The NYC GOP's Short-Lived Revival
Gotham Gazette—Bloomberg is part of a long tradition: Of the Republican mayors in the last 100 years, only Giuliani was anything of a party loyalist — and then just for the second half of his second term. Fiorello La Guardia, whose closest ally was Democratic President Franklin Roosevelt, detested Republican Party politics, and John Lindsay left the Republican Party after losing its primary in his bid for reelection.
Fred Siegel and Harry Siegel
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Bloomberg Thus Far
Commentary—For a hard-headed businessman who now presides over a budget larger than that of all but eight states, Bloomberg can seem appallingly naive. When he insisted (to guffaws) that "corruption, waste, and meaningless programs hardly exist in city government," he was declaring himself content with business as usual, and essentially denying that the city faced any sort of crisis. For a great many New Yorkers whose wonted relationship to their mayor is visceral and intimate, this detachment has been too much to bear. Time and again, Bloomberg has proved that he simply does not understand average New Yorkers or empathize with their travails. As the possibility of a subway strike loomed, he dragged reporters along to watch him buy a $600 bicycle, and suggested that others should meet their transportation needs in the same way. At a time when middle-class New Yorkers were outraged by his tax hikes, he jauntily told an elite Manhattan business group that the city was "a high-end product, maybe even a luxury product." Further stoking the anger of his critics, he jibed that he, for one, was perfectly willing to pay higher taxes.
Too Much Froth: Why the latte quotient is a bad strategy for building middle-class cities
Although Portland is often hailed as a new urban paradise, it is in a region suffering very high unemployment. "They made a cool place, but the economy sucks," notes Parks, who conducted a major study for the Oregon city. "They forgot all the things that matter, like economic diversification and affordability."
The Death and Life of America's Cities
The Public Interest—For all the accomplishments associated with the reform mayors, most cities will need several more successful administrations to repair the damage done over the past 40 years. For the revival to be sustained, it must transform the big cities' dysfunctional political culture. The danger, in the words of a world-weary veteran of Philadelphia politics, is that "Rendell improved things here just enough to make it safe to go back to the policies that produced the problems in the first place."
Big-League Mayors: Suddenly, City Hall Is The Place to Be
The Washington Post—Mayor Brown, whose hauteur has led him to be called "Emperor Brown," warned constituents before he was elected that "street lights, dog-doo and parking meters are not my cup of tea." When San Francisco residents discovered what this meant in practice — only intermittent attention to the problems of homelessness and panhandling, for example — Brown's popularity plunged.