Mayor Bill de Blasio: Good morning, everybody. Well, what we've seen during this crisis is people innovating, people coming up with ingenious ideas to address the challenges we face. New Yorkers doing what New Yorkers do best, being creative, being resourceful. And so, we've seen some great ideas, and sometimes one great idea meets another great idea and they come together and create something even better, something really, really special. And that's what we're going to talk about to begin today, the idea of Open Streets meeting the idea of Open Restaurants, coming together to create something very special for this summer in New York City. So, we have two initiatives that have been tremendously successful. Open Restaurants, fantastic – the impact it’s had helping restaurants come back, bringing back their employees, giving people a livelihood, allowing New Yorkers to enjoy our amazing restaurants again. Open Streets, free space for kids to play, families to come out. Both have come together wonderfully.
Now, let's remember we made a decision that we could not go ahead with indoor dining, given everything that we're seeing around the country, all the problems, really troubling realities in other parts of the country, and a lot of it connected to bars and restaurants. So, we have to double down on Open Streets and Open Restaurants and bring them together to address the situation and give maximum options to our restaurants, to their employees. And also, we know the people want it. We've seen an incredible, incredible response from the people in New York City. So, starting this weekend, 22 Open Streets will also have Open Restaurants on them. And some of them will be existing Open Streets, some will be new, but it's going to be amazing because it’s going to key into some of the places in our city where we have extraordinary restaurants, concentrated in one place. People love to go there in any time, but now imagine being able to enjoy it all alfresco. Arthur Avenue in the Bronx, Fifth Avenue in Park Slope, Little Italy Mulberry Street here in Manhattan.
Think about what is possible, if we could make them centerpieces of outdoor dining – taking a tough situation, turning into something good. We're going to do it all over the five boroughs. We're going to work with Business Improvement Districts and local alliances and associations that have been key partners in the Open Streets. And this will be for Friday nights and weekends, the times when people most want to come out to the restaurants and we think it's going to be something very special. So, 2.6 miles of Open Streets will be part of this dining initiative. And this is some initial ones I mentioned, more are coming in places like Dyckman Street in northern Manhattan, others to come as we go along. So, we're very excited. It is going to open up a world of possibilities and get a lot of people back to their jobs. We want to help working people.
This is going to help a lot.
I'm knocking on wood, but we know that if all goes the way we're doing it now we're making steady progress on the health care front. We're making steady progress on the restart. We can bring it together and have a really strong fall, but a lot of it hinges on our schools, reopening our schools safely, successfully. We've said, I believe it, it's going to have to be the greatest school year in the history of New York City public schools. And everyone shares that goal. And you could see the emotion earlier this week when we had the citywide graduation ceremony, how much people are feeling this moment in history, how much we have to support our kids.
We are doing the work right now to make September successful, to make the new school year successful. I want to thank the unions who represent the people who do the work that includes, of course, UFT, CSA, DC 37, all the unions that represent the people working in our school system. They have been at the table every day, literally, in the planning of the new school year. And it's been a very cooperative approach. On top of that, we've asked for the voices of parents to guide us. So, this is astounding. The DOE did a survey of parents and they got 400,000 responses – that is not a small sample size – 400,000 people answered the survey. And here's the most important fact, 75 percent of our New York City public school parents want to send their kids back to school in September. They feel ready now. They know that's what they want to do.
So, we're full steam ahead for September – the goal, of course, to have the maximum number of kids in our schools as we begin schools. And we know that there's going to be a lot of challenges. We know there's just sheer logistical challenges with schools that were overcrowded before the coronavirus and now have to practice social distancing. But we're going to make it work to the maximum in each school and we're going to work with the scheduling realities to find a way. And we're going to hope and pray in the meantime that the scientific community makes progress on this disease because that's what will really opened up the ability to get back 100 percent. But in the meantime, a lot of work going on. Chancellor Carranza, meeting later today with principals to hone their plans specifically on how much each school will be able to bring back its kids. What's the number each school can hit in terms of bringing back kids safely with distancing. And, of course, the goal and the focus will always be health and safety first for our kids, for our families, for all the people that work in our schools.
Now we are going to, of course – as part of the school reopening, what will you see? You'll see daily cleanings – deep cleanings after each day to make sure the schools, top to bottom, are safe. You're going to see constant use of face coverings. They'll be provided for free for anyone who needs them – kids, adults alike. Everyone will be expected to wear face coverings. You'll see social distancing. That six-foot rule will be in effect. You'll see a lot of features to make it easy for kids and adults in the school building to stay safe, hand washing stations, hand sanitizer all over the building. These are the kinds of things that we need to do to give people confidence, make sure they're safe, and we'll be doing that and preparing for that in the months ahead and continuing to stay close to the folks who do the work and parents as we prepare these plants.
Okay. Now I'm going to switch gears quickly and go to another topic that brings out a lot of passion in New Yorkers. Anybody who experiences this has a strong opinion about it. Yes, I'm talking about Alternate Side Parking. So, this week was the first week of a brand new approach in which we are only going to require folks, when alternate side parking is in effect, we're only going to require you to move your car once a week. No more twice a week, which has been the case in some neighborhoods. I think that's just unfair to everyone. It's going to be once a week from now on. Biggest change to Alternate Side Parking in the last two decades. This week has been a cleanup week. We've overall seen the city has stayed pretty clean. A couple of times we've had to do a cleanup. We're doing it this week. And then we will suspend the Alternate Side again the following week. So, from Sunday, July 5th through Sunday, July 12th, Alternate Side Parking will be suspended. And then we'll decide in the meantime if we need to pick it up again and when we need to pick it up again.
Now, I want to talk about one of the really painful stories within the very overall painful story of the coronavirus crisis in the city. When the coronavirus started to be on the minds of New Yorkers, one community already started to feel the pain of this crisis before it manifested for so many of the others, so many of the rest of us. We saw discrimination and bias against the Asian American community very, very early on. It was unfair. It was horrible. It was destructive. It was painful for members of the Asian American community. And we had to fight it then and we have to fight it now. We also know that a lot of the stores, the restaurants, the parts of the community that people depend on, they started to suffer. People weren't going to those stores and restaurants. They were suffering from discrimination early on in an economic way as well.
Let me just conclude and say, I do want to take a brief moment to pay tribute to two great public servants who will be leaving the administration after long and distinguished stints. Freddi Goldstein, my press secretary after four years on our team and four great years and Wiley Norvell after nine years. So that takes him back to the time I was public advocate. He has been a mainstay of this team and both of them have contributed really, really greatly, not just to this team and the work we do here every day when we're talking to the press and talking to the people, but to helping run New York City in one of its toughest moments in our entire history. So to Freddi and Wiley, thank you on behalf of all of the people of New York City, and it is a reminder and I hope all of you just take a moment to appreciate our public servants because the folks here at City Hall from March 1st to today, the vast majority of them have not even thought about taking a day off. It has been nonstop and very, very long days, people around here 15-hour day is not new to them, and throughout the coronavirus crisis, it's been typical. Our public servants, our healthcare heroes, our first responders and so many more have kept the city running no matter what's been thrown at them. So a lot of times in the public discourse, you know, it's a cheap shot to put down people who work for the government and public servants. But I think our public servants have really, really stepped up in this crisis and they deserve our thanks more than ever. So please take a moment today to be thankful for all who do so much for us. Thank you, everyone.
