Author: Gothamist

The head of New York City’s buildings department wants to grant inspectors the power to make arrests and even carry guns following complaints from agency staffers who say they’ve been attacked on the job, according to an email obtained by Gothamist. Department of Buildings Commissioner James Oddo is pushing for state legislation that would allow…

Michelle Obama, Gwyneth Paltrow, Naomi Watts, Tracee Ellis Ross, Salma Hayek and Oprah Winfrey are among the celebrities who’ve talked openly about menopause in recent years and have shed light on a topic long considered taboo. Even New York City Mayor Eric Adams joined the conversation last January, when he said that if men experienced…

The city correction officers union said a takeover of New York City jails by a federal appointee would worsen conditions at the facilities, according to court papers filed this week. The Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association is opposing efforts by U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams and public defenders from the…

Former New York Gov. David Paterson, the state’s first Black governor, endorsed Westchester County Executive George Latimer on Wednesday in his primary challenge against Rep. Jamaal Bowman, one of the state’s most competitive races this year. Paterson announced his endorsement in a community room in Co-op City, a sprawling residential complex in the Bronx portion…

More than 100 teenagers from across New York City waited in the pouring rain on Saturday for a chance to score a free prom outfit. Senior prom may be an overrated rite of passage, or a quintessential high school experience, but it’s not cheap. Teens in the Northeast spend $700 per prom on average, according…

New York state lawmakers said they will renew their push to reopen a window that allows sexual abuse victims more time to file claims after a new Gothamist analysis of hundreds of lawsuits revealed a pattern of alleged misconduct and sexual assault at Rikers Island. The chair of the City Council’s criminal justice committee, which…

The mother of a man who allegedly shot and killed a police officer in Queens on Monday night said she wished she could “turn back time” as she worked to piece together what happened. Keshia Gilyard confirmed to Gothamist by phone on Tuesday that her son Guy Rivera, 34, was in police custody in connection…

Patients of Mount Sinai Beth Israel hospital in Lower Manhattan have faced delays in receiving lifesaving care because of unapproved service cuts, according to a new report from the state health department. Through observations and interviews with hospital staff during a visit in late January, state health officials concluded the hospital was operating at severely…

The $1.5 billion effort to rid the Gowanus Canal of toxic sludge is so behind schedule and over budget due to government mismanagement that the canal may have to be re-dredged, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s watchdog. The fetid canal is in the midst of a cleanup involving the removal of 600,000 cubic…

If you’ve consumed beauty and wellness content on social media lately — and if the answer is “no,” you have my full respect — maybe you’ve been exposed to the #lymphaticdrainage craze. Influencers in New York and around the world are using a variety of techniques to manually drain fluid from the lymph nodes behind…