Eric Adams and the shadow of David Dinkins

On Jan. 1, Eric Adams will take office as the 110th mayor of New York City. However, he stands to be judged as the second Black mayor to take office during a time of crisis. For Adams to avoid the fate of David Dinkins, the only one-term mayor in the last 45 years, the former police captain must serve the interests of the city — and protect the occupational needs of his lower-middle-class supporters.

Like Dinkins, Adams comes to office during a time of unprecedented challenges. Between 1990 and 1993, the genteel Dinkins had to contend with the aftermath of the 1970s bankruptcy, factory flight, unemployment, high crime rates, raw racial tensions and political rivalries.

Adams inherits a city reeling from the double-whammy of pandemic and recession. As he takes office, new cases are mounting at the highest level in months — and claimed his inauguration among the casualties. He is the first mayor to cancel an inauguration since Fiorello LaGuardia in the Great Depression.

He will grapple with the controversy of school and business closures, vaccine and mask mandates, high unemployment, overcrowded emergency rooms, rising crime, lack of affordable housing, Black Lives Matter protests, a progressive wing looking to trip him up and a press prepared to raise questions of competence and integrity.

Yet to be successful amidst the challenges, his administration dare not ignore the needs of his base of supporters; that is the Black and Brown residents in the outer boroughs, who are among the most endangered in the pandemic and uncertain recovery.

Adams embodies the political history of Black NYC that began with the mass migration to Harlem during World War I. His tenure will represent the community’s return to a pragmatic agenda after an ill-fated dalliance with the progressive coalition of Bill de Blasio. His moderate coalition should anticipate progressive rivals looking for ways to dilute the influence of Black voters; among the schemes to watch are noncitizen voting — which Adams supports, but which will dump 800,000 immigrants onto the voting rolls.

Amos Wilson, the late social psychologist at the City University, offered sage advice during the Dinkins era in “Blueprint for Black Power: A Moral, Political and Economic Imperative for the 21st Century.” He admonished that a politics without the ownership and control of “property, wealth and organization is the recipe for Black political and non-political powerlessness.”

Adams must be a voice for his supporters in the corridors of corporations and investment firms. He should use the office as a bully pulpit to lobby companies, contractors and unions for paid training, apprenticeships, and employment in the middle-skill jobs in growth industries: trade, transportation and utilities, education and health services, professional and business services, and the fledgling high-tech manufacturing sector.

He can articulate to corporate leaders that people in the outer boroughs can compete in a global labor market, where employers tend to look beyond locals. The city’s economy is a destination for educated, skilled and determined people from around the nation and world. It can leave locals, even those with college degrees, stuck in low-wage jobs and facing the threat of automation.

Adams will have an opportunity to influence the flow of investments under President Biden’s new $1.2 trillion infrastructure act. The construction industry is a major employer in NYC and, like retail and hospitality, was shaken by the pandemic. The infusion of federal money creates an opportunity to address a historic employment imbalance where Blacks are under-represented and immigrants over-represented.

Over the next five years, NYC stands to invest $10 billion in public transit; $13.5 billion in highways and bridges; $685 million in airports; $175 million in new electric vehicle charging stations and money for broadband and clean energy projects. That will require thousands of newly trained workers from craftsmen and truck drivers to designers and accountants. Some jobs pay relatively high wages for people without college degrees. Adams must continually ask: Who will do the work and how will they be trained?

Adams also has the power to reshape the street vending trade. The city will issue new pushcart permits for the first time in generations. Street vendors generate more than $78.5 million in legal wages; under a new law, the city will begin to distribute 4,000 new licenses in July 2022. The progressive City Council, however, devised the law to benefit the immigrant community. The mayor can work to increase access for native Black and Brown citizen applicants.

In closing, Adams can expect to encounter a whirlwind of challenges, perceptions and expectations. In addition to his obligations to the city, he would be wise to promote a campaign of economic opportunity for his supporters. Not only would it advance the overall goal of workforce development, but it would strengthen his base of power for a second term.

House is an associate professor of American studies at Emerson College in Boston.