Local Groups Tasked With Protecting NYC Kids Faced With Risky Commutes

NEW YORK CITY — A Queens parent told Mayor Eric Adams Monday night that local kids heading to school face people who use drugs and defecate in front of them. Another parent told Adams she'd armed her daughter with pepper spray.

"There are many children and adults who carry something with them so that they can feel they can defend themselves," Tiffany Liu told the mayor. "We just feel that something's not right with this."

Both parents wanted to know one thing: what would the city do to keep their children safe?

Adams' response: Project Pivot, a new initiative that tasks local community groups with protecting students in 138 of New York City's 1,851 public schools.

"These are organizations which provide mentors, they provide safe passage to and from school, they provide tutors," Adams said. "It's a wide range of supports and services, something we're really excited about."

As promised, Adams and Chancellor David Banks unveiled Thursday their plan to connect community groups with local schools to provide extra help with safety, tutoring, mentorship and violence interruption services.

This announcement comes as New York faces up to a $373 million cut to its education budget, which critics say puts the future of the city's youngest citizens at risk.

An Education department spokesperson said the controversial cuts — tagged at between $215 million and $373 million — did not prompt education officials to reach outside the public sphere, as plans have been in the works for about a year.

The spokesperson declined to share a list of the schools or programs included.

Adams and Banks cast Project Pivot as a way to provide necessary community support for children at a crucial point in their development.

“It takes a village to raise a child,” Banks said. “Many of these organizations are going to provide a deeper level of safety in our schools."

And these of course are not the only safety measures the city provides.

Last month, Banks outlined plans to hire about 850 new school safety agents, invest $21 million in restorative justice programs, and launch a new platform to help schools alert parents to lockdowns, evacuations and emergencies, Chalkbeat reported at the time.

While many of these services focus on school premises, during the Monday safety meeting in Queens, Adams promised parents Project Pivot would also provide "safe passage" between home and school.

"That's part of what Chancellor Banks is talking about, what he's going to announce this week about Project Pivot," Adams said. "Creating those safe corridors."

Until then, the mayor urged parents to be proactive.

"Parents should walk the route of where their children go to and from school and identify safe zones for them," Adams said. "What store is on the route? What barbershop is on the route?

"We need to do those basic things to empower our children to know they have a safe place that they can go in route to school."