Dear New Yorkers, In just two years, the number of fires caused by lithium-ion batteries commonly found in e-bikes has more than quadrupled, according to the FDNY. The fires have left behind so much hazardous, still-flammable material that the Sanitation Department ran out of storage — and used an emergency contract to hire a company to cart it away. Lithium-ion batteries removed from fires filled 159 containers — in sizes from 5 to 85 gallons — at a DSNY storage facility in Gravesend, Brooklyn last year. Then the city hired a company called Action Trucking to remove them in the fall. Many common items, like watches and cell phones, safely use the rechargeable batteries. But larger, unregulated versions found more recently in electric bikes, scooters and other devices have sparked dangerous fires. Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh on Friday wrote to the federal Consumer Product Safety Commission, asking it to take steps to regulate the batteries, including stopping uncertified ones from entering the country. In her letter, she said the batteries led to 219 fires in New York City last year, causing 147 injuries and six deaths. A Tuesday morning fire in Bushwick that critically injured a woman was the city’s 24th fire caused by lithium-ion batteries just this year. Read more here. Some other items of note: When 88-year-old Gloria Montague died in 2018, she left her Bronx condo, family jewelry collection and estate, valued altogether at $762,775, to 78-year-old cousin Rose Montague. More than five years later, Rose is just finding out how much the estate was worth and has yet to receive anything — even as nearly half of the money has already been spent by the Bronx public administrator, Matilde Berrios Sanchez. Mayor Eric Adams and the city’s largest municipal union, DC37, have struck a tentative five-year contract that would guarantee 16.21% in wage increases by 2026. If the deal is ratified by the union’s 100,000 members, it could set a pattern for the renewal of a slew of expiring agreements with other city workers. Portrait artist Rusty Zimmerman is painting 200 people in southern Brooklyn — for free — and recording their stories in the process. On THE CITY’s FAQ NYC podcast, host Harry Siegel turns the mic on Zimmerman and gets his own portrait done. Listen here. See how New York City is doing with our newsroom’s economic recovery tracker. For the latest local numbers on COVID-19 vaccinations, testing rates and more, check our coronavirus tracker.
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