{"id":166452,"date":"2026-03-17T18:32:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T18:32:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166452\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T18:32:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T18:32:11","slug":"zohran-mamdani-looking-for-bids-as-nyc-plans-massive-marketing-campaign-for-preschool-expansion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166452\/","title":{"rendered":"Zohran Mamdani looking for bids as NYC plans ‘massive marketing campaign’ for preschool expansion"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mayor Zohran Mamdani is putting out a call for bidders as the city plans a \u201cmassive\u201d marketing campaign for the expanded rollout <\/a>of early childhood programs, The Post has learned.<\/p>\n

The Mayor\u2019s Fund to Advance New York City is seeking proposals from companies to conduct \u201cfamily focus groups\u201d to guide the administration\u2019s \u201cbranding and messaging\u201d for the expansion of 2-K and 3-K classes \u2014 a top priority of the new mayor.<\/p>\n

The feedback from the focus groups will help\u00a0\u201cdevelop a massive marketing campaign to bring families into the City\u2019s early childhood system,\u201d the Mayor\u2019s Fund said in its public notice to potential bidders.<\/p>\n

\"NYCNYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani hopes to expand universal preschool in NYC. Robert Miller for NY Post<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not clear how much the contract would be worth.<\/p>\n

The Mayor\u2019s Fund is the not-for-profit fundraising arm for City Hall that pools money from both private and public sources for Hizzoner\u2019s pet programs<\/a>.<\/p>\n

According to the most recent tax filing available for 2023, the fund had $14.2 million in cash on hand.<\/p>\n

During his campaign for City Hall last year, Mamdani proposed publicly funded universal child care for kids starting at 6 weeks to 5 years old.<\/p>\n

Taxpayers will shell out more than $36,000 per tot for the mayor\u2019s free 2-K pilot program<\/a> \u2013 roughly $13,000 more than the average cost of private child care, it was recently revealed.<\/p>\n

\"TwoMamdani\u2019s campaign promise was universal child care for kids as young as 6 weeks old. Education Images\/Universal Images Group via Getty Images<\/p>\n

Gov. Kathy Hochul earmarked $73 million in state funding for the 2,000-seat launch of the 2-K program in the city for the fall\u00a0\u2014 helping the pair\u00a0move toward fulfilling Mandani\u2019s campaign promise.<\/p>\n

Experts estimated that statewide universal child care could cost between $12 billion and $15 billion.<\/p>\n

Founded in 1994, the Mayor\u2019s Fund works 50 different city agencies and offices, 300 institutional funders and 100 community-based partners.<\/p>\n

The Mayor\u2019s Fund\u2019s major initiatives include creating the Twin Towers Fund, which raised $107 million to support the families of rescue workers killed or severely injured during the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, and setting up the COVID-19 Emergency Relief Fund to support health care workers and small businesses during the deadly pandemic.<\/p>\n

In addition, the fund has help raise funds for anti-poverty and mental health programs and support emergency services for asylum seekers under the prior mayoralties of Mike Bloomberg, Bill de Blasio and Eric Adams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayor Zohran Mamdani is putting out a call for bidders as the city plans a \u201cmassive\u201d marketing campaign…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[14927,57,9,56,63,65,64,51259,58,82],"class_list":["post-166452","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-city-budget","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-preschools","tag-us-news","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}