Mamdani’s Labor Policy Worsens Inequality
Walking my kids to their first day of school brought the unwelcome news that PS 45, on Staten Island, is down to two crossing guards. We used to have (and still need) four. This is a system-wide problem, as the city reports nearly 200 unfilled posts, even after former Mayor Eric Adams cut 500 vacant crossing guard lines as a budget gimmick in 2024.
Crossing guards’ pay starts $18 an hour. One reason why the pay barely exceeds minimum wage is the Office of Labor Relations’ strict policy of pattern bargaining over wages across city agencies, in which the first union to settle a contract with the city — be it teachers, cops or DC37 — sets the pattern for the upper-most across-the-board pay increase that the city will pay any other union.
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NYPD Must Enforce City Traffic Laws (Or Else Bring Back the Agency That Will)
The “second-most-reckless driver in the city” racked up 547 camera-issued red light and speeding tickets since 2002 before being exposed by Streetsblog NYC in April.
James Giovansanti raced his 2½ ton pickup truck through the same school zones and traffic lights on Staten Island, at the same times, at least every other day, on his way to and from work. Instead of posting a patrol car at one of these intersections to catch this reckless driver, and give him enough tickets to suspend his license, the NYPD is instead dealing with a PR crisis.
Giovansanti, you see, is a cop and his depraved indifference to pedestrian safety lays bare the crime scandal that the press rarely talks about: that the NYPD have virtually stopped enforcing traffic laws.
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Op-Ed: Mamdani Is Right To Side With The Nurses
Mayor John Lindsay famously faced a massive citywide strike of bus and subway workers as his first challenge in office. The Transport Workers Union Local 100 contract expired at the stroke of midnight on Jan. 1, 1966, just as Lindsay was sworn in. The strike was finally settled 11 days later, with union leaders jailed at Lindsay’s insistence for leading an “illegal” work stoppage.
Legendary TWU president Mike Quill suffered an ultimately fatal heart attack in prison, after wishing the judge who did Lindsay’s bidding “drop dead in his black robes.”
This is what some in the press have suggested towards Mayor Mamdani, who has joined with the 15,000 nurses striking against three big hospitals. Continue reading “Op-Ed: Mamdani Is Right To Side With The Nurses”
LaGuardia: the pro-union mayor: Today’s City Hall contenders must follow Fiorello’s labor agenda
In New York’s mayoral election, plenty of candidates claim to be the anti-Trump. But, when it comes to protecting workers’ rights and reducing economic inequality, the better question is who will be the neo-LaGuardia. The “Little Flower” served as the city’s mayor from 1934 to 1945. A Republican, Fiorello LaGuardia was an aggressive advocate for egalitarian and anti-corruption New Deal policies, particularly in support of working New Yorkers at a time when the ambitions of the federal government remained limited.
An example: In 1934, newly elected Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia watched a citywide hotel strike drag on for a second month, and determined to find an amicable settlement for the workers. The industry, represented by the Hotel Association, sparked the strike by firing union activists who refused to join a company union.
The federal government’s untested mediators saw their job as getting the strikers back to work; nothing more, nothing less. The hotel bosses doubted the feds even had that authority, and steadfastly refused to negotiate with their workers’ chosen representatives.
The mayor responded by siccing the city’s health inspectors on the picketed hotels, producing 600 summonses in 48 hours, embarrassing the bosses and humiliating the scabs (who were forced to line up and drop their pants for mandatory hernia exams). The strike ended the following week.