Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul Announces FY 2024 Budget Historic Investments and Initiatives to Drive Down Gun Violence, Improve the Criminal Justice System, and Create a Safer New York State

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul announced the public safety highlights of the FY 2024 Budget. The Budget improves public safety by providing judges greater discretion to set bail for serious crimes, providing $170 million to support the implementation of discovery reform for prosecutors and defenders, and investing $347 million in evidence-based gun violence prevention initiatives. Additional highlights include transformative investments to reduce recidivism, address the flow of deadlyfentanyl into New York State, and improve statewide emergency response services. Governor Hochul was joined by New York City Mayor Eric Adams, district attorneys and other leaders in public safety and criminal justice at today's announcement.

VIDEO of the event is available on YouTube here and in TV quality (h.264, mp4) format here.

AUDIO of the event is available here.

PHOTOS of the event are available on the Governor's Flickr page.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Thank you, everyone. Oh, great to be back. With all due love to one of my adopted cities of Albany, it's really great to have left Albany and to be back here in this city once again. We've got an exciting program and announcements to talk about here today, reflecting one of my highest priorities.

And I want to thank the individuals who came here today to show their support. Great allies of ours, starting with Mayor Eric Adams, who's been shoulder to shoulder with me, prioritizing the safety of our residents from very first day on the job. So, I think you'll be hearing from the Mayor momentarily.

Also, we have district attorneys, and they are really on the front line of protecting our citizens. And I want to extend to them the gratitude and the challenges that they face every single day. And they're teams who work so hard, they're dedicated public servants. I've seen them in action, and I want to acknowledge our District Attorney from Queens, Melinda Katz, has joined us. Melinda Katz. Eric Gonzalez, the District Attorney of Kings County. Darcel Clark, the District Attorney from the Bronx. Alvin Bragg, the District Attorney from New York County. Stanley Richards, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer from the Fortune Society. Thank you. And Tony Jordan, who had the longest commute here today, the President of the District Attorney's Association. Thank him for joining us as well. I believe we also have the Sheriff of Albany County here. Craig Apple has joined us. Great to see you again, Sheriff.

Of course, I want to thank Martin Englisher. We are in his house, a place he has occupied for 42 years of service to the YM and YWHA of Washington Heights and Inwood. We've been here before. We came here during our budget rollout a year ago to talk about our investments, our historic investments in child care, and he hosted us. So, let's continue taking care of our children. But this is a great place to set the stage for the conversation we're going to have. And this is a place that since 1917 has been changed in the lives of so many people with educational, recreational, and social programs to lift them up. So, it's organizations like this that are helping all of us give safe alternative to our children, so they don't have to go to the streets. They can find a home, a sense of family right in this building. So, I thank them.

And to everyone coming here today, it's been a long few weeks. Groundhog Day, couple times. Groundhog weeks, Groundhog month, but here we are. Here we are, and this budget process did take some extra time. But I said from the very beginning, it's not a race to a deadline, it's a race to the right results. And we have to move this state forward. I said we have to make it safer, more affordable, and more livable. I made that promise in my State of the State back in January, and that's exactly what this budget does.

Throughout this process, public safety has been front and center for me because we always had the victims of crimes and their families in mind. People like Jackie Rowe Adams - Jackie, please stand up. Jackie. You know her work. Love you, darling. A devoted public servant, a Harlem community leader, but never someone who thought she'd be thrust into a situation where with the loss of her two sons to gun violence, she became a spokesperson. She became a beacon of hope. She became a person who said, "Yes, I will stand up and to make sure that no other mother has to endure the searing pain that I had to with the loss of my boys." And I thank you for your courage, Jackie. It takes a lot of courage, and I thank you for all you do for our state and you and so many others. It was people like you that we thought of and your families during this process. And the Harlem Mothers S.A.V.E., which you've done to help save lives. And you'll never know how many young people you saved and families you were spared from what you went through, but channeling your pain and action, that grief has been extraordinary, an inspiration to all of us. Jackie Rowe.

So, we're making historic investments to support organizations like Jackie's and to transform public safety. Take those challenges and turn them into better days for our communities across the state, because it is my firm belief that every single New Yorker deserves to feel safe and to be safe in their communities. Whether it's the local bodega owner worried about shoplifters, the mother who worries about her kids walking home from school, a young woman traveling late at night on the subway, or a community that overall, just feels under siege from the day after day specter of gun violence. For too many New Yorkers, the fear is real, and fear can become paralyzing.

So as government leaders, we had us stand up and say, "No more." No more. We owe it to the neighbors, to our children, to business leaders, to do everything we can in our power to make our streets safer. So today, I want to take this opportunity to talk to you about some of the investments we're making to tackle crime head on and to make New Yorkers safe. We work with the legislature to craft a combination of new policy and major investments that we believe will make a real difference. New Yorkers are going to see these dollars at work and they're going to feel the impact. Overall, we're investing 772 million in a holistic approach to public safety. First time ever record investments to keep New Yorkers safe.

First, let's start with the challenge that communities all across New Yorkers facing, from Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, down here to the city, Albany - the gun violence epidemic. We're doubling down on methods that we know work. I'm proud to announce we're in investing $347 million in gun violence prevention. It's the largest investment ever in our state's GIVE program, the Gun Involved Violence Elimination Initiative, and we're sending resources to communities most impacted by gun violence. But we're not just making reactive investments. We're being proactive. This is what we call the holistic approach to criminal justice.

We're going to get at the root causes in these communities, the causes of the problems, and find out why the young people too often are making the wrong decision. It's about investing in those kids right from the start. Youth employment programs: they're successful. They give them the skills they need, they give them a purpose, a sense of belonging that sometimes they're just not getting in their homes. Give them opportunities to keep them off the streets, on a positive path, so they can be successful in a classroom, on the ball field, at work, extracurricular activities. We have to keep them engaged. I truly believe that to my core. A crucial element is our SNUG outreach program. I have seen this work for many, many years.

My hometown of Buffalo got to know all the leaders of SNUG. Former gang members who realize that they have a purpose, a calling, to help other young people stay off the path that they were on. So, we're investing heavily in SNUG, more opportunities for our youth, help them pursue a college degree, other options, workforce development. And we believe that ultimately, programs like this can be a catalyst for change in these young lives before it's too late. Before gun violence tears more communities apart and makes them deal with this trauma that they've had to deal with.

We also are talking about what we can do to address the aftermath of communities, whether it's the day-to-day gun violence or a place like my hometown of Buffalo where ironically on Mother's Day will be the one-year anniversary of the mass shooting in a neighborhood grocery store not far from where I live. So, we're investing $70 million for communities to deal with the aftermath of gun violence, to help lift them up, to give them a purpose, help deal with problems that are specific to their neighborhoods, to help them cope with the pain and connect them with the resources because you see the effects. Gun violence victim, the victim themselves, whether they survive or not, their families, but also their siblings, their younger brothers and sisters, the perpetrators of the crimes, their family members are affected. It has an impact on their mentality, their mental health, psychology. Let's invest in those individuals as well, so they don't have to believe that they're somehow at fault. They need mental health services.

So, we're making those kind of investments. We're investing in people. But on the other side of the equation, we have to invest in law enforcement. And help them make sure they have the resources they need to solve and to prevent crimes. And our State Police have been an indispensable resource for me. When I first became governor at the beginning of a rise in gun violence, I knew that we had talent that could be used more than patrolling the highways. Let's get them stopping the drugs and the guns from coming into our borders from places like Pennsylvania up the Iron Pipeline and our State Police working with NYPD and nine other states that we brought together because we're not manufacturing the guns in New York. They're all coming from somewhere else.

And our State Police, I've deployed them to be on the front lines. I'm increasing community stabilization units. What is this? This is literally State Police embedded in communities. I've seen them in action in Rochester and Syracuse where they had spikes in crime and now it's stabilized. We're increasing that to 25 communities. We also have a shortage in law enforcement. The mayor sees this. We see this in our communities all over the state. We're activating, doubling the number of classes for new recruits to join the State Police.

But I knew that there was one area. Build up law enforcement, help them increase the ranks, empower them. But I also knew that there's one lingering issue that people spoke about, something we needed to address, and that's the issue of bail reform. I support its core premise - I've always said that - where someone's wealth, I don't believe should be the determinant of whether they go to jail or free. Two people accused of the same offense, one's family has money, bails them out, they're back in school, back at their job. Same offense - someone else is sitting in jail. Fundamentally unfair. No one should be sitting in Rikers accused, without a trial, for a minor offense, because they didn't have the money.

But I believe that judges should have the authority to set bail and detain dangerous defendants. Full stop. Our data shows that as a result to the recent changes done in 2019, there are decreases in recidivism for low level offenses. That's positive. But increases - this is what's most troubling - increases in recidivism for defendants charged with the serious crimes. So it's clear that changes were needed.

I'm glad we came to an agreement. We talked about it, had a lot of spirited conversations. It was tough. But I knew we needed to get this done in our Budget. The agreement, that we'll be signing momentarily, removes what is known as the least restrictive means standard, which judges have said ties their hands.

It now gives them discretion if they need to hold violent criminals accountable. It upholds our fundamental belief in a criminal justice system that is fair and accessible to all. And also ensure that poverty is never treated as a crime. So I want to thank the leaders and the members of the legislature for the thoughtful work that we pulled together and got this result.

But I know that changing bail laws won't solve all our problems. I never said it would. So investing in aid for prosecution and defense funding all across the state so the criminal justice system can function efficiently. And that's why we're providing district attorneys across the state $170 million to help do their jobs. Let's give another round of applause to our district attorneys.

We're also investing $100 million for prosecution and defense funding across the state, as well as giving a pay increase - long overdue - for our public defenders who are also working so hard. New funding for pre-trial services, and alternatives to incarceration programs to focus on programs that lead to better outcomes for defendants. A lot of these individuals need help. They need supportive services, anger management, substance abuse treatment, mental health challenges. We're trying to help them so we can get them off the treadmill, get them out of that cycle.

And we also, to ensure that people who've paid their debt to society can smoothly reintegrate into communities, we're investing in 20 re-entry task forces across the state. I want to make sure that when people are back in society, the support for them. They need housing. They need a job. They need some services. And if we don't make those investments in them, we set people on a path to just be in the system over and over and over again. That's what this Budget gets at.

We're also dealing with an unprecedented opioid epidemic. I have held the hands of many families, cried with them. When they lost a loved one. It's getting worse. My family was one of those families. We lost my nephew to fentanyl a few years ago. But it's gotten so much worse. It's so much more powerful, so much more lethal. And people feel so hopeless that they don't have an alternative. We have to give them hope. We have to give them a path to recovery. And that's why we're going to be dealing with the dealers, the people who are bringing this substance into our communities, prosecuting overdose deaths, stopping fentanyl distribution, and providing more supportive services and prevention and treatment.

We're going to continue on this path. There's not an easy answer. I was a young staffer with Senator Moynihan back in the 80s when we had the coke and the crack cocaine crisis. The Mayor remembers. He was out on those mean streets back then. We know we turned the corner. We were able to get ahead of it. It was a thoughtful response out of Washington. Now our state has to step up and treat this just as seriously.

I'm proud of this Budget. We've done a lot to make New Yorkers safe. But we won't rest. This is not a "mission accomplished" moment. This says we're on a path - a path until every single parent has peace of mind when their kids are walking home from school. We won't rest until gun violence is now an afterthought, something that happens more rarely. And we won't rest until every single New Yorker has the peace that they deserve.

And I'm grateful for the partners I have. This has been a long journey to this point, and I thank, again, Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Majority Leader of the New York State Senate, Carl Heastie, the Speaker of the Assembly - extraordinary work they did to get us to this point. I view them as tremendous friends, partners. Spoke to them both this morning and thanked them for deepening our relationship to do what's right for the people of this state.

And again, thank you - with great credit - to the Mayor, our district attorneys, our community groups, our organizations, our clergy. Reverend Bernard has joined us and graced us with his presence, keeps us in his prayers.

And I won't stop. We're just getting started, my friends. I will not stop until we've made New York State be the safest, the best place to raise your families, to own a business. This is the Excelsior State. We have to live up to that model, and I thank all of you. Thank you.

And with that, let me bring up an incredible partner, a strong ally who again, is out there day after day, putting his heart and soul into helping New York City recover from the crime crisis we're facing now. And I do believe under his leadership, we will get there. We are making progress. And I'm going to make sure we have the resource to help the City out any way we can.

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the great mayor of the City of New York, Eric Adams.