Thursday, June 03, 2021
PMT: Election in New York
The Democratic Primary on June 22 will, barring a shocker, decide who the next mayor of New York will be. Most Americans outside of New York have heard of Andrew Yang, but not his seven major opponents. Here is a thumbnail sketch of who they are:
Eric Adams
Adams is the Brooklyn Borough President (each of the five boroughs of NYC has its own leader). He was a career police officer before that, ending his career as a captain. His focus is (duh) on public safety. He's a noted workaholic, and has been criticized for comments telling people to "go back to Iowa" instead of moving to New York.
Shaun Donovan
Donovan was Housing secretary and Budget Director in the Obama administration, and prior to that ran housing for the Bloomberg administration in NYC. As one might expect, he is focused on housing, and envisions NYC being a set of "15-minute neighborhoods," where most of what you need would be within a 15-minute walk of your home. He's a long shot at this point.
Kathryn Garcia
Garcia is a former Sanitation Department commissioner who has also held a number of other civil service jobs, including being the "food czar" during the pandemic. She sees the departure of police officers as an opportunity to re-shape the department, and describes herself as a "practical progressive." She also wants to rebuild the BQE.
Ray McGuire
McGuire is a former investment banker and executive at Citigroup. His focus is on the economy of the city. He draws from his business experience when talking about how to fix the city. He is a favorite of the financial community. His key word regarding the police is "accountability." He is not taking public money for his campaign, relying instead on donations from individuals on and off Wall Street.
Dianne Morales
Morales comes from the non-profit world, particularly in the field of housing. She focuses on the problems of poverty, which affect nearly all parts of the city's operation. For example, she links the rise in some types of crime in New York to housing and food insecurity. Economically, her focus would be on small businesses.
Scott Stringer
Stringer is New York's Comptroller, and previously served as Manhattan Borough President. He believes that NYC faces a crisis like the one in 1977-- some of New York's darkest days. He wants to get tourists back and juice the economy. He has been a moderate Democrat, but is running as a progressive. On crime, he wants to increase clearance rates (that is, how many crimes are solved) and focus on violent crimes.
Maya Wiley
Wiley is a civil rights lawyer who served as counsel to Mayor DeBlasio. She wants to focus on quality-of-life issues like the subway, trash collection, and broadband. She wants to hire a police commissioner from outside of the NYPD, She wants to dramatically increase the stock of public housing through new construction,
