It’s the first day of school today for New York City public students, and kids will be entering schools with fewer resources, enrichment programs, teachers, and support staff, thanks to an entirely avoidable fuck-up by the city council and Mayor Adams’s refusal to budge on restoring funding. Oh, and COVID mitigation? You can largely forget about that.

But hey, at least three-year-olds and four-year-olds will now be trained on what to do when someone with a gun comes into their school. Relatedly, the Adams administration somehow found the cash to hire 850 more cops—excuse me, “school safety agents”—to patrol our hallowed halls of learning. More, via the Daily News:

In a bit of good news on the school safety front, the Adams administration didn’t cut funding for restorative justice programs. Again, via the Daily News: 

As for the almost $500 million in school budget cuts, even if the cuts are reversed, UFT President Michael Mulgrew told Politico that “irreversible damage has already been done,” and that programs that were axed due to lack of funding would likely not be restored until next January.  

Here’s what else we’re reading:

• We’ve all given up. I don’t even have the energy to make fun of the new MTA mask signage, I’m that depressed. 
• The Adams administration is continuing to welcome asylum seekers with open arms. On Wednesday, a DHS police officer was suspended after he hit a homeless shelter resident, a 21-year-old Venezuelan asylum seeker named Meiver Martinez. According to Martinez, after the officer hit him, “about eight officers jumped on him, kicked him, punched him and used a stun gun on him three times.” He was then handcuffed and taken to a hospital. 
• Pardon me?

• Streets near NYC schools have significantly higher rates of crashes and injuries than other streets across town. Has the current administration done anything about it? No.
• The Brooklyn district attorney’s office is dismissing almost 400 convictions made over a more than 20-year period that hung on the testimony of cops that were later found to have lied during trials or committed other misconduct. 
• Gwen Carr, the mother of Eric Garner, is still pushing for accountability: She wants to see the investigative and disciplinary records involving the death of her son, and she wants some officers involved fired. The City keeps fighting her. 
• City Limits’s David Brand investigated yet another policy failure—the domestic violence shelter to homeless shelter pipeline.
• The owner of the New York Knicks and his family are showering Republican Rep. Nicole Malliotakis’s campaign with money. 
• So weed trucks can be towed over parking tickets yet this is okay? 
• Pardon me, again?