Michael Bloomberg was a good mayor of New York City, and he'd make a good president.
Over his 12 years, crime declined dramatically. The world's top terror target protected itself. The city's economy strengthened and diversified. Public schools got better by most measures. Public health improved thanks to a smoking ban, sanitation ratings in restaurants and more. Biking around the city got easier. Race relations, in too many ways rubbed raw under the eight years of Rudy Giuliani, advanced, notwithstanding the sharp rise (then drop) in stop and frisks.
But the mantle of no-nonsense managerial competence Bloomberg now claims for himself, and that many people seem to be buying because he's also a billionaire businessman, glosses over some huge blunders.
The fire
On Aug. 18, 2007, a blaze broke out at the Deutsche Bank building downtown. Two firefighters who responded, Robert Beddia and Joseph Graffagnino, lost their lives. As Wayne Barrett meticulously documented in his report, in the weeks and months leading up to the tragedy, the city ignored glaring warnings.
As Barrett put it: "The docket of pre-fire municipal malfeasance starts with the collapse of inspectional regimes at the fire and buildings departments, which combined to miss a 42-foot breach in the bank building's water-supplying standpipe for months, leaving firefighters without working hoses for more than an hour in what the Graffagnino family now calls a 'death trap.'
"Though FDNY regulations require inspections of construction or demolition sites every 15 days, the department never inspected the bank building in the six months of work that preceded the fire. The Department of Buildings granted the project a commonplace alteration permit, the kind that is only supposed to be approved when a project 'does not change' a building's use — precisely the opposite of what was planned at the Deutsche site. According to one subsequent law enforcement report, this unusual choice of permit 'allowed the building to undergo concurrent abatement and demolition,' a rare and risky venture.
There's much more smoke and much more fire.
The overhaul
Bloomberg's administration oversaw the adoption of an automated payroll system, spearheaded by private contractors at a company called SAIC, that was supposed to save the city tens of millions of dollars. The project wound up running more than $700 million over budget because it was riddled with bribes, kickbacks and corruption.