FAQ NYC

Breaking down another wild week in New York City, including that poll showing New Yorkers souring on Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul—and souring on the city even as they say things are actually going pretty well in their own neighborhoods.

When the New Yorker just isn't New York enough, you've come to the right pod…

Bradley Tusk looks at the Democrats playing musical chairs for their political lives, explains the cases for Andrew Yang and cryptocurrency, and shares the backstory behind P&T Knitware, his brand new bookstore, podcast studio, event space, and cafe on the Lower East Side.

A jam-packed episode for a jam-packed week of New York news, with Yoav Gonen of The City and Chris Sommerfeldt of the Daily News talking about all the candidates in Brooklyn who didn't even know they were on the ballot (including one candidate who isn't even alive), a dispatch from Alex Brook Lynn in Paris about sending formula across the Atlantic to frantic N.Y. moms, and Caroline Lewis of WNYC a...

For the 200th episode of FAQ NYC, a conversation about the Notorious B.I.G. and Brooklyn with Justin Tinsley, author of the new biography It Was All a Dream: Biggie and the World That Made Him.

Map master Steven Romalewski and penetrating politics reporter Brigid Bergin do their best to explain what the hell is happening with our upcoming election, where the maps are still being drawn and not even the dates, plural, for various contests aren't entirely certain. Plus, Nick Pinto of the brand-new NYC journalism venture Hell Gate breaks down his story there about the NYPD's Stonewalling Att...

Michael Daly recalls his friend Jack Maple, the maker of the maps that changed everything.

An awful lot of New York politicians end up going to prison but Assemblyman Eddie Gibbs, who spent 17 months in Rikers as a teen followed by four and a half years in state prisons, is the first to do it the other way around. He joins the pod for a conversation about that, "the bad old days" and the state of the city now, and rapping and performing comedy with legends including the late Big L and B...

A conversation from early Wednesday afternoon, before Frank James' arrest, about the train shooting and also Brian Benjamin' resignation.

Josefa Velasquez joins from Albany to break down the stop-and-start, hurry-up-and-wait path toward New York's forthcoming and already late $216 billion or so budget (and everything else) deal.

Jeff Mays of the New York Times breaks down Kathy Hochul's troubles with Black voters, and Craig McCarthy of the New York Post looks at what is, and ain't, new with the NYPD's neighborhood policing initiative, its anti-gun unit, and its quality of life enforcement push.

Chinese American Planning Council President and CEO Wayne Ho joins the pod to talk about what Albany can do to make the economics of this work for New York's aging population, and much more.

Elizabeth Glazer, the founder and co-editor of the new publication Vital City, joins the pod to talk about rising crime and the rising criminal justice reform tide in New York City, and what reformers can do to move past squishy root-causes rhetoric.

Prof. Christina Greer explains what makes Eric Adams like "a really good point guard" — and the Nets could use one for home games, by the way — and Amir Khafagy breaks down his reporting for Documented on how the city has let down the Twin Parks fire survivors now that they're no longer front-page news.

Super-reporter Greg B. Smith breaks down why Eric Adams' promise to remove the homeless from the trains "right away" has been going nowhere fast.

Alex Brook Lynn asks Katie Honan to walk us through a few of the top news items regarding our mayor in this past week in this shorter-than-usual FAQ episode. Katie gives our listeners some context for the Mayor's reaction to criticism over some of his controversial appointments and his interaction with the press, and we talk about the first few days of NYPD interaction and intervention with homele...

We have a real estate roundup with three of NYC's favorite reporters covering the subject: Rebecca Baird-Remba from Commercial Observer, Stefanos Chen from The New York Times, and Rachel Holliday Smith from The City. For the past two years we have seen so much fluctuation: rents dip and then rise sharply, blocks of store fronts abandoned, hotels turned shelter turned back to hotel, and corner deli...

Rommel H. Ojeda talks with Harry Siegel about the sorry state of the Undocumented Workers Fund. The fund has been riddled with scams targeting workers and their debit benefit cards. The company responsible for the fund's distribution debit cards, Blackhawk, has abdicated all responsibility, leaving some workers without relief while their bills pile up.

The great Ben Max rejoins Chrissy, Katie and Harry to talk about Eric A’s first trip to Albany, "fish-gate," and much more.

Graham Rayman of the Daily News runs down the slow-motion disaster at the city's jails, and map maestro Steve Romalewski breaks down the new maps Albany's Democratic majority just drew up, and explains how we got here despite a voter-approved constitutional amendment for non-partisan redistricting .

Eric Adams has talked the talk about balancing public safety and justice. Now, he's got to walk the walk.

A look back at an exceptionally busy and difficult week in New York City.

Assemblymember Ron Kim breaks down his new report accusing a prominent social service organization of stealing wages from home-care workers, with the help of 1199SEIU.

Karen Hinton, who worked for both Andrew Cuomo and Bill de Blasio, joins the pod to discuss her new memoir, Penis Politics: A Memoir of Women, Men and Power.

A conversation with incoming City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams about her past and the city's future.