Good morning and welcome to New York City Council hearing on community and housing and building.

At this time, we are asking everyone to send all electronic devices.

And at no point in time in this hearing, anyone should approach CDAs.

If you wish to testify in today's hearing and have a appearance card, please do so with us at the

back.

Chair, you may begin.

Thank you, Sergeant, and good morning.

I'm Councilmember Pierina Sanchez, Chair of the Committee on Housing and Buildings.

On behalf of the committee and the New York City Council, I'd like to welcome all the members of the public and the administration who have joined us this morning.

Before I begin, I just want to acknowledge that we are joined by council members Maloney and Riley.

New York City is home to more than one million buildings and 40,000 active construction sites at any moment.

The chief agency overseeing this work and the city's construction industry is the Department of Buildings.

The Department of Buildings plays a critical role in enforcing the rules and regulations that keep the tenants, small businesses, and workers across those one million buildings safe.

When a new building is constructed or an existing building undergoes renovation work, the public should have confidence that this work is being conducted with the utmost integrity and that the working conditions on construction sites are safe for every person involved.

Importantly, we have some of the most rigorous construction safety standards in the world, and they are up to date.

The construction codes we have in effect are just from 2022.

But our standards only protect the public when the enforcement agency is staffed, resourced, and able to ensure that developers, contractors, and professionals are following the rules.

So today we'll take a closer look at DOB's ongoing efforts to advance construction safety.

We've seen recent encouraging trends in the data in fiscal year 2026.

The mayor's management reports noted a 45% decrease in serious or fatal construction injuries, which is down from 557 to 308.

Of those serious injuries, falls remained the leading cause over the past two years.

And while the overall decline signifies can signify real progress, more can be done to identify the persistent causes of both serious injuries and deaths on construction sites.

Deaths which consistently hover around eight per year.

And I have to add that while these numbers seems positive, the trends have also zigzagged up and down since 2022 during my tenure as housing chair, and my usual optimism has a little pause.

In

the same way that New York City seeks to prevent all traffic fatalities through the Vision Zero initiative, we should use a similar data-driven approach to eliminate construction-related deaths entirely.

Recent high profile incidents also highlight the need for continued evaluation of our city's construction safety standards.

The buckling of two load-bearing columns in the 21st floor of the former Pfizer headquarters in Midtown raised significant concerns about whether corners were cut, which unsafe conditions were first identified, what scope of work was approved, how the city can ensure this never happens again.

I'm thankful for DOB's swift response to ensure the safety of all of the New Yorkers in the surrounding area.

But the incident was serious enough to prompt a citywide enforcement blitz from the department, the result of which we will also be wanting to discuss during today's hearing.

On a related note, we will also receive an implementation update for legislation that we championed here in this committee, local law 79 of 2024, which created a new requirement for proactive enforcement at Department of Buildings.

Additionally, a recent indictment from the Brooklyn District Attorney's Office raises concerns about the oversight of safety site safety training credentials.

Last month, the Brooklyn DA charged two individuals and the related company, Red Code Inc., for creating and selling fraudulent site safety cards to construction workers.

Although the company was authorized to provide site safety trainings, the DA alleged that they sold cards to construction workers who never completed that training.

We must ensure that all workers are appropriately trained and continue to improve the city's tools for overseeing the companies that fake safety credentials.

Excuse me, finally,

I

would be remiss if I didn't end with my continued concerns around staffing within the agency.

In my time as chair of the Committee on Housing and Buildings, have repeatedly raised concerns about DOB staffing.

Under the prior administration, DOB eliminated roughly a quarter of its budgeted workforce, including positions tied to inspections and safety oversight.

And while the council has fought year over year to recover positions, even in the most recent fiscal year, DOB's enforcement division saw a reduction of 16 positions, including seven inspectoral titles.

So I will continue to push for inspectorial and safety agency, excuse me, and safety capacity that the agency needs.

I look forward to hearing more about the administration's approach to construction safety, implementation of recent council legislation, and further opportunities to collaborate toward our shared goal of keeping New Yorkers safe.

I'd like to take this opportunity to thank my team, Deputy Chiefs of Staff, Ben Ratner and Ken Kim Castellanos,

our

District Director Maria José Mares, Gerard Fernandez, Soraya Bonilla, Oriana Jroa Acevedo, Malia Sardinia.

Welcome to our new fellow and Marcus Connor intern.

I'd also like to thank the Housing and Buildings Committee staff, senior legislative council Austin Malone, legislative council Billy Eck, senior, not SILIER, senior policy analyst Jose Conde, Senior Policy Analyst Dirk Spencer, data scientists Mohamed Shadid and Noah Slosberg, and finance analyst Carla Naranjo and Spencer Kuhn.

And with that, thank you all for being here today.

I'm going to turn it over to our council to administer the oath.

Please raise your right hand to your firm to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, and to answer all council member questions honestly.

I do.

Thank you.

You may begin when ready.

Thank you.

Good

morning, Chair Sanchez and members of the Committee on Housing and Buildings.

I am Ahmed Tagani, Commissioner of the New York City Department of Buildings.

I am joined today by Igal Shamash, First Deputy Commissioner, Guillermo Patino, Deputy Commissioner of Policy and Legal Affairs, and several members of the department's leadership team.

Thank you for holding this hearing on the critical issue of construction safety.