{"id":240526,"date":"2026-05-06T17:05:00","date_gmt":"2026-05-06T21:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/06\/mamdani-admin-officials-say-city-councils-fair-fares-automatic-enrollment-bill-raises-privacy-issues\/"},"modified":"2026-05-06T17:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-06T21:35:11","slug":"mamdani-admin-officials-say-city-councils-fair-fares-automatic-enrollment-bill-raises-privacy-issues","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/06\/mamdani-admin-officials-say-city-councils-fair-fares-automatic-enrollment-bill-raises-privacy-issues\/","title":{"rendered":"Mamdani admin officials say City Council\u2019s Fair Fares automatic enrollment bill raises privacy issues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mamdani admin officials say City Council\u2019s Fair Fares automatic enrollment bill raises privacy issues<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.amny.com\/news\/mamdani-admin-city-council-fair-fares-enrollment\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-05-06 17:05:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: www.amny.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Officials with Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2018s administration on Wednesday raised concerns about a City Council bill requiring them to come up with an automatic enrollment process for the city\u2019s reduced fair program \u2014 Fair Fares \u2014 citing privacy considerations.<\/p>\n

Rebecca Chew, chief program officer for the city\u2019s Human Resources Administration (HRA), the city agency that runs the program, testified to council members during a May 6 hearing that the agency\u2019s legal obligations to safeguard private information could pose challenges to implementing the legislation as written.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe very much believe in people\u2019s right to free agency and to privacy in their personal information,\u201d Chew said. \u201cSo when they\u2019re applying for a public benefit, we have to protect that information.\u201d<\/p>\n

The measure \u2014 sponsored by City Council Member Crystal Hudson (D-Brooklyn) \u2014 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.<\/p>\n

Transit advocates rallied in favor of expanding the city\u2019s reduced-priced fare program ahead of a City Council hearing on it. Wednesday, May 6, 2026.<\/span><\/p>\n

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 \u2014 nearly 40% of the 1 million New Yorkers who qualify.<\/p>\n

\u201cToo many people who qualify are not receiving a benefit designed for them, and it\u2019s for no fault of their own,\u201d Hudson said at a news conference before the hearing. \u201cThat\u2019s 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.\u201d<\/p>\n

Roughly 575,000 more New Yorkers could be enrolled in Fair…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mamdani admin officials say City Council\u2019s Fair Fares automatic enrollment bill raises privacy issues https:\/\/www.amny.com\/news\/mamdani-admin-city-council-fair-fares-enrollment\/…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":240527,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.amny.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/DSC_9096.jpg?quality=51&w=1200&p=q","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-240526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-privacy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240526"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=240526"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240526\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":240528,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/240526\/revisions\/240528"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/240527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=240526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=240526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=240526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}