February 14, 2025

Photo Credits: Spencer Platt/Getty Images

The Adams Mess

OK, I am going to resist the temptation to spend this whole newsletter on New York's political crisis, which kicked into high gear this week when President Trump's Justice Department ordered federal prosecutors to drop charges against Mayor Adams — at least for now — in order to push him to help with the federal crackdown on illegal immigration.

"I also understand that many New Yorkers are still questioning my character," Adams said, "And I know that I must continue to regain your trust."

And that pretty much resolved the situation.

Just kidding! 

By Thursday, the White House was still struggling to even find a prosecutor who would follow orders to let Adams off. In a scathing letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi, Danielle Sassoon, the Republican acting U.S. Attorney for the Southern District, cited her mentor Antonin Scalia and refused to drop the charges after a “rushed and superficial process.” 

She rejected the idea that Adams should be let off "because he occupies an important public position and can use that position to assist in the Administration’s policy priorities" — a deal that "violates commonsense beliefs in the equal administration of justice." Then Sassoon, a Republican, resigned. 

Now, Governor Kathy Hochul is facing growing pressure from Democrats to remove the mayor. If she does, it would trigger a special election on the first Tuesday that falls after 80 days — and speed up former Governor Andrew Cuomo's decision, now expected by early March, about whether he'll enter the race for mayor.

Here at the Bigger Apple, though, our thoughts are turning to Adams' legacy. And while corruption allegations will hang over him the way they still hang over the Jazz Age mayor, Gentleman Jimmy Walker, he will also be judged in large part for his serious efforts to fix one of the city's most pressing crises, housing. 

"We won't be safe until Gov. Hochul uses her power to remove Eric Adams from office. We like puppets on Sesame Street, not City Hall." -- Jessica Ramos

"Eric Adams' Corruption has become a danger to all New Yorkers. Governor Hochul should remove him from office immediately. -- Zohran Mamdani 

"In 30 years of federal criminal practice, I have NEVER seen anything like this. It could mean that Bove knew Adams’ counsel was making an illicit offer and he wanted to quarantine the evidence. Whatever his motives, I am flabbergasted by the act. Hold on to your hats, people. More shoes will be dropping in this story. It’s going to get worse." -- Jim Walden on X  reacting to the resignation of the US Attorney for the Southern District, Danielle Sassoon.

Meanwhile Comptroller Brad Lander is trying to get the $80 million back from the feds. FEMA took back the money Congress had appropriated to help fund the migrant crisis. 

Willets Point, Queens. Photo Credits: Lindsey Nicholson/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images

Last week's MI poll showed that the cost of housing was a top concern for 29% of the city's voters, second only to public safety. With millions of New Yorkers paying more than a third of their income for housing before they even get to utilities (Gov. Hochul has been talking about rate hikes all week), it is almost surprising that the number is not higher.

New York has been losing residents to the more affordable neighboring states and to the Sun Belt, and losing power in Washington as the result. City Hall needs to make it affordable to live here, which among other things like childcare and public transit, means the city needs to build way, way more housing, and do it fast. 

"The future of the city and state until 2040, the next census opportunity, will likely be locked in in less than six months,” Daniel Golliher wrote in Maximum New York last month. "The 2025 New York City elections are the last chance the city will have before 2030 to pick a mayor and city council members who can reverse our projected loss of people and power."

Part of the reason we are in this crisis is that following the Great Recession, the city's housing market did not keep up with the significant job growth to an impressive degree: the city added 362,900 more jobs than housing units between 2001 and 2018.

Northern New Jersey meanwhile kept building more than two homes per job - mostly in the counties directly across the Hudson River from the city. "The statistics indicate that the city’s horrendous housing production was largely a policy choice," Erik Engquist writes in The Real Deal. "The government simply didn’t create the conditions developers needed to meet the rising demand for housing."

Adams' "City of Yes" is made some progress in that direction. And the solution to the crisis is also a political one. The next mayor needs a bold agenda and political prowess to carry it out. 

Two mixed-use buildings under construction on 9th Avenue in Hell's Kitchen. Photo Credit: Deb Cohn-Orbach/UCG/Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

Eric Kober retired in 2017 as director of housing, economic and infrastructure planning at the New York City Department of City Planning. He is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and we talked earlier this week.

Can New York ever fully accommodate everyone who wants to be here?

It can and should accommodate more.  Just as my grandparents arrived as penniless immigrants and found opportunity, the same should be true today.  Our overregulated and undersupplied housing stock still works for the well-off.  The people who want to come and can't come at this point are the less privileged – I would like to make space for them.

The housing crisis is long-standing. But that doesn't mean there isn't a solution. There are lots of other places around the country that don't have this kind of crisis. It just means that the politics have been intractable.  

Mayor Adams asked this week to judge him on his record. How much do you think he's accomplished when it comes to housing?

He's taken steps with the City of Yes that meaningfully ameliorate the crisis, but don't solve it by any means. The city needs to be much more aggressive in terms of removing obstacles to private investment. 

Adams has shown that the situation is not hopeless, and that the political system can unite enough to make progress. But in four years, he hasn't yet placed the city on a path to affordable and abundant housing by any stretch of the imagination. He had an opportunity to do a lot more than he's done. 

If I compare him to Bill de Blasio, his record is notably better. But if I compare him to other mayors I've worked under, that's not really the case.

How do you see the mayoral candidates based on their proposed housing policies?

The next mayor needs to be far more aggressive, both at the city level, in terms of levers that are under the city's control, particularly zoning, and in terms of seeking relief at the state level from the panoply of state laws that guarantee a continued dire housing shortage. Mayors have power if they use it.

We have one candidate [Zohran Mamdani] who has staked out a socialist position, which is that the government should build a great deal of housing with public money, essentially a second public housing system and solve the housing crisis that way. The other candidates, they're liberals, and generally see a large role for government in terms of addressing the city's housing crisis but they recognize a range of roles for the private sector. 

Zellnor Myrie believes that the private sector has a significant role to play in solving this crisis and that the government needs to remove roadblocks to private sector investment in housing.  Scott Stringer  is not far from Mamdani. Other candidates – Brad Lander, Jessica Ramos – are in the middle.

Voters should focus on how realistic their positions are. The more they envision removing roadblocks to private investment, I think, the more realistic they are about actually making a dent in the city's housing supply crisis.

What would be your advice to the mayoral candidates if they wanted to get the city out of this crisis?

They should recognize that it's not going to be done with public money alone, and that the city and state need to consider how their hostility to private investment feeds into the continuation of the housing crisis. That's it.

Please build more everywhere! A new Manhattan Institute poll of NYC voters shows broad support for the City of Yes zoning reform plan and pro-housing policies. Asked about what would be more effective at making housing more affordable, voters were about evenly split between those wanting to make it easier to build, providing subsidies to renters and homebuyers, or a combination of both.

Some 49% want community input prioritized, even if it slows down and makes the process more expensive. About 42% want the government to streamline regulations to make it easier to build. Which is to say: NIMBYs and YIMBYs are about evenly numbered.

Photo Credit: Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for Haute Living/via Getty Images

Zero Bond, a private club, where Mayor Adams likes to meet friends and hold court. You may know people who may be there. Just keep in mind that Law and Order is filming outside the club on Tuesday.