Art Chang (D)

Women’s Leadership
How will you ensure that women’s participation and leadership are fully integrated across New York City government and that every decision made is considered through an anti-racist, gender-focused lens?

Make City Hall a workplace environment that supports and includes women from all walks of life, ensuring family supportive workplaces, protecting against discrimination in hiring, firing, and pay, and curating a safe space for women in all working environments.

My City Hall will commit to complete gender equity, and commit to transparency to ensure we’re held accountable, including:

Taking a cue from Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, I will work to implement a system, similar to MyVoiceLA, for government workers in any office to be able to submit tips, anonymously or not, and to provide these victims with resources such as information regarding their rights and possible next steps.
An annual audit of pay of all City employees to ensure equal pay, and to right the wrongs where we discover women were not receiving equal pay
I will commit to at least 50% of Mayoral appointments to leadership positions being women.
I will commit to appointing a woman as Police Commissioner.
Affordable and Safe Housing
Some women and families live in New York City’s homeless shelters for over a year because they cannot find safe, affordable places to live with the current rate of NYC rental subsidy. As mayor, how will you address this reality and help families build their lives outside of the shelter system?

We view the eviction crisis as a proxy for the size of the true need for low-income housing. Increasing the low income housing supply will lower housing costs for everyone. We have the largest plan to increase housing construction since the Post-WWII era. By increasing the supply of low income housing across the board, we will achieve greater affordability for everyone.

First, increase the City’s portfolio of developable land:
Start with a creative approach to re-assessing City property ownership including underutilized property like parking lots, air rights including air rights over roads and rail yards. Seek use changes to increase density. The City’s 18 golf courses represent significant development opportunities, starting with the Trump course in the Bronx. Then, build a massive amount of low-income housing units.

How will we pay for it? Through my re-distribution of the City Budget, as described in my REBOOT CITY HALL policy.

Pursue creative approaches to lowering development costs, including the costs for construction.
Give current NYCHA residents the first right to new housing.
Collect and publish data to demonstrate performance on all issues related to housing.
Finally, facilitate the conversion of underutilized office space in commercial buildings to residential and other uses, including arts uses.

Fair Wages
While all women continue to earn less on average than men in New York City, women of color and immigrants, who are more likely to work in low-paid jobs in the public and private sectors, face significantly larger gaps and higher poverty rates. What are your plans for eliminating these disparities in New York City?

Whether through government or private sector jobs, the discriminatory working conditions and pay that women receive is no longer acceptable. In 2019, women were earning only 83% of weekly wages that their male counterparts were making.

On top of this, we are now over a year into a deadly pandemic where women and minorities have been hit the hardest by unemployment and the need for caregiving. 3 million women have left the workforce since the COVID shutdown, while more have been forced out due to cutbacks.

I’ll do everything in the City’s power to hold the private sector accountable for gender inequity as well. The Mayor’s Office of Minority and Women-owned Business Enterprises needs to be revamped and refocused to support women and minorities who want to pursue the American dream and start their own businesses. While the creation of this office was a step in the right direction, it has failed to meet its objectives. I will reboot the system to:

Run on a user-friendly website where women & minority business owners can register and share resources and information.
Build an Entrepreneur Corps of business leaders to create mentorship programs for women business owners in topics such as marketing, managing, etc. for women to gain more literacy into the business world and gain the tools necessary to create their businesses in this community.
Streamline the process of permits, inspections, & licenses to make New York City the best place to start a business.
Create new business incubators for startup entrepreneurs to streamline the process of starting, obtaining permits and qualifying for MWBE status and to provide technical assistance to promote business survival and sustainability.
Hire new Procurement Officers in order to streamline the process for women-owned businesses in New York City to be brought into the City’s vendor system. With work contracted by the City, it will be easier for women to advance their businesses.

In addition to holding businesses accountable, the City should also provide support to businesses — especially small businesses and women & minority-owned businesses — to help them get back on their feet post-COVID equitably.

While many have been left hurting over the last year, there were 10% fewer BIPOC women employed in the workforce. As BIPOC women are more likely employed in the service, hospitality, and leisure industries, they were hit hard by the pandemic as they were no longer able to perform this labor. We now need to pick up these pieces and create more of a safety net for these vulnerable communities, such as an endorsement for raising the minimum wage, expanding NY’s paid leave for family and sick days, and universal childcare. In addition, we need to implement financial literacy programs and work programs aimed at raising women out of poverty and welfare.

Accessible Caregiving
This pandemic has exacerbated the big holes in our caregiving systems, including childcare and long-term care. How do you propose addressing these issues and creating a fair and equitable system both for families and the caregiving workforce?

Universal Childcare is my signature issue for children 1 to 4 years old, 8am-6pm, 12 months per year with a goal of a center within a 15 minute walk of every family.

Before COVID, fewer than 10% of families could afford childcare, leaving women to fill the gap at a tremendous cost to their own potential and well being. During COVID, the demand has only grown while the supply has shrunk, forcing women to choose between jobs and caregiving. In December 2020 alone, women lost 140,000 jobs, while men gained 16,000 jobs.

Universal Childcare levels the playing field between men and women at its most basic level by opening access to a critical service with clear benefits.

Lifting All Boats:

Makes available to all a service previously only accessible to the affluent
Women can work, study, care for elders and those with physical challenges
Children will start from a more level playing field
Strengthening Communities:

Reinforcing our ties to each other
Childcare centers can serve as a conduit to community-based services
Deepens at-home relationships between parents and children — provides parents with the equipment to support their children in emotional/psychological development with reduced stress and pressure
Potential to prioritize introducing to children how to take care of the planet and each other; introduce them to ideas of race and class at an early age and teach them how to be compassionate
Creating Jobs:

Especially for women, one of the hardest hit in the COVID crisis
Women can return to work or education
Huge new employment opportunity for caregivers, providing living wages and healthcare to women who work in childcare, allowing them the possibility to bring their own children to their workplace for care as well
Caring for the Family:

Reducing stress and making room for other responsibilities
Childcare centers can serve as a community center for maternal and women’s health, early childhood education and health, economic supports, and annual vaccine distribution

Ending Gender-Based Violence
There has been a significant uptick in reports of sexual harassment and violence against women and gender expansive people during the pandemic. What is your plan to address gender-based violence in New York City in both the private and public sectors?

We can’t just think about how to help women after violence has been committed against them; we have to try to stop violence against women in the first place. My policy positions on everything from housing, to small businesses, to affordability and food insecurity, education, and more will help create healthier communities. These healthier communities will be able to better address causes of abuse and violence by reducing societal stress. Additionally, my City Hall will partner with communities, CBOs, and non-profits to address violence against women with the individual needs of each community in mind.

Police have a long history of mishandling hate crimes against women, including incidents of racial, sexual, and domestic violence. We must introduce understanding, respect, and humanity into our justice system so that women feel safe and supported when reporting violence of any kind.

As Mayor, I will have the power to appoint a police commissioner who pledges to fix the broken reporting system that we currently have, and will use the power of the Mayor’s office to work with District Attorneys to extend these measures to their offices as well. These measures include:

Mandatory sensitivity training for police officers, ADAs, and any officials who handle victims of gender-based and sexual violence
Instituting a “Know Your Rights” intake process, in which victims are educated on the criminal & civil justice systems and are informed of their rights and legal options before they are asked to make any formal reports – in their preferred language
Expansion and better marketing and management of the Office of Victims’ Services to support victims of gender-based violence
Building a system to manage complaints against police officers, ADAs, and any officials who mishandle domestic violence or sexual violence cases

Education
Cities across the country, including several in New York, have begun to take steps to remove police from schools. As mayor, would you remove police from schools in New York City, and if so, would you reinvest the money toward educational programs and support resources?

As a parent and member of the School Leadership Team at Brooklyn Tech, I’ve personally seen School Safety Officers prevent violent physical assaults of school faculty. This resource is important to keep our teachers and students safe in the case of physical altercations only. We will remove all armed officers from schools, but keep unarmed School Safety Officers, whose exclusive duty is to ensure physical safety for students and teachers, and ensure unauthorized individuals do not enter our schools. Additionally, we would at minimum double the number of guidance counselors in our schools, and mental health crises would fall exclusively under the purview of guidance counselors and mental health professionals — not the School Safety Officers.

Maternal Health
How will you use city agencies, the budget, and your role as a public figure to address the crisis of maternal mortality and specifically the disproportionate impact on Black women in NYC?

For far too long, Black women have been dying at disproportionate rates during childbirth and have faced unconscionable discrimination from our healthcare system.

Our city must count the data on racial disparities in our health system, especially for black women. The maternal mortality rate and race disparities in maternity care are a disgrace — my administration will not stand for it, and will work with the City’s health institutions to identify the problems causing this disparity and fix them, with a data-driven approach to pinpoint problems and measure success at solving the problems.

Use data to locate the areas where we have the highest rates of maternal mortality, children born prematurely, pregnancy complications, and complaints about maternity ward service
Create a team under the DOH that will investigate and plan for solutions
Provide funding to support the recommended solutions, including expanding access to holistic maternal care, such as doulas & midwives; building Birthing Centers separate from hospitals to quickly increase the amount of care available; supporting midwife & doula training programs at CUNY and other public institutions.

Legal Justice
Low income New York City families, many headed by single mothers, continue to be impacted negatively by the lack of early civil legal representation in their interaction with City entities, such as the Administration for Children’s Services and Family Court. How would you reform the NYC civil justice system so that all NYC families have access to timely, competent legal assistance to protect their families, homes and livelihoods?

The existing Mayor’s Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence, which is currently closed due to the pandemic, must be reopened. Then, the assistance that it currently provides must be increased drastically by hiring more counselors, legal aid, and resources for safety. The City must also take responsibility to expand and better equip our women’s shelters in order to meet the needs of the city, and must have stronger oversight measures to prevent abuse while women and children stay in these shelters.

These questions and the responses from this candidate belong to PowHer and are being shared with their permission. More information can be found at: https://amayorfornycwomen.org/art-chang/

Replies

Emily VanVleck June 10, 2021 at 2:58pm

Women’s Leadership
How will you ensure that women’s participation and leadership are fully integrated across New York City government and that every decision made is considered through an anti-racist, gender-focused lens?

Make City Hall a workplace environment that supports and includes women from all walks of life, ensuring family supportive workplaces, protecting against discrimination in hiring, firing, and pay, and curating a safe space for women in all working environments.

My City Hall will commit to complete gender equity, and commit to transparency to ensure we’re held accountable, including:

Taking a cue from Mayor Eric Garcetti of Los Angeles, I will work to implement a system, similar to MyVoiceLA, for government workers in any office to be able to submit tips, anonymously or not, and to provide these victims with resources such as information regarding their rights and possible next steps.
An annual audit of pay of all City employees to ensure equal pay, and to right the wrongs where we discover women were not receiving equal pay
I will commit to at least 50% of Mayoral appointments to leadership positions being women.
I will commit to appointing a woman as Police Commissioner.
Affordable and Safe Housing
Some women and families live in New York City’s homeless shelters for over a year because they cannot find safe, affordable places to live with the current rate of NYC rental subsidy. As mayor, how will you address this reality and help families build their lives outside of the shelter system?

We view the eviction crisis as a proxy for the size of the true need for low-income housing. Increasing the low income housing supply will lower housing costs for everyone. We have the largest plan to increase housing construction since the Post-WWII era. By increasing the supply of low income housing across the board, we will achieve greater affordability for everyone.

First, increase the City’s portfolio of developable land:
Start with a creative approach to re-assessing City property ownership including underutilized property like parking lots, air rights including air rights over roads and rail yards. Seek use changes to increase density. The City’s 18 golf courses represent significant development opportunities, starting with the Trump course in the Bronx. Then, build a massive amount of low-income housing units.

How will we pay for it? Through my re-distribution of the City Budget, as described in my REBOOT CITY HALL policy.

Pursue creative approaches to lowering development costs, including the costs for construction.
Give current NYCHA residents the first right to new housing.
Collect and publish data to demonstrate performance on all issues related to housing.
Finally, facilitate the conversion of underutilized office space in commercial buildings to residential and other uses, including arts uses.

Fair Wages
While all women continue to earn less on average than men in New York City, women of color and immigrants, who are more likely to work in low-paid jobs in the public and private sectors, face significantly larger gaps and higher poverty rates. What are your plans for eliminating these disparities in New York City?

Whether through government or private sector jobs, the discriminatory working conditions and pay that women receive is no longer acceptable. In 2019, women were earning only 83% of weekly wages that their male counterparts were making.

On top of this, we are now over a year into a deadly pandemic where women and minorities have been hit the hardest by unemployment and the need for caregiving. 3 million women have left the workforce since the COVID shutdown, while more have been forced out due to cutbacks.

I’ll do everything in the City’s power to hold the private sector accountable for gender inequity as well. The Mayor’s Office of Minority and Women-owned Business Enterprises needs to be revamped and refocused to support women and minorities who want to pursue the American dream and start their own businesses. While the creation of this office was a step in the right direction, it has failed to meet its objectives. I will reboot the system to:

Run on a user-friendly website where women & minority business owners can register and share resources and information.
Build an Entrepreneur Corps of business leaders to create mentorship programs for women business owners in topics such as marketing, managing, etc. for women to gain more literacy into the business world and gain the tools necessary to create their businesses in this community.
Streamline the process of permits, inspections, & licenses to make New York City the best place to start a business.
Create new business incubators for startup entrepreneurs to streamline the process of starting, obtaining permits and qualifying for MWBE status and to provide technical assistance to promote business survival and sustainability.
Hire new Procurement Officers in order to streamline the process for women-owned businesses in New York City to be brought into the City’s vendor system. With work contracted by the City, it will be easier for women to advance their businesses.

In addition to holding businesses accountable, the City should also provide support to businesses — especially small businesses and women & minority-owned businesses — to help them get back on their feet post-COVID equitably.

While many have been left hurting over the last year, there were 10% fewer BIPOC women employed in the workforce. As BIPOC women are more likely employed in the service, hospitality, and leisure industries, they were hit hard by the pandemic as they were no longer able to perform this labor. We now need to pick up these pieces and create more of a safety net for these vulnerable communities, such as an endorsement for raising the minimum wage, expanding NY’s paid leave for family and sick days, and universal childcare. In addition, we need to implement financial literacy programs and work programs aimed at raising women out of poverty and welfare.

Accessible Caregiving
This pandemic has exacerbated the big holes in our caregiving systems, including childcare and long-term care. How do you propose addressing these issues and creating a fair and equitable system both for families and the caregiving workforce?

Universal Childcare is my signature issue for children 1 to 4 years old, 8am-6pm, 12 months per year with a goal of a center within a 15 minute walk of every family.

Before COVID, fewer than 10% of families could afford childcare, leaving women to fill the gap at a tremendous cost to their own potential and well being. During COVID, the demand has only grown while the supply has shrunk, forcing women to choose between jobs and caregiving. In December 2020 alone, women lost 140,000 jobs, while men gained 16,000 jobs.

Universal Childcare levels the playing field between men and women at its most basic level by opening access to a critical service with clear benefits.

Lifting All Boats:

Makes available to all a service previously only accessible to the affluent
Women can work, study, care for elders and those with physical challenges
Children will start from a more level playing field
Strengthening Communities:

Reinforcing our ties to each other
Childcare centers can serve as a conduit to community-based services
Deepens at-home relationships between parents and children — provides parents with the equipment to support their children in emotional/psychological development with reduced stress and pressure
Potential to prioritize introducing to children how to take care of the planet and each other; introduce them to ideas of race and class at an early age and teach them how to be compassionate
Creating Jobs:

Especially for women, one of the hardest hit in the COVID crisis
Women can return to work or education
Huge new employment opportunity for caregivers, providing living wages and healthcare to women who work in childcare, allowing them the possibility to bring their own children to their workplace for care as well
Caring for the Family:

Reducing stress and making room for other responsibilities
Childcare centers can serve as a community center for maternal and women’s health, early childhood education and health, economic supports, and annual vaccine distribution

Ending Gender-Based Violence
There has been a significant uptick in reports of sexual harassment and violence against women and gender expansive people during the pandemic. What is your plan to address gender-based violence in New York City in both the private and public sectors?

We can’t just think about how to help women after violence has been committed against them; we have to try to stop violence against women in the first place. My policy positions on everything from housing, to small businesses, to affordability and food insecurity, education, and more will help create healthier communities. These healthier communities will be able to better address causes of abuse and violence by reducing societal stress. Additionally, my City Hall will partner with communities, CBOs, and non-profits to address violence against women with the individual needs of each community in mind.

Police have a long history of mishandling hate crimes against women, including incidents of racial, sexual, and domestic violence. We must introduce understanding, respect, and humanity into our justice system so that women feel safe and supported when reporting violence of any kind.

As Mayor, I will have the power to appoint a police commissioner who pledges to fix the broken reporting system that we currently have, and will use the power of the Mayor’s office to work with District Attorneys to extend these measures to their offices as well. These measures include:

Mandatory sensitivity training for police officers, ADAs, and any officials who handle victims of gender-based and sexual violence
Instituting a “Know Your Rights” intake process, in which victims are educated on the criminal & civil justice systems and are informed of their rights and legal options before they are asked to make any formal reports – in their preferred language
Expansion and better marketing and management of the Office of Victims’ Services to support victims of gender-based violence
Building a system to manage complaints against police officers, ADAs, and any officials who mishandle domestic violence or sexual violence cases

Education
Cities across the country, including several in New York, have begun to take steps to remove police from schools. As mayor, would you remove police from schools in New York City, and if so, would you reinvest the money toward educational programs and support resources?

As a parent and member of the School Leadership Team at Brooklyn Tech, I’ve personally seen School Safety Officers prevent violent physical assaults of school faculty. This resource is important to keep our teachers and students safe in the case of physical altercations only. We will remove all armed officers from schools, but keep unarmed School Safety Officers, whose exclusive duty is to ensure physical safety for students and teachers, and ensure unauthorized individuals do not enter our schools. Additionally, we would at minimum double the number of guidance counselors in our schools, and mental health crises would fall exclusively under the purview of guidance counselors and mental health professionals — not the School Safety Officers.

Maternal Health
How will you use city agencies, the budget, and your role as a public figure to address the crisis of maternal mortality and specifically the disproportionate impact on Black women in NYC?

For far too long, Black women have been dying at disproportionate rates during childbirth and have faced unconscionable discrimination from our healthcare system.

Our city must count the data on racial disparities in our health system, especially for black women. The maternal mortality rate and race disparities in maternity care are a disgrace — my administration will not stand for it, and will work with the City’s health institutions to identify the problems causing this disparity and fix them, with a data-driven approach to pinpoint problems and measure success at solving the problems.

Use data to locate the areas where we have the highest rates of maternal mortality, children born prematurely, pregnancy complications, and complaints about maternity ward service
Create a team under the DOH that will investigate and plan for solutions
Provide funding to support the recommended solutions, including expanding access to holistic maternal care, such as doulas & midwives; building Birthing Centers separate from hospitals to quickly increase the amount of care available; supporting midwife & doula training programs at CUNY and other public institutions.

Legal Justice
Low income New York City families, many headed by single mothers, continue to be impacted negatively by the lack of early civil legal representation in their interaction with City entities, such as the Administration for Children’s Services and Family Court. How would you reform the NYC civil justice system so that all NYC families have access to timely, competent legal assistance to protect their families, homes and livelihoods?

The existing Mayor’s Office to End Domestic and Gender-Based Violence, which is currently closed due to the pandemic, must be reopened. Then, the assistance that it currently provides must be increased drastically by hiring more counselors, legal aid, and resources for safety. The City must also take responsibility to expand and better equip our women’s shelters in order to meet the needs of the city, and must have stronger oversight measures to prevent abuse while women and children stay in these shelters.

These questions and the responses from this candidate belong to PowHer and are being shared with their permission. More information can be found at: https://amayorfornycwomen.org/art-chang/
Emily VanVleck May 14, 2021 at 11:13am

Art Chang, a Yale University Women's Studies graduate, believes that in order to bridge the gender gap we need universal childcare. From his own website:

Before COVID, fewer than 10% of families could afford childcare, leaving women to fill the gap at a tremendous cost to their own potential and well being. During COVID, the demand has only grown while the supply has shrunk, forcing women to choose between jobs and caregiving. In December 2020 alone, women lost 140,000 jobs, while men gained 16,000 jobs. And as we see all around us among our friends and family: a pandemic baby boomlet is about to hit.

By providing universal childcare, women are free to work or go to school. This is also helpful for those in the childcare industry as it provides better wages and benefits. Chang also plans to renovate the City's procurement process to include more MWBE.

This reply was deleted.

Mayoral Candidates Forum

Art Chang (D)

The only option is a fair, equitable, just, and clean recovery.

Revitalize small businesses.

Replies