In his State of the City address Wednesday, Mayor Adams ad-libbed a phrase not in his written remarks, repeating it four times: “Stay focused, no distractions, and grind.”
The mayor seemed to be giving advice to himself — advice he needs to take.
Though his big ideas are fine, if limited — safe streets, more housing — he’s still not following through.
True to type, the mayor whipped the crowd into a party atmosphere.
(He wielded Wednesday’s Post article on Time Out ranking us the world’s best city.)
His message: “Crime is down, jobs are up.”
The tone was the opposite of the governor’s two weeks ago, when she drew a picture of a city where people are terrified they’ll be stabbed by a stranger and demoralized by the sight of toothpaste locked up in the Duane Reade.
The mayor risks alienating people if he continues to present the crime issue as something he’s fixed, not an ongoing crisis — yet another “random” stabbing claimed a victim in Times Square hours before the mayor spoke.
He tells us to “just look at the numbers” on crime, and we can.
Yes, he deserves credit for reducing the murder rate (though not back to 2019 near-record lows), but he hasn’t cut felony crime: We ended last year with felonies 30% higher than 2019.
One new pledge was welcome: He promised protesters blocking train and car traffic “will be held accountable.”
But we’ll need to see this in action and fast.
And the mayor remains unfocused on a long-term plan to ensure public safety.
He’s the only tough-on-crime mayor who hasn’t proposed an increase in the police force, even as it has steadily fallen by 5,000, to 35,000, since the turn of the millennium.
He’s done asking Albany for new fixes to the criminal-justice laws, save stronger authority to crack down on illegal pot shops.
Fine, but why isn’t the latter done already?
We can’t wait until the end of Albany’s spring budget season for a new tool that will take months after that to deploy; the mayor could have showed urgency.
As for housing, the mayor called — again — for half a million new apartments in a decade, including 12,000 on public-housing property.
But the city doesn’t have resources to offer massive new subsidies for below-market-rate housing.
Here, too, he must depend on Albany.
Lawmakers must revive expired tax breaks to encourage developers to set aside some units as “affordable” as they build market-rate housing.
If the mayor can reduce felonies and disorder and revive the housing market so developers build a fraction of what he promises, he’ll have accomplished much.
But the “if” is an open question, and much of the mayor’s speech was evidence of the same unfocused management style of his first two years.
Adams, for example, wants to address the scourge of motorized two-wheeled vehicles.
“We cannot have mopeds speeding down our sidewalks,” he said.
He also aspires to reduce danger from e-bike battery fires, which killed 18 people last year.
Fine, but to do this, he wants the City Council to create a “Department of Sustainable Delivery,” complete with its own commissioner and staff.
Why? New York’s existing commissioners — fire, police and consumer affairs — can handle this.
The only reason they haven’t is the mayor still hasn’t said: You can’t store batteries for commercial use in your home, and we’re also going to seize illegal, uncertified batteries from the streets.
In fact, the mayor has already signed a whole spate of supposed e-bike reforms into law.
And laws have long required cyclists to obey traffic laws.
But without enforcement teeth, they haven’t improved safety.
On the migrant crisis, the mayor offered no sign the city has it under control.
Adams’ budget projections show the number of migrants in city shelter will rise from 70,000 to 90,000 by mid-year and stay there.
The mayor is still signing no-bid contracts with hotels.
Yet Adams spun this as a feel-good immigration success story. “We are proud to uphold our legacy of welcoming the tired, the poor.”
He did not call on President Biden to secure the border, only to give work permits to all newcomers who walk across.
Much of the rest of the speech sounded like a to-do list of stuff left over from last year (and the year before): “Getting outdoor dining done, getting scaffolding down.”
This is fine, but we need faster, more decisive progress.
As his poll numbers show, Adams can’t rely on charisma any longer.
Next year, the mayor needs a longer list of results — not ideas.
Nicole Gelinas is a contributing editor to the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal.
