Steven Banks, Commissioner, New York City Department of Social Services

From 2014 to the present, Steven Banks has been the Commissioner of the New York City Department of Social Services (DSS). In this role, he is responsible for all aspects of the Department’s operations with an annual budget of $12 billion and approximately 16,000 staff serving over three million New Yorkers a year. DSS is the largest social services agency in the United States, and its programs include Cash Assistance, SNAP/food stamps, Medicaid, homelessness prevention, homeless and domestic violence services, and a broad range of other public benefits and services. Major accomplishments include:

  • Developed, implemented, and managed the first-in-the-nation right to counsel
    program for low-income tenants in Housing Court, which has already resulted in a 41% drop in evictions by Marshals as the $166 million annual program is  being phased in over five years.
  • Developed, implemented, and managed new systems and technology to provide online and telephone access for SNAP/food stamps and Cash Assistance, which has enabled DSS to manage historic increases in SNAP/food stamps and Cash Assistance applications during the COVID public health emergency.
  • Developed, implemented, and managed reforms to reverse 20 years of punitive public benefits policies, including new programs emphasizing education, training, and employment for a career pathway out of poverty, which cut in half the number of client disputes about their benefits cases.
  • Developed, implemented, and managed new social services rental assistance and rehousing programs that have enabled more than 170,000 children and adults to secure permanent housing. 
  • Conducted a 90-day review of homeless services that resulted in the integration of the then separate Department of Homeless Services into the Department of Social Services, and the 2017 Turning the Tide plan that reversed 40 years of failed homeless policies through four key approaches that have dropped the shelter census on a sustained basis for the first time by:
    • Preventing homelessness whenever possible through the right to counsel eviction defense program and the expansion of rent arrears grants, resulting in a 41% drop in evictions while evictions have been increasing across the country.
    • Increasing the provision of permanent housing, including supportive housing, that has already benefited more than 170,000 people.
    • Increasing outreach and low-barrier beds for individuals experiencing street and subway homelessness that has resulted in more than 4,200 people coming inside and remaining off the streets and subways.
    • Transforming the approach to providing shelter by closing more than 300 substandard shelters (more than 270 closed so far) and replacing them with a smaller number of 90 borough-based shelters closer to the anchors of life like schools, jobs, health care, houses of worship, and family support networks (89 sited so far).
  • Developed, implemented, and managed new programs for New Yorkers with HIV that eliminated a prior requirement barring services until clients had AIDS.

Prior to serving as the DSS Commissioner, Mr. Banks was the Attorney-in-Chief of the Legal Aid Society in New York City from July 2004 to 2014. In this role, he was responsible for all aspects of the legal practice and operations of the not-for-profit Legal Aid Society’s criminal, juvenile rights, and civil programs in New York City, which each year handle 300,000 legal matters in all five boroughs of the City with a staff of 1,900 employees, including more than 1,100 attorneys, and an annual budget of $223 million. Altogether, he worked at the Legal Aid Society for 33 years. He began as a legal intern in 1980, and served as a civil legal services staff attorney, a line attorney supervisor, a legal program manager, and a senior law reform litigator from 1981 until becoming the head of the organization in 2004 during a financial crisis. Major accomplishments include:

  • Working with the Board of Directors comprised of leaders of the major New York City law firms, managers, and the unions representing the staff (the Association of Legal Aid Attorneys/UAW and 1199/SEIU), led the organization through an out-of-court financial restructuring that saved the organization from bankruptcy after a $21 million deficit had built up under prior management.
  • Working with former New York Court of Appeals Chief Judge Jonathan Lippman, developed, implemented, and managed compliance with a new State law setting caseload caps for criminal defense staff attorneys in New York City and a new State law setting caseload caps for staff attorneys representing children in Family Court.
  • Together with managers and staff, increased the hiring of staff attorneys of color as the criminal defense caseload caps law was implemented, and was recognized by the New York City Bar as a Diversity Champion for this work.
  • Led major trial and appellate law reform cases, including the right to shelter litigation for New Yorkers experiencing homelessness, and served as counsel to the Coalition for the homeless.

Mr. Banks received his law degree from the New York University School of Law in 1981, and his undergraduate degree from Brown University in 1978.