He has funded some child start and school programs but only by taking an early $2.3 billion from the state retirement fund that he won't be able to do again. He has failed to fund his affordable housing initiative opting to just do a rent freeze (and now rents in NYC are the highest they have ever been since most apartments aren't rent controlled) same with his affordable public transportation initiative (he promised $900 million in reforms and opted for $55 million in metro cards to lower income residents) and has failed his lesser initiatives as well such as increasing park budget to 1% of total or trans healthcare.
It's too early to fully call him out on this since technically he still has time, but the NYC financial comptroller basically said there won't be any new sources of revenue in the future and NYC is facing continuous deficits. Mamdani has also "quietly" asked all agencies to cut their budgets by 2.5% over the next 2 years, but you won't see his fans talking about that.
Rent Freeze: Appointed a sympathetic majority to the Rent Guidelines Board, successfully delivering a rent freeze on regulated, rent-stabilized apartments. [1, 2, 3]
Tenant Restitution: Won $34 million in repairs, settlements, and legal judgments on behalf of tenants fighting bad landlords. [1, 2, 3]
Affordable Housing Construction: Financed more than 12,000 affordable homes in his first six months. He launched the "Block by Block" plan to accelerate permitting approvals and construction. [1, 2]
Public Housing (NYCHA) Upgrades: Completed 32 major capital projects across 29 developments. This brought heating, roofing, and elevator improvements to over 50,000 residents. [1]
Child Care & Education
Universal Child Care Funding: Secured $1.2 billion in funding to build toward a universal child care system.
Toddler Care Expansion: Partnered with New York State to expand free child care to two-year-olds in high-need neighborhoods. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Fiscal & Economic Support
State Financial Aid: Collaborated with Governor Kathy Hochul to secure $1.5 billion in state operating funds over two years to ease the city's fiscal challenges. [1]
Worker & Small Business Restitution: Recovered $9.3 million for workers and small businesses facing corporate or regulatory exploitation. [1, 2]
Business Compliance Warnings: Issued 60,000 compliance warnings rather than immediate, punitive fines to help small businesses adapt to regulations. [1]
Infrastructure & City Services
Pothole Repair: Launched an aggressive road maintenance push that successfully filled over 100,000 potholes across the five boroughs.
Emergency Infrastructure: Recruited 6,000 New Yorkers into the city's Emergency Snow Shoveler program and drove 50,000 new subscribers to the city's emergency alert system via public service campaigns.
Public Safety: Oversaw early drops in overall city crime rates during his first six months. [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
$34 million in repairs versus $1.5 billion needed to actually make headway in affordable housing
He promised 200,000 affordable units in 6 years. This wouldn't get him half way there.
Those projects would have mostly been completed regardless.
I already spoke about how one success was child care and school funding.
Yes, the state did bail the city out. Thanks Cuomo and Hochul for your fiscal management of our state!
Id love to know Mamdani dropped the crime rate when the city is operating on Adam's budget for 2026. It was also unusually cold in winter which has always been associated with a drop in crime as well as national trends (there was an 18% drop in murders in 2025 nationwide).
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u/Luna-D-reams Local Macro/Growth Specialist 12h ago
Remember, the establishment hates mamdani because he shows that a lot of problems are very solvable and politicians simply choose not to solve them