March 15, 2023 • 36 mins
Eric Adams, the 110th Mayor of NYC, oversees 320,000 employees and a $101-billion dollar budget. He sits down with Martha to talk about the challenges of running what he calls the greatest city in the world - from crime, to homelessness, to his plans to hire a “rat czar.” Martha and the Mayor discuss growing up in Brooklyn and being a beat cop, before rising to the city’s top office. Mayor Adams shares how he nearly went blind, before reversing his diabetes through a vegan diet, and the two compare thoughts on everything from composting, to their morning smoothies, to the New York Post.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Do you have a list that you look at every
single day? Your list must be about ten pages long.
You know what's interesting about this role as mayor, it's
not that as hot, it's the value. Eric Adams is
the mayor of New York City. He spent more than
twenty years as a New York City police officer before
(00:23):
entering politics. Mayor Adams has the monumental task and I
want to emphasize monumental task of guiding the largest and
some say the greatest, and I say the greatest city
in the United States, and I say in the world.
I thought it would be great to sit down with
(00:44):
the man who wields so much power and learn more
about his plans for our great New York City. And
who is he outside the office? We want to know.
It's a pleasure to welcome the one hundred and tenth
Mayor of the City of New York my podcast here
at Newstands Studios at Rockefeller Center. Welcome, mister Mayor. Thank
(01:05):
you so much. It is such a pleasure to sit
down with you and talk business. Yes, yes, business of
operating and guiding and improving and beautifying this great, great city.
You have, as I said, a monumenttions. Yes, yes, and
how do you feel right now? After what? How a year?
(01:26):
And here in three months we were entering March. But
I think that to fully understand the fullness of the
moment is, as you stated in your opening, oftentimes we
see the glory. You see the former captain, former state senator,
(01:46):
first black bell president, now the mayor of this city.
That's the glory. That's not my story. And to be
able to understand why at this moment I could take
the weight of this awesome task is to really understand
the story. And we you know, that's why I like
about your podcast. You get into the story, who's the person,
(02:08):
and then you have a better appreciation of the journey. Yes,
and we all want to know the story. We want
to know what motivated you to become mayor of the
most powerful city in the world. And you've never been
a miryor before. CEO, this is a This is a corporation, yeah, major,
and a very large corporation. Your yearly budget, you know,
(02:30):
one hundred the last budget was one hundred and one
billion dollars. You know, we balloon over any of the
location California probably as a budget larger, but this is
a major financial institution. But you know, it's amazing how
the lessons you learn from your parents come in a
(02:54):
real useful way. Mom used to start the week, she
would show how much money was coming into the house,
and she'll sit down with all six of us and
she said, this is this is how much is coming
in the house. These are all the bills. So when
you start saying that you want a new past sneakers,
tell me what item might takeoff? Do I turn off
(03:16):
the gas? So I turn off the heat? Do I
turn off the water? Do I don't buy food for
the week. So we had a full understanding of her
candid approach to well, a real budget, a real budget
minded mother, right. Yeah, and she was a single mother,
single mom of six kids. Yeah, amazing woman, never surrender,
never gave up. You know. Third grade education took us
(03:37):
from Brownsville, Brooklyn, where she just knew that she wanted
her children to be raised in the house. And I
think she was a damn good housekeeper. That was her
occupation too, right, Yes, she cleaned houses for people and
then she was she was able to find a union
job at Ampstead Daycare Center. I knew what the students
(03:57):
were eating every day because she would put it in
the type of where and bring it home file leftovers. Well,
it's it's nice to remember your parents. It's really nice
to be guided by your parents. Yes, I'm one of six. Also,
oh are you? Yes? I am that. Where Where are
you belt Lee, New Jersey in the middle of second
oldest okay okay, okay uh And we too. We lived
(04:18):
on a very very strict budget, but we supplemented with
a garden and we grew. We grew everything in the garden.
It was only a fifth of an acre, but we
grew stuff. We can stuff. We went to our cousin's
farm down in southern New Jersey and brought food back.
So I know about budget, right right, think about that. Also,
look how creative you are. You know when you do
(04:41):
some of your food shows, your cannon show. All of
that came from the foundation of what you knew of
Grandma and Buffalo taught me all kinds of mother and
homemaker tasks. Really great. So a mayor, I was driving
around the city today, so I asked the storekeeper. This
is a store that's been on Madison Avenue for one
(05:01):
hundred and ten years, Perez, It's called the seventies, upper seventies.
What a beautiful store. A lovely elderly couple run the store.
And I asked, what do you want me to ask
me or Adams? And she said, all I want me
or Adams to do for us is to make this
city safe. Love it. No, So that's one. And then
(05:24):
another person I asked, she said, all I want to
know is what is he doing about the rat population? Well,
you know, I don't know if you heard, but I
hate rats, and there's ways of doing that. We give
me to announce our rats are. That's going to focus.
It was a disjointed system previously and we're now going
(05:45):
to focus on one person overseeing the entire operation. Okay,
So eliminating the rat population which occurred, which really enlarged
because why one number one, the pandemic, A lot of
food was put out trash on our streets. We have
to move away from AUTHA. We have to move away
from plastic bags that came during the sixties during the
(06:07):
sanitation strike. We kept it. That is a failure process.
We have to put our garbage and containers, okay, containers,
garbage pails, yes, yes, again. So the other thing about
the pandemic. I mean, I was the restaurants that are
in the streets, all those exterior restaurants. Right our city
is starting to look like Moonbaie. You know, this is
(06:27):
a really scary situation because sometimes I can't even drive
down some streets because there's a restaurant on this side.
In restaurant. What's happening with the sidewalk restaurants. You know,
we have to take our hat off to the previous
administration as they instituted what we call the COVID sheds
because our restaurants were closing and it really was a lifeline. Yes,
(06:47):
now that COVID is in our rear view mirror for
the most part, we have to re acknowledge and re
examine the use of them. Counsel, when MAJII Velast squads
is coming up with a new plan, you're going to
see a smaller number and they're going to be uniform
and presentation you know nice. Yes, I mean to have
four or five of them on one street, which really
(07:09):
restricts traffic, restricts us moving from one place to another,
really is very debilitating. We have to rethink it. It
did his job, and now it's time to what do
the restaurant toursday, do they want to keep them? Some
like eating out doors, it's more eating out doors. So
we should look at how we're going to use our
names for half a sidewalk right, Yes, So it's exciting,
(07:29):
But I want to go back to the crime because
that's important. I say public safety is the prerequisite to prosperity.
And we're hitting the result of our public safety plan.
And people must not only be safe based on the stats,
say must feels safe. That's crucioot. So we see we
have witness in this year and the end of last year,
decreasing homicide, decreasing shootings. We're watching our major seven crime
(07:52):
categories also decrease. The customer satisfactory subway. In our subway system,
the numbers are extremely impressive, major riout. People are seeing
a difference. Many of the employees who work with me,
my colleagues take the subway, yes, and they are very
distraught about the number of homeless on the subways. They
(08:13):
see a lot of policemen, but they don't see a
lot of improvement in the subway. There's also still scary
crime on the subways. So, and I think part of
it is is that we highlight in our daily tabloids
the worst thing that has ever happened in the city
every day. I mean, if if it bleeds, it leads.
I mean, that's the business. But we look at the number.
(08:35):
We have an average of six felonies a day on
our subway system, six with three point six million riders.
So that's okay, No, it's not. We want to give
it all six But when you look at how many
riders we get get to and from their place, million
riders a day, three point six million million riders a day.
People listen to this, three point six million million writers.
(08:58):
So if you go to the average commuter, I write
the trains the line and say have you had a
negative encounter? It isn't all. But I feel unsafe because
you feel unsafe because you get on the plane, train,
you pick up the paper, and you hear about something
offered that happened on the system. So the police presence
is to deal with the safety. Then we removed the
encampments on our subway system. You don't see encampments anymore.
(09:20):
Four thousand people that were homeless we took off the system,
brought them aside. A stentire number of a thousand state
in care with rappermund services. Now we're zeroing in on
those few that refuse to leave. So you were in
(09:43):
the headlines this morning in our famous, fabulous New York posts. Yeah,
I get the New York Posts just because I have
to see the other side of the story. Murdoch listened
to me, So I see you being mind for suggesting
tuition for the migrant workers that are appearing in our
(10:05):
city now. But tell Us says the gas stoves. Right,
That was misleading. Right, taken from a person that had
to pay two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for his
son's student loan. College is expensive. Yes, we are not
giving people tuition to get their degrees in college. What
(10:26):
we are saying is how do we take migrants and
make them self sustaining. We're teaching them English with teaching
them some skills, with a hundred of them to see
how this would work on a suiting campus, and say
we want to make you self sustaining. We don't want
you dependent on governmental subsidies. This is a small thing
to do. It's not taking people to college paying for
(10:48):
their college tuition. That is just untrue. So it's guiding
them to certain coursework that they can take to help
them improve their job ability to take a job because
many of them cannot they cannot apply for jobs. What
about the community colleges? Are they willing to do this?
That's what we're looking at. This is this is a
pilot project. I'm saying, we want to teach English some
soft skills to make to make sure that they are
(11:10):
self sustaining. You don't want people depending on society. Totally misleading, Yes, yeah,
you know. I mean imagine if you are miss Jones
and you are saving up all your money to pay
your child soony tuition. It gives the impression that the
mayor is treating us unfairly, and that is not the
case at all. The other thing that really irks me
and many other people in the city are the numbers
(11:32):
of buildings under construction or in you know, in construction
or being repaired with all the scaffolding. That's so dangerous.
I look up all the time, wondering must be in
my in my briefings, and here's the problem. He's the
problem market that I looked into. You didn't give the permits.
(11:54):
I know that because there was another mayor before you
that gave the permits for all the stuff that was
going on. How can we improve the permit process so
that not too many brickets are given at the same time.
Here's the problem. We haven't we have an antiquated mindset.
So the reason you see of those scoffoldings up is
(12:15):
because they're loose bricks somewhere in the building instruction. For
the most part, some of the new constructions. What we're
saying to building owners that you have to cover the
entire footprint of the building. What I am saying, let's
use drones. There's new technology out there that will allow
a drone to go in to a scan of the
entire building with infrared and determine where a loose brick is.
(12:39):
Spirit right, you don't have to have that expensive scaffolding,
which is dangerous. I know, years and years until the
building can fix a brick exactly. I mean, I know
how to fix bricks. I know I know how to
dig out the old mortar and put in the new mortar.
Believe you know, that's what we're looking to move towards.
And you're going to see instantly a substantial decrease of
(13:00):
the sheds that are And I know during COVID, it
was very hard to build. It was very hard to
do the construction on fifty sixth and Park. There's a
building that has been building for years. I know, the
one on the right hand side going up check and
my Cairo projectress. She has lived with ear deafening sounds
and noise for three years. Awful. How does the mayor
(13:24):
fix that? It's about expediting the process. The Department of
Buildings good work is, but the processes were horrific and
so we are really expediting getting your permit files and
then we're looking at use new technology. We I'm a
strong believer that many of the things we were doing
is just using eight track methods. In the iPhone age,
(13:47):
we need to think about government and agencies are running differently. Remember,
cities are run by agencies, and if those agencies are misaligned, disjointed,
or not using new methods, then you'll never get the
product that tax pass deserves well in your agencies that
are that are now working for you as a mayor,
has there been a lot of turnover? Yes, yes, yes,
(14:10):
And do you feel that you're putting more and more
educated people in those jobs? Three twenty thousand employees be
the largest employer in the city, and COVID has changed
the mindset of workers. We get ready to hold a
major conference with behavior scientists to examine what has COVID
don has done to you know, what employees want to do.
(14:34):
Just in our office, I mean three day a week
work week, it's ridiculous. A city can't run on three days. No,
you can't. I can't. Are you on a three day
work week? No, we're have five days sold, you know.
But what we want to seven days mayor what we
want to do is to look at how do you
modify work days. Some people want to do twelve hour days,
(14:57):
you know, and then didn't take off the friday. Some
people want to come and do that work hours overnight.
So we want to be more flexible and what a
work environment looks like. Yeah, I think that's the only
way to go. We have to accommodate the workers and
make sure that they're making their salaries, but they have
to be working for thoselves. I think people want to
(15:19):
do that. And what people don't understand when I tell
my younger employees, I need you. I need you because
things are changing, not need you to be around me
to keep me abreast of the changes that mentoring and
learning from each other, the cross pollination of ideas, that
is what work environments should be about. That's why I
wanted to talk to you today, Mayor, because I like
(15:41):
to hear those words coming out of you. I think
it's very important to encourage and to get people to
really continue to act like human beings we are. We
are a collaborative race and we can help each other.
And if we don't get people to do it, we're
never going to clean up the act to this city. No,
(16:01):
it's all right, and it's about, you know, creating a healthy,
trusted environments where people can get the emotional intelligence that
they need. We often focus on people being academically smart,
but we need to really lean into the emotional intelligence
of creating healthy environments for children, families and workplaces. Oh
now this is something dear to my heart. What about
(16:23):
the composting system that you're envisioning, Oh, love it, love it.
You know, we did an experiment in Queens. Two things
came out of that experiment. We've reached unbelievable goals with
people composting. But many people thought South Jamaica, Queens, the
African American Caribbean community would not participate. They led the
(16:44):
entire borough in compost rate. Yes, yes, it's a real one.
We're going to expand it citywy. We're really excited about
how many tons of garbage does New York produce a year.
That's a good question. I can't give you that number.
I lose that question on a huge amount. And most
of that goes into land waste, landfill, it goes into
the ocean probably, that's probably doing a lot of damage
(17:07):
to a lot of areas. But if we could encourage
half that trash is compostable, yes, and it could easily
be turned back into something useful. What we turn our
compost in at the farm and where I live, I
call it black gold. It is so valuable and it
doesn't take very long to happen. No, and that's the goal,
the goal we want to We're going to have a
(17:28):
citywide composting a program. I was composting in harm when
I was about president. And you know, my parents come
from the South Side. Are people Are people really gonna
go for the composting? Yes, yes, we see it, we
see We witnessed what happened in Queens. It was success
beyond believe. We have an amazing commissioner over at the
Department of Sanitation, Jessica Tih. She is bringing a level
(17:52):
of ingenuity and get stuff done atmosphere. Ood I like
to hear that. Back to the crime issue, because again
that's every single day, on every front page of every
tabloid or news alert or whatever else we get. Major
crimes are down, including assaults and robberies, but in twenty
(18:14):
twenty two, they rose like twenty three percent in twenty
twenty two, and now they are you say, coming down, Oh,
without a doubt, we're trending in the right direction. February
of twenty twenty two, we were seeing a forty percent
increase in many of our major crimes, thirty percent in
some areas. We started trending down. Police Commissioner Kishan sul
put in place with a new team there of Chief
(18:37):
Magi and his team, and you're really seeing not only
the actual major crime, but you're seeing some of the
other issues. Motorcycles in three wheels on our streets, illegal plates,
just the quality of life issue that really impacts our city.
What about shoplifting, I hear, I hear that that's becoming
a major problem. That's why I said take off the masks. Wow,
(18:59):
that's why I said take off the masks. Pull it
down for three seconds before into the shop. To me,
repeated offenders committing crimes using COVID as a reason, this
is a good way to have public health and public
safety together into your store. When you when you expose
the face of someone that committed the crime, you would
cut the time that person is apprehended in half, if
(19:21):
not even more. Do you feel What do you think
about the police department right now? Oh? I love these
guys and ladies. They when you look at the record
number of closing cases, arrests, really the city is able
to handle a protest or parade. They are just you know,
(19:41):
it's amazing. I'm so happy I was part of that profession.
Would you say that they like you? I like them.
I think if you if you go around to the
average police officer, he'll tell you we have a mayor
that he has our back. I'm not going to send
my troops into the field of battle and abandon them.
I'm want to lead them into battle. They had a
(20:02):
tough job and in spite of what they went through,
they remained true to protecting our city. I want you
to know that I actually employ several retired policemen who
are fantastic gentlemen and uh and it's really nice to
hear some of their stories. They are well trained, polite,
nice and I certainly hope that the that the force
(20:25):
remains loyal and urge working because we need a good police.
You do as I stated, the our prosperity lies in
public safety, and we're prospering of our jobs. Recap covid
A back Broadway last week had one of the one
of the greatest showings. We we we have one of
(20:46):
the highest bond ratings, in increasing our bond ratings because
of our fiscal responses. What about rents? Our rents, Our
building is becoming more occupied list and I have to
borrow from the person who ran for governor once then
it's too damn high. It is expensive to live in
this city. Of that's why we need to build more
affordable housing. And so we need our local electors to
(21:09):
allow housing to be built in that community. And we
had some major projects, well it's point projects over two
thousand affordable units Bronx out in innovation Queen. So we're
going to keep pushing. But we need to find pathways
to home ownership like we had in the past with
the Mitchell Lama type program, right, that would be very useful.
(21:31):
So what's your relationship with our new governor? Oh? Love
cafter you going the whole cool? You know she is
a steady hand at the at the helm art Y. Yes,
she is. We did when I when I went to
her last year around February and stated that we need
to do something with the subway. She helped me with
the subway safety plan. That's how we got to decreases
(21:52):
we're witnessing. When I told her we need to do
something with mental health, severe mental health illnesses on the street,
she came and helped with opening news like theatric bads.
She has been just a real partner. And I think
the state is happy to see the governor and the
mayor that actually likes each other. And tourism, is it
on the increase red hot fifty six million tourists last year.
(22:14):
We think we're gonna get somewhere about sixty five million
this year. Once fully occupied. Yes, yes, we we are
top in the major twelve hotel markets. We're doing very well.
That's why we're fighting to get the d and C,
the Democratic National Convention here. What was the last time
we had a convention? Two Clinton one, that's right, I
(22:38):
went to that. I went to that convention. That was
some big convention. Yea. Tourists bring so much they spend,
they go to our restaurants, our theater. Is we're going
to encourage them to visit the outer boroughs. Now you
live where personally, well, some people say in New Jersey.
I don't know why they believe that. Right now, May's
(22:59):
living great mansion. I still have my home and Bethi Stuyveson.
I'll never leave there. I love it, but I mean
Gracie Mansion and don't let anyone for you Gracie mansions
they have it has goals, you know. The first time
I went there with Mayor Lindsay. Wow. Mayor Lindsay worked
for a law firm in Race here in Rockefeller Center.
He worked for Webster Sheffield and my husband wasn't an
(23:22):
associate at the time. Wow. So I have pictures of
me with Mayor Lindsay at Gracie Mansion, which was beautiful,
and we were gowns and we were dancing and eating
delicious food at Gracy Mansion. It's a beautiful place. Yeah,
and then Mayor Bloomberg didn't want to live there. But
why because of the ghosts? You thing? And you know
it's the best about greasy Man. What. Oh isn't it
(23:45):
beautiful looking over the Yeah it is. And I don't
know why Mike didn't like living there because it was inland. Yeah.
I love the water. Have you done anything to the mansion.
It's slight renovation which ryan to raise money so that
we can come in and have a mock to Stewart
type renovation. It's like it's like a museum. It is,
and it's and it's a beautiful, beautiful house. That's actually
(24:07):
that's actually Palks property. Yes, I know. It deserves to
be taken care of and every will maintain. So you're
you're lacking funds. Yeah, So we want to raise funds
privately to do a complete renovation. And we opened it up.
I call it to people's house. We encourage the White House, right, Yeah.
We encourage people to holy events there to come visit.
(24:28):
Have a big tent we put in the backyard during
the summer. It's used far more often than it has
ever been used. Good. Good, Maybe I'll have an event
from my Center for Living at Mount SINAI. I would
love that. So you're dealing with the migrants in terms
(24:52):
of helping them get jobs, but how are we housing them?
How are we thinking about real, real, real challenge? You know,
think about this amount. In January first, twenty twenty two,
when I became mayor, we had thirty five thousand people
in our homeless system. Thirty five thousand for all the
years in one year. We received close to that amount
(25:15):
in one year when now up to fifty thousand people
went to our system. Wow, So that's the fifty thousand
homeless people plus the thirty five thousand that was there.
We had thirty five thousand I was there already. On
top of that, we have fifty thousand migrants, thousand people.
Never had that number, looking for an end in the cold,
(25:35):
running the web, looking for places to stay. That's why
we see them sleeping on cardboard over the events, the
heating events from the subways and stuff. But many of
them are not asylum seekers. Of what we have done
for our asylum seekers, no other city or state has
done anything like this. Not only do we get them
place to sleep, we make sure they have health kid
(25:58):
we hit. Almost thirteen thousand child went into our school system,
mental healthcare, food laundry service. So we are anybody starving
on our streets they should not have to because there's
access to food, pantries, food soup kitchers, volunteers, local community.
Based on there a numbers about people who like die
overnight sleeping, we're not we're not seeing numbers like that.
(26:21):
That's a rarity. That's a rarity. Okay, that's encouraging. And
what is it costing the city to help all almost
five people? Almost We spent from last year to this
year six hundred and fifty million dollars. We think we're
going to spend about one point four billion dollars of
(26:42):
this year close to that number. And we're not getting
the help that we deserve from the federal government. We
need help from the federal government and the state government.
The governor has included resources in her budget. We want
to we want to make sure it gets passed through
in this budgetary cycle. Do you have a list that
you look at every angle day? Your list must be
about ten pages long. You know what's interesting about this
(27:06):
role as man, it's not that as hard, it's the
volume every day Martha. All day something is happening in
your phone is ringing, it never stops, and I can
It's amazing that you arrive at a place in life
without realizing the things you did before that prepared you
for it. Little did I know that meditation and breathing
(27:28):
exercise it will pay such a place, such a role
for me right now to allow me to have that
that tranquility, that peaceful You can zone out and recenter right,
recenter and just understand that you know, be present in
the moment. Don't try to hope for days that's free
from crisis. Pray and meditate on having the ability to
(27:50):
deal with those crisis as they come up. And your staff,
how many people work just very closely with you and
in and around your office. We have three and twenty
thousand employs, but righting in city Hall you have probably
roughly anywhere from seventy to eighty that are there with
me and I have an amazing team. We have done
things that have never been give a daily meeting every
(28:12):
morning eight am. Um. First time in history we have
an African American woman who's the first deputy mayor. First
time we have a woman as a police commissioner of
women as a fire commissioner. And we're good, aren't we? Oh?
What Yeah, women know how to run multitask No, they
(28:32):
know how to get stuff done. Yep, we are I
love my team. How can you run a family and
and have a job and be married to a difficult
man and uh and try to make a pretty home
if you're not like that? Right, once you have a
family and once you married, you're a difficult man, and
then you can work for me. Well, you know, because
I'm I'm I'm an optimistic third grader. Well that is something.
(28:57):
So the typical day starts at eight am. Oh that's
the time of the media at the meeting. Okay, when
do you get to the office. I'm up at five
normally I'll do my meditation, my exercise, make my green smoothie.
What's your exercise combination? Calistatics, little lightweight train and stretching,
you know, and then I'll just go into a breathing
(29:18):
I'll say my prayers, I'll read some positive affirmations, you know.
Then I'll do a quick google and see what good
drinks Matha Stewart has online. Dan, you have a green
smoothie every morning? Everybody what's in your green smoothie combination? Blueberry, spinach,
kale maka powder, some ginger, ginger, little celery. It's a
(29:42):
nice good makes it for you. I'll do it myself.
So and you should put some collagen in it, marine
collagen powder. It's tasteless and it really helps. I start
my day with a green juice. Also, okay, okay, that's
why you look fabulous. I try. But it's it's energizing,
Yes it is. It is instead of that heavy on
(30:06):
the road with bacon. I forget that. Once you break
that habit. It's unbelievable. Your energy level when you do
a healthy man in the morning. Oh yes, this morning,
I was already at pilates at six fifteen. And uh.
And then I go home and I take care of
the chickens, and then I have my green juice. I
have one cappuccino. That's my cappuccino. And so then after
(30:27):
you have your juice, what do you do? Then? I
read all my papers, you know, in my way on
my way into the office. Sometimes I take the train
to throw up over the New York you know. Actually
like the pose. I know. I read sports are great, right,
Page six is great? I have to read page six
to see what's going on. No, but I'll you know,
(30:50):
zip through the papers, find out what's going on in
the city, listen to some of the talk shows that
are coming on, and then uh, you know, by then
it's eight am, and I'm being to breathe by the
team on what the day looks like. And you know
what we have on our plate? Yeah, a lot on
that plate. I hope it's like a great big charger play.
They make him, they make him sixteen inches now. But
(31:12):
it's it's exciting, you know. And and I say all
the time to the team, like, how could I complain?
I'm the mayor of New York. This is the greatest
city on the globe. And and you know, twenty eight
years ago, MARKA, when I stayed in January for his
twenty twenty two I'm going to be the mayor. People
used to say, what's wrong with this guy? You know, well,
(31:33):
you're here, you're here, and you're doing it. People who
lead such busy lives that I don't think there's anybody
around here that leads a busier life than New mayor.
But I don't feel it. I don't feel it good.
You look very You look so well. The mayor looks rested,
he's smiling, he's laughing, you can hear him laughing. But
he is um and fit. You look very fit. So
(31:55):
diet is very important, and h and just being not
always not always been like that. We'll talk about your transformation. Yeah,
And it was a couple of years ago. Woke up
Martha and I couldn't see the alarm clock. I thought
it was sleep in my eyes and it was a
very frightening experience. And at the same time, was having
pains in my stomach. I thought it was colon cancer
(32:16):
because I just lost a good friend of colon cancer.
My my hands and feet were tingling. I went to
the doctor. He checked my stomach and my colon. He
said I had an ulcer. That was the pain I
was feeling. But that also saved my life because he said, Eric,
your real problem, the reason you have vision laws is
that you have late stage diabetes and you're gonna lose
your sight. Was that an hereditary thing for you. That's
(32:37):
very interesting that you say that, because that's what I thought.
And he says that you know that tingling you're feeling
your fingers and toes is you have permanent nerve damage.
You're gonna lose some fingers and toes. Right. And I
met a doctor, doctor Esselton. He wrote a book of
preventing reversing heart disease. I called him up Cleveland Clinton.
He treated Bill Clinton for his heart disease. And he
(32:58):
told me your food. He said, you changed your you
could put this in remission, changed my diet. Three weeks
after going plant base, my vision came back. Wow, a
nerve damage went away. The altar went away in three
And you heard a lot of rumors. And let me
put those rumors to rest. Cops like donuts. We were
eating every type of doughnuts, sweet and so what I
(33:23):
learned it's not your DNA, your dinner. Mom and I
shared the same dinner, not that we shared the same DNA.
That food impacts our health. And it just put me
on an amazing journey of health as well. What has
been your most difficult day as mayor? When office of
Mara and Rivera they were assassinated. You know, that was
(33:46):
just really hard, you know, and went went families, yes, yes,
and being in the hospital watching the pain. It was hard.
These were young men, they were you know, first generation
New Yorkers. They can into the police department to make
a difference. It was just a very very painful moment
for me. How are the families still strong? Strong? I
(34:09):
really take my hat off to them. They dealt with
the initial pain and now they're very engaged and help
in any way they can. And you know, you know,
Mommy told me now I was a little boy, you're
gonna be in dark places. You know, it's either either
going to be a burial or planted. We have to
turn pain into purpose, and they have turned the painful
moment into a purposeful moment. What's your biggest perk about
(34:34):
being mayor? I wish I did, you know, if I
get it? If I get a perk the New York
posted right about me, or the New York Times, they
would say, you know, Eric got a free token, you know.
But the most joy about it, it's like people. This
city is made up of amazing people. It's a Shakespearean tragedy.
(34:55):
If you live only in your own little kakum, you know,
there's so much advantage, isn't there. This this place is amazing.
That's why I would never move to another city, right,
I would never ever, ever, No, that's why I'm saying.
It's just like it's just like an incredible place. And
that's why I want it. I wanted the sparkling, clean,
infestation free Gotham City again. I am with you. I'm
(35:19):
going to bring you Okay, Well, I will help you
in any way I can. Mayor Adams, I think you've
gotten off to a good start. You have to keep
that chin up, that's right, and uh, and keep fighting
because it is a big fight every day, isn't it.
It is? It is, but it's an enjoyable one, okay,
and I enjoy just I'm a blue collar guy, and
(35:40):
you know, like you said, your parents and families, this
is a blue collar city, no matter, no matter how
prosperous we are individually. If you look at our lineage,
there's someone that made it for us. And their hands
were dirty from the rope that they did. I don't
even call it dirty, just they were just used. So
that's that's right, well said, right, Well, use hands. Well,
(36:01):
good luck. I don't want to keep you from your
office too much because I know you have so so
much work to do. Um. Eric Adams is a very
busy man. As you can hear, he seems to be
on top of it all, doesn't he. He's talking really well,
and he seems to have those numbers and those challenges
and everything pretty clear in his head. Keep that list going,
(36:23):
keep those checklists happening, and check them off as you
as you accomplish your very daunting tasks. Adams, Well, thank
you so much. Good to see you. Thank you,
Do you have a list that you look at every
single day? Your list must be about ten pages long.
You know what's interesting about this role as mayor, it's
not that as hot, it's the value. Eric Adams is
the mayor of New York City. He spent more than
twenty years as a New York City police officer before
(00:23):
entering politics. Mayor Adams has the monumental task and I
want to emphasize monumental task of guiding the largest and
some say the greatest, and I say the greatest city
in the United States, and I say in the world.
I thought it would be great to sit down with
(00:44):
the man who wields so much power and learn more
about his plans for our great New York City. And
who is he outside the office? We want to know.
It's a pleasure to welcome the one hundred and tenth
Mayor of the City of New York my podcast here
at Newstands Studios at Rockefeller Center. Welcome, mister Mayor. Thank
(01:05):
you so much. It is such a pleasure to sit
down with you and talk business. Yes, yes, business of
operating and guiding and improving and beautifying this great, great city.
You have, as I said, a monumenttions. Yes, yes, and
how do you feel right now? After what? How a year?
(01:26):
And here in three months we were entering March. But
I think that to fully understand the fullness of the
moment is, as you stated in your opening, oftentimes we
see the glory. You see the former captain, former state senator,
(01:46):
first black bell president, now the mayor of this city.
That's the glory. That's not my story. And to be
able to understand why at this moment I could take
the weight of this awesome task is to really understand
the story. And we you know, that's why I like
about your podcast. You get into the story, who's the person,
(02:08):
and then you have a better appreciation of the journey. Yes,
and we all want to know the story. We want
to know what motivated you to become mayor of the
most powerful city in the world. And you've never been
a miryor before. CEO, this is a This is a corporation, yeah, major,
and a very large corporation. Your yearly budget, you know,
(02:30):
one hundred the last budget was one hundred and one
billion dollars. You know, we balloon over any of the
location California probably as a budget larger, but this is
a major financial institution. But you know, it's amazing how
the lessons you learn from your parents come in a
(02:54):
real useful way. Mom used to start the week, she
would show how much money was coming into the house,
and she'll sit down with all six of us and
she said, this is this is how much is coming
in the house. These are all the bills. So when
you start saying that you want a new past sneakers,
tell me what item might takeoff? Do I turn off
(03:16):
the gas? So I turn off the heat? Do I
turn off the water? Do I don't buy food for
the week. So we had a full understanding of her
candid approach to well, a real budget, a real budget
minded mother, right. Yeah, and she was a single mother,
single mom of six kids. Yeah, amazing woman, never surrender,
never gave up. You know. Third grade education took us
(03:37):
from Brownsville, Brooklyn, where she just knew that she wanted
her children to be raised in the house. And I
think she was a damn good housekeeper. That was her
occupation too, right, Yes, she cleaned houses for people and
then she was she was able to find a union
job at Ampstead Daycare Center. I knew what the students
(03:57):
were eating every day because she would put it in
the type of where and bring it home file leftovers. Well,
it's it's nice to remember your parents. It's really nice
to be guided by your parents. Yes, I'm one of six. Also,
oh are you? Yes? I am that. Where Where are
you belt Lee, New Jersey in the middle of second
oldest okay okay, okay uh And we too. We lived
(04:18):
on a very very strict budget, but we supplemented with
a garden and we grew. We grew everything in the garden.
It was only a fifth of an acre, but we
grew stuff. We can stuff. We went to our cousin's
farm down in southern New Jersey and brought food back.
So I know about budget, right right, think about that. Also,
look how creative you are. You know when you do
(04:41):
some of your food shows, your cannon show. All of
that came from the foundation of what you knew of
Grandma and Buffalo taught me all kinds of mother and
homemaker tasks. Really great. So a mayor, I was driving
around the city today, so I asked the storekeeper. This
is a store that's been on Madison Avenue for one
(05:01):
hundred and ten years, Perez, It's called the seventies, upper seventies.
What a beautiful store. A lovely elderly couple run the store.
And I asked, what do you want me to ask
me or Adams? And she said, all I want me
or Adams to do for us is to make this
city safe. Love it. No, So that's one. And then
(05:24):
another person I asked, she said, all I want to
know is what is he doing about the rat population? Well,
you know, I don't know if you heard, but I
hate rats, and there's ways of doing that. We give
me to announce our rats are. That's going to focus.
It was a disjointed system previously and we're now going
(05:45):
to focus on one person overseeing the entire operation. Okay,
So eliminating the rat population which occurred, which really enlarged
because why one number one, the pandemic, A lot of
food was put out trash on our streets. We have
to move away from AUTHA. We have to move away
from plastic bags that came during the sixties during the
(06:07):
sanitation strike. We kept it. That is a failure process.
We have to put our garbage and containers, okay, containers,
garbage pails, yes, yes, again. So the other thing about
the pandemic. I mean, I was the restaurants that are
in the streets, all those exterior restaurants. Right our city
is starting to look like Moonbaie. You know, this is
(06:27):
a really scary situation because sometimes I can't even drive
down some streets because there's a restaurant on this side.
In restaurant. What's happening with the sidewalk restaurants. You know,
we have to take our hat off to the previous
administration as they instituted what we call the COVID sheds
because our restaurants were closing and it really was a lifeline. Yes,
(06:47):
now that COVID is in our rear view mirror for
the most part, we have to re acknowledge and re
examine the use of them. Counsel, when MAJII Velast squads
is coming up with a new plan, you're going to
see a smaller number and they're going to be uniform
and presentation you know nice. Yes, I mean to have
four or five of them on one street, which really
(07:09):
restricts traffic, restricts us moving from one place to another,
really is very debilitating. We have to rethink it. It
did his job, and now it's time to what do
the restaurant toursday, do they want to keep them? Some
like eating out doors, it's more eating out doors. So
we should look at how we're going to use our
names for half a sidewalk right, Yes, So it's exciting,
(07:29):
But I want to go back to the crime because
that's important. I say public safety is the prerequisite to prosperity.
And we're hitting the result of our public safety plan.
And people must not only be safe based on the stats,
say must feels safe. That's crucioot. So we see we
have witness in this year and the end of last year,
decreasing homicide, decreasing shootings. We're watching our major seven crime
(07:52):
categories also decrease. The customer satisfactory subway. In our subway system,
the numbers are extremely impressive, major riout. People are seeing
a difference. Many of the employees who work with me,
my colleagues take the subway, yes, and they are very
distraught about the number of homeless on the subways. They
(08:13):
see a lot of policemen, but they don't see a
lot of improvement in the subway. There's also still scary
crime on the subways. So, and I think part of
it is is that we highlight in our daily tabloids
the worst thing that has ever happened in the city
every day. I mean, if if it bleeds, it leads.
I mean, that's the business. But we look at the number.
(08:35):
We have an average of six felonies a day on
our subway system, six with three point six million riders.
So that's okay, No, it's not. We want to give
it all six But when you look at how many
riders we get get to and from their place, million
riders a day, three point six million million riders a day.
People listen to this, three point six million million writers.
(08:58):
So if you go to the average commuter, I write
the trains the line and say have you had a
negative encounter? It isn't all. But I feel unsafe because
you feel unsafe because you get on the plane, train,
you pick up the paper, and you hear about something
offered that happened on the system. So the police presence
is to deal with the safety. Then we removed the
encampments on our subway system. You don't see encampments anymore.
(09:20):
Four thousand people that were homeless we took off the system,
brought them aside. A stentire number of a thousand state
in care with rappermund services. Now we're zeroing in on
those few that refuse to leave. So you were in
(09:43):
the headlines this morning in our famous, fabulous New York posts. Yeah,
I get the New York Posts just because I have
to see the other side of the story. Murdoch listened
to me, So I see you being mind for suggesting
tuition for the migrant workers that are appearing in our
(10:05):
city now. But tell Us says the gas stoves. Right,
That was misleading. Right, taken from a person that had
to pay two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for his
son's student loan. College is expensive. Yes, we are not
giving people tuition to get their degrees in college. What
(10:26):
we are saying is how do we take migrants and
make them self sustaining. We're teaching them English with teaching
them some skills, with a hundred of them to see
how this would work on a suiting campus, and say
we want to make you self sustaining. We don't want
you dependent on governmental subsidies. This is a small thing
to do. It's not taking people to college paying for
(10:48):
their college tuition. That is just untrue. So it's guiding
them to certain coursework that they can take to help
them improve their job ability to take a job because
many of them cannot they cannot apply for jobs. What
about the community colleges? Are they willing to do this?
That's what we're looking at. This is this is a
pilot project. I'm saying, we want to teach English some
soft skills to make to make sure that they are
(11:10):
self sustaining. You don't want people depending on society. Totally misleading, Yes, yeah,
you know. I mean imagine if you are miss Jones
and you are saving up all your money to pay
your child soony tuition. It gives the impression that the
mayor is treating us unfairly, and that is not the
case at all. The other thing that really irks me
and many other people in the city are the numbers
(11:32):
of buildings under construction or in you know, in construction
or being repaired with all the scaffolding. That's so dangerous.
I look up all the time, wondering must be in
my in my briefings, and here's the problem. He's the
problem market that I looked into. You didn't give the permits.
(11:54):
I know that because there was another mayor before you
that gave the permits for all the stuff that was
going on. How can we improve the permit process so
that not too many brickets are given at the same time.
Here's the problem. We haven't we have an antiquated mindset.
So the reason you see of those scoffoldings up is
(12:15):
because they're loose bricks somewhere in the building instruction. For
the most part, some of the new constructions. What we're
saying to building owners that you have to cover the
entire footprint of the building. What I am saying, let's
use drones. There's new technology out there that will allow
a drone to go in to a scan of the
entire building with infrared and determine where a loose brick is.
(12:39):
Spirit right, you don't have to have that expensive scaffolding,
which is dangerous. I know, years and years until the
building can fix a brick exactly. I mean, I know
how to fix bricks. I know I know how to
dig out the old mortar and put in the new mortar.
Believe you know, that's what we're looking to move towards.
And you're going to see instantly a substantial decrease of
(13:00):
the sheds that are And I know during COVID, it
was very hard to build. It was very hard to
do the construction on fifty sixth and Park. There's a
building that has been building for years. I know, the
one on the right hand side going up check and
my Cairo projectress. She has lived with ear deafening sounds
and noise for three years. Awful. How does the mayor
(13:24):
fix that? It's about expediting the process. The Department of
Buildings good work is, but the processes were horrific and
so we are really expediting getting your permit files and
then we're looking at use new technology. We I'm a
strong believer that many of the things we were doing
is just using eight track methods. In the iPhone age,
(13:47):
we need to think about government and agencies are running differently. Remember,
cities are run by agencies, and if those agencies are misaligned, disjointed,
or not using new methods, then you'll never get the
product that tax pass deserves well in your agencies that
are that are now working for you as a mayor,
has there been a lot of turnover? Yes, yes, yes,
(14:10):
And do you feel that you're putting more and more
educated people in those jobs? Three twenty thousand employees be
the largest employer in the city, and COVID has changed
the mindset of workers. We get ready to hold a
major conference with behavior scientists to examine what has COVID
don has done to you know, what employees want to do.
(14:34):
Just in our office, I mean three day a week
work week, it's ridiculous. A city can't run on three days. No,
you can't. I can't. Are you on a three day
work week? No, we're have five days sold, you know.
But what we want to seven days mayor what we
want to do is to look at how do you
modify work days. Some people want to do twelve hour days,
(14:57):
you know, and then didn't take off the friday. Some
people want to come and do that work hours overnight.
So we want to be more flexible and what a
work environment looks like. Yeah, I think that's the only
way to go. We have to accommodate the workers and
make sure that they're making their salaries, but they have
to be working for thoselves. I think people want to
(15:19):
do that. And what people don't understand when I tell
my younger employees, I need you. I need you because
things are changing, not need you to be around me
to keep me abreast of the changes that mentoring and
learning from each other, the cross pollination of ideas, that
is what work environments should be about. That's why I
wanted to talk to you today, Mayor, because I like
(15:41):
to hear those words coming out of you. I think
it's very important to encourage and to get people to
really continue to act like human beings we are. We
are a collaborative race and we can help each other.
And if we don't get people to do it, we're
never going to clean up the act to this city. No,
(16:01):
it's all right, and it's about, you know, creating a healthy,
trusted environments where people can get the emotional intelligence that
they need. We often focus on people being academically smart,
but we need to really lean into the emotional intelligence
of creating healthy environments for children, families and workplaces. Oh
now this is something dear to my heart. What about
(16:23):
the composting system that you're envisioning, Oh, love it, love it.
You know, we did an experiment in Queens. Two things
came out of that experiment. We've reached unbelievable goals with
people composting. But many people thought South Jamaica, Queens, the
African American Caribbean community would not participate. They led the
(16:44):
entire borough in compost rate. Yes, yes, it's a real one.
We're going to expand it citywy. We're really excited about
how many tons of garbage does New York produce a year.
That's a good question. I can't give you that number.
I lose that question on a huge amount. And most
of that goes into land waste, landfill, it goes into
the ocean probably, that's probably doing a lot of damage
(17:07):
to a lot of areas. But if we could encourage
half that trash is compostable, yes, and it could easily
be turned back into something useful. What we turn our
compost in at the farm and where I live, I
call it black gold. It is so valuable and it
doesn't take very long to happen. No, and that's the goal,
the goal we want to We're going to have a
(17:28):
citywide composting a program. I was composting in harm when
I was about president. And you know, my parents come
from the South Side. Are people Are people really gonna
go for the composting? Yes, yes, we see it, we
see We witnessed what happened in Queens. It was success
beyond believe. We have an amazing commissioner over at the
Department of Sanitation, Jessica Tih. She is bringing a level
(17:52):
of ingenuity and get stuff done atmosphere. Ood I like
to hear that. Back to the crime issue, because again
that's every single day, on every front page of every
tabloid or news alert or whatever else we get. Major
crimes are down, including assaults and robberies, but in twenty
(18:14):
twenty two, they rose like twenty three percent in twenty
twenty two, and now they are you say, coming down, Oh,
without a doubt, we're trending in the right direction. February
of twenty twenty two, we were seeing a forty percent
increase in many of our major crimes, thirty percent in
some areas. We started trending down. Police Commissioner Kishan sul
put in place with a new team there of Chief
(18:37):
Magi and his team, and you're really seeing not only
the actual major crime, but you're seeing some of the
other issues. Motorcycles in three wheels on our streets, illegal plates,
just the quality of life issue that really impacts our city.
What about shoplifting, I hear, I hear that that's becoming
a major problem. That's why I said take off the masks. Wow,
(18:59):
that's why I said take off the masks. Pull it
down for three seconds before into the shop. To me,
repeated offenders committing crimes using COVID as a reason, this
is a good way to have public health and public
safety together into your store. When you when you expose
the face of someone that committed the crime, you would
cut the time that person is apprehended in half, if
(19:21):
not even more. Do you feel What do you think
about the police department right now? Oh? I love these
guys and ladies. They when you look at the record
number of closing cases, arrests, really the city is able
to handle a protest or parade. They are just you know,
(19:41):
it's amazing. I'm so happy I was part of that profession.
Would you say that they like you? I like them.
I think if you if you go around to the
average police officer, he'll tell you we have a mayor
that he has our back. I'm not going to send
my troops into the field of battle and abandon them.
I'm want to lead them into battle. They had a
(20:02):
tough job and in spite of what they went through,
they remained true to protecting our city. I want you
to know that I actually employ several retired policemen who
are fantastic gentlemen and uh and it's really nice to
hear some of their stories. They are well trained, polite,
nice and I certainly hope that the that the force
(20:25):
remains loyal and urge working because we need a good police.
You do as I stated, the our prosperity lies in
public safety, and we're prospering of our jobs. Recap covid
A back Broadway last week had one of the one
of the greatest showings. We we we have one of
(20:46):
the highest bond ratings, in increasing our bond ratings because
of our fiscal responses. What about rents? Our rents, Our
building is becoming more occupied list and I have to
borrow from the person who ran for governor once then
it's too damn high. It is expensive to live in
this city. Of that's why we need to build more
affordable housing. And so we need our local electors to
(21:09):
allow housing to be built in that community. And we
had some major projects, well it's point projects over two
thousand affordable units Bronx out in innovation Queen. So we're
going to keep pushing. But we need to find pathways
to home ownership like we had in the past with
the Mitchell Lama type program, right, that would be very useful.
(21:31):
So what's your relationship with our new governor? Oh? Love
cafter you going the whole cool? You know she is
a steady hand at the at the helm art Y. Yes,
she is. We did when I when I went to
her last year around February and stated that we need
to do something with the subway. She helped me with
the subway safety plan. That's how we got to decreases
(21:52):
we're witnessing. When I told her we need to do
something with mental health, severe mental health illnesses on the street,
she came and helped with opening news like theatric bads.
She has been just a real partner. And I think
the state is happy to see the governor and the
mayor that actually likes each other. And tourism, is it
on the increase red hot fifty six million tourists last year.
(22:14):
We think we're gonna get somewhere about sixty five million
this year. Once fully occupied. Yes, yes, we we are
top in the major twelve hotel markets. We're doing very well.
That's why we're fighting to get the d and C,
the Democratic National Convention here. What was the last time
we had a convention? Two Clinton one, that's right, I
(22:38):
went to that. I went to that convention. That was
some big convention. Yea. Tourists bring so much they spend,
they go to our restaurants, our theater. Is we're going
to encourage them to visit the outer boroughs. Now you
live where personally, well, some people say in New Jersey.
I don't know why they believe that. Right now, May's
(22:59):
living great mansion. I still have my home and Bethi Stuyveson.
I'll never leave there. I love it, but I mean
Gracie Mansion and don't let anyone for you Gracie mansions
they have it has goals, you know. The first time
I went there with Mayor Lindsay. Wow. Mayor Lindsay worked
for a law firm in Race here in Rockefeller Center.
He worked for Webster Sheffield and my husband wasn't an
(23:22):
associate at the time. Wow. So I have pictures of
me with Mayor Lindsay at Gracie Mansion, which was beautiful,
and we were gowns and we were dancing and eating
delicious food at Gracy Mansion. It's a beautiful place. Yeah,
and then Mayor Bloomberg didn't want to live there. But
why because of the ghosts? You thing? And you know
it's the best about greasy Man. What. Oh isn't it
(23:45):
beautiful looking over the Yeah it is. And I don't
know why Mike didn't like living there because it was inland. Yeah.
I love the water. Have you done anything to the mansion.
It's slight renovation which ryan to raise money so that
we can come in and have a mock to Stewart
type renovation. It's like it's like a museum. It is,
and it's and it's a beautiful, beautiful house. That's actually
(24:07):
that's actually Palks property. Yes, I know. It deserves to
be taken care of and every will maintain. So you're
you're lacking funds. Yeah, So we want to raise funds
privately to do a complete renovation. And we opened it up.
I call it to people's house. We encourage the White House, right, Yeah.
We encourage people to holy events there to come visit.
(24:28):
Have a big tent we put in the backyard during
the summer. It's used far more often than it has
ever been used. Good. Good, Maybe I'll have an event
from my Center for Living at Mount SINAI. I would
love that. So you're dealing with the migrants in terms
(24:52):
of helping them get jobs, but how are we housing them?
How are we thinking about real, real, real challenge? You know,
think about this amount. In January first, twenty twenty two,
when I became mayor, we had thirty five thousand people
in our homeless system. Thirty five thousand for all the
years in one year. We received close to that amount
(25:15):
in one year when now up to fifty thousand people
went to our system. Wow, So that's the fifty thousand
homeless people plus the thirty five thousand that was there.
We had thirty five thousand I was there already. On
top of that, we have fifty thousand migrants, thousand people.
Never had that number, looking for an end in the cold,
(25:35):
running the web, looking for places to stay. That's why
we see them sleeping on cardboard over the events, the
heating events from the subways and stuff. But many of
them are not asylum seekers. Of what we have done
for our asylum seekers, no other city or state has
done anything like this. Not only do we get them
place to sleep, we make sure they have health kid
(25:58):
we hit. Almost thirteen thousand child went into our school system,
mental healthcare, food laundry service. So we are anybody starving
on our streets they should not have to because there's
access to food, pantries, food soup kitchers, volunteers, local community.
Based on there a numbers about people who like die
overnight sleeping, we're not we're not seeing numbers like that.
(26:21):
That's a rarity. That's a rarity. Okay, that's encouraging. And
what is it costing the city to help all almost
five people? Almost We spent from last year to this
year six hundred and fifty million dollars. We think we're
going to spend about one point four billion dollars of
(26:42):
this year close to that number. And we're not getting
the help that we deserve from the federal government. We
need help from the federal government and the state government.
The governor has included resources in her budget. We want
to we want to make sure it gets passed through
in this budgetary cycle. Do you have a list that
you look at every angle day? Your list must be
about ten pages long. You know what's interesting about this
(27:06):
role as man, it's not that as hard, it's the
volume every day Martha. All day something is happening in
your phone is ringing, it never stops, and I can
It's amazing that you arrive at a place in life
without realizing the things you did before that prepared you
for it. Little did I know that meditation and breathing
(27:28):
exercise it will pay such a place, such a role
for me right now to allow me to have that
that tranquility, that peaceful You can zone out and recenter right,
recenter and just understand that you know, be present in
the moment. Don't try to hope for days that's free
from crisis. Pray and meditate on having the ability to
(27:50):
deal with those crisis as they come up. And your staff,
how many people work just very closely with you and
in and around your office. We have three and twenty
thousand employs, but righting in city Hall you have probably
roughly anywhere from seventy to eighty that are there with
me and I have an amazing team. We have done
things that have never been give a daily meeting every
(28:12):
morning eight am. Um. First time in history we have
an African American woman who's the first deputy mayor. First
time we have a woman as a police commissioner of
women as a fire commissioner. And we're good, aren't we? Oh?
What Yeah, women know how to run multitask No, they
(28:32):
know how to get stuff done. Yep, we are I
love my team. How can you run a family and
and have a job and be married to a difficult
man and uh and try to make a pretty home
if you're not like that? Right, once you have a
family and once you married, you're a difficult man, and
then you can work for me. Well, you know, because
I'm I'm I'm an optimistic third grader. Well that is something.
(28:57):
So the typical day starts at eight am. Oh that's
the time of the media at the meeting. Okay, when
do you get to the office. I'm up at five
normally I'll do my meditation, my exercise, make my green smoothie.
What's your exercise combination? Calistatics, little lightweight train and stretching,
you know, and then I'll just go into a breathing
(29:18):
I'll say my prayers, I'll read some positive affirmations, you know.
Then I'll do a quick google and see what good
drinks Matha Stewart has online. Dan, you have a green
smoothie every morning? Everybody what's in your green smoothie combination? Blueberry, spinach,
kale maka powder, some ginger, ginger, little celery. It's a
(29:42):
nice good makes it for you. I'll do it myself.
So and you should put some collagen in it, marine
collagen powder. It's tasteless and it really helps. I start
my day with a green juice. Also, okay, okay, that's
why you look fabulous. I try. But it's it's energizing,
Yes it is. It is instead of that heavy on
(30:06):
the road with bacon. I forget that. Once you break
that habit. It's unbelievable. Your energy level when you do
a healthy man in the morning. Oh yes, this morning,
I was already at pilates at six fifteen. And uh.
And then I go home and I take care of
the chickens, and then I have my green juice. I
have one cappuccino. That's my cappuccino. And so then after
(30:27):
you have your juice, what do you do? Then? I
read all my papers, you know, in my way on
my way into the office. Sometimes I take the train
to throw up over the New York you know. Actually
like the pose. I know. I read sports are great, right,
Page six is great? I have to read page six
to see what's going on. No, but I'll you know,
(30:50):
zip through the papers, find out what's going on in
the city, listen to some of the talk shows that
are coming on, and then uh, you know, by then
it's eight am, and I'm being to breathe by the
team on what the day looks like. And you know
what we have on our plate? Yeah, a lot on
that plate. I hope it's like a great big charger play.
They make him, they make him sixteen inches now. But
(31:12):
it's it's exciting, you know. And and I say all
the time to the team, like, how could I complain?
I'm the mayor of New York. This is the greatest
city on the globe. And and you know, twenty eight
years ago, MARKA, when I stayed in January for his
twenty twenty two I'm going to be the mayor. People
used to say, what's wrong with this guy? You know, well,
(31:33):
you're here, you're here, and you're doing it. People who
lead such busy lives that I don't think there's anybody
around here that leads a busier life than New mayor.
But I don't feel it. I don't feel it good.
You look very You look so well. The mayor looks rested,
he's smiling, he's laughing, you can hear him laughing. But
he is um and fit. You look very fit. So
(31:55):
diet is very important, and h and just being not
always not always been like that. We'll talk about your transformation. Yeah,
And it was a couple of years ago. Woke up
Martha and I couldn't see the alarm clock. I thought
it was sleep in my eyes and it was a
very frightening experience. And at the same time, was having
pains in my stomach. I thought it was colon cancer
(32:16):
because I just lost a good friend of colon cancer.
My my hands and feet were tingling. I went to
the doctor. He checked my stomach and my colon. He
said I had an ulcer. That was the pain I
was feeling. But that also saved my life because he said, Eric,
your real problem, the reason you have vision laws is
that you have late stage diabetes and you're gonna lose
your sight. Was that an hereditary thing for you. That's
(32:37):
very interesting that you say that, because that's what I thought.
And he says that you know that tingling you're feeling
your fingers and toes is you have permanent nerve damage.
You're gonna lose some fingers and toes. Right. And I
met a doctor, doctor Esselton. He wrote a book of
preventing reversing heart disease. I called him up Cleveland Clinton.
He treated Bill Clinton for his heart disease. And he
(32:58):
told me your food. He said, you changed your you
could put this in remission, changed my diet. Three weeks
after going plant base, my vision came back. Wow, a
nerve damage went away. The altar went away in three
And you heard a lot of rumors. And let me
put those rumors to rest. Cops like donuts. We were
eating every type of doughnuts, sweet and so what I
(33:23):
learned it's not your DNA, your dinner. Mom and I
shared the same dinner, not that we shared the same DNA.
That food impacts our health. And it just put me
on an amazing journey of health as well. What has
been your most difficult day as mayor? When office of
Mara and Rivera they were assassinated. You know, that was
(33:46):
just really hard, you know, and went went families, yes, yes,
and being in the hospital watching the pain. It was hard.
These were young men, they were you know, first generation
New Yorkers. They can into the police department to make
a difference. It was just a very very painful moment
for me. How are the families still strong? Strong? I
(34:09):
really take my hat off to them. They dealt with
the initial pain and now they're very engaged and help
in any way they can. And you know, you know,
Mommy told me now I was a little boy, you're
gonna be in dark places. You know, it's either either
going to be a burial or planted. We have to
turn pain into purpose, and they have turned the painful
moment into a purposeful moment. What's your biggest perk about
(34:34):
being mayor? I wish I did, you know, if I
get it? If I get a perk the New York
posted right about me, or the New York Times, they
would say, you know, Eric got a free token, you know.
But the most joy about it, it's like people. This
city is made up of amazing people. It's a Shakespearean tragedy.
(34:55):
If you live only in your own little kakum, you know,
there's so much advantage, isn't there. This this place is amazing.
That's why I would never move to another city, right,
I would never ever, ever, No, that's why I'm saying.
It's just like it's just like an incredible place. And
that's why I want it. I wanted the sparkling, clean,
infestation free Gotham City again. I am with you. I'm
(35:19):
going to bring you Okay, Well, I will help you
in any way I can. Mayor Adams, I think you've
gotten off to a good start. You have to keep
that chin up, that's right, and uh, and keep fighting
because it is a big fight every day, isn't it.
It is? It is, but it's an enjoyable one, okay,
and I enjoy just I'm a blue collar guy, and
(35:40):
you know, like you said, your parents and families, this
is a blue collar city, no matter, no matter how
prosperous we are individually. If you look at our lineage,
there's someone that made it for us. And their hands
were dirty from the rope that they did. I don't
even call it dirty, just they were just used. So
that's that's right, well said, right, Well, use hands. Well,
(36:01):
good luck. I don't want to keep you from your
office too much because I know you have so so
much work to do. Um. Eric Adams is a very
busy man. As you can hear, he seems to be
on top of it all, doesn't he. He's talking really well,
and he seems to have those numbers and those challenges
and everything pretty clear in his head. Keep that list going,
(36:23):
keep those checklists happening, and check them off as you
as you accomplish your very daunting tasks. Adams, Well, thank
you so much. Good to see you. Thank you,
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