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Comptroller Stringer releases bold vision to rebuild and reimagine the NYC economy, proposes $1 billion ‘NYC Recovery Now’ fund to help small businesses and drive and equitable comeback
Stringer outlines 37-point agenda for a comprehensive post-COVID recovery and a fairer and more equitable New York City economy — with new initiatives for small businesses and nonprofits, targeted programs for arts and culture, and deep investments in green industries, M/WBEs, and digital infrastructure like 5G and universal broadband
‘NYC Recovery Now’ Fund would deliver $1 billion stimulus in targeted grants to small businesses and nonprofits in need — distributed through a five-borough multilingual Rapid Business Outreach program
— Scott StringerAs mayor, I’m going to be ready on Day One with the bold vision and a real plan to bring back the jobs lost during the pandemic in my first year and lead this city into the post-COVID age, stronger and fairer than ever.
New York, NY – To rebuild New York City’s economy after the COVID-19 pandemic and reimagine it from the ground up, New York City Comptroller and mayoral candidate Scott Stringer today announced a comprehensive 37-point economic recovery plan to jumpstart small businesses, create hundreds of thousands of jobs, and fortify New York City’s status as the epicenter of the nation’s economy.
Stringer’s economic plan would launch the NYC Recovery Now Fund, a $1 billion small business and nonprofit stimulus grant program, to swiftly aid restaurants, small businesses, nonprofits, and arts and cultural institutions to immediately get the economy back on its feet. Stringer’s robust agenda to rejuvenate and reimagine the city’s economy would erase COVID jobs losses in the first year of his mayoralty and build from there.
New York City Comptroller Scott M. Stringer said: “New Yorkers have shouldered a tremendous burden in the last 12 months — so many of our neighbors have lost their jobs and struggled to put food on the table. I’ve seen it, and I’ve been fighting every day to make sure every New Yorker has the resources and support they need to provide for their family. But we can’t just wind back the clock — our economy wasn’t working for everyone, even before the pandemic. We need to rebuild and reimagine our economy so it works for working families and small businesses, not just the wealthy and Wall Street.”
Stringer’s plan, “New Day for New York,” is the sixth part of his mayoral agenda entitled “The Details to Deliver” — highlighting the need for specific, actionable plans to set New York City on a fundamentally new trajectory from the past decade and take the city forward from the COVID-19 pandemic, stronger and fairer than ever before.
Stringer added: “A bet on New York City is as close as it gets to a sure thing, and with this plan, I’m betting big. This is a plan to replace vacant storefronts with new and innovative small businesses, fill our buses and subways with New Yorkers commuting to work again, and help our small business owners and workers breathe a sigh of relief knowing they have a partner in city government – not an adversary. I have seen New Yorkers come together in times of crisis and tragedy, and we always come out stronger — and as mayor, I’ll bring back the jobs lost during the pandemic in my first year and lead this city into the post-COVID age, stronger and fairer than ever.”
Congressmember Adriano Espaillat said: “Scott Stringer understands what New Yorkers have been through in the last year, and he is the man to bring our entire city back. COVID-19 has laid bare disparities that many candidates in this race didn’t see — but Scott saw them. No other candidate for mayor can even come close to Scott’s record of standing up for immigrant workers and business owners, and this plan doubles down on his commitment to ensuring that no New Yorker is left behind in our city’s economic recovery. With Scott Stringer, New Yorkers can be confident they’re getting a mayor who cares about them, who will fight for them, and who can deliver the change that will make their lives better.”
Congressmember Jerry Nadler said: “Scott Stringer has believed in and fought for New York City through 9/11, the Great Recession, and Hurricane Sandy, so there is no one better equipped to lead another turnaround for this city. He has never been afraid to put forward progressive ideas, and I know he will bring our city back stronger and fairer than it was before. Scott has the big ideas and the detailed plans to get New York City moving forward again — and he is the leader we need to make it happen.”
State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi said: “We have to get our economy going again, but we can’t just go back to the same old system that wasn’t working for everyone. We need to grow in a way that makes our city greener, improves transit, and tackles the rampant inequality in our city — and Scott Stringer has the bold, unapologetically progressive plan to make that happen. We need a mayor like Scott Stringer, who can bring New York into this century and prepare us for the next one.”
A Real COVID Recovery Plan: For Economic Recovery
The COVID-19 pandemic has devastated New York City’s economy, which has lost an entire decade’s worth of job gains in less than a year. Within twelve weeks of the city’s shutdown, New Yorkers lost over a million jobs — and central business districts are still virtually ghost towns, rife with vacant storefronts and empty office buildings. While the economy has slowly begun to recover, the crisis has not abated: the city remains more than 600,000 jobs below its peak employment in early 2020. And for certain industries — including small retailers, restaurants, hotels, and the performing arts — the pandemic has left their viability fundamentally in doubt, threatening the character of neighborhoods in every part of the city.
While there is likely not a single New Yorker whose work life has been unaffected by COVID-19, the economic toll of this pandemic has not been felt equally throughout the city. While Wall Street made $38 billion since the pandemic began, communities of color — already struggling with tremendous sickness and loss — have also suffered disproportionate job losses, exacerbating existing inequalities and compounding suffering. New York City’s next mayor must take bold action to do more than just rebuild the economy — reimagining a more equitable economy that works for every community.
Stringer’s comprehensive economic recovery vision will address the devastation caused by COVID-19 and the inequalities that existed before it that left certain communities particularly vulnerable to the effects of the pandemic. With this plan, Stringer will erase the job losses caused by COVID within his first year as mayor and grow our economy from there with eight key priorities:
Jumpstart New York’s local economy with grants for small businesses and nonprofits by:
- Creating the NYC Recovery Now Fund, with $1 billion in federal stimulus to speed direct grants to small businesses, nonprofits, and cultural organizations in the city’s hardest-hit sectors — leisure and hospitality, retail, transportation, warehousing, administrative services, other (personal) services, and manufacturing;
- Focusing on small business — offering grants up to $20,000 for smaller businesses and up to $100,000 for medium-sized businesses (based on payroll), with the vast majority of grants going to the 85% of small businesses in hard-hit sectors with payrolls under $500,000;
- Targeting relief to those who need it most and give them the flexibility they need — asking applicants to prove revenue losses of 35% to 50% in calendar year 2020 and allowing Recovery Fund dollars to cover a broad range of costs, from back rent and insurance to inventory, payroll, and structural improvements needed for safety;
- Ensuring no one is left behind — facilitating distribution with multilingual Rapid Business Outreach Teams going door-to-door to businesses in every borough to provide information and aid, focusing especially on the city’s hardest-hit communities; and
- Spreading the word with an international ad campaign, “New York, New Day” to herald the city’s re-opening.
Slash red tape and deliver new supports to help businesses grow and thrive by:
- Building on the Red Tape Commission and creating Launch NYC, a single online portal where entrepreneurs can get all the permits they need to open and run a business;
- Setting strict time limits on agencies to sign off on all necessary permits and certificates;
- Establishing a NYC Tech Corps to help businesses expand their digital presence and reach new customers in order to grow;
- Expanding outdoor dining to continue supporting the recovery of restaurants and bars; and
- Allowing businesses a “cure period” to address and fix violations rather than fining them immediately.
Keep New York City a magnet for talent and hard work by:
- Investing in programs that will make the city a better, more affordable place to live and raise a family, including embarking on the single largest local investment in childcare in the nation;
- Putting two teachers in every elementary school classroom to bring educational equity;
- Reversing the brutal budget cuts that the current administration has made to the Parks Department; and
- Providing tuition-free CUNY to prepare New Yorkers for the jobs of tomorrow.
Double down on infrastructure investments, including 5G and universal broadband, by:
- Launching Rebuild NYC, a major public works program to rebuild the city’s crumbling infrastructure — from public transit, streets, and parks to schools and hospitals;
- Repairing and greening our crumbling infrastructure to ensure the city can support the needs of New Yorkers now and in the future; initiating a program to redesign the city’s streetscapes to better serve the needs of pedestrians, cyclists, and small businesses; and reconfiguring and realigning the transit system to serve a 24-hour, five-borough economy; and
- Harnessing federal dollars dedicated to closing the digital divide to invest in our 5G infrastructure and ensure that every New Yorker has access to affordable high-speed broadband at home.
Train New Yorkers for the jobs of the future by:
- Transforming New York’s scattershot workforce development programs into a coherent whole to equip New Yorkers with the tools they need in a 21st-century economy; and
- Making CUNY community colleges tuition-free for every New Yorker, giving more people access to the education and training they need for the jobs of the future.
Create over 100,000 good-paying green jobs with a Green New Deal for New York City by:
- Retrofitting New York’s most environmentally inefficient buildings — catalyzing exponential growth in the green construction and retrofit sectors, while ensuring that small businesses in New York City can capitalize on the new demand for green labor;
- Transforming Rikers Island into a green energy hub, driving as much as $340 million in annual economic activity while generating sustainable energy and good green jobs that can lift up communities that have suffered from both incarceration and pollution;
- Building out shoreline resiliency projects across the city, finally bringing post-Sandy infrastructure projects to a close and getting shovels in the ground on crucial projects that can protect our schools, hospitals, and homes from the next storm;
- Jumpstarting solar installations throughout the five boroughs by increasing the City’s solar tax abatement and slashing the red tape that has made installing solar much harder than it should be for building owners; and
- Building out green infrastructure like green roofs, bioswales, and rain gardens, which offer an opportunity to both beautify our neighborhoods and capture rainfall that could flood neighborhoods or pollute waterways.
Lead a Broadway revival and spur the creative economy by:
- Purchasing 250,000 tickets at cultural venues throughout the five boroughs to distribute to frontline workers, students, and families; and
- Supporting the creative workforce by addressing the dire need for space, while enhancing the diversity of the creative economy and highlighting one of the most vital yet unheralded elements of our city’s economy, one that employs hundreds of thousands of people and generates tens of billions of dollars in economic activity.
Harness the City budget to rejuvenate and double spending with Minority- and Women-Owned Businesses (M/WBEs) by:
- Building on Scott’s strong record of standing up for and investing in M/WBEs, including appointing the first-ever Chief Diversity Officer in New York City government and increasing M/WBE spending in the Comptroller’s office from 13% to 50% — even as mayoral agencies spend only 5% of the City’s $20 billion procurement budget with M/WBEs; and
- Appointing a Chief Diversity Officer empowered to ensure the City utilizes diverse suppliers, institutes equitable workplace policies, ensures diverse representation across mayoral appointments, implements true language access across city agencies, and launches a new generation of the City’s Local Law 1 M/WBE program.
To read the full Stringer economic recovery plan, click here.
Scott Stringer was born and raised in Washington Heights. He attended P.S. 152 on Nagle Avenue and I.S. 52 on Academy Street. He graduated from John F. Kennedy High School in Marble Hill and John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan, a CUNY school.
Stringer was elected City Comptroller in 2013. Prior to serving as Comptroller, he was Manhattan Borough President from 2006 to 2013 and represented the Upper West Side in the New York State Assembly from 1992 to 2005. He and his wife, Elyse Buxbaum, live in Manhattan with their two children, Max and Miles.
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