“If AI is the next creative and economic medium, it must be in the hands of the New Yorkers who too often get invited last—public housing residents.”

NYCHA’s Hylan Houses. (Adi Talwar/City Limits)

New York City’s public housing communities have always been engines of culture, grit, and ingenuity. If we genuinely believe AI will shape the next century of work and creativity, then the front line for equitable access must be New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) community centers, reimagined as neighborhood AI hubs that deliver training, credentials, and real economic mobility.

This isn’t abstract. New York is building the infrastructure to lead in responsible AI. Empire AI—a statewide public-interest supercomputing initiative housed at SUNY Buffalo—just moved into its next phase, expanding computer access to researchers across a 10-member consortium. Pair that with CUNY’s AI Academic Hub, now offering 170+ AI-focused courses and entry programs like “AI-One: CUNY AI for Everyone.” The spine is there. Now we need the capillaries: local, trusted access points in NYCHA community centers. 

ChatGPT 5.0 is here. OpenAI’s newest flagship model is more innovative across coding, math, and real-world tasks, and is now the default in ChatGPT and rolling into developer and enterprise tools. Technology is quickly advancing and changing the way society functions and how people will perform their jobs. AI is not here to displace people from the workplace; it is here to welcome them and be more productive, if you know how to use it. It also offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to utilize the technology to create businesses, jobs, and reduce poverty. 

Despite near-universal availability of wired broadband, one in four city households lacked a fixed broadband subscription as of 2023, mostly in low-income communities like NYCHA. Many rely on cellular-only connections, limiting the kind of learning, coding, and portfolio-building that AI work demands. We need durable, local solutions that fuse access with training in low-income communities. An AI community-centered training model can fill that gap.

New York State has stepped in with consumer-protection moves to require low-cost internet service provider plans, but price alone won’t close a skills gap. An AI Hub in public housing would reimagine NYCHA community rooms, often used for a wide range of intergenerational programs, into dedicated, always-on technology centers.

Unlike the current NYCHA model, where activities span many topics, these hubs would focus intensively on one subject area: building AI and technology skills that lead directly to education, credentials, and jobs. Renovated or repurposed in underutilized community spaces in neighborhoods most in need, each hub would be equipped with high-speed broadband, modern devices, and on-site coaching staff to guide learning, along with connections to technology companies and community partners.

The curriculum would align with CUNY certificates and the SUNY/CUNY Reconnect program’s high-demand fields, including data, health technology, IT support, and green tech. Residents would gain hands-on experience with GPT-5-level systems (and others) for coding, data analysis, design, entrepreneurship, and assistive AI, with practical applications for resumes, small-business automation, and creative portfolios.

From these neighborhood hubs, learners could transition into internships and applied research projects, with tailored pathways for first-generation students, career changers, and those without prior degrees, or direct fellowships with employers. The program would build on Soulful Synergy’s decade of workforce training experience with over 11,000 people trained and over 15,000 certifications earned.

Its partnership with the Public Housing Community Fund, through the NYCHA Technology Academy, is delivering instruction rooted in the community and responsive to employer needs. These hubs would ensure that the future of AI in New York City and beyond evolves in a way that does not harm low-income populations and provides the most incredible opportunity to access technology and jobs.

Public housing communities produce the art, music, food, fashion, and small businesses that define New York. By definition, public housing also serves the lowest-income people. If AI is the next creative and economic medium, it must be in the hands of the New Yorkers who too often get invited last—public housing residents. An AI hub model compresses the distance between inspiration, training, credentials, and a first paid project right in the neighborhood.

The moment could not be more urgent. New York has already laid the foundation: free community college for adults in high-demand fields, a statewide public-interest AI supercomputer, a public university system rapidly scaling AI coursework, and a city wiring public housing for high-speed internet. What’s missing is the last mile—the trusted, accessible local hubs that can transform AI’s potential into tangible resident opportunities for people that need it most.

Now is the time to plant the flag, commit resources, and build the partnerships that will ensure AI becomes the great equalizer it is meant to be.

Alex Zablocki is executive director at Public Housing Community Fund. Dwayne R. Norris is co-founder of Soulful Synergy.

The post Opinion: Plant the Flag, And Bring AI to Public Housing appeared first on City Limits.

By ALI SWENSON and AMANDA SEITZ

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump suggested Monday that the use of Tylenol during pregnancy may contribute to rising autism rates in the U.S., a potential link experts have studied and say is unproven.

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Speaking Monday from the White House, the president said women should not take acetaminophen, also known by the brand name Tylenol, “during the entire pregnancy.” He also raised unfounded concerns about vaccines.

The Trump administration has been under immense pressure from Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s diverse Make America Healthy Again movement to provide answers on the causes of the marked increase in autism cases in the U.S. in recent years.

Experts say the rise in cases is mainly due to a new definition for the disorder that now includes mild cases on a “spectrum” and better diagnoses. They say there is no single cause to the disorder and say the rhetoric appears to ignore and undermine decades of science into the genetic and environmental factors that can play a role.

The announcement is the latest step the administration, driven by Kennedy and his supporters, has taken to reshape America’s public health landscape.

Beyond cutbacks at federal health agencies, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been roiled by disagreements over Kennedy’s vaccine policies. An influential immunization panel stocked by Kennedy with figures who have been critical of vaccines last week changed shot guidance for COVID-19 and other diseases.

Trump on Sunday evening teased Monday’s announcement as a big one, telling reporters, “I think we found an answer to autism.” Experts say that oversells what would be possible from a presidential administration in its first year. They insist more research is needed to conclusively identify whether and how environmental factors may play a role in the disorder.

Kennedy for years has promoted debunked theories that vaccines could be responsible for rising rates of autism, which affects 1 in 31 U.S. children today, according to the CDC. Scientists, doctors and researchers have attributed that increase instead to greater awareness of the disorder and the newer, wide-ranging “spectrum” used to issue diagnoses for people with milder expressions of autism. It’s hard to tell if there may be additional factors behind the increase.

By GENE JOHNSON and SALLY HO, Associated Press

SEATTLE (AP) — A federal trial beginning in Amazon’s hometown this week is set to examine whether the online retailing giant tricked customers into signing up for its Prime service and made it difficult to cancel after they did so.

The Federal Trade Commission sued Amazon in U.S. District Court in Seattle two years ago and has alleged more than a decade of legal violations, including of the Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act, a 2010 law designed to help ensure that people know what they’re being charged for online.

Jury selection began Monday, with opening statements to follow.

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Prime provides subscribers with perks that include faster shipping, video streaming and discounts at Whole Foods for a fee of $139 annually, or $14.99 a month.

It’s a key — and growing — part of Amazon’s business, with more than 200 million members. In its latest quarterly report, the company in July reported more than $12 billion in net revenue for subscription services, which is a 12% increase from the same period last year. That figure includes annual and monthly fees associated with Prime memberships, as well as other subscription services such as its music and e-books platforms.

The company said it does clearly explain Prime’s terms before charging customers, and that it offers simple ways to cancel membership, including by phone, online and by online chat.

“Occasional customer frustrations and mistakes are inevitable — especially for a program as popular as Amazon Prime,” Amazon said in a trial brief filed last week. “Evidence that a small percentage of customers misunderstood Prime enrollment or cancellation does not prove that Amazon violated the law.”

But the FTC said Amazon deliberately made it difficult for customers to purchase an item without also subscribing to Prime. In some cases, consumers were presented with a button to complete their transactions — which didn’t clearly state it would also enroll them in Prime, the agency said.

“Amazon has long known that millions of its customers struggled with enrollment and cancellation of its subscription service, Prime,” the FTC said in its trial brief. “Millions of consumers accidentally enrolled in Prime without knowledge or consent, but Amazon refused to fix this known problem, described internally by employees as an ‘unspoken cancer’ because clarity adjustments would lead to a drop in subscribers.”

Getting out of a subscription was often too complicated, and Amazon leadership slowed or rejected changes that would have made canceling easier, the complaint said.

Internally, Amazon called the process “Iliad,” a reference to the ancient Greek poem about the lengthy siege of Troy during the Trojan war. The process requires the customer to affirm on three pages their desire to cancel membership.

U.S. District Judge John Chun, an appointee of former President Joe Biden, issued an order last week affirming that the Restore Online Customers’ Confidence Act applies to Prime. He also limited some of the legal defenses Amazon may offer at trial and sided with the FTC on its claim that Amazon violated the law by collecting customers’ billing information before disclosing Prime’s terms.

But Chun said several other issues remain for the jury to decide, including whether Amazon’s disclosures of the material terms of Prime membership are “clear and conspicuous” and whether the “Illiad” cancellation method is “simple,” as the law requires.

Chun also ruled that two Amazon executives named as individual defendants — Neil Lindsay and Jamil Ghani — were so entwined with the Prime program that they will personally face liability if the jury sides with the FTC. A third, Russell Grandinetti, could also potentially face personal liability if the jury so decides.

Amazon said a statement Monday: “The bottom line is that neither Amazon nor the individual defendants did anything wrong — we remain confident that the facts will show these executives acted properly and we always put customers first.”

The FTC, which declined to comment Monday, began looking into Amazon’s Prime subscription practices in 2021 during the first Trump administration, but the lawsuit was filed in 2023 under former FTC Chair Lina Khan, an antitrust expert who had been appointed by Biden.

The agency filed the case months before it submitted an antitrust lawsuit against the retail and technology company, accusing it of having monopolistic control over online markets.

In July, Chun admonished Amazon for withholding 70,000 documents from the FTC, including documents improperly marked as containing internal legal advice, saying that conduct was “tantamount to bad faith.”

Meanwhile, like other tech companies, Amazon has been attempting to forge friendlier ties with President Donald Trump, who repeatedly criticized the company during his first term.

In December, Amazon donated $1 million to Trump’s inauguration fund. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, along with other tech leaders, was also a guest at the inauguration.

Earlier this year, Amazon’s Prime Video service began streaming “The Apprentice,” the long-running TV show that boosted Trump’s profile before he ran for president. The company is also working on a documentary that offers an “unprecedented behind-the-scenes look” into the life of first lady Melania Trump.

By JOSH FUNK, AP Transportation Writer

The Trump Administration wants to redistribute $2.4 billion it pulled from California’s high-speed rail project as part of a new $5 billion program announced Monday to fund rail projects to boost passenger rail traffic nationwide.

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The new program’s rules for states and others wanting to participate remove any mention of diversity or climate change dating to the Biden administration. The new program will also put a priority on projects in areas with higher rates of birth and marriage and projects that improve safety at railroad crossings.

The Trump Administration has removed climate change and so-called DEI language from other grant requirements, and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy took a jab at that Biden-era language and California Gov. Gain Newsom’s rail project in his announcement.

“Our new National Railroad Partnership Program will emphasize safety – our number one priority – without the radical … DEI and green grant requirements. Instead of wasting dollars on Governor Newsom’s high-speed rail boondoggle, these targeted investments will improve the lives of rail passengers, local drivers, and pedestrians,” Duffy said.

The biggest chunk of this money the Federal Railroad Administration announced comes from the $4 billion that was pulled from the California project. The rest of the money comes from a combination of what was announced last year and what is in this year’s budget.

President Donald Trump and Duffy have both criticized the decades-old California project for its cost overruns and many delays that have kept the train that’s designed to connect San Francisco and Los Angeles from becoming a reality yet.

California officials said they will fight this effort to redistribute money they believe should be going to their project. They had already filed a lawsuit challenging the Trump administration’s decision to pull federal funding from the state’s high-speed rail project

“The FRA’s decision to terminate federal funding for California high-speed rail was unlawful, unwarranted, and is being challenged in federal court. Now, their attempt to redirect a portion of that funding, currently the subject of litigation, is premature,” said Micah Flores, a spokesman for the California High-Speed Rail Authority. “The Authority has been prepared for this possibility and will take imminent legal action to block this misguided effort by the FRA.”

FILE – The Tied Arch Bridge construction site, which will take high-speed trains over State Route 43, April 15, 2025, in Fresno County, Calif. (AP Photo/Godofredo A. Vásquez, File)

The focus on areas with higher birth and marriage rates reflects Trump’s executive orders that make spending that benefits American families a priority in his administration, according to an FRA spokesman.

The Federal Railroad Administration said railroad crossings are important to address because more than 200 people a year are killed when trains collide with vehicles or pedestrians at crossings. That has long been something the government and railroads work to address but it is costly to build bridges or underpasses that allow cars to safely bypass the tracks.

Even though the money is targeted toward improving passenger rail, some of it will almost certainly go to improvements on the nation’s major freight railroads because Amtrak uses their tracks for most of its long-distance routes across the country.

The administration also said it would give priority to projects that improve the traveling experience for families by adding amenities like nursing mothers’ rooms, expanded waiting areas and children’s play areas in train stations.

Applications for this money are due by January 7.

Associated Press writer Sophie Austin contributed to this report from Sacramento, California.