Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul and Mayor Mamdani Extend Nearly 100,000 3-K, Pre-K Offers; Cut Average Travel Distance for 3-K Families by Six Blocks

Governor Kathy Hochul and Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani today announced that New York City has extended 99,921 offers for 3-K and Pre-K for the upcoming school year, with more families receiving offers to one of their top choice programs and average travel distances decreasing across the city. This includes 2,000 additional 3-K seats for New York City families to have childcare closer to home, made possible by the state's direct investment in 3-K.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page will post photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Starting off the day with three-year-olds is my idea of a good day, as a grandmother of a three-year-old. I want to thank the mayor for the invitation to join him for this very significant announcement, and people should not underestimate what this means. It is a sign of the fruition of a real commitment to partner together to deliver something that New Yorkers have dreamed about, talked about, but never had up until now. So thank you for helping us work together to make New York City, New York State, the best place in America to raise a family, and I'm committed to that.

I want to thank our councilmembers here, our principal, our chancellor once again and all of our teams. You think about what it takes to be a parent in this city, it is hard. It is hard. I just came out of my apartment building in Midtown and spent half the time talking to five-month-old Molly in a stroller, realizing that her dad probably had a very small place, because all of our places are small, and raising a child there, and the expenses, and the stress, and the worry that parents have just walking to our streets. It takes a special kind of person who says, "I want to have my child raised in this vibrant, incredible place." But also, it's so darn expensive. And when you think about the fact that it's anywhere from $20,000-40,000 a year for childcare, if you had to cover that from birth up until kindergarten, a lot of people are starting to rethink whether or not they're even going to have families, and that to me is tragic. Tragic that you have to factor that in, that they can't afford a house or a place to live, or they can't afford - maybe they have one child - they're not going to be able to afford a second for education later.

But childcare should not be on that list of worries, and that's what we're committed to, taking that off the list and saying, "We're committed to you and your families." And I'll say this: Not only is it important for the family, just like my family years and years ago, when we had our children, and I was working in Washington for a senator. I loved that job, and I never dreamed I'd have to say goodbye to it because we couldn't find affordable childcare, but that's exactly what happened. So I landed okay. I'm doing fine after having to give up a job I love, so don't worry about me. But at the time, there was so much uncertainty. You're having to go from two incomes to one. My husband working for the government, we struggled. I knew all about the coupons, and buying the Pampers, and the jars of baby food and all those extra costs that are there when they're little.

So I want to say this: As a Governor, I believe that what we can do to make New York a better place for families, but also make us more competitive nationally. Think about this: We are the number one destination in America for college graduates, but then something happens. They start a family. It's "Ah, I want to stay, but have to move out." We do not want that to happen. We want people who want to be here to be able to afford to stay here. And so taking off that cost is going to be a help for them as a family. But also think of the businesses. If you're trying to recruit the best talent from across the country, and people are evaluating where they can go, the cost of living of different cities, and they know that coming to New York City, they don't have to worry about the cost of childcare when we fully implement our vision for universal childcare across New York City and the state.

We are now in a very competitive position to recruit individuals who otherwise might have said, "No, I can't afford to live in New York." This is the beauty of what we're doing here, and I'm so excited about it. So the families who are doing everything they're asked to do - getting an education or getting a job and building careers, building families - they're doing everything right. We as a government have a responsibility to help lift them up at this moment. So I will not go on about being New York's first mom Governor, everybody's heard me say that 1,000 times. New York's - thank you - New York's first mom Governor, New York's first grandma Governor.

But it gives you a perspective, it truly does, of what those struggles were like for me, and I've cultivated this really strong sense of empathy for all the other families, a belief in them and knowing that they will get through these days, but we are there to help them. So I wanted to say this: My, the Budget I laid out in January helped become a culmination of a vision that I launched years ago, first as Lieutenant Governor, chairing the Statewide Commission on Childcare, but also as Governor.

Over the last four years, we have spent dollars, $8 billion from our Budget to help families directly with subsidies. At one time, you had to be making $57,000 or less in order to get a childcare subsidy. It is now over $108,000. Look how many more families and children we could pick up with those changes and recovering that cost. Building more bricks and mortar, helping subsidize renovation, people's homes, building the capacity to do what we're doing here today is to expand outward. So I made these changes, and I'll tell you, it makes a huge difference when you have a partner who shares that vision, who will say, "Yes, what can we do to get this done?" So I was so excited to put in support for $1.2 billion in our Budget to help the city out with their funding for $100 million extra to help solve the three-year-old program, which we talked about. We talked about that last summer, about how we have to rightsize this, get people able to have seats in their own neighborhood and not expect them to go across the city to get a slot. So we're solving for that, and I commend you and your team for accomplishing that.