Transcript: Mayor Mamdani To Deliver Free Childcare To More Than 10,000 Low-Income Children
Zohran Mamdani on NYC Mayor's Office transcripts.
Passages
Good morning, everyone. It is such a pleasure to be here today alongside so many parents, so many providers, so many advocates who, as we've just heard, have long called for change. Those whose tireless work to make childcare free for all has brought us together today. And it is a privilege as well to do so at BronxWorks, an organization that not only runs high-quality childcare centers, but is a key partner to our city in the work to help families here in the Bronx apply for and receive childcare vouchers. I want to acknowledge we have a number of leaders both inside and outside of our administration who are here with me today. We have our ACS commissioner, Rebecca Jones Gaston. We have our deputy chancellor for Early Education, Erica Phillips. Our ACS deputy commissioner, Elizabeth Wolkomir. We have the person that you call all the time and I call all the time, the mayor's office of childcare executive director, Emmy Liss. We have a person that when you say the Bronx three times, she appears, Bronx Borough President Vanessa Gibson. We have the chair of the Children and Youth Committee in City Council, Council Member Althea Stevens. Young people, young people, young people always. We have the chair of the Early Childhood Education Committee of the City Council, Council Member Jennifer Gutiérrez, one of the foremost champions for childcare at the City Council. We have my former roommate and State Sen. Jabari Brisport, chair of the Committee on Children and Families. We have someone who has fought long and hard for this day, Council Member Lincoln Restler, who is here with us. Sen. Luis Sepúlveda, who's here with us; Assembly Member Landon Dais, who is here with us — both of whom [are] welcoming us to their districts. We have Assemblywoman now and soon to be Sen. Jessica González-Rojas. Councilwoman Julie Won. We also have Rabbi Moishe Indig, who is here with us. We have UJO Associate Director David Katz, who is here with us. Now I want to name a few other names: Cardi B, Richard Avedon, Al Pacino. The woman who inspired countless New Yorkers to pursue their dreams, to build an empire, to make music. A man who reshaped what a photograph could be and how far it could reach. And the actor who warned us in “Heat,” “Brother, you are going down.” Three different visionaries, but one common thread: Three children of the Bronx. They each became great figures because they possessed that drive, that hunger, that ambition that lives deep in the heart of the city that we are proud to call our home. And each of them also spent time in this borough's public parks, in this borough's public schools. The foundation upon which they built that excellence was also laid in part by public goods and by public services. And yet we know that those services were not inevitable. They had to be fought for. They had to be won. The state's childcare assistance program, an initiative that provides parents vouchers to help them afford childcare, is an example of one of those services. For nearly three decades, the voucher program has helped give children in the Bronx and across our city a strong start in life, regardless of how much money their parents have in their pocket. But we can only serve the number of children that the funding allows. And in May of 2025, the number of children in need of vouchers exceeded the program's capacity. New families were placed on a waitlist — a waitlist that kept on growing. Today, there are more than 29,000 children on that waitlist, with more being added by the day. Over the last few months, I have had the privilege of speaking with parents and childcare providers who have shared with me how much of a lifeline that program is. How painful it is for them or for their clients to be stuck on that waitlist with no end in sight. And today, I am so proud to announce that there is light at the end of the voucher tunnel. For the first time in 15 months, New York City is taking children off the voucher waitlist, and this is only the beginning. We will continue to do so on a rolling basis. And I am deeply grateful for the leadership and support of Gov. Kathy Hochul, whose $1.2 billion investment in our city's historic universal childcare program included $475 million to stabilize and expand the voucher program. And I also just want to take a moment to commend City Council Member Lincoln Restler. Because I swear every time I see him, he has to say the word “voucher,” “waitlists,” “parents.” And it is that kind of relentless commitment, relentless drive that ensures that this kind of a topic is always at the heart of the conversation that's taking place in the halls of power. So, thank you to Lincoln and thank you to every other relentless advocate for this. Truly. And that's the kind of work that is so critical in ensuring that today is possible. Because thanks to that work, thanks to every single person that is here, we are now able to deliver affordable childcare to thousands upon thousands of additional families who need it most. And I have to be honest, when I say “affordable,” I might be misspeaking because what I mean to say is 100 percent free. This past August, we announced a $5.2 million investment to cover the fees that families would otherwise have to pay out of pocket. That means that every family currently in the program and every family coming off the waitlist will not have to worry about whether or not they can afford the copays traditional to the voucher program. And for families trying to find childcare providers that participate in the voucher program, our city's first ever childcare provider map at nyc.gov/childcare, one that we launched together a few months ago, has launched a new feature: a filter that will allow families to search for providers that accept vouchers, like many of the high-quality home-based providers who are with us here today. Now expanding our voucher program is just our latest effort to make childcare a truly universal public good here in our city. And I know that there are cynics out there who reject our efforts to deem universal childcare a public good; those who might label this kind of an initiative as idealistic or radical or naive. And yet we also know that that same cynicism was once applied to public schools. It was once applied to public parks, to subways, to libraries, to sewers, to trash collection, even to streetlamps. The marker of progress, my friends, is expanding both what is promised and to whom it is promised. Bringing New York City closer to a future where every New Yorker can access universal childcare is about more than just lifting a financial burden from New Yorkers' shoulders. It's about building a city where the people know they can demand more from their government and one where their government delivers more in kind. Thirty years from now, when our city is dancing to a beat we cannot imagine or taking in art more creative than anything we've ever seen, it will be in no small part because the children of this city had the support and the public goods they needed to succeed. The parks in which they could play, the public transit they could ride to visit new worlds, and the universal childcare they could rely upon to learn, to grow, to become themselves. And while we may have some more gray hair then, we will know that progress was made, that greatness was made possible because of a program like this one. Because government provided its people with the foundation to succeed. And because, and I say this specifically to all of the providers and the advocates, because you were willing to believe once again that something different could happen. Because I know that every time you sat down with me, you sat down with Emmy, you sat down with Nick, you sat down with Yvonne, you sat down saying the same things you've told people in power for years; the same things that you have grown tired in having to testify about. And yet you believed that this time something could be different. And if you didn't make that choice, we couldn't make this one. So, thank you for continuing to believe, thank you for continuing to fight. Thank you for making today possible. And with that being said, I'm going to say the Bronx, the Bronx, the Bronx. And here she is, the Bronx borough president, Vanessa Gibson.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceAnd now we are going to go from the Bronx to Brooklyn. Please join me in welcoming City Council Member Jennifer Gutiérrez.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceThank you, Council Member. You have been a real partner in this work. And I think what was so exciting is that we know this work is one that has to be done every single day. It's not just in announcements; it's not in the first day of school; it's every day. And you've been a partner for every day of that, truly. And now, you know, when you go to Brooklyn, you gotta come back to the Bronx. And if we're gonna talk about young people, there's only one person to talk about it. So please join me in welcoming City Council Member Althea Stevens.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceAnd now we are going to bring up the one and only State Sen. Jabari Brisport. New York State Sen. Jabari Brisport: Good morning, BronxWorks. I'm New York State Sen. Jabari Brisport, chair of the Children and Families Committee in the New York State Senate. I am a Brooklyn boy through and through, but today the Bronx is leading the way, baby. Now, I remember when this waitlist issue started and was triggered. You know, about two years ago, in the 2024 state budget, we increased the eligibility and made more parents eligible for CCAP. And it was good. And we were proud. We increased the amount of money per child in the CCAP. And it was good. And we're proud. But one thing we could not win in that budget was enough funding to meet the increased demand. And a year later, by spring of 2025, we had seen wait lists popping up across the state. Hundreds of youth here, hundreds of youth there, and in New York City, the epicenter, thousands of children, thousands of families being told they were eligible for this program, a voucher for their child, but that there was no space or no money for the thing that had been promised to them. By this year, it had reached tens of thousands. And you heard the mayor: 29,000 people on the waitlist. And so many people have been fighting for this. It has taken parents rising up and demanding the funding for this program. It has taken providers fighting for the program. It has taken advocacy groups. I want to shout out to the Empire State Campaign for Childcare. I want to shout out AQE, the Alliance for Quality Education; ECE, Early Childhood Educators on the Move. It has taken community leaders. It has taken elected officials. And we got lucky this year; in 2026, we also got a mayor who believes in the power of early childhood education. And so now, for 10,000 children, the parents of 10,000 children, we can tell them: you don't have to wait any longer. Childcare is coming to you. And I am confident as we all stand, arm in arm, hand in hand, fighting together for the rest of the funding, we are getting the rest of those youth off that childcare waiting list. And we are guaranteeing free childcare to every family in New York City and the state of New York. Thank you so much. You know, I want to just give Jabari his flowers for a moment. I used to be an assembly member. I would serve in Albany, and Jabari was my roommate. No matter what time of day it was, the day would not be over unless he was talking to someone somewhere about universal childcare. And years and years of pushing this forward — And what I said earlier, it really does extend to Jabari, which is that all of you having fought for so long is what allows us to make a choice. Without that work, we don't have a choice to even make. So, thank you to all of you, to Jabari, to everyone. And if we're going to speak about relentless advocacy, you know I have to go back down to Brooklyn and bring up City Council Member Lincoln Restler.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceWe got to come back to the Bronx. Sen. Luis Sepúlveda.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceSenator, all I can say in response to that is, �Claro que sí! And now, to close us out, the Assembly member himself was welcoming us here to this district. Assembly Member Landon Dais.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceAbsolutely. So, we received our state budget allocation this summer and then needed to review the entirety of that allocation. In addition, we wanted to do a review of uptake rates for families receiving these vouchers, as well as attrition for families that are currently receiving care. And those things together, it is all motivated by a desire that once we offer a voucher to a family, that we are confident in our ability to continue to give them that care. We do not want to celebrate something on Monday and then announce on Friday, actually, there's been an issue that they should need to be aware of. And so, all of this is taking the time to make sure we're doing things right, doing it with a coalition that spans from city to state to federal elected officials and advocates at every level. It allows us to get to this point where now 10,000 children will be taken off this wait list.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceYou know, one thing I want to shout out is when we had those conversations with childcare providers, with advocates, what they laid out is how heartbreaking it also is for them to look at families that they know need those kinds of services but are prevented from utilizing them because of that voucher. The absence of that, that voucher, affects those families. It also affects those childcare providers. So, Emmy, if you want to just add something.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceI think it is incumbent upon all of us to play a role in responding to what is one of the most important questions of our time, which is artificial intelligence, the response to it, the regulation of it. And I think that it is right that City Council is having a hearing on this. I look forward to reviewing the proposals that they put forward. I also think it's critical that we in City government continue to lead as well. Recently, we put forward a nation-leading moratorium on generative AI for students in the ages of 2-K through eighth grade, with limited use for students in high school. We've also seen our DCWP; we've led with the creation of restrictions on the use of AI to advertise apartment listings. A lot of New Yorkers are unsure when they open up a listing, whether it's real or whether it has been generated by artificial intelligence. And we're also in the process of developing a new rule that mandates that after a certain amount of interaction with a chatbot, that you have to be connected with an actual human individual that can respond to your question, so you're not stuck in the kind of doom loop that so many New Yorkers are right now.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceYes, so I think a few things first. I'll just start with your last question, then I'll go into AI. You know, the focus for us is how do we make it as easy as possible for New Yorkers to both understand what civil service jobs are available and how they can apply for them. And so, this builds on the work that we did with opening up 2 Lafayette as a walk-in center for anyone who's interested in applying to a public sector job. They can come in from Monday through Thursday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. And we want to demystify this process. We also want to make New York City lead by example when it comes to being an employer in our city. And these are some of the steps that are required to do so. Kelly, to your other questions about artificial intelligence. You know, I don't use much AI in my day-to-day life. However, like most New Yorkers, whenever I use any kind of a popular search engine, AI has now become imbued in part of the results that are being generated. So, if you're using Google, if you using DuckDuckGo, it seems to be built into the system itself. And when it comes to how I think of artificial intelligence, you have some of the leaders of the creation of this technology saying that there's a 10 percent chance that humanity could come to an end as a result of this. I think when that kind of language is par for the course, when companies are asserting that each of them has faced something similar to the Hugging Face incident. It does demand a level of response that goes beyond just the political topic of the day. It does raise itself to understanding artificial intelligence as one of the most consequential technological shifts in the last few generations of the world.
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceSo, I'm looking forward to reviewing all the legislation that's been put forward by the Council. And once we do so, I'll be sure to share. And Madina, could you say the first part of your question again?
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the sourceI think that there has to be regulation of this technology at every single level. And I think we're talking about a technology that affects our nation as a whole. This is not a New York City-specific question. And therefore, I think the place where we need the most urgent response to this is at the national level. And I do think that the consistent framing of AI in the context of being in an arms race with China loses sight of the fact that this will have an impact on New Yorkers at every level of their lives as well as Americans, frankly, and it already is because we're seeing what impact it's starting to have on the job market, as well [as] what impact it is starting to have on how people relate to the world around them, and that to me is of immense importance and I'm excited to see what kind of legislation comes out of it. Thank you. ###
Zohran MamdaniCheck at the source
Every passage above is taken from this recording: NYC Mayor's Office transcripts, Transcript: Mayor Mamdani To Deliver Free Childcare To More Than 10,000 Low-Income Children.