Mayor Eric Adams announced a $5.5 million investment to expand free swim lessons across New York City, reaching nearly 18,000 students. The initiative aims to improve water safety, particularly in underserved communities, while saving families over $1.3 million in swim lesson costs. With rising temperatures and the city’s extensive shoreline, officials emphasize swimming as both a crucial life skill and an equity issue. The program also supports the development of future lifeguards and ensures more children can safely enjoy NYC’s public pools and beaches.
Mayor Adams Announces $5.5 Million Investment to Expand Free Swim Lessons to Nearly 18,000 Students, Building Safer, More Affordable City for NYC Families
Deputy Mayor Jeffrey Roth, Operations: Good morning everyone and welcome. I’m Jeffrey Roth, New York City deputy mayor for Operations. This is my first public event as new deputy mayor and we couldn’t have chosen a better location. Our city’s pools are the best, giving us space outside our cramped apartments to relax and connect. They’re also very real public safety infrastructure keeping our families cool during ever hot summers, if we know how to use them safely.
Behind us today you can see a class of second graders taking part in one of the city’s free Swim for Life classes. These classes aren’t just a fun way to stay active, the skills they learn here literally save lives. The Adams administration has been laser focused on making New York the best place to raise a family. Today we have an announcement detailing one of our initiatives to help us do just that. With that, I’ll turn the mic over to Mayor Adams.
Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you, D.M. So just listen. Doesn’t that sound sound good? Children having fun using our spaces. We should call Commissioner Donoghue the fun commissioner, you know, in charge of our parks, in charge of our spaces, our pools, all the things that are fun and really the foundation of raising healthy children and families.
People don’t realize the role of play in the mental development of a child. Play is not just something that you do because you’re bored. No, play is how they learn how to be part of a community, how to enjoy time together, how to explore. The noise you hear behind us of these children playing is actually developing themselves and I think the deputy mayor said it right. Rarely do you have a duality to a skill like swimming. Not only is it a form of play, in a form of social and emotional intelligence and development, it also saves lives.
All of us experience the trauma when a child is lost due to drowning or by one of our pools or one of our beaches. We wanted to be proactive and deal with this issue in a real way and so we’re going to make a big splash this year in ensuring that we increase the number of young people who learn how to swim and the earlier they start, the more adept they are to the water.
So congratulations to our second graders starting during their graduation today. We wish them well. We’re going to make sure that our kids can continue to learn to swim safely and the beautiful thing is the four-letter New York City word, for free. These are free programs. And in our State of the City address in January, we announced that we will be expanding our free swimming classes to reach over 4,800 school second graders, 4,800 second graders.
Under this 5.5 million dollar expansion, we will now reach nearly 18,000 students with this program and this is so important out here with this space. I’m sure Councilman Moya would tell you many of our inner city children don’t get the opportunity to do these lessons and if you were to do an analysis of where we’re having a deficit in those who know how to swim, you would go into the inner city Black and brown communities and communities where historically they’ve been underserved, but we’re going to be serving more kids and families in these underserved communities to give them the support that they need.
And we’re saving families over $1.3 million on swim lessons. We’re putting more money back in the pockets of everyday New Yorkers because we know that having access to free swim lessons, pools and beaches can make a difference in a family’s life. Listen, the beaches in our city, that is the French Riviera, that is the Bahamas, that is the exotic island somewhere. This is where everyday New Yorkers go and ensure that they can enjoy the warm and the hot days of the summer and so think about the look of pride parents have up here on top, watching your baby swim, right?
You know, the pride that these parents, they will have watching their children swim, learning how to swim, taking away one issue of if their child is near water and their child won’t be able to swim correctly. This is how you build a safe and healthy community for families and so we want to make sure our children can both be safe and have fun here. That is why we are working to keep our kids safe at our world-class pools and beaches and we will continue to do so and we are driving into safety so we can make New York City the safest community in this country. Enjoy the summer. This is a great kickoff. This is one of those fun events that we love.
Deputy Mayor Roth: Thank you, mayor. I now want to bring up Parks Commissioner Sue Donoghue to say a few words.
Commissioner Sue Donoghue, Department of Parks and Recreation: Thank you, Deputy Mayor Roth. Thank you, Mayor Adams. It’s always good to see you, Councilmember Moya. And congratulations to the kids behind me from P.S.24, Andrew Jackson, who just are completing our eight-week swim for life lessons today.
In government, it’s our job to give the next generation the tools they need to be healthy and successful. And in a city with 520 miles of shoreline and with increasingly hotter summers, we know that swimming education is a critical skill that saves lives. Water safety is also a matter of equity. Far too many children in our city, as the mayor said, particularly students of color, lack access to swimming lessons. This puts lives at risk and also limits opportunities for young people.
We are so proud at the Parks Department to offer this free swim program that meets kids where they are and to provide lessons during the school day. And I might add, probably a fun escape during the school day as well for a couple hours. We’re breaking down barriers that have kept so many from participating and, importantly, we’re building a pipeline of lifeguards for the future.
Once again, I’d like to thank our mayor, Eric Adams, who from day one has put safety, affordability, and opportunity at the forefront of his administration. Last year, we reached over 6,000 kids through our Swim for Life programming. With these investments in swimming infrastructure, we’ll be able to expand that even further this year. Thank you so much.
Deputy Mayor Roth: At this time, I’d like to invite Councilmember Francisco Moya to say a few words.
City Councilmember Francisco Moya: Thank you. Good morning. I’d like to say thank you to Mayor Adams for this wonderful initiative. I’m someone who’s born and raised right here in Corona, Queens. I know that when I had to take swimming lessons, we had to go very far away to figure out where to go, and it was a YMCA that wasn’t close by. I learned how to swim, but I know that programs like this that are so critical to communities like mine make it so that we can talk about how families can come here.
The commissioner, thank you again, commissioner, for all the great work that you’re doing here with the Parks Department, because it’s about affordability, and it’s about safety, and that’s exactly what this program is doing. They’re opening the doors for so many young kids across the great borough of Queens and this city, and particularly my district right here, to have access to learn how to swim. Enjoy the beautiful structure here, this beautiful center that we have here as well, but I think that this is really the initiatives that we from this administration that make it so great for our kids and our community to truly enjoy.
So once again, I want to say thank you to Mayor Adams. Thank you again to the commissioner of the Parks Department for always being at the ready when I call as well. We have a great event later on today. It’s Parks Day in District 21 today. We have many exciting things to do, but I’m just very excited for the kids behind me and those that will be coming here. Thank you again for this wonderful achievement today. Thank you.
March 25, 2025 Manhattan, New York
Sources: NYC.gov , Midtown Tribune
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