More Enormous Differences Between Eric Adams’ and Edward Sonnino’s Campaign Platforms For New York City Mayor 2021
There are many enormous differences between the campaign platforms of New York City mayoral candidates Eric Adams (Democrat) and Edward Sonnino (Independent). In my August 7, 2021 article, I stressed the dramatic differences regarding how to greatly improve New York City’s public schools with my goal of turning them all into elite schools, run like the best private schools in the country. That requires strict class discipline, lots of homework/study hall, an enlightened “liberal arts” curriculum, individual assistance to students with academic or psychological difficulties, and well-organized voluntary extracurricular activities in the arts and sports on weekends, holidays, and the entire summer break. Turning all our public schools into elite schools is of crucial importance for NYC’s social and economic prosperity because all our problems, such as widespread poverty, low incomes, violence, crime, addiction, and high taxes, are mostly due to mediocre public schools.
In this article I detail some of my other unique proposals for making New York City a very prosperous city socially and economically, and much more livable and beautiful. All New Yorkers, of all income levels, will benefit greatly.
NYC’s quality of life will be greatly improved in the summer by having many, and I mean many, beautifully landscaped Olympic-size swimming pools in our parks. They will be very well run, open until late in the evening, and have quality cafes. Important details: Some pools will be reserved for adults, others for adults with children, and others for teenagers. Some pool establishments will be very upscale and have high entrance fees, which will serve to cover general maintenance expenditures for all the pools. Some pool establishments will have moderate fees, and others very low fees. But all pool establishments will be beautiful.
As for Manhattan’s Central Park Reservoir, it is a wasted asset! It should be turned into a summer swimming oasis with various well-run establishments, some for adults, some for adults with children, and some for teenagers. All establishments will have quality cafes. Some establishments will be luxury establishments, with high entrance fees which will help finance Reservoir maintenance expenditures. Some establishments will have moderate entrance fees, and others very low fees. But all establishments will be beautifully landscaped and very well run. The Reservoir’s water will be purified, all algae removed, the bottom of the reservoir covered with concrete just like many pools. That way the water will never be brown, always a clear blue. There will be rowboat and sail boat rentals. The establishments will be open until late in the evening.
The entire waterfront along the Hudson and East River will be beautifully landscaped, with quality cafes/restaurants, just like the Hudson River Walk and the High Line on the lower West Side of Manhattan. The same goes for the waterfront along the Atlantic Ocean.
New York City’s sidewalks must be greatly upgraded, transformed into beautiful walkways, with esthetic paving (not ugly concrete slabs!) and many quality flowerbeds and quality trees. Sidewalks along avenues will be widened. Lighting must be warm and intimate, no more alienating tall lampposts with ugly cold white lighting. All lampposts will be low and in the traditional, art nouveau style of the first half of the 20th Century. Walking down NYC sidewalks must be a pleasure in itself. That is an important element of quality of life.
The need for many landscape maintenance workers (for the parks, the pools, the sidewalks) fits in with the NYC Beautification Corps, offering jobs to all takers. We have many unemployed and unskilled who will find rewarding employment with the NYC Beautification Corps instead of being on welfare. A great use of NYC’s tax dollars, serving to make the city much more beautiful and livable, while eliminating unemployment. No more unemployment in NYC!
Beyond multiplying swimming pools in the parks and beautifying the city, we need a drastic change in the approach to solving our welfare and homeless crisis on a sustained basis. No more shelters, welfare hotels/motels, and transient SRO’s. No more homeless sleeping on sidewalks because they fear shelters. We need to create well-run, safe, well-supervised, attractive, dignified welfare campuses, with separate housing for adults with children, for couples, for singles, and for the mentally disturbed. No barracks-like accommodations. Only studios and one bedroom apartments. The campuses will have onsite schools, childcare, medical clinics, social workers and psychologists. All adults capable of working and not finding jobs in the private sector will be assigned jobs with the NYC Beautification Corps or the campus maintenance corps. Welfare children need to have all day school (from nursery through high school) to free their parents to work. All persons on welfare need stability and many need direction. Ensuring that welfare children get a truly excellent education (along with quality extracurricular activities in the arts and sports) is essential for them to not end up on welfare themselves as adults. In one generation, with NYC having only elite public schools and well-run welfare campuses, the number of people on welfare will plummet. That means much stronger economic growth and much lower taxes.
As for the problem of affordable housing, one cause has been misguided national economic policy over decades which has repeatedly led to avoidable recessions, high unemployment, and subpar economic and earnings growth. (Fortunately, Fed Chairman Powell seems to have learned from past monetary policy mistakes and understood that properly using QE financing will avoid needless recessions in the future and lead to much stronger, sustained growth.) Another cause is the inadequate education imparted to many of our citizens by mediocre public schools, leading to low personal incomes. In the modern economy, a quality education is absolutely necessary to avoid poverty and low personal incomes. Transforming all our public schools into elite schools will solve the problem within a generation. In the meantime, the solution is not requiring real estate developers to mix in low income or middle income housing with high-end housing. That is counterproductive economically and unfair. Following that “socialistic” mentality, we would force mixed housing on Fifth Avenue and Park Avenue! That would only drive away the wealthy, and the city would end up being a city exclusively of low incomes and poverty. People are entitled to live among their socio-economic peers. We need high-end neighborhoods, the more the better for New York, economically and culturally. The sustainable, fair solution for affordable housing is developing attractive new middle-income and low-income neighborhoods, and greatly improving public transportation throughout the city. Solving social problems requires enlightened capitalism, not socialism!
New York City will be a leader in animal welfare. All public schools will have an abandoned and abused animals companionship and adoption program. Not only is this for animal welfare, which all civilized societies must ensure, but it is for the good of our youth who will become more empathetic and develop an ethos of respecting and loving animals, and knowing how to treat them properly.
We also need neighborhood medical clinics in order to minimize hospital emergency room utilization and to provide preventive medicine for the numerous citizens who do not have their own primary care physician. Such clinics will be tied in with Medicare and Medicaid and private medical insurance companies. The staffing can in great part be of recent medical school graduates doing their internships with NYC hospitals.
Many will wonder where NYC will find the money for these quality of life programs along with turning every single public school into an elite school. The answer is the following: When investors see a city with a convincing, practical, common sense, enlightened reform program and committed leadership leading to sustainable social and economic solutions, they will be very willing to invest in that city’s municipal bonds. To be more attractive, those newly issued municipal bonds can also promise variable returns, such as variable interest rates, determined annually, with increases in tandem with improving city finances. I have no doubt that the reforms listed in my platform will greatly increase investor confidence in NYC’s bonds, seeing the reforms as a very effective investment generating much increased social and economic prosperity.
Also, New York City’s mayor should make the case that high quality public education is in the national interest, not just in a given city’s interest, and that the federal government should finance a large share of any city’s public school expenditures when they prove to be very effective.
The federal government should also largely finance a city’s welfare expenditures, particularly when the city is not at fault for generating poverty. In fact, many people on welfare in NYC did not grow up in NYC, rather have migrated here from other parts of the nation and from abroad. Why should NYC have to shoulder welfare costs, especially when the federal government can avail itself of QE financing by the Federal Reserve, which costs nothing? (See my articles explaining what QE really is, and debunking common misconceptions.)
Finally, a city’s persuasive enlightened social reform program will undoubtedly generate many large charitable donations from wealthy individuals and companies, particularly when the city is pro-business, recognizes that no city can be economically prosperous without many wealthy residents and highly profitable businesses, and is publicly against vilifying and soaking the rich. Particularly when the city and its citizens understand that whatever the wealthy do with their money is good for the economy: if they spend on consumption, that’s good for jobs; if they invest, that’s good for economic growth. Where would we be without venture capital?
I have no doubt that if I’m elected mayor, NYC will be transformed into a socially and economically prosperous city, a stunningly beautiful city with the highest quality of life for all its residents, a leader in public school education, showing the way to the nation on how to eliminate poverty, violence, crime, and addiction. Nationwide, people will wonder why it took so long to find the way to solving our social and economic problems.
© Edward Sonnino 2021
August 13, 2021
Independent Write-in Candidate for NYC Mayor 2021 (self-funded)
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