Sewer Socialism, Meet Pothole Politics (GIFT ARTICLE)

This is the article from today's Morning Spew newsletter from Hell Gate. To get the newsletter in your inbox every weekday, including a link round-up of all the important NYC news, sign up here. After more than 100 days as mayor of New York City, Zohran Mamdani is still very much a democratic socialist, committed to governing for working people and meeting their everyday needs, no matter how mundane or basic. That was the theme of Mamdani's "First 100 Days" address in Queens on Sunday evening, held at the Knockdown Center, the former door factory-turned-nightclub venue. The event was attended by hundreds of City Hall staffers, agency employees, deliveristas, everyday New Yorkers, and members of the Democratic Socialists of America—Mamdani's political home. With the fading afternoon light filtering in through the factory space's west-facing, dust-covered windows, Mamdani championed his vision for democratic socialism in the country's largest city. "On January 1, I told New Yorkers that City Hall would hold a singular purpose, to make this city belong to more of its people than it did the day before," Mamdani said to the often-roaring crowd. "For 102 days, we have endeavored to do exactly that, delivering public goods and public excellence." During the speech, Mamdani outlined his administration's accomplishments over the first 100 days—a launch of a 2-K child care program that he said will ramp up to universality within four years; a series of settlements over stolen wages for New York City's workers; and the appointment of six new members to the Rent Guidelines Board, who will almost certainly follow through on Mamdani's campaign promise to freeze the rent for the city's rent-stabilized tenants. But the accomplishment that Mamdani stressed the most—that he really wanted to beat attendees over the head with—is his commitment to filling potholes around the city, part of an agenda the mayor has dubbed "pothole politics." "I was elected as a democratic socialist and I will govern as a democratic socialist," Mamdani said, recounting previous socialist mayors, like those who ran Milwaukee over a century ago, who had an attention to the civic good they dubbed "sewer socialism." "We will lower costs, pave the road, shovel snow from the street, and return dignity to working people's lives," Mamdani said. "And to the cynics, you know what? We're going to fill your potholes too." Mamdani's pothole-filling is impressive, though it began much later in the mayor's first 100 days, as his Department of Transportation could only begin to fix City streets after a punishingly cold and snowy winter. But the idea of "pothole politics" resonated with Mamdani's supporters inside the Knockdown Center. "I think he's been a lot more present than I thought he would," said William Gutierrez, a 28-year-old Woodside resident who voted and canvassed for Mamdani. "The idea of the mayor is much more tangible now, seeing him around the city, talking about things that affect people's day-to-day, like filling the potholes. Maybe that's recency bias, but I work in Bushwick, and seeing the potholes get filled there—you can already see the difference." Elissa Krauss, who helped organize the group "Seniors for Zohran" during the campaign and grew up a few blocks away from the Knockdown Center in Maspeth, agreed. "He's been doing great, I'm very satisfied," she said. "What I love the most is the respect he has for the people who work for the City. They're the ones that keep this place running. How he handled the emergency with the snow, that shows how much respect he has for them. He's also handled Hochul pretty well with the child care." During Mamdani's speech, he outlined three new priorities for his administration that will take far longer than 100 days, saying, "When socialists make promises, we go after it and get it." They included his announcement of the City's first government-owned grocery store, to be opened next year in and around La Marqueta, an existing City-owned market in El Barrio under the Park Avenue viaduct. (Mamdani claimed Fiorello La Guardia, one of his political idols, had first formally developed the space to offer affordable food during the Great Depression.) Mamdani shared that City-owned grocery stores would then open in the other four boroughs by the end of his first term. Mamdani also announced that the City will be rapidly expanding the stalled-out trash containerization program (supporters were handed signs that read "put a lid on it"), with the goal of launching containerized districts in each borough by the end of next year, achieving full city-wide containerization by 2031. The mayor added that his administration would also be redesigning large swaths of its bus infrastructure to allow for faster buses (even if they're not quite free). Mamdani once again shied away from direct confrontation with Governor Kathy Hochul, only briefly mentioning his push to tax the city's wealthiest to fill a $5 billion budget gap—an effort that appears futile amidst the governor's absolute refusal to budge on the issue during closed-door state budget negotiations. Instead, Mamdani poked fun at the looming budget deficit, when, after a surprise appearance by Senator Bernie Sanders, he asked the former mayor of Burlington what it was like to have an actual surplus to work with. The mayor's sense of humor was also present in a "100 Day Address Museum," placed near the Knockdown Center's bathrooms (you know, where you definitely go to "use the toilet"), which featured artifacts from his first 100 days, including an unfinished Mountain Dew Baja Blast (from a mukbang video with his DCWP commissioner) and bits of gravel from a pothole repair. (Papi Juice's Oscar NÑ kept the venue true to its dance party roots by DJing pulsing tracks throughout the evening.) Hunter College professor Sarah Chinn told Hell Gate she would have liked Mamdani to say more about CUNY and its crumbling facilities, which are deeply in need of repair. But she feels that the system has been getting a lot of behind the scenes support from City Hall so far, and overall, she was impressed by Mamdani's address. "To a certain extent, he was preaching to the choir, but every now and then, the choir needs it," Chinn said. "I was really pleasantly surprised how much he pushed being a democratic socialist, when there's been some push to get him to pull back from his left-wing policies, and the answer is clearly, 'No.'" submitted by /u/HellGateNYC [link] [comments]