The Arduous Task Ahead of New York's New Mayor

Democrat Bill de Blasio’s easy win in the New York mayoral election shouldn’t overshadow the enormous task that lies ahead. While making lots of promises, the state of affairs left by his predecessor, Michael Bloomberg, may leave him with little room to maneuver. In January (when de Blasio takes the helm), he will have to tackle a great obstacle course.

The new mayor largely based his campaign on the theme of inequality: Out of New York City’s 8.3 million residents, more than 400,000 are millionaires. At the same time, 46 percent of the population lives below or just above the poverty line.

To reduce these inequalities, the Democrat said that he would start with improving education. De Blasio thus promised to create room for 68,000 kindergartners over the age of four and to start a college advisement program.

Raising Income Taxes

To finance these programs, he wants to raise taxes for the wealthy. Municipal income tax rates for those who make more than $500,000 will rise from 3.8 percent to 4.41 percent. Expected to bring in $530 million a year, this initiative has provoked uproar among conservatives, who stress that the taxes burden this segment of the population; local and federal taxes combined already pass the 50 percent mark. [New York’s wealthy] are one of the most taxed populations in the United States.

The main difficulty will be receiving approval from the state of New York, a necessary step to change local taxation. “We have a long way to go,” Bill de Blasio swore during his campaign. One could argue that David Dinkins, Rudolph Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg, his three predecessors, found the means to overcome state reluctance to raise taxes. But this is exactly the problem: There are still issues at hand, as the midterm federal election looms in fall 2014.

The new mayor will have to face a lot of persuasiveness from the Republicans as well as from within his own camp, especially New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, who is against tax hikes. Bill de Blasio is convinced that his enormous victory is capable of changing policies in Albany, New York’s state capitol.

Social Issues at the Mayor’s Office

The second problem facing the new mayor is the employment contracts of 300,000 city employees. Six years ago discussions ended in failure, with Michael Bloomberg failing to find a compromise with the unions.

This social dilemma constitutes a real time bomb for Bill de Blasio. Arrears of increasing salaries, according to the City Finance Commission, would cost $7 billion. That’s more than the budget deficit, and police and firefighter expenditures combined.

If Bloomberg held strong against these claims, his successor finds himself in a less comfortable position, since the unions were among his first campaign supporters. Here the expectations again are high. The disappointment might be inversely proportional if de Blasio doesn’t give [in] a little.

A $2 Billion Hole in the Budget

But with what money? Under Michael Bloomberg, the city’s budget soared more than 33 percent (excluding inflation) to reach $70 billion. Today, New York spends $8,700 per person, double the amount that Chicago spends and 50 percent more than Los Angeles. The mayor leaves office with $2 billion missing.

The question being asked regards how his successor is going to balance future budgets; his campaign policy would increase spending, especially with the construction of 200,000 public housing units. Of course, there is the parallel question of reducing the number of tax exemptions, which under the previous office benefited real estate developers of luxury apartments. It will probably not suffice.

Bill de Blasio is going to have to make his choice quickly. Some — like the Republicans, but also a good number of New Yorkers — fear that the new mayor will cut police spending. He promised that he would change police director Ray Kelly’s “stop and frisk” security policy, which discriminates against ethnic minorities. What will be the impact of this sort of change? No one knows.

Yet Bill de Blasio must act carefully not to challenge the positive measures made against crime by Rudolph Giuliani and pursued by Bloomberg. Thanks to them, the number of murders fell to its lowest level in 50 years, making New York one of the safest large cities in America.

The Democrats Return

Nearly 20 years have passed since a Democrat ran New York. David Dinkins, the last, left bad memories: The city was dirty and poorly managed, and crime was rampant. His record was so terrible that the New York Post ran a cover titled, “Dave, Do Something!”

Bill de Blasio made many promises to his voters, capturing the frustrations of a social group who felt excluded from Bloomberg’s bourgeois attitude. If his perspective won him the election, it is now essential that the new mayor find the right solution, compatible with the city’s finances, to change New York.