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New York City Council Speaker Corey Johnson wouldn’t say how much time he spent on Cape Cod over the summer as he defended his job performance amid findings that lawmakers posted their least productive summer in two decades.
“I was spending some time with my family this summer and I hadn’t seen my mother since before the pandemic,” Johnson said in his first public remarks about The Post’s story since it published Tuesday. “I’m not ashamed of me taking some personal time, while at the same time the Council was continuing the hard work.”
The Post revealed this summer has been the Council’s least productive in two decades — with committees and its other bodies meeting or scheduled to meet just 61 times between July 1 and September 30.
That’s the lowest number over the three-month period since 2003, an analysis of Council records shows.
It’s also a dramatic drop in the meetings and hearings when compared to the numbers posted in the summers of 2017, 2018 and 2019 — and even a decline from the number during the pandemic-ravaged summer of 2020.
The decline was especially notable this summer as the Council failed to hold an oversight hearing on the reopening of schools until Sept. 1, days before students returned to classrooms; and didn’t hold an oversight hearing on the crisis at the Rikers Island lockup until Sept. 15.
A half-dozen Council insiders and observers pinned the plummet in productivity on Johnson’s trips to Provincetown, Massachusetts, a summer hot spot renowned for its art galleries and beaches.
“I think the Council’s been incredibly productive, we’re passing a host of important bills today, we’ve done that the entire summer,” Johnson claimed, reiterating the statement his spokeswoman gave the paper for the initial story, which did not respond to questions about his schedule. “I’m proud of the work that we’ve done over the last four years.”
He offered the remarks during a press conference held before the City Council met to approve a slew of bills that tightened protections for delivery workers in the Big Apple, who argue they are regularly exploited by restaurants and technology companies that build the popular phone-based applications.
It was the meatiest Council agenda since the budget passed in June.
Johnson and his aides have argued The Post looked too narrowly at Council productivity and provided a statement that claimed “this body is having the most productive Council session ever terms of bills passed.”
A review of records shows that the Council and Mayor Bill de Blasio have enacted 94 new city laws during the first nine months of the year, roughly equal to the pace set in 2020 when 125 new laws were passed during the entire year.
However, it’s a significant decline from the pre-pandemic pace when Johnson’s Council enacted 228 laws in 2019 and 223 laws in 2018.
Johnson’s predecessor, Melissa Mark-Viverto, got 256 bills enacted into law in 2017 and 194 in 2016, legislative records analyzed by The Post show.
Once again Thursday, Johnson would not say how much time he spent away from the Big Apple and the City Council.
And when asked to explain a claim in the Tuesday statement from his office that he used his travels to “take the summer to look for new legislative solutions to ongoing problems for the fall term,” Johnson responded by citing family as the reason for his absence.
“I’m proud of my record on the Council and I’m proud of the work that I’ve done,” Johnson said as he walked inside for the Thursday meeting. “I’m proud of my service, and we’re going to keep working for the rest of this year.”
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