Street Cleaning Vol 5: America's Funniest Mayors

A newsletter of bits and pieces.

Lyndon Johnson once said, “When the burdens of the presidency seem unusually heavy, I always remind myself it could be worse. I could be a Mayor.” Mayors occupy a frustrating middle ground— in some ways more powerful than national politicians with direct influence on the lives of their constituents, but also beholden to the whims and budgets of State and Federal leaders. Mayors don’t fly off to Washington; they work where they live and live where they work in a minefield of local grievances and power dynamics. The last few years of New York’s Eric Adams have underscored how truly strange the job is. Adams is a talented retail politician who relishes being out and about, who is unafraid to personally meddle in projects even over the heads of his own agencies, and whose corruption trial and knack for self-preservation quickly became a sideshow in the early days of the Trump administration, demonstrating how a big-city mayoralty is simultaneously consequential and petty, local and national.

In many states, a big-city mayor may have power rivaling or exceeding the governor. In NYC the Mayor commands a budget of over 100 billion dollars, operates the nation’s largest unified public school system with just under a million students, commands a police force with more officers than the militaries of Ireland, the Netherlands, or Portugal, and manage the largest public housing portfolio in the nation (albeit indirectly). With all this authority, it’s surprising the number of clowns and criminals who get elected mayor. Here, in no particular order, are some of them.

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford: “I’ve got more than enough to eat at home.”

There is a buffet of Rob Ford incidents to choose from, but this one is my favorite..

Mayor Bill de Blasio “murders” Staten Island Chuck

Part of the clownish nature of being Mayor is participating in quirky local traditions. Staten Island Chuck, the groundhog who tells New Yorkers how much longer winter will be, bit billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2009, prompting one of the better New York Times Headlines.

Despite this, the City thought it would be a good idea to introduce the grumpy rodent to the famously large and uncoordinated Mayor Bill De Blasio in 2014. De Blasio dropped (threw?) Chuck, who died a week later of “acute internal injuries.”

The NY Post wrote at least one hundred thousand articles about this, and is still writing about it today, despite Chuck dying over ten years ago.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s 24-pack

Many mayors unlucky enough to serve during COVID lockdowns didn’t survive the natural unpopularity of telling everyone to stay home. But maybe no COVID-era mayor flamed out as spectacularly as Chicago's Lori Lightfoot. Lightfoot shuttered the lakefront area along Lake Michigan in the pandemic’s early days, depriving residents of a relatively safe outdoor space, and prompting a wave of memes of the diminutive Lightfoot guarding things.

At the peak of her unpopularity, Lightfoot was photographed carrying a 24-pack of Modelos out of a Walgreens, accompanied by her security detail. One can only imagine for whom. Maybe all for her. Relatable!

Anyway... Let’s do better!

In the next couple of posts, I’m going to look at this June’s NYC mayoral field from a planning perspective. About 50% of my subscribers are from New York, and I’m a little troubled that even my more informed friends and co-workers seem to have only the vaguest sense of the people competing to run the biggest city in America. Part of this is fatigue with politics (Trump), part of this is that many candidates (with one notable exception) are mediocre communicators. Despite that, there are genuinely interesting and innovative ideas being proposed that deserve to be part of the conversation. My goal is to look at the candidates through the lens of a planner— their visions on development and housing, public space, and transportation. There are obviously more issues than these. I’m not going to compare approaches to education or the candidate’s stances on Israel. I’ll touch on public safety when it intersects with other issues, but will leave the candidates’ ideas for the NYPD to other sources. Mostly this is because these are not my areas of expertise, but also because I don’t think many voters understand the tremendous power Mayors have over housing affordability, the rise and fall of various neighborhoods, if it’s safe to cross your street, what your street looks like, or how fast your bus is. Look out for the first post next week.

Some links to get you up to speed

• The non-profit newsroom The City is providing excellent, comprehensive coverage, and their Ranked Choices newsletter is a great weekly digest of what’s going on in the race. If podcasts are more your thing, I recommend the FAQ NYC series of interviews with candidates.

• The NY Mag column City Politic, often written by Ross Barken or Errol Louis, is a good running commentary on City leadership and the people seeking it.

• Hell Gate has very entertaining, and shamelessly left-leaning, election coverage. If you are more ‘just the facts’ than you can’t beat Politico New York.

Here are some things that have nothing to do with mayors

• I was skeptical of this article from Urban Omnibus about what public meetings and hearings could learn from theater, but came away convinced.

• I watched the Pope’s entire funeral, and wow, when I die, carry me through the streets. The ceremony, which typically takes place entirely in St. Peter’s, burst out onto the streets as the Pope’s body was carried from the Vatican through Rome to his chosen resting place at St. Mary Major. The photos make you wonder why this isn’t standard practice, and the throngs of people lining the route, crammed onto balconies and hanging out of windows, were enough to turn my cold secular heart soft. It also weirdly reminded me of everything the Paris Olympic Opening Ceremony should have been.

• If you live in NYC, I highly recommend the Museum of the City of New York’s exhibit on dance cultures from the Lindy Hop to Voguing.

• Finally, my beloved and cursed New York Knicks are in the playoffs, and the modicum of space around Madison Square Garden that isn’t for cars is finally being activated. I went to Game 2 of the first round, and the vibes outside were electric.

City Sign of the Month