Four Ways to Make the Most of a De Blasio Mayoralty
Four Ways to Make the Most of a De Blasio Mayoralty
The progressive Democrat is going to win today’s race for mayor of New York City, but what his victory will mean remains to be seen. As those who seek progressive changes in government and society should know, their work begins, not ends, when their preferred candidates win office.
Bill de Blasio is going to win despite the Republican candidate Joe Lhota’s tireless efforts to link de Blasio to the city’s last Democratic mayor, David Dinkins, and the chaos that reigned under Dinkins’s administration from 1990 to 1993. While Lhota’s hapless flailing has not and should not have concerned de Blasio, the challenges that Dinkins faced should very much be on his mind, and ours.
The parallels are worth noting. De Blasio, like Dinkins, is an amiable, left-of-center Democrat taking over for a three-term centrist with an outsize personality and a huge and varied legacy whose third term was marred by flatlining achievements and divisive racism (Ed Koch’s increasing attacks on “poverty pimps” and African-American leaders, Bloomberg’s increasingly aggressive defenses of stop-and-frisk). In various polls and man-on-the-street interviews, New Yorkers have expressed their fondness for de Blasio’s empathy, kindness, and relatability, as they did for Dinkins. Meanwhile, those who were increasingly locked out of City Hall during Bloomberg’s last term, including unions, community organizations, and housing advocates, have coalesced into a coalition that has ably countered Lhota’s efforts to cloak himself in Bloomberg and Giuliani’s mantle, much as they helped Dinkins overcome Ed Koch’s incumbency in 1989.
This all sounds good—who wouldn’t want to ride into office with an image of geniality, backed by a powerful and diverse progressive coalition?—but it doesn’t mean an era of good feelings is just around the corner. Amiability is a great quality in a candidate, but it can make trouble in City Hall. Those who campaign as no-nonsense hardliners have it easy: every time they piss someone off or get into a tussle, it bolsters their image. Nice guys, on the other hand, are accused of breaking campaign promises and being crypto-jerks the minute they make a tough decision or disagree with a former ally, and if they do try to please everyone, they’re quickly labeled powerless pawns of their supporters. As Chris McNickle’s recent biography of Dinkins notes, the last Democratic mayor of New York struggled mightily with both sides of this coin, to the point that even when he succeeded, he failed. Dinkins reduced crime, improved education, and balanced four budgets during a recession, but the impression of his mayoralty was one of disorganized management, in which attempts to please everyone ended up pleasing no one.
As de Blasio takes office, he will face the full range of issues that a mayor must deal with, and he will have many people to please. In the first months of his administration, it will be easy for the left-liberal coalition that elected him to fracture into its constituent parts, each demanding attention for its particular area of interest. It will be extremely difficult to keep this coalition together and focused on a few key issues, but if a de Blasio mayoralty is to deliver real change, it is a challenge that must be taken up. Civic action isn’t just necessary to keep the mayor’s eyes on the prize; it’s also crucial in a metropolis where many of the ideas that de Blasio has championed will require action in Albany. While New York City never lacks for worthy causes, the combination of de Blasio’s campaign promises and current city politics suggests (at least) four areas where progressives should put pressure on the mayor.
Policing: Stop-and-frisk has dominated the news cycle recently, and for good reason. While a federal appeals court gave defenders of stop-and-frisk some ammunition when it put a stop to sweeping changes ordered by Judge Shira A. Scheindlin last week, de Blasio will doubtless forge ahead with his plans to drop the city’s appeal of the case, replace Commissioner Raymond Kelley, and enforce recently passed anti-bias legislation (as well as potentially passing additional legislation). The problems in the department are systemic, however, and include questionable training practices and numbers-driven policing that alienates beat cops and communities alike. Reforming the department and rebuilding faith in the police in minority communities is a tall order for whomever de Blasio picks to run the show, and much of New York’s well-off electorate remains extremely skittish about any uptick in crime, no matter how slight. Even though Lhota’s lurid ads proved fruitless in the short run, critics will be ready to pounce the minute either statistics or a high-profile incident turn attention to crime, and pressure to privilege security at any cost will mount. Keeping de Blasio focused on substantive reform when the going gets tough will be politically difficult, but without counter-pressure, the law-and-order crowd will ensure that the status quo persists.
Universal Pre-K and Improved After-school: Raising taxes on New York’s wealthiest to restore and expand these programs has been one of de Blasio’s signature campaign promises, but as many have noted, state action will be required to fund the measure. While de Blasio’s old friend Governor Andrew Cuomo has recently suggested that he could find the funding for the measure without raising taxes, and most observers agree that these programs are worthy, fighting for a tax increase to fund them draws considerably less enthusiasm. This is too bad, because in addition to improving student achievement, programs like these employ community members and improve community-school linkages in ways that help to sustain neighborhood schools. Leaving such programs at the whim of year-to-year state budgeting is no way to guarantee their long-term viability.
Affordable Housing: Critics are divided on de Blasio’s credentials here. He both created a “worst landlords” watch list as public advocate and took donations from some of those folks as a candidate. He has, however, spoken up about the ineffectiveness of voluntary inclusionary zoning and other current city subsidy policies, which add a few “affordable” units here and there in exchange for ever-more-rapid and massive development. De Blasio has called for better incentive programs and has occasionally suggested a return to pension-funded construction of affordable units. From Koch to Bloomberg, NYC mayors have championed development, both as a way of bringing the rich and their tax dollars back to the city and as a way of creating jobs, to the point that the city has become impossibly expensive to live in for many low-income and working-class New Yorkers. Rethinking and reforming this city-as-a-growth-machine strategy, especially after the Real Estate Board of New York spent millions to influence council races, will require both mayoral mettle and popular support of the sort that makes council members think about their constituents, and not just their campaign funds.
Championing the Working Class: De Blasio has been extremely vocal in this direction, recently appearing at fast food worker rallies to insist on such things as paid sick days, paid family leave, and minimum- and living-wage laws. Many unions will be caught up in negotiating lapsed contracts with the city when de Blasio takes office, a process that severely challenged Dinkins and could well prove tough for de Blasio, as millions in back pay hangs in the balance (as does the city’s budget). NYC’s labor coalition has proved adept at coming together to encourage voters to support de Blasio on the Working Families Party line. One hopes that even as they negotiate their own contracts, they will stay focused on the need to keep momentum going—in Albany as well as downtown—for measures that will benefit all of New York’s working families.
Nick Juravich is a graduate student in the history department at Columbia University. He blogs about the Crown Heights neighborhood in Brooklyn at www.ilovefranklinave.blogspot.com.
Editor’s note: the paragraph on policing was revised at 12:45 p.m.
