STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — A Tompkinsville garbage depot with a lofty future served as the setting for Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani’s latest leadership announcements Friday.
Leila Bozorg, the current executive director of housing for Mayor Eric Adams, will become the city’s deputy mayor for housing, and Julie Su, a former acting labor secretary under President Joseph Biden, as the city’s future deputy mayor of economic justice.
“I‘m so proud to appoint two deputy mayors who will not only work to deliver the affordability agenda that resonated with so many New Yorkers, but will lead the implementation of a more expansive approach to govrnment,” Mamdani said.
The two become the latest faces of the incoming Mamdani administration that will take the helm at City Hall Jan. 1.
Other members of the leadership team have included Dean Fulihan as the incoming first deputy mayor and Sherif Soliman, a former Staten Islander and graduate of Port Richmond High School, as the Office of Management and Budget director.
One of his hirings caused some controversy after antisemitic tweets resurfaced from Catherine Almonte Da Costa, who the mayor-elect named director of appointments Wednesday. She announced her resignation Thursday.
Mamdani said Friday that he would not have hired her had he been made aware of the tweets raising questions about his transition team’s vetting process.
Of the two appointees announced Friday, Mamdani said they would help lead his administration’s goal of making a more economically-prosperous city for all New Yorkers.
Part of that vision is the development of more housing, like that set to be built at the Jersey Street garbage depot where the mayor-elect held his Friday press conference. The project has been in the works since at least Mayor Bill de Blasio’s administration.
Neither the mayor-elect nor his announced appointees could provide a timeline on when they expect the Hillside Grove development with more than 230 units to open, but that they would do all they can to ensure those sorts of developments come to be as efficiently as possible.
“I think that this is a critical issue. Even when I’ve sat with real estate leaders, I’ve said we may have disagreements about labor, material. One place of immense agreement will be that we have to eliminate the cost of waiting,” he said. “We have to ensure that no longer are we putting hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not more, on those who want to build housing in the city because of how long a process they’re waiting for.”