Translating Eric Adams

            In the circle of white Manhattanites among whom I travel, Mayor Eric Adams is an enigma. He doesn’t seem to advance their interests, as they perceive them, and as a result they don’t understand what motivates him politically. Having had the rewarding experience of spending more than a decade working in the Southeast Queens community in which he grew up, I thought it might be something of a public service for me to attempt to explain the world view of that community and how the Mayor represents it, as best I can. Doing so requires generalizing about a community of which I am not a member, which risks, at best, inaccuracy, and at worst pejorative stereotyping – but I am willing to hazard doing so to attempt to make matters clearer to those who are perplexed. 

            Jamaica, Queens is said to be one of the largest communities of African American homeowners in the United States. Two of its zip codes have among the highest income levels in Queens. It includes the neighborhoods of St. Albans, Hollis, Springfield Gardens, Laurelton and Rochdale, unfamiliar to most white residents of Manhattan south of 125thStreet. Not only are these the neighborhoods that shaped Mayor Adams, but they are also represented by City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams (the City’s second most powerful public official) and Congressman Gregory W. Meeks. Congressman Meeks is the Queens County Democratic Chair, the ranking minority member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and the Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. While Queens member of Congress, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,’ name may be more familiar to Manhattanites, Congressman Meeks is a far more influential and powerful figure. Arguably, southeastern Queens is New York City and State’s most politically formidable community – one about which most white Manhattanites know next-to-nothing. 

            Southeast Queens has been home to many notable New Yorkers. Congressman Meek’s predecessor, former Member of Congress, the Reverend Dr. Floyd Flake, was long the pastor of one of the city’s largest churches, Allan A.M.E Cathedral (succeeded by his spouse Dr. Elaine Flake). Former Citicorp CEO Richard D. Parsons also grew up here. In the past, a large group of well known, successful jazz musicians made Jamaica, particularly St. Albans, their home. 

            Mayor Adams represents and advances the interests of his constituency well. Many neighborhood residents are government workers – postal employees, teachers, transit employees, police and corrections officers. Among the higher income neighborhood residents are school principals and other senior administrators (and, in fact, Mayor Bloomberg’s schools Chancellor, Dennis Walcott, continues to live there and is now President of the Queens Public Library). The largest private sector employer in the community is jetBlue, whose personnel work at airports run by quasi-governmental entity, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. These folks care about the compensation and benefits received by government and union workers – and the Mayor has gone a long way towards bringing to closure a large number of public employee union contracts that had expired. Residents of Jamaica also care about public safety – both in terms of preventing violent crime, but also in terms of averting the random stopping of Black men by police. Most are car owners and are less invested in public transit. Bike lanes are not their issue. 

            What they also care less about are the public space issues in midtown and downtown that so bother us Manhattanites – like litter, street homelessness and sidewalk vending – which white Manhattan residents view as being “out of control” and where City government is viewed as failing. Not to say that they these issues don’t matter to residents of southeast Queens and Central Brooklyn, but they are certainly less important than other things. The most important issue to southeastern Queens residents, in fact, is the flooding of the basements of their homes by a rising water table in the decades since the closure of the Jamaica Water Company – a multi-billion-dollar problem with which Greenwich Village residents are entirely unfamiliar. 

            Mayor Adams is serious when he refers to himself as a “working class mayor,” and when he notes that he neither has nor needs a “degree from Harvard” to be a successful leader of New York City. He has appointed to city positions people whom he trusts with whom he has had long relationships, and individuals who are proven vote getters in areas across the city, presumably with the idea that this will be beneficial in his campaign for re-election. This has been standard operating procedure for New York City politicians for generations, particularly those of the first half of the 20thcentury who came up through political machines. While Mayors have appointed people to senior positions with prestigious academic credentials and/or high-level private sector experience, this has been a more recent and occasional practice. And I would note first, that it hasn’t been obvious that those Ivy Leaguers have proven to be more effective public servants and second, that the Mayor’s Commissioner of the Sanitation Department, on which many of the complaints I hear from my social set are focused, is an Upper East Side resident with three degrees from Harvard. 

            The Mayor is also focused on directing government contracts to Black-owned businesses previously excluded from the benefits of government largess. Some of these efforts have come under scrutiny and questions have been raised about them in the media. But pushing public dollars to Black-owned businesses, to which government lip service has been extensively paid in recent years, is definitely part of the Mayor’s agenda. Similarly, I think it can be safely said that some of the practices in which the Mayor and his campaign have engaged that have raised journalistic and white eyebrows, are, in the view of Black folks, practices in which whites in power have long conventionally engaged without public comment. It is only when people of color have taken up the levers of government, in their view, that these have become issues. 

            It should also be acknowledged that Mayor Adam’s prior position in government was as the Borough President of Brooklyn. Borough Presidents preside over small operations. Much of their time is spent cheerleading for their boroughs, attending public events, making announcements, and issuing press releases on matters of public concern. So, it shouldn’t be surprising that Mayor Adams continues to view these to be central components of his mayoralty. In any event, there is less to mayoral control of city government than might be otherwise obvious because of the decades of accreted bureaucratic structures the constitute city government, particularly in matters of contracting and employment, that tremendously constrict the effectiveness of any mayor. Mayors have all announced great sounding programs that never happen.

            It can be accurately said that Mayor Adams is fairly representing his constituency, the folks who voted for him. Further, it should be noted that we Manhattan liberals have long taken pride in our advocacy of empowering people of color and working people – giving them a voice in the deployment of government power. There is something hypocritical about complaining about how they are exercising it now that they have it.