Dear Mayor Adams,
It’s late summer in New York City, and while many of us are taking off and checking out, you, sir, are the mayor who never sleeps in the city that doesn’t either. And no wonder: If my to-do list at work looked like yours, I too would be unable to rest. Summer’s almost over, and you’re still scrambling to put together an annual budget for the city’s schools. The transit system is, once again, in a fiscal quandary and cutting services. Your solution to our homelessness crisis—encampment sweeps—doesn’t seem to be helping, which is particularly unfortunate now that, thanks to the governor of Texas playing politics with human lives, we have a whole new population of migrant New Yorkers in need of housing and services. And I haven’t even gotten to the glut of vacant office space! Or polio! Or monkeypox! Or crime—up more than 30 percent, year over year, in July! Just thinking about it all makes me want to go back to bed.
The crime thing, for any mayor, is a bad look. But it’s a particularly gnarly piece of gristle for you, the ex–NYPD officer who ran on a law-and-order platform. It was, as I’ve written here before, a risky strategy to employ, and not because I don’t think you have the chops to deliver on it. Rather, the crimes of post-2020 New York are simply not so black-and-white. Way beyond mere bad guys versus good guys, what we are experiencing now is more like law and order and unrest and mental health and homelessness and economic disparity and gangs and Pandemic Trauma. In this regard, to paraphrase a lyric from Hamilton: Winning was easy, Mr. Mayor, but governing is harder.
The term unprecedented is overused these days, but I think it’s safe to say you inherited a New York City experiencing a series of complex, interrelated challenges the likes of which had not been seen before in either of our lifetimes. There will be no silver bullet to fix the ills of our city, but a series of strategic, tactical decisions that will take some time to deploy, and even more time to render visible effects. (I suspect affordable housing will be a big piece of this puzzle.)
But I am not writing to chide you for things not done or roads not (yet) taken. I am here to help you get a win. Put some points on the board. A simple way to get New Yorkers back in your corner. Two words, one person: rat czar.
The city needs an individual working across departments to develop and roll out a holistic plan to tackle that other scourge plaguing New York City right now: rats. Desperately. More than that, Your Honor, I think that politically, you need one.
The city’s problems are complicated, but our opinions on rats are not. Nobody likes them, and there have never been more of them. It seems like a little thing, but picture it: a press conference in a neighborhood plaza or apartment building known for being a local rat haven. Lights, cameras, and you. Announcing that New Yorkers have spoken and you have heard us: The rat boom has been, for us humans, a bust. Then you introduce us to the newly minted NYC rat czar. I’m picturing someone no-nonsense and capable, preferably with a New York accent and a sense of humor. Basically Dr. Anthony Fauci, but for rats.
Perhaps the rat czar pledges their commitment to an extra day of trash pickup in high-rat-density areas, or to inspect construction sites for rat-prevention measures, or to expand our city’s composting program. Perhaps they even promise to perform a rat assessment of those outdoor dining sheds. I’m not sure of the particulars—despite my passion for the topic, I’m not vying for the job. What I know is that your plate is too full to think about something as seemingly minor as rats. But I assure you, many of the rest of us New Yorkers think about them. Often.
I know, I know. You’re thinking, I have really serious problems to deal with, matters of life and death. I’m going to prioritize rats? And I say, yes.
Hear me out. When you are watching a movie or a TV show and they want to signal blight and neglect, what do we see? Rats. Today’s New York might no longer have some of its old, black-and-white signifiers of misfortune and chaos. Gone are the subway graffiti and squeegee men (well, maybe). But we’ve still got the rats and overflowing corner trash bins.
Appointing a rat czar is, as far as I can see, a win-win. Rats are one of the few things that all New Yorkers would applaud you for taking on. And, unlike with crime, few would hold it against you if a rat czar didn’t yield banner results right away. Rats are, we all know, an uphill battle.
Much as the concept of a recession is partly psychological, so is the idea of a thriving and exciting New York. The rats among us are the extras in the backdrop of an Adams administration that New York simply does not need.
Sincerely,