Through its Public Records Access Officer, Outgoing Adams Administration Orders Document Response by February 27, Leaving Issue to Mayor-Elect Mamdani
911 Health Watch Challenges DEP’s Refusal to Explain Finding 68 Boxes of September 11th Documents
December 29, 2025
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact:
Benjamin Chevat
911 Health Watch
646 477 1461
Ben.Chevat@911HealthWatch.org
Matthew McCauley
Turken, Heath & McCauley, LLP.
914 363 6355
mmccauley@thmllp.com
Andrew Carboy
Law Offices of Andrew J. Carboy LLC
212 520 7565
acarboy@carboylaw.com
Mayor Adams’ Record Appeal Officer has directed a response to the Freedom of Information Law request of 911 Health Watch by February 27, 2026. This directive leaves the work of responding to our FOIL request, now two and half years old, to the Mamdani Administration.
Because of years-long delays, 911 Health Watch filed an Administrative Appeal of the Mayor’s effective denial of the FOIL request.
The Records Appeals Officer responded on December 24. While denying the appeal, the Officer ordered the Mayor’s Office to respond to our request by February 27, 2026.
911 Health Watch again calls on Mayor-elect Mamdani to release the “Harding Memo”, a document the New York Times reported was sent to then-Deputy Mayor Harding in October 2001. “A memo to Deputy Mayor Robert M. Harding from his assistant in early October said that the city faced as many as 10,000 liability claims connected to 9/11.” (New York Times, May 14, 2007, “Ground Zero Illnesses Clouding Giuliani’s Legacy”)
Mayor-elect Mamdani should commit his administration to full cooperation with the City Council-ordered DOI investigation of the 9/11 documents, and provide DOI with the resources needed to find out what the City knew regarding the health hazards at Ground Zero and when the City knew it.
Mayor-elect Mamdani can be the Mayor that finally resolves this issue on behalf of tens of thousands of first responders, workers, and residents in and around Ground Zero after 25 years of denial by four Mayoral Administrations.
In addition, regarding 911 Health Watch’s Article 78 proceeding seeking testimony from the City as to why it originally denied it had any records about 9/11, DEP unsurprisingly opposes 911 Health Watch’s request for live testimony. (NYC Response and 911 Health Watch Reply).
We are now awaiting a Court decision.
911 Health Watch and its attorneys, Andrew Carboy and Matthew McCauley, will continue their work to get the answers City Hall refuses to provide.
Benjamin Chevat, Executive Director of 911 Health Watch Inc, stated:
Mayor-Elect Mamdani can be the Mayor who after 25 years answers the question: what did the City know about the hazards caused by the toxic chemicals at Ground Zero, and when did it know it? He can do that by ordering his yet to be named Corporation Counsel to release the ‘Harding Memo’ and the data that went into drafting it, by supporting and fully cooperating with the City Council’s DOI investigation and by making sure DOI has the funding to do its job.
Explained Andrew Carboy:
At the agency level and in Supreme Court, the DEP worked to dismiss our case for two years, asserting we had no reason to claim the documents existed, in the first place. Now, after admitting to us that it had hundreds of thousands of September 11th records, DEP refuses to explain itself, voluntarily. We request the Supreme Court direct DEP officials to testify, under oath, and provide New Yorkers with the answers they deserve.
Matthew McCauley stated: “The City’s opposition is a contradiction by first assailing us for ‘… merely recit[ing] the procedural history …’ and then laughably claiming its current ‘… extraordinary transparency…'”
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