Following Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio’s victory last week, the city is preparing for its new leader in 12 years – including Mayor Bloomberg weighing in on his predecessor and the current public advocate assembling what the Brooklyn politician is calling his “transition team.”
Bloomberg, in his weekly Sunday radio address, said he and de Blasio – who has been a vehement critic of the current mayor – would routinely spend time together in the weeks leading up to de Blasio taking the reins of the city government come January.
The mayor went on to say that “no new administration ever gets handed a completely blank slate” and the members of Bloomberg’s administration have “worked to prepare clear, concise memos explaining the issues the next administration will confront, both immediately and in the longer run.”
Bloomberg, who did not endorse any mayoral candidate and is often at ideological odds with de Blasio, said during the radio address that “if the experience of our administration offers any guide, some things that may look at the outset as if they’ll be easy going to the next team at City Hall could prove a lot harder once they really wade in.”
De Blasio – whose support in Queens came strongly in the borough’s western neighborhoods but who lost in much of South Queens and parts of mid and central Queens – announced his “transition team” last week. The group is being co-chaired by Jennifer Jones Austin and Carl Weisbrod.
Austin is the chief executive officer and executive director of the Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies – a prominent city social policy and advocacy organization. Weisbrod has led a career leading several public and private initiatives focused on revitalizing city neighborhoods.
“We’re building a team that’s devoted to building one great city where everyone shares in our prosperity,” de Blasio said in a prepared statement.
For more information about the incoming de Blasio government, visit www.transition2013.com.
By Anna Gustafson
