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NYC Adds Cultural Benefits to Incentivize Undocumented to Get ID Cards

The municipal identification cards that New York plans to start issuing next year in an effort to make life easier for undocumented immigrants will come with an added benefit so enticing that many others may sign up for them too: an offer of free tickets or discounts at 33 of the city’s leading cultural institutions.

The municipal identification cards that New York plans to start issuing next year in an effort to make life easier for undocumented immigrants will come with an added benefit so enticing that many others may sign up for them too: an offer of free tickets or discounts at 33 of the city’s leading cultural institutions.

Lincoln Center and Carnegie Hall; the Bronx Zoo and the New York Botanical Garden; the American Museum of Natural History, the Snug Harbor Cultural Center and many others will offer a variety of perks — most of them equivalent to a basic one-year membership — to holders of the new ID cards, which are expected to be made available to any city resident over age 14, regardless of their legal status.

The incentives are meant, in part, to encourage cultural activity among immigrants and other New Yorkers who may feel they cannot afford to visit the symphony or ballet. That anyone can sign up is by design: The de Blasio administration clearly hopes the cards will be embraced by a wide swath of residents, reducing any potential stigma they may carry.

Among the deals are a one-year membership at the Bronx Zoo (a $79 value), $5 off the price of a movie ticket at the Brooklyn Academy of Music and discounted admission to plays at the Public Theater. For food lovers, there is a 10 percent discount at M. Wells Dinette, the quirky culinary outpost at MoMA PS 1 in Long Island City, Queens.

But the fine print includes many caveats. The City Ballet, for instance, is offering access to rehearsals and seminars, but not to regular performances. Some of the museums offering no-cost admission, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art, are already technically free. And some of the city’s higher-priced sites, like the Museum of Modern Art, the Neue Galerie and the Whitney Museum of American Art, are not part of the initial group of participating institutions, all of which operate in city-owned buildings or on city-owned land.

Caroline Cournoyer is GOVERNING's senior web editor.
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