We must address language barriers, cultural incompetence and the damage done by prohibition. This is not an easy feat, but if we overcome this, Hispanic New Yorkers stand to be a key population to help our state’s legal industry achieve its true potential and fulfill the vision set out by the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act. Here’s why New York must do more to make legal cannabis accessible to its Latino population.

● Prohibition was harmful to Latinos. The racist undertones of anti-cannabis movements, such as the War on Drugs, adversely affected Latinos, and reversing those impacts must be a priority in the legal industry. It is commonly known that the now derogatory term “marijuana,” along with the first wave of prohibition in Texas, was created because of anti-Mexican sentiments and the plant’s association with migrants crossing the border.

For the Latino community, the War on Drugs not only perpetuated racist stereotypes, but it was also a driver of mass deportations and increased hostilities toward Hispanic migrant populations. Latino women were more likely to be arrested or have their children taken away in connection to cannabis use and possession. Prohibition also sparked the creation of the Drug Enforcement Administration, an agency responsible for the criminalization and incarceration of Latinos in the United States and in South America. This deepened the negative and discriminatory stereotypes about Spanish-speaking Americans and cannabis, especially in major cities with large Hispanic populations like New York City.

● Latinos have an influential presence in New York. New York state has the fourth-largest Latino population in the U.S., tallying almost 4 million of us. In New York City, we make up more than a quarter of the population, being outnumbered only by Caucasians. Due to our growing presence, Latinos will play an increasingly large role in the state’s culture, innovation, politics and key industries. This influence will undoubtedly continue in New York’s emerging cannabis industry. We have been leaders in legalization efforts in the state and trailblazers in the wider industry. We also represent a large portion of the legacy community and a significant consumer profile.

Latino culture and cannabis culture are closely related. We must ensure that this connective tissue remains as we transition into a legal market.

● Latinos are becoming fierce cannabis advocates and consumers. The Latino population is the youngest ethnic group in the U.S. Additionally, Hispanic culture has historically recognized the medicinal benefits of the plant. Attitudes are still shifting within our community. Though it is common for elder-generation Latinos to perpetuate negative stigmas around cannabis consumption, overall, our community not only consumes cannabis but fiercely advocates for it. According to a 2019 report by Ad Age, Hispanics are 30% more likely than the average cannabis consumer to belong to a group that actively promotes legalizing cannabis. The study also found that Latinos are 42% more likely than the average American to be cannabis campaigners. Cannabis campaigners are characterized as people who don’t necessarily consume cannabis, but who are informed about cannabis issues and actively support legalization.

New York must tap this enthusiasm to effectively incorporate our community into the cannabis industry. This means more cannabis education and restorative justice efforts in Latino neighborhoods, more programming and advertising in Spanish, and culturally competent “budtenders” and staff at dispensaries.

To most effectively address these barriers, an increase in Latino operators and dispensary owners is also key. That would grant us the social and economic equity benefits of the new legal industry and repair the lingering damage done to our communities by the War on Drugs.

Latinos will be a decisive demographic in the long-term success of the state’s legal industry. From Latino trailblazers paving the way within the community to Latino consumers and stakeholders posing an influence from the outside, we will uplift the cannabis sector for the long term. For the sake of social equity and the health of the industry, New York must activate our community in the rollout of its adult-use program. ■

Kristina Lopez Adduci is the founder and CEO of House of Puff, a cannabis accessories brand with a focus on education and destigmatization. Vladimir Bautista is CEO and co-founder of cannabis lifestyle brand Happy Munkey and a conditional adult-use retail dispensary license applicant.

THE MAIN THRUST of New York’s Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, or MRTA, is to promote social equity in the rollout of legal weed in New York. Women, minorities, disadvantaged farmers, disabled veterans and “justice-involved individuals” (those with prior low-level cannabis convictions) were to be favored. Big cannabis and big business—which included the 10 medical marijuana providers already established in the state—were mostly deprioritized.

The new Cannabis Control Board started off with a bold and innovative program to provide a jump-start on adult-use production by allowing existing licensed hemp growers and processors to receive temporary limited licenses to produce recreational product in advance of permanent licensing. Although some of the regulations were confusing, the program generally was applauded.

DAVID N. FELDMAN

There also seems to be broad agreement among those in the industry about the importance of promoting and supporting social equity players. But there’s a line being drawn at whether to do so at all costs. Many, for example, saw the CCB’s decision to issue the first 150 or so dispensary licenses to not-for-profits with a social equity mission or individuals with prior New York marijuana convictions as a positive. Some wondered why other social equity players, such as disabled veterans, are somehow less deserving of this priority.

THOSE LEADING THE CANNABIS CONTROL BOARD ARE CAPABLE

The CCB also planned to provide real estate (through the state Dormitory Authority of the State of New York) and funding (through the new $200 million so-called Webber-Willis Fund) to these players. The locations, however, apparently have not yet been acquired by the state. The fund, so far, does not seem to be operating or fundraising, and its principals have been accused by media outlets of conflicts of interest.

The state also is fighting a lawsuit from an individual whose conviction was in Michigan, claiming it is unconstitutional for New York to exclude those with convictions from other states.

And those aren’t the only complaints. Some have expressed frustration about delays, pointing out that it took almost two years to open the first dispensary in Manhattan, and delivery services have yet to be commenced. Some have complained about high prices in the first store, run by Housing Works, which must compete with the so-called “legacy” or illicit market—players New York City Mayor Eric Adams recently began cracking down on.

All that said, the individuals leading CCB and the Office of Cannabis Management it oversees are capable, determined and well-intentioned. Most stakeholders believe that real estate, funding and confusing regulations will be sorted out in the months ahead. The balance between promoting social equity and assuring an industry run by smart and hard-working operators is expected to be found.

In a few years, the sausage indeed will be made, and what likely will be the largest cannabis retail market of any U.S. state will emerge and thrive. The bigger question for another day: What happens when federal legalization eliminates interstate barriers? ■

NEW

BE

KRISTINA LOPEZ ADDUCI

THE CONFUSION AND FRUSTRATION SURROUNDING NEW YORK’S RETAIL ROLLOUT WILL BE SHORT-LIVED

VLADIMIR BAUTISTA

STATE FACES DAUNTING TASK OF ADDRESSING NEEDS, DEFINING SUCCESS

WHAT MAKES A REGULATORY ENVIRONMENT

SUCCESSFUL?

In a nascent industry such as cannabis, a federally illegal, highly regulated industry emerging from its legacy form, this question is asked by many but defined by few.

Each state that enacts a legal program, whether medical or adult use, faces a similar set of challenges in ushering this new industry into existence, including defining what constitutes success. Newly enacted regulators and staff face the difficult task of shaping the industry in their state in a manner that addresses the needs and the legislative intent of the laws enacted behind them.

Stakeholders to the industry come in many shapes and forms: business owners, regulators, social and economic equity market participants, investors, legislators, city and state budgets, consumers and patients. Considering that broad array, it should come as no surprise that the industry brings with it competing initiatives, and the enactment and creation of the regulatory environment surrounding the industry is a daunting task.

With the passage of the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act on March 31, 2021, the state of New York established the backbone for the industry to come. Subsequent regulations and laws, including those that administer the conditional adult-use retail dispensary, or CAURD, program and the conditional use cultivators and manufacturers, enabled the adult-use market to officially launch at the end of 2022 with the opening of the state’s first adult-use dispensary.

Though the CAURD program helped achieve New York’s goal of opening the state for adult use by the end of 2022, the success of such a program and the measure of its outcomes will play out in the years to come.

New York’s proposed regulations attempt to address many of the issues that have plagued more mature markets with regard to ownership and control concerns, with an aim to ensure that independent operators find success in the marketplace. The state has come out of the gate in the proposed regulations

IT TOOK NEARLY A CENTURY to suppress the legacy of cannabis in American agriculture and medicine. Just a decade ago, as a Brooklyn native who grew up during the height of cannabis criminalization, I could not have imagined buying an eighth of weed legally in New York City.

Despite the history, on March 31, 2021, the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, championed by Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, state Sen. Liz Krueger and the StartSMART Coalition, became the country’s landmark equity-centered law to intentionally hold government accountable for restoring and repairing communities disproportionately impacted by the overpolicing and disinvestment of the prohibition era.

I never expected the damage from decades of harsh laws and entrenched negative stigmas to disappear overnight. However, some have criticized the state’s timing, peddling the narrative that it is moving too slowly.

Analyzing the adult-use markets legalized prior to New York's, every state had a lag period between legalization and launch, more often giving first access to already licensed medical operators, which further exacerbated inequities in the industry. In 2016 California and Massachusetts legalized adult use, and both opened the market for sales in 2018. In 2020 New Jersey legalized cannabis, and the state opened the market for first sales in 2022.

Providing 300-plus licenses to justice-involved individuals, small-business owners and farmers, the New York state Office of Cannabis Management should be commended for rapidly building a seed-to-shelf supply chain in less than two years, culminating with the first dispensary opening in December 2022.

New York is also taking an unprecedented approach to support previously existing, unlicensed cannabis entrepreneurs, often referred to as “legacy operators,” transition into the legal industry. Though others demonized the legacy market, New York has embraced the underground culture and its credibility.

The state’s conditional adult-use retail dispensary license and Cannabis Compliance Training and Mentorship Program mark the start of intentional inclusion in New York’s market. The nonprofit CAURD licensing opportunity also demonstrates an extraordinary model that supports sustainable funding to organizations that have served marginalized communities, provides opportunities to those same communities for retail workforce development and contributes to state cannabis tax revenue, 40% of which goes back to the

to address areas of potential control such as through contracted management service agreements, future rights to equity, and separation of ownership and control by license type.

In looking to address the disproportionate enforcement of cannabis prohibition, the regulations also address specific licensing tiers and opportunities for minorities and other economic groups. However, despite any regulator’s good intentions, the regulatory environment is only one of a few key economic drivers that will impact New York’s cannabis market.

Adam Smith’s invisible hand theory focuses on the hidden economic forces that impact free markets, typically based upon self-interest. While addressing potential control issues to craft a market that caters to individual license types rather than vertical integration, the state may have stymied the willingness of investors to provide capital to an industry where cash flow is difficult at best and economies of scale cannot be achieved.

In an economic environment that competes with the legacy market on a pricing perspective, the maturity of the market in this unlimited license state may lead to many more business failures while business owners cannot cover the onerous tax implications of the federal tax code 280E that belies the best of intentions on behalf of the regulators.

Success begins with a single step. In New York, the journey has just begun. ■ Mitzi Keating is founder of Cannabis Advisory Services at Citrin Cooperman.

ON A MISSION

communities disproportionately impacted by criminalization.

Amid these groundbreaking advancements for the state, New York City is contending with the proliferation of visible, unlicensed smoke shops, a common trend experienced during the lag period in other markets. From my experience in legalization efforts across the country, an industry grounded in restorative justice requires a three-pronged approach to enforcement:

1. Facilitating the transition of preexisting legacy operators into the legal market through intentional programming and resources;

2. Bringing unlicensed businesses that have received warnings into compliance through rehabilitative engagement; and,

3. Using civil enforcement actions to disrupt unregulated activities that pose a risk to public health and safety.

Mayor Eric Adams launched Cannabis NYC to support New Yorkers starting or growing a legal cannabis-related business. As an emerging multibillion-dollar industry, cannabis will contribute significantly to the city’s economic recovery and can address the past wrongs that disproportionately affected Black and brown communities.

Cannabis NYC is on a mission to make our city the global leader in cannabis industry excellence in education and equity across business, science and culture. To accomplish this, MRTA’s intent must be protected, and efforts to repair social, economic, environmental and human injuries caused by prohibition must not be derailed by stigma and misinformation.

Cannabis NYC is actively creating an interagency hub of free resources and services for all New Yorkers, kicking off with a five-borough informational tour, in collaboration with the New York City Housing Authority and the Mayor’s Office of Equity. We are partnering with industry pioneers and institutions to support citywide public education initiatives, workforce training and curriculum development. The NYC Cannabis Policy Advisory Commission will include a diverse group of local and global experts, including racial justice, economic development and health equity leaders tasked with publishing an annual policy report. This is just the beginning.

Cannabis is a plant with agricultural, industrial, nutritional, medical and spiritual utilities that will have global impact, from health to hospitality to housing. Armed with the right alignment of community advocacy, business innovation and government leadership, at the state and local level, New York is poised to become a model of cannabis excellence for the world. ■

Dasheeda Dawson is founding director of Cannabis NYC.

NEW YORK IS POISED TO BECOME a MODEL OF CannaBIS EXCELLEnCE FOR THE WORLD

Liz Holtzman, ‘the Lion Killer,’ (still) knows her way around the political den

INTERVIEW BY RAINA LIPSITZ

Elizabeth Holtzman, a 31-year-old who had never held elective office, announced in March 1972 that she would run against Emanuel Celler, a Brooklyn machine politician who had spent 50 years in the House of Representatives. She won, earning the moniker “Liz the Lion Killer.” At the time and for 42 years afterward, she was the youngest woman elected to Congress. Holtzman, a proud liberal, ran against the war in Vietnam. She served on the powerful House Judiciary Committee and, as a first-term congresswoman, was instrumental in the Watergate hearings. She co-founded the Congressional Caucus on Women’s Issues and fought for passage of the never-adopted Equal Rights Amendment. After serving four terms in Congress, she was elected district attorney of Kings County and served as New York City comptroller. Holtzman spoke with Crain’s about how to make your voice heard when nobody’s listening and what she’s learned about power.

Given the slim political margins and the intense polarization in the country, how can a firstyear member of Congress make progress on an issue? I was a brand-new member and still was able to make a difference even in my first term. There were two very important things I did. One was to [sue] the secretary of defense to try to stop the bombing of Cambodia. The other was to uncover and call for a series of actions against Nazi war criminals living in the United States.

So can a young whippersnapper freshman, someone who is supposed to be seen and not heard from, make a difference? Yes. Partly it’s happenstance, but partly it’s your ability to take advantage of issues that fall in your lap. And it also requires a bit of guts.

Takeaway for business professionals

Holtzman learned earlier than most not to take no for an answer. She believes that if you can’t get something done one way, it’s your job to figure out another way to do it—a lesson she has applied to a number of issues, from suing the secretary of defense to halt the Nixon administration’s bombing of Cambodia to expelling Nazi war criminals from the United States. That perseverance has paid off throughout a long career in politics and law.

Based on your own experience, how would you advise someone who’s brand-new to politics to build power?

I don’t think you build power. I think power comes from, one, the fact that you have it and are willing to use it, and, two, that you use it in a just way. I’m thinking about what happened when I became district attorney in Brooklyn. There had never been a woman in any bureau chief position. They were passed over routinely because a woman was not in charge … [suddenly] I was [the] D.A., and I could make those decisions just by snapping my fingers. I had the power to do that and I did it.

That same thing happened with minority leadership in the office; there had never been a Black person who was the head of anything. I changed that with a snap of my fingers. I hired somebody right away. When you use your power to make those kinds of changes, people take note. You have to use the power you have to do justice.

Describe a time when being underestimated worked to your advantage. Running for Congress the first time, nobody gave me a chance. We couldn’t raise any money, and we didn’t get any endorsements from any unions or good-government groups. Even though I ran on an anti-war platform, none of the peace groups supported me. Being underestimated meant that I was able to win because they didn’t spend a lot of money on the race on the other side.

I was struck by Kathryn Garcia’s recent remark to Crain’s that when she was running for mayor in 2021, she sometimes wished that she didn’t have to put on makeup every day. How has gender affected your career, and how different do you think it is for women today?

Gender on the whole has made it harder. I think when I first ran for office, there was some small advantage to being a woman. They’d never seen women campaigning at subways, supermarkets and so forth, so people noticed it and remembered having met me. I still have people say, “I met you at the Avenue M subway stop, don’t you remember?” And also, at that point, because it was an issue of corruption, the image of a woman as more caring and honest was helpful to me.

Women still have to overcome gender stereotypes. Sometimes they can, sometimes they can’t.

What would you say to people who are eager to move forward on issues, such

as climate change and abortion rights, but have lost faith in institutions, such as Congress and the Supreme Court?

You have to figure ways of getting around them and doing it other ways. When I got to Congress I couldn’t get a bill passed immediately, but [I brought] a lawsuit. I had a press conference. I made noise. You can’t give up, because what’s the alternative? You just have to figure out more effective ways.

I was in the South in the summer of 1963. I saw these young kids demonstrating peacefully, marching for voting rights, being arrested, being thrown into jail, being hit with cattle prods and attacked by dogs and all the rest. And they never stopped. They never stopped. Did change happen immediately? No, it took some time, and we are still confronting terrible racism in this country. But they ended Jim Crow. Young people standing up against institutions that they had no illusions about when they did it: against the sheriffs, the cattle prods, the

DOSSIER

ON HER RÉSUMÉ House of Representatives (1973-1981); Kings County district attorney (1982-1989); New York City comptroller (1990-93); Herrick law firm, counsel and co-chair, Government Relations Group (1993-present)

BORN Ocean Parkway, Brooklyn

GREW UP Flatbush, Brooklyn

RESIDES A Brooklyn neighborhood

“very different” from where she grew up

EDUCATION Radcliffe College (1962), Harvard Law School (1965)

BREAKING THE MOLD In 1972 Holtzman became the youngest woman elected to Congress at age 31, a title she retained until 2014. In 1981 Holtzman became the first and only woman elected Kings County district attorney. In 1989 she became the first and only woman elected New York City comptroller.

dogs. I saw them do that. If they could do it, why can’t we?

You’ve said in interviews that Americans’ reluctance to see former President Donald Trump held accountable for abusing his power is troubling. Where do you think that reluctance comes from? And why are powerful people so often treated as if they’re above the law?

I think it’s partly because we don’t often have to deal with people like Donald Trump or Richard Nixon. Take a look at George Santos. He’s being seated in Congress. Where is the investigation? Why hasn’t it started? What’s happening? It’s not normal to lie and cheat in the way that he has. The institutions are not eager and not accustomed to imposing penalties on their colleagues. Those who are too timid to enforce the law against the high and mighty are undermining the Constitution itself.

How would you compare Donald Trump to Richard Nixon in terms of abuse of power? Both thought they were above the law. The difference is ultimately how they were treated. When Nixon resigned rather than face certain impeachment by the House and certain conviction in the Senate, he was disgraced. His political power evaporated. Donald Trump was defeated in the election, but he still has political power. He still is a potent force. ■

ASHLEY HOLT

These four early-stage tech startups in the city are still raising venture capital—here’s why

BY CARA EISENPRESS

Venture capital dollars have been slower to fund startup companies during the past several quarters, especially in later rounds and at expensive valuations. Companies at earlier stages, however, are still raising money to fund new products, acquire market share and add staff.

Here are four that have raised money in the city in recent weeks.

QR codemaker adds $25 million

a restaurant table, where orders can then be placed without a server.

Beaconstac’s technology also lets businesses track certain information about the customer doing the scanning.

CruISEBOunD

FUNDING DETAILS

Cruise deal site lands $10 million

$10 million Series A INVESTORS Priceline Chief Executive Jeff Boyd; PAR Capital Ventures of Boston; Steve Kaufer, co-founder of Tripadvisor

HEADQUARTERS

Gramercy

In the resurgent travel industry, Cruisebound announced that it will put $10 million in new funding toward enhancing its cruisesearch platform and marketing to more would-be cruisers.

Tech-enabled help for workers in financial crisis gets almost $2.9 million

Employers who want to help their workers in the midst of financial hardship can use Canary. The startup closed a funding round this month.

E.POP

FUNDING DETAILS

$1.6 million in seed funding

INVESTORS Undisclosed

HEADQUARTERS Financial District

co-founder Rachel Schneider said: “Everyone is susceptible to falling on hard times.”

The company said people have scanned its clients’ 1.8 million codes a total of 150 million times. Chief Executive Sharat Potharaju said the startup is profitable and tripled its revenue last year.

BEaCOnSTaC

FUNDING DETAILS

$25 million Series A

INVESTORS Telescope Partners of San Francisco and Accel of Palo Alto, California

HEADQUARTERS

Midtown

FOUNDER Sharat

Potharaju

Beaconstac allows businesses to create and track the use of quick-response codes, known as QR codes, the black-and-white patterned squares that customers can scan with their phone’s camera to access information. The company charges individuals $15 to $49 per month and businesses as much as $99 per month to create and customize QR codes. The codes allow customers to find more information about a business, such as a menu at

FOUNDERS PierreOlivier Lepage, Tyler Barber

“There is a pressing need for frictionless technology that meets consumers on- and offline, and QR codes are rising to the challenge,” Potharaju said.

The funding will go to hiring employees and further developing the platform, he said.

Beaconstac’s customers include FedEx, Marriott and Revlon.

Co-founders PierreOlivier Lepage and Tyler Barber sold a previous company, Rocket Travel, which let travelers increase their airline miles with hotel bookings, to Priceline for about $20 million.

Lepage said he later noticed that researching cruises was difficult because users had no way to compare prices, rooms, amenities and routes. Booking on mobile was also a pain point, he said. So he and Barber designed Cruisebound, adding bits of education to help first-time bookers.

Canary gives employers the chance to raise and send out tax-advantaged financial relief through its Grant Circle.

FOUNDERS Sunil

Rajan, Sunay Shah

Canary argues that reducing financial stress on a workforce is good business, reducing the need to replace people who have to step back due to a personal financial crisis.

Canary

FUNDING DETAILS

About $2.9 million

INVESTORS Capital

One Ventures of McLean, Virginia

HEADQUARTERS

Flatiron

FOUNDER Rachel Schneider

The company’s clients include Clear Channel Outdoor, Harvard Business Publishing and Visionworks. The average grant size was $848 per person, with two-thirds of the grantees earning less than $50,000 last year.

But the appeal of Canary is wider, CEO and

Seed round for paper-free receipts company Paper receipts are passé, argues E.pop, a newly financed company with headquarters in New York and offices in London and the Middle East. With a single platform open to both merchants and consumers, E.pop says it can help reduce the number of paper receipts printed while also improving security and creating a channel for marketing.

If consumers download the company’s app, the founders said in a news release, they can then have all new transactions documented securely without needing to share email information with each new retailer or trying to store a crumpled-up paper receipt for their records.

The firm said it will add staff to its current team of 10 and continue adding functionality and partners to its platform with the funds. ■

Notice of Formation of 24 DEGREES LLC

Arts. of Org. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 12/29/22.

Office location: NY County. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to c/o Bruce Blank, 867 Broadway, NY, NY 10003

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

Notice of Qualification of UNISON RENEWABLES US, LLC

Appl. for Auth. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 01/12/23. Office location: NY County. LLC formed in Delaware (DE) on 11/16/21. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to c/o Corporation Service Co., 80 State St., Albany, NY 12207-2543. DE addr. of LLC: 251 Little Falls Dr., Wilmington, DE 19808. Cert. of Form. filed with Secy. of State, John G. Townsend Bldg., 401 Federal St., Ste. 4, Dover, DE 19901.

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

Notice of Formation of Limited Liability Company (LLC). NAME: HUX FOUNDATION LLC -Articles of Organization filed with the Secretary of State of New York (SSNY) on 04/12/2022. Office location: NEW YORK County. SSNY shall mail a copy of process to: The LLC, 135 W 36TH ST FL 19, NEW YORK NY 10018.

Purpose: Any lawful purpose.

Notice of Qualification of FERRADO HOTELS, LLC

Appl. for Auth. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 01/04/23. Office location: NY County. LLC formed in Delaware (DE) on 03/17/06. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to the LLC, 20411 SW Birch St., Ste. 360, Newport Beach, CA 92660. DE addr. of LLC: 251 Little Falls Dr., Wilmington, DE 19808. Cert. of Form. filed with Secy. of State, 401 Federal St., Ste. 4, Dover, DE 19901.

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

Notice of Formation of TRELAWNY 201 LLC

Arts. of Org. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 12/23/22.

Office location: NY County. Princ. office of LLC: 184 Woodland Ave., River Edge, NJ 07661. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to Corporation Service Co., 80 State St., Albany, NY 12207.

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

Notice of formation of Limited Liability Company. Name: EC Lower Hudson 2 LLC (“LLC”). Articles of Organization filed with the Secretary of State of the State of New York (“SSNY”) on December 23, 2022. NY office location: New York County. The SSNY has been designated as agent of the LLC upon whom process against it may be served. The SSNY shall mail a copy of any process to EC Lower Hudson 2 LLC, c/o Exact Capital Group LLC, 150 East 52nd St., 14th Floor, New York, NY 10022.

Purpose/character of LLC is to engage in any lawful act or activity.

Notice of Qualification of COLBECK STRATEGIC LENDING III CARRY VEHICLE, LLC Appl. for Auth. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 01/04/23. Office location: NY County. LLC formed in Delaware (DE) on 11/09/22. Princ. office of LLC: 888 Seventh Ave., 29th Fl., NY, NY 10106. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served.

SSNY shall mail process to the LLC at the princ. office of the LLC. DE addr. of LLC: c/o Corporation Service Co., 251 Little Falls Dr., Wilmington, DE 19808. Cert. of Form. filed with Secy. of State of DE, Dept. of State, Div. of Corps., John G. Townsend Bldg., Dover, DE 19901.

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

Notice of Qualification of HAZA PROPS LLC

Appl. for Auth. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 01/05/23. Office location: NY County. LLC formed in Delaware (DE) on 08/12/22. Princ. office of LLC: 4415 Hwy. 6, Sugar Land, TX 77478. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to c/o Corporation Service Co., 80 State St., Albany, NY 12207-2543. DE addr. of LLC: 251 Little Falls Dr., Wilmington, DE 19808. Cert. of Form. filed with DE Secy. of State, Div. of Corps., John G. Townsend Bldg., 401 Federal St., Ste. 4, Dover, DE 19901. Purpose: Real lease property management.

1330 CONSULTING LLC.

Arts. of Org. filed with the SSNY on 01/04/23. Office: New York County. SSNY designated as agent of the LLC upon whom process against it may be served.

SSNY shall mail copy of process to the LLC, 77 7th Avenue, Apartment 4, New York, NY 10011. Purpose: Any lawful purpose.

Notice of Formation of Limited Liability Company (LLC). NAME: WOLF COVEN LLC -

Articles of Organization filed with the Secretary of State of New York (SSNY) on 12/15/2022. Office location: NEW YORK County. SSNY shall mail a copy of process

to: The LLC, 98 E BROADWAY STE 309 NEW YORK NY 10002.

Purpose: Any lawful purpose.

VP, Global Employee Relations Manager (HR) (Pacific Investment Management Company LLC (PIMCO) – New York, NY); Mult. pos. avail. Offering salary of $107,000$215,000 per year. Create scalable global Employee Relations strtgs & programs for bus to dvlp the next phase of Employee Relations function, includ’g idea generation on best practices & implementation. Review & evaluate Employee Relations-related processes to create workflow for Employee Relations collab w/ Human Resources Business Partners, Human Resources Centers of Excellence, & internal & external counsel. F/T. Apply w/ resume to trish.jusay@pimco.com. Ref. JobID: 6501102.

PUBLIC & LEGAL NOTICES

Notice of Formation of Limited Liability Company (LLC). NAME: SIX SIGMA CAPITAL LLC - Articles of Organization filed with the Secretary of State of New York (SSNY) on 05/27/2022. Office location: NEW YORK County. SSNY shall mail a copy of process to: The LLC, 135 W 36TH ST FL 19, NEW YORK NY 10018.

Purpose: Any lawful purpose.

Notice of Formation of Limited Liability Company (LLC). NAME: FISCAL CAPITAL LLC - Articles of Organization filed with the Secretary of State of New York (SSNY) on 6/02/2022. Office location: NEW YORK County. SSNY shall mail a copy of process to: The LLC, 135 W 36TH ST FL 19, NEW YORK NY 10018.

Purpose: Any lawful purpose.

Notice of Formation of 76 WEST NYC 1251 LLC

Arts. of Org. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 12/23/22. Office location: NY County. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to c/o Schulson Collective, 1525 Sansom St., 2nd Fl., Philadelphia, PA 19102. Purpose: Own and operate restaurant.

Notice of Qualification of VOTORANTIM LLC

Appl. for Auth. filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) on 12/22/22. Office location: NY County. LLC formed in Delaware (DE) on 03/18/22. Princ. office of LLC: 1330 Avenue of the Americas, 30th fl., NY, NY 10019. SSNY designated as agent of LLC upon whom process against it may be served. SSNY shall mail process to the LLC at the princ. office of the LLC. DE addr. of LLC: 251 Little Falls Dr., Wilmington, DE 19808. Cert. of Form. filed with Secy. of State, Div. of Corps., John G. Townsend Bldg., 401 Federal St., Ste. 4, Dover, DE 19901.

Purpose: Any lawful activity.

POSITIONS AVAILABLE

Analyst (Citadel Americas Services LLC – New York, NY); Multi. Pos. Avail. Offering salary of $200,000 - $250,000 per year. Analyze fin. statements & bus. strategies, build detailed fin. models & conduct comp. due diligence & channel checks. F/T. Reqs a Master’s degree (or foreign equiv) in Fin, Accounting, Econ, Stats, Tech, Fin Engin or a related quant field & 2 yrs of exp in the job offered or performing fundamental equity research & analysis. In lieu of a Master’s degree (or foreign equiv) in Fin, Accounting, Econ, Stats, Tech, Fin Engin or a related quant field & 2 years of exp in the job offered or performing fundamental equity research & analysis, will accept a Bachelor’s degree (or foreign equiv) in Fin, Accounting, Econ, Stats, Tech, Fin Engin or a related quantitative field & 5 years of exp in the job offered or performing fundamental equity research & analysis. Education, training, or exp must include: Conducting equity valuations, corporate financial statement analysis & linear regression calculations on behalf of a global financial services institution; Financial modeling using MS Excel & VBA to project industry growth & forward company earnings; Obtaining & analyzing data from Bloomberg or similar third party source; Working as a long/short hedge fund analyst; & Presenting investment recommendations to clients or portfolio managers.

Resumes: citadelrecruitment@citadel.com. JobID: 7028751.

Associate (Citadel Americas Services LLC – New York, NY); Mult pos avail. Offer’ng salary of $125,000 - $175,000 per year. Conduct differentiated, bottom-up fundamental fin rsrch & analysis of companies, bus models & industries. F/T. Reqs a Bach degree (or foreign equiv) in Fin, Econ, Engin, CS or a rel field. Edu, train, or exp must include the follow’g: perform’g sell-side equity rsrch, invstmnt banking, or invstmnt mngmnt; maintain’g detailed income statement models & relevant market data spreadsheets in MS Excel or sim; build’g, assess’g & manipulat’g models & communicat’g them to internal mngmnt & cross-functional stakeholders; analyz’g info in SEC docs, earn’gs transcripts & sell side rsrch reports; conduct’g rsrch projects that examine industry growth & competitive dynamics, includ’g regulatory & tax dvlpmnts; &, conduct’g meet’gs & phone calls to communicate with senior management of companies under coverage.

Resumes: citadelrecruitment@citadel.com

JobID: 7028754.

Data Engineer (Citadel Americas Services LLC – New York, NY); Mult pos avail. Offer’ng salary of $150,000 - $225,000 per year. Coordinate the dsgn, dvlpmnt & maintenance of complex data ingestion processes & data products that assist in the investment rsrch process. F/T. Reqs a Bach degree (or foreign equiv) in CS, Info Tech, Engin, Physics, Math, Stat, Econ or a rel field. Edu, train’g or exp must include the follow’g: sftwre engineer’g; perform’g data mining & transformation as well as Web data extraction; systems dsgn includ’g translat’g bus reqs into systems functionalities & build’g clear user interfaces; programm’g in Python or sim; data structures, algorithms or comp architecture; big data process’g & cloud tech includ’g Spark, Hadoop, AWS S3 or sim; &, database dvlpmnt in MS SQL Server, HP Vertica, Snowflake, MongoDB or sim.

Resumes: citadelrecruitment@citadel.com. JobID: 7028756.

Trader (Citadel Securities Americas Services LLC – New York, NY) Mult. pos. avail. Offer’ng salary of $140,000 to $225,000 per year. Monitor & analyze incoming market information, economic news & trad’g activity to manage portfolio risk, identify investment opportunities & make trad’g decisions. F/T. Reqs a Bachelor’s degree (or foreign equiv) in Fin, Econ, Math, Eng, CompSci, Phys, or a rel quant field. Edu, train’g, or exp must incl the follow’g: work’g in a data-driven quant trad’g envirnmnt; financial & statistical modell’g incl time-series analysis; work’g in financial mrkts with derivative pricing; programm’g & script’g languages includ’g Python, R, C++, or similar; stat tools incl R, Matlab, or similar; & analyz’g large data sets & other informational input to inform investment or trad’g decisions.

Resumes: citadelrecruitment@citadel.com. JobID: 7028787.

PUBLIC & LEGAL NOTICES

BRAVE TOTS LLC.Filed with SSNY on 09/28/22. Office: Bronx County. SSNY designated as agent for process & shall mail copy to: 2881 E 197th Street, 3rd Floor, Bronx, NY 10461.

Purpose: Any lawful.

Marketing Analytics & Insights (Pacific Investment Management Company (PIMCO)– New York, NY) Mult. pos. avail. Offering salary of $159,058 to $170,000 /year. Leverage CRM & Market’ng data to analyze client journeys that lead to imprvd client exp. & determine how Marketing activities can be added to imprv client exps. Using the same data, determine ways in which Marketing can increase the effectiveness of its efforts based on business goals. F/T. Apply w/ resume to Lupe.Rubalcaba@pimco.com. Ref. JobID: 6761100.

and spend $150 million to combat a growing opioid-overdose trend.

In his speech, delivered in his native borough at the Queens eatre in Flushing Meadows–Corona Park, Adams painted a rosy picture of the city’s Covid-19 pandemic recovery, compared to where it stood when he took o ce last year.

“One year later, our city is on the pathway to being safer. Our economy is recovering, and our stores, subways and hotels are full,” the mayor said. “Our children are back in school with their teachers and friends. Our theaters are thriving, our restaurants are booked, and New Yorkers are back to work.”

But amid fears of a looming recession, planned cuts to the city budget and the need for buy-in from the state and federal governments, it is unclear how quickly the proposals might come to fruition.

Garment District rezoning

Within weeks, Adams’ o ce said, the city will begin work on a plan to rezone part of Midtown to convert blocks zoned for manufacturing and o ce space into needed housing.

Although the mayor was light on details during his speech, City Council member Keith Powers said the initiative would focus on the Garment District, which has been held up as a prime target for such conversions given its high vacancy rates and central location. Nearly 18% of the area’s o ce space, spanning 4.6 million square feet, is vacant, according to an October report by the Garment District Alliance—a landlord-supported group that applauded the mayor’s plan ursday.

Critically, as Politico rst reported, the plan might have the backing of both council members who represent the area. Powers, whose East Side territory includes parts of the Garment District, said he supports the project, and West Side member Erik Bottcher pointed this month to a city planning study that recommended building new housing in the area.

Adams o ered no details about how many housing units could be created in the Garment District, what blocks would be a ected or a time frame for when the monthslong rezoning process would begin. It is unclear how much of a dent it would put in Adams’ moonshot goal of building 500,000 homes in the next 10 years.

Powers said the rezoning would start with a study to see “how much opportunity there is,” while City Hall said it would begin talking to community members soon about the proposal.

e alluring o ces-to-apartments concept has captured the city’s imagination as Midtown struggles to rebound from the pandemic. But the logistically di cult renovations will not happen overnight if they happen at all.

“People approached us left and right about converting this building,” a broker who arranged the sale of one Garment District commercial structure told Crain’s this month. “But the development costs would be high, and this is not a luxury neighborhood, so it will be hard

to charge enough for the apartments to cover those costs.”

Building housing would represent an about-face for the Garment District, which was rezoned for more commercial space in 2018.

Adams wants at least some of the new Midtown housing to be rent-restricted, according to City Hall.

Achieving that could hinge on whether state legislators renew the lapsed 421-a tax break this year. Adams and Gov. Kathy Hochul both have identi ed it as a priority.

roughout the speech, Adams heaped praise on Hochul, who was seated in the auditorium. She could play a key role in making the mayor’s policy goals a reality in Albany.

MWBEs, CUNY, apprenticeships, Navy Yard to grow jobs

Adams pledged ursday to signi cantly boost the amount of money awarded via city contracts to minority- and woman-owned business enterprises—aiming for $25 billion by the 2026 scal year and $60 billion by 2030.

About $1.2 billion in contracts was awarded to MWBEs in scal 2021, according to a city comptroller study. Business owners have complained about difculty securing city jobs despite a 2005 law intended to ensure just that.

Adams also revealed plans to expand the CUNY 2X Tech program, which by 2021 had achieved its goal of doubling the number of City University students graduating with a bachelor’s degree in a technology-related eld. It will grow to serve more campuses, including community colleges, with a focus on communities of color and rst-generation students, the mayor said.

A new accelerator program aims to set up apprenticeships for 30,000 New Yorkers by 2030, including youths and adults and focusing on nance, health care, marketing and information technology, according to City Hall. A citywide campaign will try to sign up potential participants, it said.

“ is is on-the-job experience with an opportunity for permanent employment in high-demand careers, and it will ensure employers can tap the talent they need,” Adams said.

Last year the city and the state together announced a $1.6 billion science park and research campus will

be built in Kips Bay within the next few years. In his address, the mayor built upon the life science focus. e city’s e ort to become a “global center of sustainable biotech” will start with opening an incubator at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, Adams said, “where biotech startups will transform the way we eat, build and protect our environment.”

Citywide composting push is back on the agenda

Fresh o a three-month pause to the popular composting program in Queens that angered the borough’s food scrappers, Adams on ursday announced a citywide expansion of free composting, supplanting the curbside program that has existed in a patchwork of neighborhoods since 2013.

Queens and Brooklyn will be served rst starting this year, a Sanitation Department spokesperson con rmed, followed in 2024 by Manhattan, the Bronx and Staten Island. Experts say composting will play a key role in helping New York

health in the next few weeks. e course of action, he said, will include new clubhouses for people with serious mental illness that will o er peer support, community access to services and employment, and educational opportunities.

Adams was noticeably less bullish than in the past on the city’s ability to get a handle on the in ux of asylum-seekers—now more than 42,000 people, by his count— who have entered the city in recent months, straining its shelter system and other services. Instead, he repeated a call for more state and federal aid.

“We will continue to do our part, but we need everyone else to do their part as well,” he said. “We need more help from Albany and Washington, D.C. e asylum-seeker crisis is a national issue, not a local one.”

$150 million for opioid harm reduction and treatment

Employment for nurses and people with disabilities

In the aftermath of the nurses strike at Monte ore and Mount Sinai, during which members of the New York State Nurses Association fought for better wages and safer sta -to-patient ratios, Adams has promised to focus on nurse education and retention.

e city, he said, will partner with CUNY on an education initiative to support 30,000 current and aspiring nurses during the next ve years with training, mentorship and clinical placements.

e mayor also pledged to focus on creating employment opportunities for New Yorkers with disabilities. He said that currently, only about 1 in 3 people with a disability in the city are employed. New York will launch a Center for Workforce and Workplace Accessibility and Inclusion, which will connect about 2,500 people with disabilities to jobs, he said.

A mandate for Lyft, Uber to go emissions-free by 2030 e city will require Lyft and Uber to transition their ride-hail eets to zero emissions by 2030, as part of a broader push to convert more vehicles to electric, Adams announced ursday.

“ at’s zero emissions for over 100,000 vehicles on our city streets. And it will be achieved with no new costs for individual drivers,” Adams said. “We’re pleased that both companies are embracing this shift, and we look forward to working with them to get it done.”

achieve its climate goals, and it could help cut down on the city’s rat population by removing organic waste from the garbage.

Homelessness, continuing migrant crisis in focus

Adams said that this year the city will work with state and federal partners to o er free health care to New Yorkers experiencing homelessness who have been living at Department of Homeless Services shelters for more than seven days. He added that the city will work to provide care where people need it, not just in emergency rooms and hospitals. e plan is part of a larger initiative to focus on “upstream solutions,” he added, instead of providing reactive care when people are already in trouble.

“ at means eliminating bureaucratic barriers and focusing on the structural challenges that so often force people into crisis,” he said.

Following the plan he announced in November to address mental health care, he said he will unveil a broader plan for mental

e city will use $150 million from the state’s opioid settlement fund to pay for opioid use harm reduction and treatment programs, Adams said. Treatment advocates are calling on the governor to invest in the programs, following recently published city data that revealed an unprecedented level of overdose deaths in 2021.

Combating fentanyl—a deadly additive that was found to be involved in about 80% of overdose deaths in the city—is a priority, Adams said.

“Do you remember what [heroin and crack cocaine] did to our city and country? at is what fentanyl is about to do right now,” he said.

“Fentanyl is destroying our cities across America. We have to ght back.”

An emphasis on women’s health care, home visits

Adams this month unveiled a plan to focus on women’s health care this year, and the city started making abortion medication available at some of its sexual health clinics.

During the State of the City address, the mayor said the city will continue to support new mothers with doula programs and home visits. He added that in the coming months he will announce a comprehensive women’s health agenda.

Lyft and Uber have pledged to reach zero emissions by 2030 by transitioning their respective eets to electric vehicles. Adams’ mandate would formalize those commitments for all high-volume ridehail eets in the city through a new Taxi and Limousine Commission rule it plans to propose in the next month or two, City Hall spokesman Charles Lutvak told Crain’s e public will have an opportunity to comment on the proposed rule during a Taxi and Limousine Commission hearing, Lutvak said.

TLC Commissioner David Do said in a statement that the agency will unveil more details on the initiative in the coming weeks.

e Adams administration has been encouraging companies and New York drivers to switch to electric vehicles, and to advocate for the charging infrastructure needed to support them. e mandate comes a day after the TLC approved rules to distribute 1,000 new ride-hail licenses speci cally for electric four-wheelers later this year, and as the city works to electrify its own eet of more than 30,000 vehicles.

In separate statements, both Lyft and Uber said they look forward to working with the city.

“New York’s commitment will accelerate an equitable citywide transition to electric,” Paul Augustine, Lyft’s director of sustainability, told Crain’s. “With smart, targeted investments in incentives and charging infrastructure, we’ll help tear down the barriers that prevent drivers from making the switch to electric.” ■

Jacqueline Neber, Eddie Small and Caroline Spivack contributed.

“THIS WILL ENSURE EMPLOYERS CAN TAP THE TALENT THEY NEED”

NYCMAYORSOFFICE/FLICKR

ADAMS DELIVERING his address at the Queens Theatre

DAVIS also chairs a health equity subcommittee for New Jersey.

MICHELLENE DAVIS

RESIDES West Orange, New Jersey, and Washington, D.C.

GREW UP Camden, New Jersey

EDUCATION Bachelor’s in English and political science, Seton Hall University; JD, Seton Hall University School of Law

NEW GROOVE Davis is exploring becoming a holistic chef and nutrition coach. She said she’s fascinated by raw veganism. “No one in my family wants to ever speak with me again until this phase passes,” she said.

EXTENDED FAMILY TIES Davis has nine godchildren ranging in age from 8 to 24.

LUCKY BREAK She served as the executive director and chief executive of the New Jersey Lottery from 2005 to 2007. She says her skills as an attorney—critical analysis and straightforward communication— were honed there.

WORLD TRAVELER During her interview with Crain’s, Davis spoke from Ghana, where she was attending a health retreat.

A focus on diversity in health care

Medical fellowship group exec looks out for underrepresented students

BY JACQUELINE NEBER

Since childhood, New Jersey native Michellene Davis has wanted to look out for marginalized and underrepresented groups. She grew up in Camden, the daughter of a bishop and a social worker. Her parents instilled in her the idea that people are “literally here on the planet in order to make it better for your fellow brother and sister.”

In her neighborhood, she watched as many residents worked two or three jobs yet still couldn’t make ends meet. As she got older, she sought to understand the systems that kept her neighbors from advancing, she said.

She started her career as a criminal defense attorney. For about ve years she was the assistant deputy public defender for Essex County in Newark.

“I got to do a great deal of representing those whose voices had not previously been at tables or who had been … left to make decisions with very few options,” she recalled.

As a litigator, Davis had a penchant for making what she refers to

as policy arguments in her motions before courts and at trial: She would argue that a lack of a universal health care system, for example, played into why her client was in a certain situation.

Positive change

Davis now brings that desire to understand and dismantle the reasons why some groups have more opportunities than others to her role as president and chief executive of National Medical Fellowships in Washington, D.C., a group that works to build more diversity in the health care industry through scholarships and programs for underrepresented medical students.

e organization has an o ce in Midtown, and she splits her time between New Jersey and D.C. But coming back to the area full time is very likely for her, Davis added.

“[ e New York metro area] has marginalized peoples,” she said. “Our scholars come from there. Our alumni practice and serve the communities there.”

She also chairs New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy’s health equity subcommittee on that state’s wealth disparity task force.

Davis has been the rst woman of color in some of her roles, she says, but she does not want to be the last. She feels diversity is important to a business, especially in the health care industry, because it can lead to positive change. Her advice to employers is simple: Do more.

“Do not wait to attempt to recruit a diversity candidate to begin bringing about equitable practices in your institution,” she said. “You should be trying to create an environment that cultivates inclusion.”

Leaders should analyze their policies and practices, make sure every employee is aware of promotion opportunities and look at materials to be sure they don’t include coded language.

“[If] I'm an accounting rm, do I do more than just put up a table at the National Association of Black Accountants conference?” she asked. “Am I an active participant in the statewide Hispanic Chamber of Commerce? Am I listening as much as I'm talking when I'm in those environments, so that others who know others will be saying, ‘ is is a company that you might want to look toward?’ ” ■

“DO NOT WAIT TO RECRUIT A DIVERSITY CANDIDATE TO BEGIN BRINGING ABOUT EQUITABLE PRACTICES IN YOUR INSTITUTION”

New York’s Position on Setting Ambitious Climate Goals

FEATURED SPEAKER: DOREEN M. HARRIS

President and CEO

New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA)

SPONSORED PANEL

Gain valuable insight on New York State’s Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act and how it leads the nation in setting ambitious climate goals and advancing the clean energy economy.