NYC Municipal IDs are here! Here's how to get one

A leak promised that NYC’s municipal ID card program would start on today, and hey, look at that, the website for the cards is up and running and chock full of information. So, wanna get your hands on a new form of ID that will separate you from the jerks who live in places like Buffalo or Syosset? Read on then, because we’ll let you know where and how you can snag an NYC municipal ID card of your own.

WHERE TO GO

At the moment, Brooklyn has two enrollment centers with confirmed hours. The Brooklyn Business Center (210 Joralemon Street, 1st floor) is open from 8:30am to 4:30am Monday through Friday, and the main branch of the Brooklyn Public Library (10 Grand Army Plaza), open from 9am to 9pm Monday though Thursday, 9am to 6pm Friday and Saturday and 1pm to 5pm on Sundays. The Sunset Park Recreation Center (7th Avenue and 43rd Street) will be open this spring, and will be an enrollment center once that happens.

There will also be two roving pop up enrollment centers, because New York City loves pop up everything, moving around the city eventually. You can find information for those on the municipal ID program’s website once they start.

WHAT YOU NEED

Of course, if you’re going to get an ID card, you need to be able to prove your identity. In order to do that, you need to get 4 points of ID and residency proof under the rubric set out by the city. The good news is that if you have a New York State driver’s license or a non-driver’s photo ID from the DMV with a New York City address, or an NYC handgun license (which you probably don’t have), you don’t need any other forms of ID because those all show your full identity and residency.

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If you don’t have any of those though, you’ll need a different combination of documents that prove who you are and where you live. For identity, you can use things like a US or foreign passport, visas, US or foreign driver’s licenses, even ID documents from a foreign country. That being said, any foreign ID document beyond a machine readable passport only gets you two ID points.

To prove residency, you can use letters addressed to your home that come from NYC schools, from NYCHA or from a homeless shelter that you’ve stayed in for 15 consecutive days, your lease or property tax statement or insurance or utility bills. If you don’t have any of those, you can also use a tax return that’s no more than one year old, or a bank account statement, pay stub or jury duty summons that’s dated within 60 days. All of those need a NYC address on them, of course.

WHAT YOU GET

As we’ve gone over, you get a bunch of awesome free one-year memberships to NYC’s cultural institutions like BAM, the Bronx Zoo, the Museum of the Moving Image, the Museum of the City of New York and P.S. 1. To actually start the memberships, you’ll need to visit these places though, so just keep that in mind if you’re planning any trips.

There are a bunch of other benefits beyond the memberships though. The NYC ID will also function as a library card in all three of New York’s library systems (Brooklyn, New York and Queens), which you can set up with a trip to your local library. You can get 10% off an annual NYC Parks recreation center membership, 20% off family memberships at 22 YMCA centers around the city and a free 30-day trial at New York Sports Clubs. Hell, you can even get 5% off at Food Bazaars around the city on weekdays from 7am to 7pm, among other benefits.