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Taking Office, de Blasio Vows to Fix Inequity
Chang W. Lee/The New York Times
Bill de Blasio, right, with
his wife and children, was sworn into office at City Hall on Wednesday
by former President Bill Clinton. More Photos »
By MICHAEL M. GRYNBAUM
Published: January 1, 2014
Bill de Blasio, whose fiery populism propelled his rise from obscure
neighborhood official to the 109th mayor of New York, was sworn into
office on Wednesday, pledging that his ambition for a more humane and
equal metropolis would remain undimmed.
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Chang W. Lee/The New York Times
Letitia James was sworn in on Wednesday as New York
City’s public advocate. Dasani Coates held the Bible.
More Photos »
In his inaugural address, Mayor de Blasio described social inequality as
a “quiet crisis” on a par with the other urban cataclysms of the city’s
last half-century, from fiscal collapse to crime waves to terrorist
attacks, and said income disparity was a struggle no less urgent to
confront.
“We are called to put an end to economic and social inequalities that
threaten to unravel the city we love,” he said to about 5,000 people at
the ceremony, many beneath blankets on a numbingly cold day.
Mr. de Blasio, 52, the first liberal to lead City Hall in two decades,
delivered his critiques as his predecessor, Michael R. Bloomberg, whose
Wall Street pedigree and business-first approach to governance seemed to
embody the city’s current gilded era, sat unsmiling a few feet away.
It was only one of many potent symbols of change that dominated a ceremony unlike many before it.
Gone was the more solemn air of inaugurations past, replaced by the
booming strains of disco, soul, and dance music by the Commodores,
Marvin Gaye and Daft Punk, spun by a local D.J. stationed high above the
audience. (Even Hillary Rodham Clinton, seated onstage, swayed with the
music.)
Several of the nation’s pre-eminent Democrats — including Gov. Andrew M.
Cuomo and former President Bill Clinton, who administered the oath of
office over a Bible once owned by Franklin D. Roosevelt — appeared with
Mr. de Blasio on the dais, celebrating the elevation of a party stalwart
with whom they had close ties.
The ceremony was filled with an unusually open airing of the city’s
racial and class tensions, including a poem bristling with frustration
about “brownstones and brown skin playing tug-of-war,” a pastor’s words
about “the plantation called New York,” and fierce denunciations of
luxury condominiums and trickle-down economics.
Mr. de Blasio, a careful custodian of his image, took pains to
choreograph the appearance of a newly approachable and inclusive City
Hall, arriving with his family on the subway and walking onstage to
doo-wop tunes. Even the placement of cameras seemed to ensure that only
the dignitaries on stage and ordinary New Yorkers arrayed behind them
would be shown — and not the many lobbyists and political operatives in
the crowd.
And although he warned that his administration’s work “won’t be easy,”
Mr. de Blasio made only passing reference to the myriad and daunting
challenges — fiscal, political and structural — that he will face in
enacting his ambitious policy agenda.
Several of his proposals, including his signature plan to pay for
prekindergarten classes by raising taxes on the wealthy, are at the
mercy of the governor and state legislators in Albany. Other elements of
his platform are expected to be opposed by powerful interests in the
city’s corporate classes.
But in his first hours as mayor, Mr. de Blasio opted to focus more on
his aspirations for the office, and fulfilling a campaign promise to
change the tone of city government on Day 1.
The mayor’s transition team held a ticket lottery so that ordinary New
Yorkers could attend the inaugural ceremony, and the City Hall plaza was
quickly filled with a diverse crowd that punctuated speeches with
impromptu cheers, lending the feel of a jamboree to an event typically
more formal than festive.
From her seat in a back row, Justina Taylor, 16, of the Bronx, started
singing along with a Jay-Z song. “This is my kind of inauguration,” she
said.
Light moments abounded. The young children of Scott M. Stringer, who was
being sworn in as the city comptroller, squealed as their father sought
to recite the oath of office and drowned out his words. Mr. Stringer
laughed: “He’s not quite ready for a television commercial,” he quipped —
a sly reference to the celebrity that Mr. de Blasio’s 16-year-old son,
Dante, attained after starring in his father’s campaign ads.
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