January
Mayor Eric Adams has filed a US$708 million lawsuit against 17 charter bus and transportation companies in Texas. The lawsuit seeks to recover all costs New York City has incurred in providing emergency shelter and services to Caribbean and other migrants transported to New York City by the charter bus companies in the last twenty months.
Many of the migrant and asylum seekers arriving in New York from the Southern Border of the United States are nationals of Cuba, Haiti, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.
Last week, Adams issued an executive order restricting how buses of asylum seekers being sent by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott could arrive in New York City.
Since the spring of 2022, Adams said Abbott has admitted to facilitating the transport of more than 33,600 migrants to New York City without having the companies transporting those migrants pay for continued care in violation of New York’s Social Services Law.
The mayor told a press conference that the lawsuit seeks to recoup the hundreds of millions of dollars incurred to care for all these individuals, costs moving forward for any of those migrants still in New York City’s care, and costs for all those who are transported to New York City from Texas in the future as part of Governor Abbott’s plan.
February
Brooklyn Democratic State Sen. Zellnor Y. Myrie on Tuesday today joined colleagues, healthcare workers, and labor leaders in a massive rally in Albany urging Gov. Kathy Hochul and State University of New York (SUNY) Chancellor John B. King, Jr. to reverse course on the proposed closure of SUNY Downstate Hospital in Central Brooklyn.
“Our community, our people, walked past refrigerators with dead people in them; we had doctors who had heart attacks, and you have the temerity to tell us you want us to go; how dear you!” Myrie, whose grandmother hailed from Jamaica and who represents the 20th Senate District in Central Brooklyn, told the vociferous rally in Albany.
“We want you to serve,’ and we serve; and, for that, we get a slap in the face,” added Myrie, flanked by colleagues, healthcare workers, and labor leaders. “When I had COVID, Downstate saved my life, and you tell us Downstate has to close.”
“We reject this plan!” he declared. “And don’t come to Central Brooklyn for votes because this is an election cycle. You will hear from us until justice is done.”
March
New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced last Thursday a US $741 million investment in an estimated 80,000 human services workers employed by non-profit organizations with a city contract as part of a new cost-of-living adjustment (COLA).
The mayor said the human services workforce—which is overwhelmingly female, with 66 % women and 46% women of color—remains on the frontlines of the city’s most pressing issues as it delivers vital services across housing, food access, health services, and asylum seeker services, among other areas.
The Adams administration’s investment in a new COLA represents a critical step towards delivering pay equity across race and gender for a workforce that provides lifesaving services across the city.
With Thursday’s announcement, the administration has invested over $1.4 billion in wage enhancements for the human services sector to date.
“When things get tough, we must invest in our most valued asset: the people who are on the frontlines solving the most pressing issues facing our city,” said Mayor Adams.
April
Dr. Lisa Millsaps-Graham – who, with her husband, Hashim Muhammad-Graham, P.E., on Saturday coordinated a College and Vocational Career Fair in conjunction with the Brooklyn Canarsie Lions College and Vocational Career Planning team – says that the event “showcased a concerted effort to address the growing wealth gap in Brooklyn communities.”
Dr. Millsaps-Graham told Caribbean Life on Tuesday that the event, held at P.S. 227 on East 83rd Street in Canarsie, Brooklyn, was themed “Advancing My Future.”
She said the initiative, “keenly supported” by Brooklyn Canarsie Lions Club President Jean Joseph, “aimed to raise awareness, elevate, and equip neighbors with the necessary tools to secure and sustain personal and generational wealth through higher education and career advancement.”
“Despite enthusiastic responses from hundreds of Eventbrite registrants, who resonated with the vision through flyers, advertisements, or personal invitations, the event saw a turnout of only 25 %,” Dr. Millsaps-Graham said. “Those attendees were treated to a rich and diverse program.”
She said the event featured over 40 vendor tables, representing institutions such as the State University of New York (SUNY), the City University of New York (CUNY), Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), private colleges, trade schools, and vocational alternatives, “catering to a wide range of educational aspirations.”
May
The New York For All coalition, elected officials, community members, and allies on Tuesday rallied and held a press conference at the Million Dollar Staircase to call for the passage of the New York For All Act (S987 Gounardes / A5686 Reyes).
The coalition said all New Yorkers, regardless of immigration status, want to lead open lives, participate in their communities, and provide for their family without intimidation.
The New York for All Act offers protections that help make this possible by prohibiting all local law enforcement and state agencies from conspiring with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) or participating in its cruelty.
“With only weeks left of the legislative session and the looming 2024 presidential election, it’s more critical than ever to enact New York for All to protect our communities and keep families together,” the coalition said.
“With the ‘New York for All’ Act, we have an opportunity to protect immigrant communities, create a fairer justice system, and ensure true public safety for all,” said State Sen. Andrew Gounardes. “By prohibiting local law enforcement from conspiring with ICE and Border Patrol, we allow parents to attend parent-teacher conferences, go to the grocery store, or visit public hospitals without worrying their family will be torn apart by deportation.”
June
Jamaican-American lawyer Janice Robinson won in a massive landslide one of two Civil Court Judge seats in Brooklyn’s 6th Municipal Court District in the New York Democratic Primary on Tuesday night, beating fellow Jamaican-American lawyer Kenneth Gayle in the two-way race.
According to the New York City Board of Elections, with 98.51 percent of scanners reported, Robinson received 10,820 votes, or 72.27 percent, to Gayle’s 3,910 votes, or 26.12 percent. There were 241 write-in ballots, or 1.61 %.
Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn resident Robinson, who has been a civil litigator for over 20 years, told Caribbean Life that she brings “a wealth of experience to the table.”
A lifelong Brooklynite, Robinson was born to immigrant parents from Jamaica. She said she got her first taste of public service work when she was “volun-TOLD” to help on her uncle’s campaign in the 58th Assembly District in Brooklyn. Her uncle, former New York State Assembly Member Nick Perry, is now the United States Ambassador to Jamaica.
Robinson said she is also “service-minded” and gives back to the community both through her work and as a member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., the first Black sorority.
As a civil litigator in Brooklyn, working for major insurance companies for over twenty years, Robinson said she has seen the bench’s demographics slowly changing to become more diverse.
“The bench should strive to reflect those that appear before it,” she said.
July
After leaving her post on May 31 as the city’s top lawyer, Barbadian-born former New York City Corporation Counsel Sylvia Hinds-Radix shared with Caribbean Life a farewell email she had written to staffers.
“For over two years, I have had the honor of serving as the 81st Corporation Counsel,” said Justice Hinds-Radix. “Leading one of the finest law offices in the country and contributing to the betterment of the city has been the privilege of a lifetime.”
During her City Council confirmation hearing, she recalled that she had pledged to uphold the mission of the office, “which is to protect and defend the interests of the City of New York.
“Together, we have fulfilled that promise with excellence and integrity,” she said, stating that a main priority during her tenure was to strengthen the office “to help us more effectively carry out its mission.”
Justice Hinds-Radix said that she was gratified that, after extensive efforts advocating for the department, she and staffers had secured and implemented salary and merit pay increases to address significant retention and hiring issues.
“The program we created to invest in our bar exam retakers has been phenomenally successful,” she said. “It has substantially increased pass rates and provided additional attorneys for the office.”
She said creating two new legal divisions — Ethics & Compliance and Risk Management — fortified the office’s capabilities and provided additional resources for all city agencies.
August
The two most powerful Democrats in the United States Congress last Tuesday endorsed Caribbean-American Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party nominee for President.
US Senate Majority Leader Charles “Chuck” Schumer and US House of Representatives Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, both New York Democrats, endorsed Harris, the daughter of retired Jamaican-born economist Dr. Donald Harris.
“Vice President Harris has done a truly impressive job securing the majority of delegates needed to win the Democratic nomination,” said Schumer at a joint, nationally-televised news conference with Jeffries in Washington. “So now that the process has played out, from the grass roots, bottom up, we are here today to throw our support behind Vice President Kamala Harris.”
Schumer said that when he spoke with Harris, she said: “She wanted the opportunity to win the nomination on her own and to do so from the grassroots up, not top down.”
Jeffries, whose 8th Congressional District in New York encompasses a large concentration of Caribbean nationals in Brooklyn and Queens, said Harris’s candidacy has “excited and energized the House Democratic Caucus, the Democratic Party, and the nation.
“She is ready, she is willing, she is able to energetically and emphatically lead America into the future,” he said.
September
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and the Brooklyn-based West Indian American Day Carnival Association (WIADCA), organizer of the gigantic Carnival Parade on Brooklyn’s Eastern Parkway, have strongly condemned the shooting at the extravaganza on Labor Day Monday.
“The West Indian American Day Parade is a joyous event that celebrates the multitude of cultures and diversity in our city. But instead of allowing all to enjoy a momentous occasion for our city, a gunman turned today’s celebration into tragedy when he senselessly fired into the crowd, hitting multiple revelers,” said Adams and WIADCA New President Roger Archibald, an attorney, in a joint statement Monday night.
“The NYPD is investigating this incident, and we are grateful for the brave men and women who quickly responded and helped to ensure New Yorkers could continue to be safe while celebrating,” they added.
“While we are keeping the victims and their families in our prayers as they fight to recover, we know we must do more to combat gun violence and ensure the safety of every New Yorker and visitor,” Adams and Archibald continued.
On Tuesday, the New York Police Department (NYPD) said that one man died after an unidentified gunman opened fire on spectators almost at the end of the 57th Annual West Indian American Day Carnival Parade on Eastern Parkway in Brooklyn.
The NYPD said at least five people were shot and wounded at Classon Avenue and Eastern Parkway in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn.
The NYPD said 25-year-old Denzel Chan, of Texas, died at the sprawling Kings County Hospital in the heart of the Caribbean community in Brooklyn after being shot in the stomach by the assailant, who remains at large.
The New York Caribbean Carnival Week, which started on Thursday, culminated on Monday, Labor Day, a public holiday in the United States, with the grand parade of masqueraders, with large and small costumes, displaying the culture of the Caribbean, along a 3 ½-mile route on Eastern Parkway, a major thoroughfare, starting at Buffalo Avenue and ending at Grand Army Plaza and Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn.
WIADCA said over three million spectators, largely behind police barricades, were expected to view and celebrate 57 years of Caribbean culture, cuisine, programs, contribution, mas, steel band music, and much more.
October
Brooklyn Assembly Member Monique Chandler-Waterman and the 58th Assembly District Safety and Mental Health Taskforce have joined the Transport Workers Union Local 100 (TWU), stakeholders and leaders in rallying for stronger safety measures for Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA) workers following the recent stabbing of train conductor Myran Pollack who was critically injured and currently remains in critical care.
Chandler-Waterman, the daughter of Jamaican and Barbadian immigrants and representative of the 58th Assembly District in Brooklyn, said on Tuesday that this incident occurred along the #3 and #4 lines at the Utica Avenue Station in Crown Heights, Brooklyn.
“This incident highlighted the need to continue activating continued mental health programming and measures to support impacted individuals and deeper implementation of enhanced safety actions designed to create safer working environments and protective measures of all of New York’s public service workers every day,” she said.
“As a strong advocate for safety, we have worked tirelessly with the community to carry out strong legislation in Albany to support our public service workers statewide,” she added, stating that she sponsored legislation A6455 to ensure the prohibition of the operation of New York City Transit Authority subways or trains without at least one conductor on board, along with the train operator.
“This action would require a conductor on any subway or train operated by such authority whenever the subway or train has more than two cars attached to the engine,” Chandler-Waterman continued.
From the community front, she said she has done “extensive work” to highlight a special 988 Suicide & Crisis Hotline in partnership with the New York State Office of Mental Health “to connect to trained crisis counselors 24/7, which was amplified by Link NYC.”
Additionally, the Assembly Member said she has done “extensive work” to enhance Mental Health clinics in schools for everyone.
November
The Caribbean-American community in New York early Wednesday expressed profound disappointment and frustration over the election of Donald Trump as the 47th president of the United States.
Trump, the 45th US president, defeated Caribbean-American US Vice President Kamala Harris, the daughter of Jamaican-born retired economist Dr. Donald Harris, in the hotly contested race on Tuesday night.
The former President, among other things, survived a criminal conviction, indictments, assassination attempt, and charges of authoritarianism in securing the requisite swing states—including Georgia, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania—and won 277 Electoral College votes to reclaim the US presidency. Harris received 224 Electoral College votes.
“It’s very disappointing,” Guyanese-born New York State Sen. Roxanne Persaud told the Caribbean Life. “The bottom line is America is not ready for a woman president. She’s (Kamala Harris) the best qualified.
“It’s misogyny; it’s a shame,” added Persaud, who represents the 19th Senate District in Brooklyn, about Harris’s defeat in Tuesday’s US Presidential Elections. “We have work to do. We’ll never give up.
“In terms of moral compass, I don’t think they (Trump and his Republican surrogates) have any,” she continued. “When someone can talk about such evil and reward him, it’s sad.
“A woman has to jump through all the hoops and still don’t get elected,” Persaud said. “His (Trump) surrogates are speaking what he wants them to speak. He said he’s going to send immigrants home; it’s the immigrants who are babysitting their children, etc.”
Delroy Wright, a Jamaican-born community activist in Flatbush, Brooklyn, said he was in disbelief about the elections’ result.
“I can’t believe it,” he told Caribbean Life. “America has voted for a man who only uses only sound bites and has no comprehensive plan on how he’s going to lead this country. He uses sound bites such as’ immigrants are poisoning the blood of America; they’re taking Black jobs; Kamala is not Black.’
“I can’t understand how America can fall for that,” Wright added. “The economy is clearly good. Kamala has put forward a clear plan of what she would do for America and even put forward how we would pay for them.
“Come Jan. 20, 2025 (Inauguration Day), he will again inherit a good economy, based on all the standard measurements, and I predict he’s going to ‘tank’ that also,” he said.
Benjamin Pinczewski, a Brooklyn-based lawyer active in the Caribbean-American community and supports several Caribbean elected officials, said he was “very frustrated, disappointed, disgusted and downhearted” with Trump’s victory.
“I’m very disappointed, but I’m not surprised,” he said. “I think White America was enraged over the fact that Obama was elected President, and they never got over it.
“I blame Joe Biden (current US President) and the fact that he was clearly significantly impaired but refused to step aside until it was too late (to make ways for Harris) – unfair to Kamala and to America,” Pinczewski added. “Never underestimate the hatred so many of our fellow Americans have for people they perceive as ‘different.'”
Martin Felix, a Grenadian-born adjunct college professor in New York and public school teacher in Brooklyn, warned, “It’s going to be a long, cold winter – a metaphor for the four years approaching.
“I think the polls were showing a closer race than what actually transpired,” said Felix, an executive member of the Brooklyn-based group Caribbean-Americans United in Support of Kamala Harris for President. “I believe that was because people had cognitive dissonance (mentally conflicted).
Sherrill-Ann Mason-Haywood, a Vincentian-born community worker in Brooklyn, said: “We were on the right side of history, but America has spoken loudly.
“As sad a day that this may be for us, we have real decisions to make,” she said. “America has sent a loud message about what it wants to preserve: its original principles. Let us never forget the ‘experiment that America was set up to be and that it annihilated the native peoples and brought enslaved people to bring its experiment to life. It is still in the business of annihilating and enslaving people.
“We need to either remain docile and accept the result, and deal with whatever the consequences, or start educating ourselves, unifying and consolidating our real power to build a different, more inclusive nation,” she added.
December
On Thursday, joined by colleagues and advocates in Southeast Queens, Sen. Zellnor Myrie (D-Central Brooklyn) urged New Yorkers to protect themselves from deed theft scams this holiday season.
Myrie said deed theft is a crime where homeowners can unknowingly lose the title to their property and that longtime Black and brown homeowners are especially vulnerable.
Myrie, representative for the 20th Senate District in Brooklyn, whose grandmother hailed from Jamaica, was joined by Assembly Member Alicia Hyndman (D-Queens) and Sen. Leroy Comrie (D-Queens), along with Lori Miller of Neighborhood Housing Services of Jamaica and Jay Inwald of Legal Services NYC.
“Deed theft is a pernicious crime that robs families of the wealth they’ve built and passed down for generations,” Myrie said. ‘Particularly in Black communities where property values have increased in recent years, scammers and fraudsters are on the lookout for ways to steal titles to our homes.
“While we recently passed new laws I sponsored to make deed theft easier to prosecute, all homeowners should be aware of these types of crimes and take action to protect themselves,” he added.
“Deed theft has been a persistent issue for homeowners in Southeast Queens and nearby communities, threatening the legacy of families who have invested so much into their homes,” Hyndman said.
“This year, we took meaningful steps to combat this injustice,” she added. “The State budget officially defines deed theft as a crime, limits how predatory investors can pressure homeowners to sell or take over inherited properties, and introduces stronger protections to keep New Yorkers in their homes.
