Ready, aim, act

Stanching the blood flow on New York City streets begins by taking the problem with deadly seriousness, which is why Democratic mayoral nominee Eric Adams was right to call what transpired Saturday night on the streets of North Corona — the firing of more than 40 shots, wounding 10 people, mostly bystanders — a “mass shooting.” Too often, we reserve the fearsome term for massacres in schools, malls or suburban parking lots. There’s a subtle racism in that double standard, as though what happens routinely on city streets is somehow less worthy of our apoplexy.

It is good news that during the past four weeks, shootings citywide are down 35% compared to the same 28-day period last year, and homicides are down 46%. It is very bad news that both categories of crime remain elevated since last year, with shootings a whopping 19% higher than they were at this point in 2020.

Mayor de Blasio embraced Adams Monday at his general election kickoff, and the current mayor would love for the handoff to his successor to be seen as a continuation of his eight-year legacy. But that personal physical embrace hasn’t yet been accompanied by an embrace of Adams’ public safety policies, even though it was on the strength of those policies that Adams won the confidence of primary voters.

De Blasio could, but hasn’t, followed Adams’ advice to bring back the NYPD’s plainclothes anti-crime units, with substantial reforms, to take on the gangs and crews. He could, but hasn’t, demanded police spot-checks at train and bus stations to try to interdict illegal guns as Adams urges. He could, but hasn’t, combined the efforts of the NYPD’s gang and gun units, treating the two tightly interwoven problems as one.

Yes, New York needs federal help, including a strong anti-gun trafficking law and a federal-state-local Gang and Guns Task Force. But we don’t need to wait for the feds, or for Eric Adams to become mayor. De Blasio can do more now.