Q&A
Discussion on utility costs and affordability of cooling for low-income households
1:41:38
·
60 sec
Deputy Commissioner Joffe and Council Member Restler discuss the challenges of utility costs and affordability of cooling for low-income households in New York City.
- Joffe confirms that the problem of limited cooling access is concentrated in low-income communities, particularly communities of color.
- They highlight that beyond the 10% without access to cooling, there's a significant portion of households not using their air conditioners due to utility costs.
- The discussion emphasizes the need to address both access to cooling devices and the ability to afford running them as part of a comprehensive solution.
Lucy Joffe
1:41:38
I mean, I think just logically based on how we see other trends playing out, yes.
1:41:41
I just don't know that we have it at the subborough level through the HVS, so that's why I hesitated.
1:41:48
But absolutely, this is a problem of, resources and we see this, absolutely concentrated in low income communities, particularly communities of color.
1:41:58
What we found to be particularly concerning
Pierina Sanchez
1:41:59
and striking is that in addition to that 10%, which we're not minimizing in a in
Lucy Joffe
1:41:59
a big city like, 10%, which we're not minimizing in a in a big city like this, that is a lot of households, is that there's an additional big chunk
Pierina Sanchez
1:42:04
of people
Lucy Joffe
1:42:05
or of households who are not running the air conditioner that they have because they cannot afford, the cost of utilities.
1:42:17
And so to us, that is that has been the limiting factor in some of the city's previous efforts, to address this problem and it's something that we wanna make sure really is handled as part of, this broader effort.
1:42:29
As you said, I I hear you to be saying, let's handle 1 and then the other.
1:42:32
We wanna really make sure that we're thinking about these and we can talk about what how the timeline makes sense here.
Lincoln Restler
1:42:37
Just to give a sense, the number of people who don't have access to air conditioners in New York City, that's more than the total populations of Washington, DC, Nashville, Denver, Seattle, San Francisco.
