Speaker Menin presses on declining inspection numbers

I want to move on to inspections.

According to reports,

And I know Chair Shulman referenced this.

Inspectors inspected more than 5,000 towers in 2017.

By mid-2025, the number had fallen to just over 1,100.

Why are we inspecting so few towers compared to nine years ago?

Yeah, thank you for the question, Speaker.

So our inspection work is really the sort of third layer of defense that we have when we think about the

system that exists to protect the city from Legionnaires disease clusters.

The first layer is really what the owners need to be doing on a daily, weekly, and monthly basis.

The second layer from our standpoint is to ask

And because of the law that was implemented from last year's 2025 Legionella law,

they also now need to submit this monthly Legionella sampling to allow us to investigate how they are doing, how owners are doing with the daily, the weekly, and the consistent actions that need to be taken.

The third layer of defense in this system is what you've described, is us doing these inspections, going actually physically to these cooling towers.

And the fourth layer is if we find things that are wrong, if there's things that need to be immediately addressed or adjusted, we...

enforce and issue summonses which turn into fines and we order corrective action to be taken.

All of these layers together are coming together to help to reduce the risk of Legionnaires disease clusters and one of the layers that we have as I mentioned here is inspections.

Let me talk about the rates of inspections.

Our inspections this time last year compared to last are up 30%, over 30%.

And that work is critical, but it is also not the only layer.

I'm sorry, Commissioner.

I want to interrupt you because it's not about what's happening right now after the outbreak.

It's what didn't happen before the outbreak.

Because obviously we know now the department is doing far more inspections after the outbreak has already occurred.

What I'm concerned about is, according to reports, the department issued no violations in the three zip codes covering the Upper East Side in January, March, May, and June of this year.

The department issued 20 summons to six buildings in February, five summons to one building in April.

Is that correct?

Let me answer that question, but let me come back to clarify the previous.

The 30% increase number, Madam Speaker, is not after the cluster.

That level of inspections was higher even before the cluster.

So the new water ecologist positions, the funding that we got, that has made a difference.

And more inspections have happened even now.

before this cluster.

Let me pass it to Deputy Commissioner Corinne Schiff to talk about the monthly summonses and inspections you just asked about.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Speaker, we're still looking at the data that was in the council report to see if our data matches that.

But I would say a couple of things.

First, as we have discussed last year, we were short-staffed, and that's why we were not meeting our goals to inspect every cooling tower annually.

And as the commissioner testified, we were authorized to hire additional staff in November 2025, and we have been actively recruiting.

And that is why our inspections are up about 35% citywide since the start of this year.

And as we continue to bring staff on and train them, those inspection rates will go up.

As the Commissioner said, inspections are one part of our overall program to promote compliance among cooling tower

operators with the Council's nation-leading, incredibly protective laws and the regulations that we have issued to detail for owners how to comply with those local law mandates.

So in addition to inspections, which are an important part of promoting compliance, we also offer guidance that we publish on our website and we make available to owners.

We have individual consultations.

We send out reminders at key points of the year.

We have newsletters that we publish on key topics.

We hold training sessions.

All of these are designed to support owners who have very specific requirements that they have to implement all the time.

There's work for them to do many times a week, weekly, monthly.