HEY, CUO: FIX NOT PIX
DeB: Pay NYCHA money, not visits
Mayor de Blasio on Wednesday accused Gov. Cuomo of “hypocrisy” for staging a photo op at a dilapidated New York City Housing Authority project without forking over desperately needed state funds for repairs.
During an interview with Sirius XM radio, de Blasio called Cuomo’s March 12 tour of the roach-infested Jackson Houses in The Bronx while the mayor was out of town a “political opportunistic act” and demanded the governor finally deliver $250 million the state has long promised for housing repairs.
“The hypocrisy is the governor is getting his photo op but is not handing over the money,” de Blasio said. “I would say ‘put your money where your mouth is and give us the money you already owe us.’ ”
He added, “It has been a long, long time since the governor showed up in a public-housing building, which strikes me as a rather political opportunistic act.”
De Blasio said his administration since 2014 has budgeted $2.1 billion for repairing NYCHA buildings and another $1.6 billion for NYCHA daily operations. He added the price tag to fully fix NYCHA is about another $20 billion — money the city doesn’t have.
“I would say the same about Donald Trump that I would about Andrew Cuomo. If you want to help, it is real easy. Pick up the phone and say, ‘How can I help?’ ” he said.
“Come help us. Don’t criticize. Don’t undercut. Don’t act like it happened because of something recently. [The NYCHA problems] have been going on for decades . . . but I don’t have the illusion that either federal government or certainly the executive branch of the state level will try to find a way to help.”
De Blasio then joked on the “Sway In the Morning” show that he “cleaned up” his dialogue for its predominantly hip-hop audience.
“I know you want me to be very proper here,” said de Blasio, an avid hip-hop music fan. “I was told by . . . my team that this [is] Christian family programming, and I should not use any curse words or anything like that.”
Reps for Cuomo said the governor was “invited” by the NYCHA tenants to rally on their behalf, and blamed the city for the funding delay, saying it has yet to deliver a plan on how it would spend the money.
Cuomo aides also pointed out that the governor last week announced the state was adding another $250 million for NYCHA.
“The tenants of NYCHA have implored the governor to intervene due to the fact that they are living in uninhabitable conditions, their children are being made ill, and the mayor is nonresponsive,” said Cuomo spokes- person Dani Lever.
“The mayor is in 100 percent control of NYCHA and has not acted. The mayor’s chronic problem is he thinks giving more funding to an incompetent management system will make a difference. It won’t. The problem is the incompetent management, which failed to make repairs and for years has failed to even spend the money it has.”