Mamdani admin officials say City Council’s Fair Fares automatic enrollment bill raises privacy issues
https://www.amny.com/news/mamdani-admin-city-council-fair-fares-enrollment/
Publish Date: 2026-05-06 17:05:00
Source Domain: www.amny.com
Officials with Mayor Zohran Mamdani‘s administration on Wednesday raised concerns about a City Council bill requiring them to come up with an automatic enrollment process for the city’s reduced fair program — Fair Fares — citing privacy considerations.
Rebecca Chew, chief program officer for the city’s Human Resources Administration (HRA), the city agency that runs the program, testified to council members during a May 6 hearing that the agency’s legal obligations to safeguard private information could pose challenges to implementing the legislation as written.
“We very much believe in people’s right to free agency and to privacy in their personal information,” Chew said. “So when they’re applying for a public benefit, we have to protect that information.”
The measure — sponsored by City Council Member Crystal Hudson (D-Brooklyn) — would require the Department of Social Services (DSS), which encompasses HRA, to come up with a plan for establishing an automatic enrollment system for benefits programs it administers, including Fair Fares.
Transit advocates rallied in favor of expanding the city’s reduced-priced fare program ahead of a City Council hearing on it. Wednesday, May 6, 2026.
Proponents of automatic enrollment say it could greatly increase the number of people participating in Fair Fares, as the program has struggled to get a majority of those eligible to sign up since it was launched in 2019. Chew said that as of March, 380,000 New Yorkers were using Fair Fares — nearly 40% of the 1 million New Yorkers who qualify.
“Too many people who qualify are not receiving a benefit designed for them, and it’s for no fault of their own,” Hudson said at a news conference before the hearing. “That’s why I introduced Intro. 248 to establish automatic enrollment. We should not require New Yorkers to apply multiple times for support they know they qualify for.”
Roughly 575,000 more New Yorkers could be enrolled in Fair…
