This article is adapted from our June 10 edition of RANKED CHOICES, THE CITY’s weekly election newsletter. Click here to sign up.

Dear New Yorkers,

It’s crunch time! Early voting starts Saturday, June 14, and runs through Sunday, June 22. Primary day is June 24.

Ready? A quick checklist:

• Double-check your registration here. (: To vote in a primary, you have to be ed with a party.)
• Find your early voting site, Primary Day voting site and sample ballot here (after you enter your address).
• Refresh your memory on how ranked choice voting works and ranking strategy. TL;DR — Do not rank anyone you hate, but do fill in as many spots on your ballot as you can with candidates you can stand.
• Take our Meet Your Mayor quiz to find out which mayoral candidates match best with you on local issues.

There is a LOT of stuff happening in the days leading up to voting, both the known (debates) and the unknown (more surprise endorsements, perhaps?).

The second comptroller debate, co-moderated by my colleague Alyssa Katz alongside WNYC’s Brian Lehrer and NY1’s Errol Louis, is tonight, and you can watch here. (What’s a comptroller? Don’t worry, we’ve got you.)

The final mayoral debate airs Thursday night, which I’ll be co-moderating with Brian and Errol and you can watch here. It comes a week after the first debate, where nine candidates fought for air time — and against each other — in a chaotic match-up. (Re-read our coverage of the night here.) 

The next mayoral debate has fewer candidates — Michael Blake and Jessica Ramos didn’t qualify — and there will be an audience inside the auditorium at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

I can exclusively reveal in this newsletter that there have been many Zoom meetings and discussions on what questions to ask, how quickly we can ask them, how substantive they can be in the time allotted and how a lightning-round question can be both fun and revealing. But for everything else, you’ll have to tune in on Thursday. 

We’ve written a ton of voter guides this campaign season to help you make an informed decision at the ballot box. Here’s more to help you out:

1. Our guides on elections for borough president, district attorney, judicial candidates and 13 City Council races to watch. 
2. Track who’s spending big money on your favorite (or least favorite) candidates. 
3. You can also listen to our interviews on FAQ NYC with almost all of the Democratic primary candidates, if you have a few hours. 

As always, if you have questions about voting or the election, reply to this email or send us a note at [email protected]. Happy voting, NYC!

— Katie Honan and THE CITY’s election team

What We’re Reading … 6y404y

• Two new internal polls from the Cuomo and Mamdani camps show a tightening race between the two candidates.
• The state’s power authority spent more than $100 million for lights Cuomo, as governor, wanted on New York City’s bridges. Now they’re up for auction.
• What climate-related challenges await the next mayor? We took a look.
• NYCHA tenants leaders say they didn’t endorse Cuomo despite what his campaign says. And his PAC is raising big money from businesses that have interest in front of the city.  
• Progressives have yanked from Ramos after she backed Cuomo.
• DC 37 has launched a PAC for Adrienne Adams. 
• Our friends at Chalkbeat New York asked the mayoral candidates where they stand on key education issues like school safety, the curriculum overhaul, class sizes and more. Find out which candidate lines up with your own views, and sign up for Chalkbeat’s free local newsletter to keep up with important news on NYC schools.

What’s Ahead …  2e3h6t

Days until the June primary: 14

June 10 (TONIGHT): Comptroller primary debate, 7 p.m.

June 12: Final Democratic mayoral debate, 7 p.m.

June 13: Next campaign finance deadline, which means we’ll get a new look at which candidates have the most cash headed into the final campaign days.

June 14: Early voting begins. This is also your last day to to vote for the primary and the last day the Board of Elections can receive your absentee ballot application online.

Your Election Questions, Answered d3j4e

❓Reader Margaret M. asked: What’s the difference between an absentee ballot and an early, mail-in ballot?

Answer: On a practical level, there is not a lot of difference between these two options. Both must be requested by the same date (June 14 if online and June 23 if in person), postmarked by the same date (June 24) and each has a pre-paid envelope for their return. And importantly, if you vote using either mail-in method, you are not allowed to vote in-person on a voting machine.

For all the rules and to request a mail-in ballot, here is all the information from the city Board of Elections.

Because of a recent state law change, any voter can request an early mail-in ballot for any reason. For an absentee ballot, there are specific requirements, like being out of the country at the time of the election. For absentee ballots, you also have the option to automatically request one for all future elections if you are permanently ill or disabled.

Have a question for our election team? Reply to this email or send your questions to [email protected].

THE CAMPAIGN KICKER: Will mayoral candidate Michael Blake be on the debate stage on Thursday? We’ll see — the former Assemblymember is suing the Campaign Finance Board to secure a spot on stage.

Our nonprofit newsroom relies on donations from readers to sustain our local reporting and keep it free for all New Yorkers. Donate to THE CITY today.

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Thousands of New Yorkers flooded the streets of Lower Manhattan Tuesday evening protesting the Trump istration’s immigration crackdown, which in New York City has been playing out inside immigration courthouses for three weeks. 

The throng gathered in Foley Square denouncing raids that have taken place in the city and across the country. Many voiced for protesters in Los Angeles, where large demonstrations have been ongoing since Friday, and where President Donald Trump ordered the National Guard and the Marines to quell the demonstrations. 

“To the liberals who are too busy criticizing the protesters in Los Angeles — take that energy and use it on the state violence that is being used,” activist Linda Sarsour shouted to the crowd. “The root of our problem is not protesters. The root of our problem is masked men kidnapping men and women and students.” 

Sarsour was referring to weeks of arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents, who are often seen across the country covering their faces with masks. In New York City, ICE has spent the past three weeks staking out immigration courthouses, arresting people attending regular court hearings — often in their attempt to apply for asylum — in the hallways, lobbies and even bathrooms of the court buildings. 

Hundreds of protesters left Foley Square to march across lower Manhattan and then north on Church Street on Tuesday. Among them was said 23-year-old Marilin, whose family is from Ecuador and whose father is undocumented. 

“I’m speaking up for my family, they’re immigrants in this country but they’re not criminals,” she said, choosing not to share her full name for fear of repercussions for her relatives. The immigration raids and courthouse arrests have weighed heavily on the family in recent weeks, she said.

“He’s like, ‘If they take me, they take me,’ but at the same time, I know he’s scared because he’s going to leave behind three kids,” she said of her dad.

As several hundred marchers continued north, a splinter group returned to the corner of Duane and Broadway outside 26 Federal Plaza, the government building that contains several floors of immigration courts as well as a floor where people taken into custody at hearings have been detained.

It has been the epicenter of ICE activity of the past few weeks, and the street outside has been a locus for demonstrations in recent days.  Tuesday’s protest was the largest yet, with several hundred people gathering on either side of Duane Street, which is closed off to all but federal vehicles.

The demonstrators were met with dozens of NYPD officers from the Strategic Response Group on either side of the roadway. As demonstrators tried to block the entrance to the street, NYPD officers forced their way into the crowd and pushed protesters onto adjacent sidewalks, making several aggressive arrests.

A standoff with demonstrators went on for more than three hours, as NYPD occasionally grabbed and arrested people who stepped off the sidewalk, and sometimes rushed onto the sidewalk to make arrests, pulling people into the street and shoving them onto the roadway. They appeared to make several dozen arrests over the course of the evening. An NYPD spokesperson didn’t immediately respond to a request for information on an arrest total or what charges demonstrators may face. 

“I’m mad, furious,” said one protester earlier in the evening, a 20-year-old who had traveled from Staten Island to the protest and declined to give his name out of concern for his parents’ immigration status. 

“My parents and my family, they come from a lot of hard work and I feel like a lot of their hard work over these past two, three decades that they’ve been here is going to waste because some people can’t put their pride aside and understand that we’re the forefront of this country.”

Skirmishes went on until late in the night, punctuated by chaotic arrests, chanting and at one point even a bagpiper. 

On Monday, Mayor Eric Adams, who has directed his istration to not publicly criticize Trump, seemed to side with the president in blaming the protesters, saying that “the escalation of protests in Los Angeles over the last couple of days is unacceptable and will not be tolerated in our city.”

Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch, who stood with the mayor, said the NYPD “will protect every person’s right to protest peacefully” but warned they would act swiftly to quell any disruptions.

“We have no tolerance for violence, none. We have no tolerance for property damage. We have no tolerance for people blocking entrances to buildings, or blocking driveways, or blocking cars from moving,” she said. “And any attacks against law enforcement will be met with a swift and decisive response from the NYPD.”

The commissioner and mayor were flanked by NYPD Chief of Department John Chell and Deputy Mayor of Public Safety Kaz Daughtry, who days earlier had played a round of golf with Trump — on their private time, they said — at his New Jersey course. Neither the commissioner nor the mayor took any questions. (The New York Post reported Tuesday that Trump had promised Chell and Daughtry that he wouldn’t send the military into New York so long as the NYPD kept demonstrators “in line.”)

Protesters have made several attempts in recent weeks to block vans used to transport detainees from entering and exiting immigration courthouse buildings. In late May, around two dozen people were arrested by the NYPD after they tried to stop a van from leaving another immigration court, on Varick Street. This weekend, federal agents in tactical gear were unable to move protesters to allow a van to until they called in dozens more NYPD officers for backup, who quickly pushed demonstrators aside making several arrests, and used pepper spray on some.

On Tuesday, the crowd had grown substantially from recent days, but with dozens of NYPD officers stationed all around the building, vehicles entering and exiting the plaza faced no major disruption. 

One protester who ed the crowd named Giselle, 24, who declined to give her last name because of her first family’s immigration status, said her uncle, who is also undocumented from Ecuador, had decided that after 35 years of not leaving the U.S., he would now self-deport. 

“The very first thing he’s going to do is he’s going to travel for the first time in his entire adult life,” she said. “He’s going to travel, he’s going to take his hard-earned money, and he’s going to live off it in his retirement in Ecuador. So I’m embracing that, because what else can you do?”

“It’s a fear I have to live with every day,” said one protester, 20, whose parents are Mexican and undocumented. “It’s always in the back of my mind, what I can do if my parents are ever arrested? And so I feel that it’s my right as a citizen, as a woman, as a person, to come and show up.”

Our nonprofit newsroom relies on donations from readers to sustain our local reporting and keep it free for all New Yorkers. Donate to THE CITY today.

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The two candidates running for city Comptroller didn’t go head-to-head as much as they showed how much they overlap during Tuesday’s final televised debate hosted by THE CITY, NY1, WNYC and other partners.

Vying for the role of the city’s fiscal watchdog are Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine and City Councilmember Justin Brannan (D-Brooklyn).

They both agreed that the city funnels too many dollars to outside consultants instead of to public school classrooms, said pension funds should not be invested in cryptocurrency, and wanted to use the office to create more affordability to everyday New Yorkers.

“The city is spiraling out of reach for working families, and our budget is the sharpest tool we have to bring down the cost of living for you and your family,” said Brannan, who represents Brooklyn’s Bay Ridge and Coney Island and chairs the Council’s finance committee.

“I’ll use the powers of the office to fight and win on behalf of New York,” said Levine, who was previously a City Council member representing Manhattan’s Upper West Side and West Harlem.

As the city’s chief financial officer, the comptroller oversees the city’s $112 billion budget. The office is up for grabs because current Comptroller Brad Lander is running for mayor and not seeking reelection.

The duties of the comptroller — along with a staff of more than 700 people — include reviewing most city contracts, auditing agency spending, issuing bonds and managing the city’s five pension funds, which total $280 billion. The comptroller often acts as a check on the mayor.

Each candidate agreed that “bold” solutions were needed to move the needle for families in New York City and insisted they could use pension funds to increase investments in green energy and housing development without endangering the city’s ability to achieve its goal of a 7% return for retirees. To that end, Levine proposed investing pension funds to help finance 70,000 affordable homes, while Brannan proposed investing half a billion dollars over eight years to launch a universal child care system. (The comptroller must win approval of the board of trustees of each fund for any investment changes.)

Though both Levine and Brannan have expressed the importance of fighting President Donald Trump and defending the city amid threats to slash its federal funds, they took different approaches on how to do that.

In the past, Levine proposed adding $1 billion to the city’s $8 billion reserve funds to protect against potential federal cuts, which he reiterated during the debate without naming a number. Mayor Eric Adams has resisted adding to the reserves despite calls from Lander and fiscal groups, including the Citizens Budget Commission and the Independent Budget Office.

On the other hand, Brannan proposed investing in the city’s most vulnerable communities that would be most affected by cuts.

“We can’t run a city on reserves,” Brannan said. “If you want to add to the reserves, that means you have to cut somewhere.”

Levine also said he wanted to organize “blue city and blue state” pension funds around the country to “use our collective power to say to CEOs, ‘You can’t give in to the Trump agenda, you can’t abandon commitments to diversity, or climate or worker safety,’” he said.

Weighing in on advocacy that pushed public pension funds to divest from Israel amid its war in Gaza, Levine said he would buying Israeli bonds for the pension fund. Brannan didn’t specifically respond to that idea, but he said that he opposed divesting from companies that benefit from Israeli policies. When asked to clarify if the two disagreed about purchasing Israeli bonds, Brannan said, “No, we don’t. He just wants to disagree.”

There were a few brief moments of sparring during the debate.

While Brannan touted his role in helping to City of Yes for Housing Opportunity — an overhaul of citywide rezoning rules to help spark more housing development — Levine hit back that Brannan also secured carveouts for his district.

Brannan said those exemptions only applied to certain parts of Bay Ridge that experienced flash flooding. (Other areas of the city also experience flash floods, and a flood map is forthcoming that will serve to restrict where basement apartments can be built.)

In response to many reader and viewer questions about the city’s plan to switch its retirees’ healthcare plan to Medicare Advantage — which some retirees have said offers worse coverage at higher costs — in order to save hundreds of millions of dollars, the two candidates also diverged in their approaches. 

“Medicare Advantage is a scam,” Brannan said. “Retirees, whatever health care plan you signed up for on the first day you started working — that is the retirement plan that you should retire with the city of New York should not be balancing its budget on the backs of retirees.”

Levine took a more measured stance, saying he’d make a decision based on “the details of the plan in consultation with retirees, with current workers, with labor leaders,” but noted that retirees should have “plans for zero s” and “outstanding healthcare.”

The two men traded barbs when Brannan noted his for a bill that would preserve retirees’ health care plans, and invited his opponent to do the same.

Levine shot back that Brannan only became a sponsor of the bill “a matter of days ago, after resisting for years and years and years. This is an eleventh-hour conversion for purely political reasons.”

“Why did you wait three years?” Levine asked Brannan.

“Why didn’t you sign on to the bill?” Brannan countered.

Levine has raised $1.25 million and has received $3.5 million in public matching funds, according to the New York City Campaign Finance Board. Brannan trails with $834,400 raised and has received matching funds of $2.5 million.

Levine and Brannan participated in the debate as “leading contenders,” determined by fundraising and spending thresholds the Campaign Finance Board set.

State Sen. Kevin Parker of Brooklyn and Ismael Malave Perez, who works at the Department of Citywide istrative Services, will also appear as candidates on the Democratic primary ballot.

There will also be a Republican primary for comptroller later this month but candidates Peter Kefalas and Danniel Maio, both of Queens, have reported minimal fundraising and do not qualify for official debates.

Early voting starts June 14, with the primary election set for June 24.

Additional reporting by Greg David.

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Tenants are preparing to say farewell to brokers’ fees as a law takes effect Wednesday requiring whomever hired the agent to pay the fee.

The law, known as the Fairness in Apartment Rental Expenses (FARE) Act — which the City Council ed with a veto-proof majority in November — states that a broker who publishes a listing for a property for rent is to be paid by the landlord and stipulates the disclosure of all fees tenants pay up front. 

Landlords often hire brokers to find tenants to rent open apartments, and tenants can also hire brokers to help find them suitable space. But in New York City and Boston, it’s been the custom that even if tenants find an apartment themselves, they may be on the hook to pay the broker fee, which has no cap but typically equals about a month or two of the monthly rent.

Now, under the FARE Act, tenants should only pay the fee if they hire the brokers themselves. 

The city Department of Consumer and Worker Protection can fine brokers and companies that violate the law by charging or even requesting a fee. The fines start at $750 for first-time offenders, $1,800 for second offenses and $2,000 thereafter.

Renters can file complaints for illegal activity by calling 311 or visiting the DCWP website.

Councilmember Chi Ossé (D-Brooklyn), who sponsored the FARE Act, encouraged New Yorkers to “screenshot, snitch, report,” as he put it in a recent video. “Become a community enforcer of the FARE Act.”

The FARE Act is meant to make moving more affordable for people trying to find housing in the city’s tight market. The average upfront cost of moving in New York City — including the first month’s rent, security deposit and broker’s fee — hovered near $13,000 in 2024, StreetEasy data showed. The company estimated tenants on average can expect to pay closer to $7,500 up front without a broker’s fee.

The city of New York — and its taxpayers — may also save money by avoiding brokers’ fees, which amounted to about $141 million through the One Shot Deal, an emergency rental assistance program, and rental vouchers over the past two fiscal years, according to the Independent Budget Office. (DSS paid over $1.34 billion on the voucher program alone over those two years.)

Legal Wrangling Not Over 706r2m

One wrinkle that could change the FARE Act in the future hinges on a lawsuit filed in December by the Real Estate Board of New York (REBNY) and some brokerage groups. The city of New York asked to dismiss the suit. 

The judge presiding over the case on Tuesday denied REBNY’s request for an injunction but did not dismiss the case, which adds some uncertainty moving forward.

“We’re disappointed that the preliminary injunction in our federal lawsuit has been denied and that the FARE Act will go into effect,” REBNY President James Whelan said in a statement. “New Yorkers will soon realize the negative impacts of the FARE Act when listings become scarce, and rents rise. We will continue to litigate this case as well as explore our avenues for appeal.”

Still, REBNY advised its about how to comply, and renters in the midst of apartment hunts are cautiously optimistic about what new law might mean for their wallets.  

Tabby Greene, a data analyst in Flatbush, Brooklyn, who must move out of her apartment by July 31 found a listing for a studio apartment in Bensonhurst on Zillow for $1,500 per month. When she reached out to the broker to ask for more information, she learned there would be a broker’s fee equivalent to one month’s rent.

When Greene pushed back, the broker told her the rent would increase between $125 to $200 per month if she didn’t want to pay the fee.

“You have the option for me to represent you and pay a one time broker fee or pay a forever broker fee,” the broker wrote to Greene via text message. “Is [sic] just stupid politics.”

Greene, who visited the apartment and submitted an application, recently checked the listing again and saw the apartment’s rent rose to $1,850 — a 23% increase that puts it out of her budget. (The listing description still indicates a one-month broker’s fee.) So, she’ll keep looking.

“As long as the FARE Act goes through, I really don’t see why I would be paying for a broker’s fee,” she said. “If I don’t hire them, what am I paying you for?”

Brokers who vehemently opposed the FARE Act warned rents would rise because landlords would bake the brokers’ fees into rents. That worries one tenant, who lives in the heart of Queens and said she’s nervous about being priced out.

For three years, the tenant has been dealing with poor conditions in her apartment and has a difficult relationship with the landlord. 

“We stayed here because we knew we couldn’t incur the cost of another move,” said the woman, who requested anonymity given her sensitive living situation. “My mentality going to the next apartment search, in hoping we don’t have to pay a broker’s fee is, if it’s not the perfect place, we can move next year — instead of, guess we have to stay here for a while.”

An analysis from StreetEasy found properties that dropped the broker fee in April raised rents 5.3% — compared to 4.6% increases in the rest of the market, where fees remained. That means landlords aren’t baking in the full cost of the broker fee into the baseline rent.

In 2024, no-fee rentals were about 4.2% more expensive on average than similar apartments charging a broker fee.

“Asking rents are primarily driven by market conditions, rather than solely by property managers’ costs,” said Kenny Lee, an economist at StreetEasy. “The demand and supply dynamics are really the core drivers of the asking rent, on top of whatever the cost that the landlords have to cover.”

Our nonprofit newsroom relies on donations from readers to sustain our local reporting and keep it free for all New Yorkers. Donate to THE CITY today.

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Two City Council leaders are requesting a probe into whether the NYPD has been violating New York City’s sanctuary laws, which are supposed to bar local authorities from participating in federal immigration enforcement. 

In a letter sent Monday, Speaker Adrienne Adams and Oversight and Investigations Committee Chair Gale Brewer asked the Department of Investigation to look into several incidents this year where the lines between civil immigration enforcement and criminal investigations may have been blurred.

“We are concerned by recent reports that information provided to federal agencies by the NYPD is now being used in civil immigration proceedings in ways that may violate New York City’s laws and New Yorkers’ Constitutional rights,” the lawmakers wrote, adding that “these incidents appear to have resulted in multiple people being detained or sent to a prison in El Salvador without due process.”

The letter cites a report from THE CITY and Documented about 19-year-old Merwil Gutiérrez Flores, who the NYPD arrested and charged with gun possession in The Bronx but not prosecuted. Nonetheless, he ended up in FBI and then ICE custody, and was swiftly deported to CECOT, the notorious El Salvadoran prison.

The letter also mentions the NYPD providing Homeland Security Investigations with the sealed arrest record of Leqaa Kordia, who was arrested outside Columbia University during pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the spring. Federal officials told the NYPD they were investigating her for money laundering, which was why police officials said they shared the record. But Kordia was already in ICE custody when ICE made the request, and federal attorneys later used the NYPD document in its deportation case against her.

A spokesperson for Mayor Eric Adams — who had been facing federal corruption charges until the Trump istration dropped that case, and who’s vowed not to publicly criticize the president, which the letter-writers say has diminished public trust in his leadership — didn’t immediately return a request for comment on the letter.  The NYPD also did not immediately return a request for comment. 

Clodagh McGowan, a spokesperson for the DOI, said they received the letter and are reviewing it.

In April, the Council sued the Adams istration over an executive order allowing ICE to reopen an office on Rikers Island, which a judge has temporarily blocked from occurring. The mayor’s attorneys have said the lawsuit is a political ploy by someone seeking his job, as Speaker Adams, who’s term-limited out of office, is running for the Democratic mayoral nomination.  

While the NYPD regularly collaborates with federal agencies on criminal matters, it is barred from cooperating on civil immigration matters under a series of laws signed by former Mayor Bill de Blasio. 

But in an era where the Trump istration has made mass deportations a priority, with other federal agencies deputized for that effort, the Council ’ letter notes mounting concerns that the NYPD might be aiding in those efforts, “intentionally or unintentionally.”

The sanctuary city laws, they wrote, “are grounded in a  simple principle: when  immigrant communities  fear  cooperation  with  law  enforcement, everyone is less safe.” 

They added that “New Yorkers must trust that their own city government will not participate in their civil  rights being violated, and these recent episodes raise serious doubts that should be urgently  addressed.  Any violations of city laws by our own agencies  undermine the rule of law, public confidence, and public safety.

Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch has repeatedly said the NYPD does not collaborate with the federal government on civil immigration enforcement but defends collaboration on criminal matters as essential to keep New Yorkers safe. 

Asked last month at a Council hearing if she was considering changes to the NYPD’s relationship with federal agencies in light of the Trump istration’s deportation push, she had a blunt reply. 

“The short, straight answer to this is no,” she testified.

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In a crowded mayoral primary, the last thing you may be thinking about is what judge to vote for. 

Every year, judicial vacancies open up across New York City’s court divisions, but few judicial races are competitive and most will not appear on the ballot in June’s primary elections. 

But some city voters will vote directly for Civil Court judges this June, a position that presides over things including tenant-landlord issues and civil lawsuits seeking up to $50,000. The role comes with a 10-year term and a salary of $216,400.

Of the 14 Civil Court vacancies in the city this year, only five races are contested, meaning more than one candidate is vying for the seat.

New Yorkers will also vote for their picks to attend the judicial nominating convention, where delegates choose their candidates for state Supreme Court (more on these positions later).

: Because judge positions are part of the state court system — rather than city-level offices like mayor or comptroller — they are not chosen by ranked choice voting in the primary.

Why are so few judge races contested? 4o32p

In most judicial vacancies, the candidate is predetermined by party insiders and runs uncontested, in which case they won’t appear on your ballot at all. 

As THE CITY has reported on previously, political patronage plays a significant part in securing judicial nominations, and they are in many cases predetermined. Running a campaign to become a judge involves a lot of money and insider . In most cases, party connections are enough to ensure incumbent judges and party favorites are the frontrunners in judicial races. 

Because judicial delegations often consist of people closely tied to the local party, there is little debate over who the nominee will be.

“They don’t even know the judges, they just vote for them. They’re told by their political leaders,” said Alan Flacks, a longtime judicial and county party watcher who pens a newsletter on the subject.  

Unlike other elected positions, judicial candidates have many limitations on how they can fundraise. Judges cannot personally solicit donations and must rely on committees to fundraise on their behalf, or personally finance their own campaigns.

The Candidates for 2025 6mz3w

Depending on where you live, you may see judicial candidates on your ballot this June. You can also take a look at your sample ballot here. Here’s what’s being contested in The Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens:

Bronx: Judge of the Civil Court 

All Bronx residents will vote for one candidate.

• Shekera Anessa Algarin
• George M. Santana

Brooklyn: Judge of the Civil Court

All Brooklyn residents will vote for two candidates.

• Janice Chen
• Marisa Arrabito
• Susan Liebman
• Janice P. Purvis

Queens: Judge of the Civil Court  

All Queens residents will vote for one candidate.

• John J. Ciafone
• Sheridan C. Chu

Judge of the Civil Court, 1st Municipal Court District, Queens

This district covers Astoria, Long Island City, Ravenswood and Queensbridge. Voters will choose one candidate. 

• Juliette-Noor Haji
• Thomas G. Wright Fernandez

Judge of the Civil Court, 2nd Municipal Court District, Queens

This district covers Sunnyside, Woodside, Sunnyside Gardens, Blissville and parts of Long Island City. Voters will choose one candidate.

• Julie M. Milner
• Eve Cho Guillergan

Who are the delegates to the judicial convention? 2r3po

Voters will also have the opportunity to choose their judicial nominee to the New York Supreme Court, but not until November.

However,on the primary ballot, voters in eight Assembly districts in Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens will choose a slate of delegates and alternate delegates to attend the judicial convention, who then go on to select the New York Supreme Court nominee that appears on the November ballot. 

New York is the only state that requires Supreme Court nominees to be chosen through party conventions, a century-old statute that was established when the state Supreme Court was the only trial court in the state. 

Delegates, who often run as a group to fill the varying number of seats available, attend their county’s judicial nominating convention in the weeks after the June primary, or send an alternate delegate if unavailable.

While there are few requirements to run for a seat, delegates are often heavily involved in local party politics, or have previously held an elected position, such as former New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito and term-limited Councilmember Diana Ayala, who are currently seeking the position. But like judicial races, the delegates will only appear on the June ballot if the election is contested.

At the convention, delegates cast their votes for their pick, but how they are chosen depends on the county. In The Bronx and Queens, nominations are pushed by the local parties. In Manhattan, nominees are vetted by a screening . Those who make it through then host catered meet-and-greets — at their own expense — to introduce themselves to candidates ahead of the vote. 

Critics argue that the judicial delegation system is antiquated and prevents voters from directly participating in the election process. Reforming the convention system would require “significant statutory reform” according to Sarah Steiner, a NYC-based lawyer specializing in election law. In 2008, the United States Supreme Court upheld the process in a unanimous decision after then Brooklyn Civil Court judge Margarita Lopez Torres filed a suit against the State Board of Elections after she was thwarted by party bosses in an attempt to run for a seat on the state Supreme Court..

What do the different courts do? k3m4y

New York City has five different main court systems. On your ballot this year, some New Yorkers will see judicial candidates for the Supreme Court and Civil Court.

• Supreme Court: Unlike our national Supreme Court, the New York Supreme Court is not the highest court in the state — that’s the Court of Appeals, whose judges are appointed by the governor. The Supreme Court deals with criminal and civil cases and is the only court that can grant divorce proceedings. It also generally only hears cases that are outside the jurisdiction of other state and city courts. Supreme Court judges are elected to serve 14-year .
• New York City Civil Court: Civil Court deals with civil cases, i.e. cases that have to do with disputes between people or organizations, rather than cases which deal with the violation of a criminal law. It deals with cases involving amounts of money up to $50,000, and it’s also where you’ll find small claims court and housing court. Civil Court judges serve 10-year .
• Surrogate’s Court: The Surrogate’s Court deals with issues involving decedents, which includes handling wills, estates and adoptions. The Surrogate judge is elected to serve a 14-year term, or until retirement at 70.

New York City also has Family Court and Criminal Court, but these positions are selected by the mayor from recommendation provided by a judiciary committee that he appoints. Neither are elected positions.

This article is adapted from previous judicial race guides from THE CITY from 2022, 2023 and 2024.

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New stores are opening across the city at an impressive pace, many of them in locations now newly accessible to certain businesses because of Mayor Eric Adams’ “City of Yes” rezoning revamped archaic rules.

Construction of new multifamily buildings is also finally picking up, a year after the legislature and the governor finally agreed on a new tax break to spur residential construction amid the city’s severe housing crisis.

And the conversion of obsolete office buildings into much needed housing is surging, spurred by a tax break ed a year ago and the rezoning that greatly expanded the kind of buildings that could be converted.

“The trend is very simple. People are building,” said Carlo Scissura, president of the New York Building Congress. “Office-to-residential conversions will be one of the most successful programs to hit New York in many decades. You have a lot of older office buildings in great locations near transit and it makes sense to see them become residential buildings.”

The activity is a sign that policy changes sought by the Adams istration, real estate interests and pro-housing groups are paying off.

But it comes with a major asterisk. All of the new apartment construction projects expected to use the new 485-x development incentive are for buildings with fewer than 100 units — sidestepping a costly wage requirement for construction workers but also producing less housing than the sites could accommodate.

“The activity is all excellent and wonderful, but we are not seeing enough numbers to say we are making a demonstrable dent in the goal of adding 500,000 new housing units,” said Basha Gerhards, senior vice president of the Real Estate Board of New York.

At least the numbers are headed in the right direction.

The Department of City Planning will announce Tuesday that 500 vacant storefronts reopened in the last year that might otherwise have been shuttered permanently because of restrictive zoning rules that forbade reopening old storefronts in residential areas. (The city tracks store openings and vacancies through a database called Live XYZ.)

The fast-growing amusement sector, which includes arcades and mini golf courses, has taken advantage of the new flexibility.

For example, Activate Games signed a 175,000-square-foot lease at 24 Union Square East, where it will occupy part of the first floor and all of the second floor of a former furniture store at its first New York site. The Canadian company, with 40 locations worldwide, has pioneered a gaming business that combines physical activity with mind games that groups can play, and it could not have opened in Union Square without the zoning changes.

“It’s clear that we made an important change at the right moment,’’ said Dan Garodnick, director of the Department of City Planning and the driving force behind the City of Yes rezonings. “It was the right time to take a hard look at zoning rules that were stifling businesses. Early results are in, and they are quite good.”

Meanwhile, office-to-residential conversions are gaining momentum. Originally concentrated downtown because of rules that only allowed conversions for older buildings along with incentives for neighborhood recovery after 9/11, landlords are now targeting Midtown office buildings, including in Times Square.

City of Yes now allows the conversion of any office building before 1991 in an area that allows residential use and exempts the building from almost all property taxes from 25 to 35 years as long as it sets aside a quarter of the units at below market rents. Other city programs have made it easier as well.

REBNY originally estimated that conversions would produce 20 million square feet and 20,000 new apartments. It now believes the figure could reach 40 million square feet and 40,000 units.

The most well known is the revamp of the former Pfizer headquarters on East 42nd Street, where Metro Loft is going to create 1,600 new units in what is being hailed as the largest office conversion in the world.

A few blocks to the north, Rudin is working on the overhaul of two of its office buildings at 845 Third Ave. and 355 Lexington Ave., which are not very far from its headquarters at 345 Park Ave. filled with prestigious tenants like the financial giant Blackstone and the NFL.

“We saw that tenants wanted to come to 345 Park Avenue and a block or two away there was no demand for office space,” said Bill Rudin, co-executive chair of the firm.

The first conversion expected to come online next year is actually the most surprising: 5 Times Square, built by RXR in 2002 as the headquarters of the ing firm EY. The firm decided to relocate to a new building on the far West Side in 2017. When the pandemic hit, RXR was able to ink only one small lease for the building and found very little interest in corporate tenants for Times Square, whose vacancy rate is higher than other Midtown districts.

But the building had been built in a way that made residential conversion much easier than other office buildings, and with changes to the zoning rules, RXR determined it could do an overhaul for a relatively modest price tag of several million dollars. It will create 1,250 new apartments, a quarter of which will be below market rate, that target a younger demographic.

“There will be studios and one-bedrooms that appeal to young professionals coming to the city,” said Jeff Holmes, senior vice president. “And the reality is we have a 1.4% vacancy rate.”

Developers are again seeking permits for new multi-family buildings, which dried up after the controversial 421-a tax break lapsed in June 2022 and wasn’t replaced by 485-x until this January. The new incentive provides a 35- or 40-year exemption from property taxes, which are so high for apartment buildings that few are ever built without a tax incentive.

In the first three months of the year, builders filed for almost 7,000 new units in 123 buildings, a 65% increase from the last three months of the year.

Meanwhile, in the first five months of the year developers who have to file an expression of an interest in using 485-x have indicated they are interested in building 2,600 units using the abatement.

But all those buildings are for less than 100 units, avoiding a requirement that any new building in the city must pay a minimum $40 an hour construction wage to access the tax break.

The city takes an optimistic view of the results.

“With 118 buildings representing roughly 2,600 new homes already showing intent to use to program in just 10 months of operation, 485-x is proving to be the tax incentive we needed to keep producing more affordable housing,” Adams said in a statement.

But the REBNY report noted that the 7,000 new units filed for in the first quarter is only a little more than half the 12,500 units needed each quarter to meet the mayor’s goal of 500,000 new housing units over a decade.

Real estate insiders suggest 485-x will work for large buildings where a rezoning allows a major increase in square footage. Scissura of the Building Congress said he expected an effort next year to revise 485-x if new construction continues to be concentrated in smaller buildings.

“Everything is playing out as expected. The absence of the larger projects we need at scale to meet the city’s production goals was identified early on by REBNY as a likely outcome of the new program design,” said Gerhards of REBNY.

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As Gov. Kathy Hochul weighs which prisons to close this year amid declining incarceration rates and a corrections staffing crisis, advocates and formerly incarcerated people are calling for one of New York’s most infamous facilities — Attica — to shutter its gates for good.

The state budget finalized in May includes a plan to close up to three state prisons. The sites are expected to be announced by the end of the year. 

Hochul and other state officials haven’t disclosed which of the 42 potential sites are on the chopping block or detailed in any meaningful way how the locations will be selected. 

But advocates want to see Attica on the list, along with two other prisons near Syracuse: Marcy Correctional Facility and Mid-State Correctional Facility. 

They cite the long history of abuses at Attica and the beatdown deaths of Robert Brooks, 43, at Marcy on Dec. 9, 2024, and Messiah Nantwi, 22, at Mid-State on March 1. Multiple correction officers have been criminally charged with murdering Brooks and Nantwi by fatally kicking and punching them as well as trying to cover up what happened.

“That would send a message to the entire community that when these prison guards step out of line and take somebody’s life, the prison should be closed,” said Renny Smith, who spent 27 years behind bars and is now a member of the coalition of Incarcerated People’s Lives Matter, a nonprofit that advocates for people in prison. 

“That should be the policy, that should be the norm,” he added. “That’s one way to hold these prison guards in check.” 

State Sen. Julia Salazar (D-Brooklyn), who chairs the Committee on Crime and Correction, agreed. 

“A prison where an incarcerated New Yorker can be tortured and killed by corrections staff, while other staff watched without intervening, is not a place where people can expect to be safe,” she told THE CITY. 

The push to shutter Attica comes more than five decades after the infamous 1971 prison uprising, where 43 people — mostly incarcerated men — were killed after state troopers stormed the facility. 

Despite decades of calls for reform, the maximum-security prison continues to be associated with allegations of brutality and inhumane conditions. Smith and other advocates argue that closing Attica would not only address that cycle of abuse but also serve as a powerful statement against the state’s punitive past.

“Attica is a prison notorious for systemic racism and especially prevalent violence,” Salazar said. 

The push for the closure of Attica isn’t unanimous. 

Attica is fully equipped with stationary surveillance cameras and has received significant capital improvements over the past several years. The Wyoming County lockup is also one of the largest prisons in the state with room for 2,253 people. 

Overall, New York’s state inmate population has decreased over the last two decades, from a high of over 72,649 in 1999 to 31,194 as of June 2, according to prison records. 

That drop — driven by criminal-justice reforms, changes in sentencing laws and a declining crime rate — has led to a major reduction in the number of state prison facilities throughout the state. Since 2009, the state has closed 32 prisons, saving hundreds of millions of dollars, according to budget records.

Many of the prisons closed were smaller facilities designed to house lower-level offenders. 

As for this year’s shutdowns, Hochul has noted correction officers will be allowed to transfer to other facilities. 

“When any prison is closed, there will be no job losses,” she told reporters in May. “I need every single person who is a corrections officer to transition either to an ading facility or to have consolidations.” 

The financial heartbeat of some upstate towns where the prison serves as the main source of employment is at stake. Hochul originally proposed clo to five prisons this year but that was pared back to three, likely due to pushback from upstate lawmakers, according to prison insiders. 

The state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision last year closed Great Meadow Correctional Facility in Washington County and Sullivan Correctional Facility in Sullivan County. 

Another potential target for closure this year is Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, near the Canadian border. The maximum security facility is where two convicted murderers, Richard Matt and David Sweat, escaped in June 2015. 

Correction officers at the prison, which holds 2,959 people, also played a key role in the 22-day wildcat strike earlier this year, according to department insiders. 

Collins Correctional Facility in Erie County, where the strike began, is also a possible target, according to a media reports. 

Thomas Mailey, DOCCS chief spokesperson, said the department will “carefully review the operations” at each facility before coming up with a possible list for closures.

The review includes: physical infrastructure, program offerings, security levels, specialized medical and mental health services, according to Mailey. It also takes into consideration “the proximity of other facilities in the area to minimize the impact to staff, potential re-use options and areas of the state where prior closures have occurred in order to minimize the impact to communities,” he added. 

But the process is done entirely behind the scenes without any input from the public. 

“It’s concerning that we all know so little about the process by which (the state prison system) is deciding to close facilities,” said Antony Gemmell, a Legal Aid Society supervising attorney in the Prisoner Rights Project. 

“It makes sense that the system would shrink,” he added. “That should be a trend, and to the extent that it is a trend, there does need to be a greater level of transparency.”

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Mayoral candidate and State Senator Jessica Ramos ed FAQ NYC in March to lament that “there is, I think, a little bit of amnesia happening. I do think the press could do a better job of highlighting the myriad of ways in which Andrew Cuomo has created the mess that he now claims he is somehow going to fix. But I can’t forget, right? My district was the epicenter of the epicenter. To me, it’s not only about, of course, all those grandparents who died in the nursing homes and him lying about it. I him taking away Medicare funding from our hospitals in the middle of the pandemic.”

Now, Ramos is endorsing Cuomo, and hosts Christina Greer, Katie Honan and Harry Siegel discuss her surprise turn and much more ahead of Thursday’s Democratic mayoral debate, where Katie will be one of the s. 

Early voting starts this Saturday, and you can go here to find your early voting and election day sites (they’re often not the same) and also see exactly what will be on your ballot. If you need to catch up, The City’s Meet Your Mayor quiz lets you see which candidate’s views line up most closely with yours and you can hear directly from all the leading Democratic candidates except Andrew Cuomo, who’s declined to come on since getting in the race, at FAQ NYC.

Our nonprofit newsroom relies on donations from readers to sustain our local reporting and keep it free for all New Yorkers. Donate to THE CITY today.

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