The enforcement comes after a City Limits investigation found some marshals were not posting notices of eviction online, as a 2024 state law requires—or were posting them just days before tenants could be removed from their homes.

A marshal’s eviction notice, seen in 2010. Photo by Marc Fader for City Limits.

The Department of Investigation (DOI) will enforce a state law that requires city marshals to post notices of eviction online in addition to serving tenants in person, according to a memo from DOI Commissioner Jocelyn Strauber. The memo, released in late February, says marshals must post notices online within 24 hours of serving them in person, and threatens discipline for noncompliance.

The enforcement comes after a November City Limits investigation found that some marshals were not posting notices of eviction online, or posting them just days before tenants could be removed from their homes. Posting online was required by a state law that took effect at the end of June 2024, but official guidance for marshals wasn’t released until Feb 27, 2025.

“Last year we passed legislation requiring the New York City Marshals to file a notice of eviction by both physical posting and electronic filing to ensure that tenants and their lawyers clearly understood when eviction proceedings were occurring and the timeline for legal response. Unfortunately, as City Limits found in their reporting, there has been inconsistent compliance with this law.” said New York State Senator Brad Hoylman-Sigal.

New York City’s marshals serve eviction notices and carry out evictions in the city in addition to other responsibilities, like booting cars and collecting debts from civil court proceedings. Marshals carried out 16,813 evictions last year and 3,919 so far this year, on track for the most since the end of a pandemic-era moratorium on evictions in the state.

The DOI’s Marshals Bureau oversees city marshals, with the ability to investigate and discipline those who don’t follow state law and the handbook that regulates their actions. Marshals were already required to serve eviction notices in person and by mail prior to the 2024 law mandating the online postings.

When a tenant is served a notice, a 14-day waiting period kicks in, after which they can be evicted at any time.

The increased transparency online posting affords was welcomed by housing advocates like Craig Hughes, who said the rules will help tenants clarify the first possible eviction date. This gives them time to apply for city assistance, transition to new housing, or get reasonable accommodations before entering the shelter system.

Michael Woloz, a spokesperson for the Marshals Association of New York City, a professional group for marshals that also lobbies on their behalf in Albany, told City Limits, “We were not consulted [on the original legislation]. However, we would be eager to work with our lawmakers on any future legislation.”

The original law did not specify when exactly online notice had to be served. City Limits found that out of a sample of 537 eviction notices served in September 2024, 29 were posted online after 14 days—the minimum window before an eviction can be executed—while 37 were never posted at all.

Lawyers for tenants said that failures to post online denied tenants their due process rights and crucial time they could use to prepare a legal defense. Marshals said that they were not consulted on the new rules and needed time to update data systems and procedures in order to comply.

In response, DOI convened stakeholders to make new rules and amended the Marshals Handbook. “We sought to ensure both prompt notice to tenants and that the time-frames imposed were reasonable and realistic,” Spokesperson Diane Struzzi told City Limits.

DOI worked with the state court system, city marshals, and the Legal Aid Society to craft the new guidance, a process the agency said took eight months.

“After a notice of eviction has been served upon a tenant, marshals must file such notice electronically in the New York State Court Electronic Filing (NYSCEF) system,” wrote DOI commissioner Jocelyn Strauber in the Feb. 27 memo outlining the rules. “Absent extraordinary circumstances, this electronic filing shall be completed no later than twenty-four hours following service of a notice of eviction.” 

The Marshals Association’s Woloz quibbled with that guidance slightly: “We believe that ‘next business day’ would be appropriate.”

Hoylman-Sigal has already introduced an amendment to the 2024 law that would enshrine the new rules. “I’m pleased that DOI has already updated the Marshall Handbook to include this requirement. My legislation (S.3043) will make that requirement permanent and give a strong legal foundation to DOI’s interpretation of the law,” Hoylman-Sigal told City Limits.

Payton Fisher, a lawyer with Mobilization for Justice, echoed the importance of a legislative remedy, since the current legislation expires in 2026: “the statue has a use-it-or-lose-it quality because of the sunset provision. I think it has a better chance of remaining on the books if we can show that it has been effective.”

The memo also lays out potential disciplinary action for marshals who don’t comply. “Disciplinary action[s] taken against marshals are made on a case-by-case basis and turn on the specific circumstances of each case,” said DOI’s Struzzi. The agency disciplined 11 marshals for errors during evictions from 2019 through mid-2024, as City Limits reported last year.

The rules also strengthen requirements for in-person service for congruence with last year’s law. Marshals are required to attempt in-person service but can leave the notice with an adult resident or post it on the door, and follow up by certified mail. “DOI advises marshals that whenever possible, notices of eviction shall be physically posted on the door of the subject residence, even in circumstances when personal service has been achieved,” wrote Strauber.

But the law won’t fix all the hitches of the eviction system, according to Hughes, a social worker with Bronx Legal Services. Lawyers, tenants, and advocates still rely on marshal’s offices to figure out when an eviction is actually scheduled after the 14-day minimum waiting period is up. And there isn’t consistency in how marshals respond.

Some offices, like Marshal Robert Renzulli’s, have apparently attempted to simplify the process, providing a form response to inquiries about eviction dates that includes the following: “Parties should make decisions in anticipation that execution of the Warrant of Eviction will occur on that ‘Earliest Eviction Date.’”

The move may help reduce how often lawyers and advocates need to call marshal’s offices to find the earliest eviction date, and help marshal’s office staff triage inquiries. But some marshals aren’t able to execute evictions near the first possible date. Sometimes, they’re pushed back or moved up—cases where knowing exactly when an eviction is happening, not just the first possible date, could prove crucial.

In a city that is churning out 40 evictions a day so far in 2025, some advocates say there’s still more to be done to give tenants every chance.

“People should be able to know what to expect when an eviction notice is issued and discretion that allows a marshal to withhold critical information is not helpful discretion,” said Hughes. “We’re talking about making people homeless here. Given that that is the stakes of it, it doesn’t seem at all inappropriate to demand that there is 100 percent transparency.”

To reach the editor, contact Jeanmarie@citylimits.org

Want to republish this story? Find City Limits’ reprint policy here.

The post City Marshals Must Post Eviction Notices Online Within 24 Hours, New Rules Say appeared first on City Limits.

After two years as the starting quarterback at Stillwater, Nick Kinsey has reportedly transferred to Archbishop Hoban High School in Akron, Ohio.

247Sports reported the news Tuesday, and Kinsey has Hoban listed in his bio on X.com.

Kinsey holds several Division-I offers, including those garnered from Eastern Michigan, North Dakota State and Southern Miss within the past couple of months.

Kinsey threw for 2,268 yards and 24 scores as a sophomore at Stillwater. Last fall, he threw for 1,412 yards and 10 scores as Stillwater — which featured an inexperienced varsity receiving core in 2024 — leaned more heavily on the legs of junior star running back Emilio Rosario-Matias.

Kinsey arrived in Stillwater in 2023 after transferring in from Benilde-St. Margaret’s.

Archbishop Hoban won four consecutive state titles in Ohio from 2015-18, and won again in 2020. It lost in the Division 2 semifinals last fall. The program has produced a number of Division-I players in recent years.

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BY GABRIELA AOUN ANGUEIRA

KULA, Hawaii (AP) — The car tires, propane tanks, gas generators and rusty appliances heaped on the side of a dirt road waiting to be hauled away filled Desiree Graham with relief.

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“That means all that stuff is not in people’s yards,” she said on a blustery July day in Kahikinui, a remote Native Hawaiian homestead community in southeast Maui where wildfire is a top concern.

In June, neighbors and volunteers spent four weekends clearing rubbish from their properties in a community-wide effort to create “defensible space,” or areas around homes free of ignitable vegetation and debris. They purged 12 tons of waste.

“It’s ugly, but it’s pretty beautiful to me,” said Graham, a member of Kahikinui’s Firewise committee, part of a rapidly growing program from the nonprofit National Fire Protection Association that helps residents assess their communities’ fire risk and create plans to mitigate it.

Kahikinui is one of dozens of Hawaii communities seeking ways to protect themselves as decades of climate change, urban development, and detrimental land use policies culminate to cause more destructive fires.

The state has 250,000 acres of unmanaged fallow agricultural land, nearly all of its buildings sit within the wildland-urban interface, and two-thirds of communities have only one road in and out.

But experts say that even with so many factors out of communities’ control, they can vastly improve their resilience — by transforming their own neighborhoods.

“Fire is not like other natural hazards, it can only move where there is fuel, and we have a lot of say in that,” said Nani Barretto, co-executive director of the Hawaii Wildfire Management Organization (HWMO), a 25-year-old nonprofit at the forefront of the state’s fire-risk mitigation.

Neighborhoods all over the United States are wrestling with the same challenge, some in places that never worried about fire before. A recent Headwaters Economics analysis found 1,100 communities in 32 states shared similar risk profiles to places recently devastated by urban wildfires.

A ‘Firewise’ movement

HWMO helps communities like Kahikinui become Firewise. In the 10 years preceding the August 2023 Maui fires that destroyed Lahaina, 15 Hawaii communities joined Firewise USA. Since then, the number has more than doubled to 31, with a dozen more in the process of joining.

“Everyone was like, ’My God, what can we do?’” said Shelly Aina, former chair of the Firewise committee for Waikoloa Village, an 8,000-resident community on the west side of the Big Island, recalling the months after the Maui fires.

The development — heavily wind exposed, surrounded by dry invasive grasses and with just one main road in and out — had already experienced several close calls in the last two decades. It was first recognized as Firewise in 2016.

As HWMO-trained home assessors, Shelly and her husband Dana Aina have done over 60 free assessments for neighbors since 2022, evaluating their properties for ignition vulnerabilities. Volunteers removed kiawe trees last year along a fuel break bordering houses. Residents approved an extra HOA fee for vegetation removal on interior lots.

Measures like these can have outsized impact as people in fire-prone states adapt to more extreme wildfires, according to Dr. Jack Cohen, a retired U.S. Forest Service scientist.

“The solution is in the community, not out there with the fire breaks, because those don’t stop the fire in extreme conditions,” said Cohen.

Direct flames from a wildfire aren’t what typically initiate an urban conflagration, he said. Wind-blown embers can travel miles away from a fire, landing on combustible material like dry vegetation, or accumulating in corners like where a deck meets siding.

“They’re urban fires, not wildfires,” said Cohen.

The solutions don’t always require expensive retrofits like a whole new roof, but targeting the specific places within 100 feet of the house where embers could ignite material. In dense neighborhoods, that requires residents work together, making community-wide efforts like Firewise important. “The house is only as ignition resistant as its neighbors,” said Cohen.

Communities can’t transform alone

Even with renewed interest in fire resilience, community leaders face challenges in mobilizing their neighbors. Mitigation can take money, time and sacrifice. It’s not enough to cut the grass once, for example, vegetation has to be regularly maintained. Complacency sets in. Measures like removing hazardous trees can cost thousands of dollars.

“I don’t know how we deal with that, because those who have them can’t afford to take them down,” said Shelly Aina. The Ainas try offering low-cost measures, like installing metal screening behind vents and crawl spaces to keep out embers.

HWMO helps with costs where it can. It gave Kahikinui a $5,000 grant for a dumpster service to haul out its waste, and helped Waikoloa Village rent a chipper for the trees it removed. It’s been hard to keep up with the need, said Barretto, but even just a little bit of financial assistance can have an exponential impact.

“You give them money, they rally,” she said. “We can give them $1,000 and it turns into 1,000 man hours of doing the clearing.” HWMO was able to expand its grant program after the Maui fires with donations from organizations like the Bezos Earth Fund and the American Red Cross.

At a time when federal funding for climate mitigation is uncertain, communities need far more financial support to transform their neighborhoods, said Headwaters Economics’ Kimi Barrett, who studies the costs of increasing fire risk. “If what we’re trying to do is save people and communities, then we must significantly invest in people and communities,” said Barrett.

Those investments are just a fraction of the billions of dollars in losses sustained after megafires, said Barrett. A recent study by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Allstate found that $1 in resilience and preparation investment can save $13 in economic and property losses after a disaster.

Another hurdle is asking residents to do work and make sacrifices as they watch others neglect their role. “The neighbors will ask, ‘What about the county land?’ There’s no routine maintenance,’” said Shelly Aina.

Her husband Dana Aina said he reminds people that it is everyone’s kuleana, or responsibility, to take care of land and people. “An island is a canoe, a canoe is an island,” he said, quoting a Hawaiian proverb. “We all have to paddle together.”

Bigger stakeholders are starting to make changes. Among them, Hawaii passed legislation to create a state fire marshal post, and its main utility, Hawaiian Electric, is undergrounding some power lines and installing AI-enabled cameras to detect ignitions earlier.

Meanwhile, Firewise communities have found that doing their own mitigation gives them more clout when asking for funding or for others to do their part.

After the 66-residence community of Kawaihae Village on Hawaii Island joined Firewise, they were finally able to get a neighboring private landowner and the state to create fuel breaks and clear grasses.

“Without that we wouldn’t have been on anyone’s radar,” said Brenda DuFresne, committee member of Kawaihae Firewise. “I think Firewise is a way to show people that you’re willing to help yourself.”

Associated Press coverage of philanthropy and nonprofits receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content. For all of AP’s philanthropy coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/philanthropy.

By EMMA BURROWS, Associated Press

The Kremlin confirmed Monday that Russian President Vladimir Putin has gifted to Donald Trump a portrait he commissioned of the U.S. president.

Putin gave the painting to Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, in Moscow earlier this month, the Russian president’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said in a response to a journalist’s question, declining further comment.

The gift was first mentioned last week by Witkoff in an interview with former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. Witkoff told Carlson that Trump “was clearly touched” by the portrait, which he described as “beautiful.”

Steve Witkoff, White House special envoy, speaks during a television interview outside the White House, Wednesday, March 19, 2025, in Washington. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

Witkoff met Putin after talks with Russian officials about trying to end the war in Ukraine. Ceasefire talks continued Monday in Saudi Arabia, where U.S. officials met their Russian counterparts, a day after meeting with Ukrainian negotiators.

During his interview with Carlson, Witkoff described Putin’s gift as “gracious” and recalled how Putin told him he had prayed for Trump last year when he heard the then-candidate for the U.S. presidency had been shot at a rally in Pennsylvania. “He was praying for his friend,” Witkoff said, recounting Putin’s comments.

In 2018, Putin gave then-President Trump a soccer ball that the Secret Service had checked for listening devices before Trump gave it to his son — a precaution that hearkened back to a Soviet-era gift to a U.S. diplomat that turned out to be bugged.

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In 1945, a carving of the Great Seal of the United States was given as a gift from Soviet school children to then-U.S. Ambassador Averell Harriman. It hung in his office for six years allowing the Soviet Union to eavesdrop on his conversations until the State Department discovered that it contained a covert listening device.

It was not immediately known if the portrait Putin gave to Trump had been examined for bugs. The White House hasn’t commented on the portrait.

Trump isn’t the first sitting president to receive a gift from Putin. In 2021, Putin gave then-President Joe Biden a $12,000 lacquer writing box and pen when they met at a summit in Geneva, Switzerland. In 2013, he reportedly sent then-President Barack Obama porcelain plates and espresso cups.

This apparently isn’t the first portrait of a U.S. leader Putin has sent, either. In 2014, the Russia president reportedly sent to George H.W. Bush a portrait of the former president on his 90th birthday.