Political Courage with Brad Lander

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This is the WarOnCars. I'm Doug Gordon and I am here in the studio, as always,

with my co-host Sarah Goodyear. Happy September. Happy September. It's the

re-entry. I love it. You can tell it's September in our neighborhood because the

traffic is back. That's right. The school drivers are back. It's sad, but

there are also a lot of nice kids and parents walking on the street. It is

adorable. Biking and it's lovely. I love that. So real quick, we are on Patreon at

patreon.com slash the WarOnCars pod. You can also pre-order our book, which is

coming in October. It's called Life After Cars, freeing ourselves from the

tyranny of the automobile. It's available wherever books are sold. We're

also going on tour. That's right. You can go to lifeaftercars.com and

find out if we're coming to a city near you and we are adding new cities all the

time. In big news, we just announced our guest for our show in Brooklyn at the

Bell House. Yes. Former New York City DOT commissioner, Jeanette Sadekhan. Yes,

like a superstar special guest. I'm so excited. Rockstar of the Livable

Streets movement. Speaking of which, I think we have one here. We do indeed.

Brad Lander is the 45th comptroller of the city of New York. He has held that

position since 2022. Before that, he was my New York City Council member, and

that was a position he held, not just mine, but a lot of people. Yes. For 12

years in the city council, he co-founded the Progressive Caucus. He

represented, like I said, me and my neighborhood, including the neighborhood

we're sitting in here in Brooklyn. A lot of you may know him as a

candidate for mayor during the Democratic primary that just wrapped up in

June. And Brad really distinguished himself in a very crowded field with

his detailed platform, all of his policies, as well as his cross

endorsement of Zoran Mamdani, who eventually won the race. Also, in

June, mere days, I think it was a week out from the primary day, Brad was

escorting a man out of an asylum hearing down in Lower Manhattan when

he was arrested by federal agents. And that became big news, of course. Brad

is the highest-ranking Jewish elected official in the city of New York. And

it was a really shocking moment on, I guess, our country's road to

autocracy. Yeah, I have to say, though, I heard that Brad got

arrested. I saw the call to action to go to Foley Square to show

support. And I was in Foley Square with hundreds of other people when

Brad was released and spoke to the crowd. And I have to say, it was an

incredibly moving event and day in general, because there were just so

many people there who had just run there out of a sense of urgency, the

way that when bad things happen in New York, I feel like New Yorkers are

very, very good at springing into action to try to repair and support

and make things right. And so then when you came out, it was just really

inspiring. And it's a personal thing for me, too, because my grandfather, who

is Italian, was arrested under the Alien Enemies Act in 1942 and was

processed right there, that same court complex. And then he was taken

to a cell on Ellis Island and interned for six months without access to

counsel. So anyway, I think we should officially welcome Brad Lander to

the war on cars.

All right, well, I am thrilled to be here. Thank you for the invitation. I

have wanted to join the war on cars for quite some time now.

You've been a member for a long time.

Honored to be doing it. Thank you for the invitation. Thank you for being

there that day at Foley Square. I will say that free Brad Lander signs

were not something I ever imagined I would see or really want to see again.

But it felt powerful to have all those people out there saying for all the

things that are going on in the world for all the ways this country is

creeping toward fascism. New Yorkers know better. We show up and for each

other, you know, I had tried to do that that day at Gardo, who I was

accompanying and lots of other folks that I've been with since have been back

pretty much weekly since then. Our neighbors, our New Yorkers, we show

up for them. Thank you for showing up for me and want to hear that story

about your grandfather is pretty powerful. But that's what New York City

is all about. Like at this moment with creeping authoritarianism, fighting

back by getting out in the streets and insisting on inclusive, multi

racial democracy by showing up for our neighbors is what we're called to do.

And I do think courage is is required. And it's nice to have you on not too

many elected officials actually have the courage even to come on the war

on cars because they think perhaps that the New York Post will seize on

that as evidence of their radical tendencies. They will. So they're

not wrong about about that. Right. That's what we're hoping will

happen. But you're here for it. So we really appreciate.

Well, I wonder, Brad, like, have you reached a new stage of your political

career where I don't want to say you have like no Fs left to give, but

like, because you care very deeply about the stuff that you're doing.

And and even though you, you know, I was recently saying to someone

that like, I don't think a person has lost an election and come out

as much of a winner as you did. Because if you didn't already

have the respect of so many New Yorkers, which you do, so many

people saw something that I'd know about you, which is your

political courage, your ability to stand up for people in different

coalitions, your ability to reach across different demographics

and say we're all one New York and we do better together. But have

you sort of reached a new stage? We're like, I'll go on the war

on cars. I'll do anything now.

Absolutely. I mean, I would have, I think I would have been

willing to come on the war on cars earlier. But I also

think it's fair to say, you know, I'm in my, I don't give

a f**k phase.

Alright, you swore you made it, that's fine.

Yeah. Well, the fact that Stephen Colbert not just had Zoran and

me on earlier that week, but then let me say good f**king

riddance to Andrew Cuomo the next night was maybe the, you

know, one of my favorite media appearances, but but taking

your question seriously. Look, when you do something like run

for mayor, you worry a lot. You are thinking, can I

control my message? I've got a set of things I want to

say, what will the implications of this be? And yes, your head

goes to, okay, yes, I of course want more livable streets and

fewer traffic crashes and people to be able to have outdoor

dining at open streets. But I don't want the car owners to

think I'm coming actually, you know, to declare war on them.

And you spend a lot of time with your comms team in your

head trying to calibrate in all those directions. And it

helps a lot after going through all of that to see that what

actually people respond to best is when you are able to be just

your most honest, clear self. And people could figure out who

you are. And the fact for me that I spent millions of

dollars trying to get people's attention to a long track

record of working to make the city better, a whole bunch of

detailed policies, without a whole lot of success at drawing

attention to me or to those things. But then down the stretch

when an arrest just doing the simple thing of showing up to

a company immigrant New Yorkers who deserve due process and the

rule of law, going after Andrew Cuomo on the debate stage for

all the reasons I thought he would be a disaster in ways

that showed yeah, being unafraid, but also just being

willing to throw and take some punches. And then to do the

cross endorsement and say, yeah, implicitly, I see it's not

that likely to be me, but I care more about the city and its

future. That did put me in a space of saying what's best to be

able to do is just go out there and be who you are. And

that really is both more fun. And people respond to it a

lot better.

The fun part for me, even as someone who knows you but

was experiencing this just as a New Yorker was when you did

that cross endorsement. And this happened before. But the love

that you both have for the city, I don't think we've seen a

campaign based on this is a great city, and it can be

better. You know, Eric Adams ran on New York City is a hell

whole of crime and only I can fix it. That's Andrew Cuomo's

pitch is like the city is terrible. I don't even live

here. And I'm telling you that it's terrible. But you

guys just have this like buddy cop energy that I really

loved, especially in the the cross endorsement video where

you were just ordering from a, you know, what's more New

York than ordering from a street, a food cart. I loved it.

Thank you. Yeah, we felt it, which was nice. Now, I've

said this before, but I really did decide to do the

cross endorsement in a more like rank choice math sort of

way. Don't want Andrew Cuomo to be mayor. Our voters

have to we got to add our voters up to make sure

that doesn't happen. And I give credit to the, you

know, the staff are actually a lifelong resident of

Park Slope, somebody born not too far from where we are

young staffer, Arden Dressner Levy, who put the script

together. And when I read that script, I was like, this

is perfect. Like it really does convey that love of

New York. And it's sad that our politics is at a

point where people are so used to ego driven, selfish,

sour, you know, I thought it was pretty

significant that on election day, both Andrew

Cuomo and Eric Adams went out of their way to let

everyone know they were the only ones that they were

voting for, right? They weren't going to have two,

three, four or five. And for us to say, no, there's a

vision of this city we love and share that so many

New Yorkers do. And yeah, of course, you're

frustrated with how unaffordable things are or

with ways that city government isn't delivering

in how it needs to absolutely. But what drives

here is a love of this place.

Well, I was going to say, you know, I think

that it can be so hard to build coalitions and to

find solidarity. And I guess I wanted to ask you

about that because I think we're at a point where

it's just incredibly important to figure that out.

And who can you be in coalition with? And it's

not going to be people that you agree with on

every single point. And so how do you approach

finding people that you can be in coalition with,

build solidarity with? What is that made of?

What has to underlie those alliances?

Yeah, I'm trying to decide whether to go from the

love or go from the things we oppose. I guess I'll

start from the love just because it's a nicer

place to start, even though being honest, like

this is a moment. You know, when people say

popular front, right, like that's maybe like

this classic political starting from the negative

I said I wasn't going to. But I actually think it's

useful. You know, people, I don't know that

everyone knows what popular front refers to,

but it refers to anti-fascist coalitions

that did include a pretty big range of people

on the left, you know, in that case, this was

Europe before the war, so broad groups of

socialists, of liberals, social Democrats,

but also liberals and, you know, people more

moderate in our context, who recognize that if

they were going to block creeping authoritarianism

and fascism in their countries, they would need

these broader coalitions, you know, in a classic

form in France, it brought a like a Jewish

socialist Leon Bloom to power. And they're

not easy coalitions to build, but I do think

they need two things. One, that level at

this moment of clarity, like we really do have

all around the world, not just in Donald Trump,

threats to the things we care the most about,

to like the rule of law, to democracy, to these

core values. But obviously you also have to

be inspired by something in New York City.

That's not hard, you know, you mentioned it's

the first day of, you know, first day of

first week of school. And when you're out

on the sidewalks watching diverse sets of

parents hold their, you know, kids walking

in their hands and that's such an incredible

diverse set of people wherever you are, even for

as segregated as the city is, you know, the

kids walking into neighborhood public schools

are often pretty diverse. And here are these

public institutions that got started, you

know, most of the school buildings in this

neighborhood over a hundred years old. And

yet they're just the platforms for people's

hopes and dreams for their kids. So I

guess what I'd say is that model of a belief

in the idea that we all do better when we all

do better, that there's something foundational

about the, not just kind of like democracy

is separation of powers and some principles

in a constitution, but the foundation for

our shared life in common in which we get

to dream for our kids of a life better

than the one we had in this city with

people from all around the world who see the

possibility of the things we build in common,

our schools, our parks, our libraries, our

streets as a shared treasure that's for our

thriving and for our kids future success.

Like that is a vision of coalition and then

people really do view that differently.

You know, we're going to have our

factional fights within the Democratic

Party, within New York City, within the

livable streets movement about what's

most important now about where you can and

can't compromise, but okay let's get to it.

It felt like such a turn from the last

election because last time out,

Catherine Garcia's voters and Maya Wiley's

voters, they didn't cross endorse and so

their voters, many of them left the

other person off and if they had

crossed endorsed one of them probably

would have won, we would not have been

in this nightmare that we're in with

Eric Adams, this time around the kind

of purity test that I think sometimes

the left that's very self-defeating on

the left just didn't happen.

I feel like people on the left, this

broad definition of that, understood

the stakes better than I can recall in

any other election. I think part of

that is because you and Zaron

communicated those stakes as well as

you did, but something just shifted.

I think maybe it was having Trump in

the White House or something like

that, but it was very different this

time around.

Agreed. I mean I said that a lot

throughout the campaign. People would

ask me about okay so what are you

going to do differently from last time?

We've got ranked choice voting but we

added four years ago and that cross

endorsement didn't happen and part of

what I would say is look I'm controller

because people who voted either for

Catherine Garcia or for Maya Wiley

voted for for Mayor, voted for me for

controller four years ago. That is a

coalition that makes sense to me.

It is in some ways what I was trying

to rebuild in my campaign, but it

also requires openness to a team

sport politics and of course I went

into it hoping that you know I would

be the one that was emerging in first

with that broader coalition, but

that's what it means to approach it

as a team sport. Everybody thinks

like that, but you better be willing

and of course normal people do this

all the time. People play team sports.

You go out for the baseball team and

you'd like to be the shortstop and

the coach chooses someone else to be

the shortstop and you get to play

second base or right field but you're

excited to show up again and try to

contribute to the teams winning. That is

a very normal human thing to do

unfortunately it's not a very normal

political thing to do. That's why I

sort of said you're like a like a

buddy cop sort of movie because

an old improv teacher would say you

know the goal is not to be funny the

goal is to make your teammate look

like a genius

and if you all go out to make your

teammate look like a genius

you look like a genius and so does

everyone else and I felt like you guys

had that dynamic you and Zaron really

that was clear on the Colbert

appearance it was clear in the videos

your goal was I'm going to make this

other person look good and it worked.

I got to tell you one funny story

though that may be transition for

talking about our livable streets

infrastructure because one of the fun

things we did during that week was

to ride down the Prospect Park West

bike lane. Actually we were coming from

my house in the South Slope

where we had done the pre-interview

with Colbert's team because we were

going on a couple of days later and we

had decided after the cross investment

we would visit each other's

neighborhood so I had gone the day

before

to Steinway Street and we had gone to

some of the Yemeni cafes

there and then he came over here we

did the Colbert thing and then we

jumped on on city bikes and

rode up to the park and then rode

down the Prospect Park West bike lane

toward Grand Army Plaza.

You know I feel a lot of pride in that

in that bike lane so he was like

it's your neighborhood and so I was

riding in front but

as we came into

Grand Army Plaza the press and people

were there so I was like Zaron come on

up and so we're riding

side by side we reach Grand Army

Plaza

he gets off in a very elegant

rolling dismount

and then

you know there's some of the

comments are about you know how

you know sweet and buddy cop movie

is and how rank choice voting is the

cure for male loneliness but honestly

most of the comments were about his

rolling dismount and I'm like dude

you even got to look better than me

getting off a bicycle.

That was the moment he became

mayor.

That's right and considering the

history of that bike lane

which we're going to get into

I think it would have been

poetic if you had owned that moment

but these are the these are the

sacrifices we have to make

but this kind of goes to Doug's point

it's like you know

sure you think ah you know I could

do a rolling dismount and then you

think the project here is bigger

the bike lane looks good

Grand Army Plaza looks good

Prospect Park looks good

we are trying to build a future

for a politics that can do

more of that and what's

not important is how I get off a

bicycle.

All right so let's talk about

Prospect Park West

Sarah I'm going to put you on the

spot here for a moment because we were

joking we just recorded the audio

book and we each had

a word or a phrase we could not

pronounce out loud and yours was

Prospect Park West.

It was no it's Prospect Park West

bike lane.

Oh okay so I'll take this

I'll leave this part of it.

See I can say it now.

You did it yeah.

But the language here is so

significant because was it a bike

lane or a bike path and was it a

trial period or a pilot project

turned out to be the subject of

all the litigation.

All right so we'll back it up a

little bit so June 2010

DOT installs this bike lane.

Goes from a three lane street

down to a two lane street with a

two-way bike lane much safer

but of course let's say a

loud minority started making

trouble about it and this wasn't

your ordinary group of

Nimbies this was some of the most

powerful people in your district.

Do you are then in your first

term as city council?

Just a few months I literally

started in January of 2010.

Yeah so and you're going up

against a dean of Brooklyn

College a former deputy mayor

under Giuliani and the former

DOT commissioner who happens

to be married to Senator

Chuck Schumer.

This is a lot to take on.

How did you navigate this?

I know the answers to some of

these questions because this

is how I kind of cut my teeth

in the livable streets

movement it's how I got

introduced to you and it really

was a knock down drag out

fight that a different city

council person a different

elected official could have

found a compromise and we

sort of know what those

compromises look like which is

the status quo.

How did you feel when that

opposition started mounting?

It really was my first big

political battle you know I

had run for city council in

2009 I hadn't been in politics

before I had run to

non-profit affordable housing

groups one in the

neighborhood the Fifth Avenue

Committee and the Pratt Center

so I was already a part of

the livable streets community

at the Pratt Center we had

supported the effort to

bring congestion pricing into

the city and done a lot of

work on bus rapid transit

and so it wasn't a total

neophyte but I had been a

policy wonk and a planner

in the work not an elected

official or a political leader

in it I had been on

community board six when

we voted to ask DOT to

bring the bike lane and had

voted in favor of that resolution

so I knew which side I was on

but I was in no way prepared

for the level of backlash

I wasn't surprised that there

were opponents but this

wound up just exploding

in a way that was surprising

to me and I was like whoa

we put up a web form

like a survey and I remember

it was like a 13 question

survey with three open-ended

questions about how people

felt about it

3,000 people filled out the

survey and I mean 2,000

in favor but a thousand

opposed so on the one hand

it was clear how people felt

which was really useful

and also it was clear

there was a very strong

of course if people lived

maybe not of course

but if people lived on

or closer to Prospect

Park West they were more

likely to be opposed

and clearly in a certain way

to feel more strongly

like oppositional energy

like that's not that there wasn't

a huge amount of support

but there was an anger

that it was clear

it was gonna people

were gonna remember

and so yeah I had some thoughts

of maybe there's a way

to navigate to compromise here

that's kind of where you go

if you're an elected official

but I had a few things

first I had an amazing

policy director named

Michael Friedman Schnapp

who already at that point

as a pretty young person

was a real leader on

on livable streets

and really my most important

educator on these issues

and we went back and forth

about it a little

and what was clear to me here

was you know

there wasn't actually

going to be

even if we wanted there

like making everyone happy

that wasn't the thing here

and so it would be better

to just lean in

and be clear with people

about why I believed

it was gonna be better

when we got there

and of course let's listen

we found a few things

to do like make sure

the design of it

echoed Prospect Park

a little thing

like having aggregate concrete

on the islands

matching the aggregate concrete

of the Prospect Park West sidewalks

like fair enough

let's make it as nice as we can

but let's also just have the courage

to say

this is gonna make the streets safer

fewer people are gonna get killed

in traffic crashes

it's gonna be a lovely place to

ride

it's gonna enhance

the public realm of our neighborhood

and the things people are afraid of

are in this case mostly change

change is not always easy

but if we do it boldly

and do it together

it'll work out better

and the nice thing for me

is that really turned out to be true

I did get a lot of pushback

I took a lot of heat

I was the subject of a

you know a deposition

in the lawsuit

and at the end of the day

not even at the end of the day

by the middle of the day

it was clear

it was beautiful

it was working

it was safer to ride

people liked it

the momentum was with us

and I think that helped me say

all right as as often as I can

that's the right way to approach a fight

I don't think people

who are outside of New York

understand how important that fight was

because

had that gone down

had you folded

had DOT folded

I think the

New York City that we know today

wouldn't exist in the same way

it might have happened

in fits and starts

but that really was a sort of crucible

of the moment

I agreed you mentioned

Jeanette Sadik Khan

coming to the Brooklyn

Book Tour line here

and I urge people to go

and to read her book

Street Fight

as well as Life After Cars

she had taken the helm

and was doing a whole set

of really important things

that Times Square redesigned

moving towards City Bike

but this was the first place

that she encountered

as part of that livable streets work

where there was huge

and well organized political pushback

and it is easy to imagine

a world where

the mayor

or what had had

sided with the opponents

against her

that Lane had been stripped out

as we're still all these years later

seeing

that bike lanes can be stripped out

when a mayor sides

with a different political constituency

whatever

maybe she would have quit

who knows exactly

how it would have gone

but the work that got done

with the momentum

that came at that moment

is really critical

still right now

to people's confidence

in the city we can have

if we keep pushing forward

Yeah I mean you mentioned City Bike

which was one of the things

that was coming into being

at that time

you know City Bike

now we

it's just so much a part

of the landscape of New York

people use it

as a really helpful

part of our public transportation system

tourists love it

it just makes pieces fit together

in a whole new way

but that was another thing

that in 2016

when the system was expanding

into your district

that there were

also complaints about

stations eliminating parking

and you managed to thread

the needle on

on this one too

I mean streets blog called

your statement

a pitch perfect statement

on bike share

and talking about the impact on parking

and you know it wasn't going to be

a catastrophe

that we couldn't recover from

now of course

there are city bike stations

everywhere

and they are very very well used

and people just accept it

but I guess my question for you is

at that first fight

you were at the beginning of your term

did that experience

help you to realize like

oh I can actually

do the things that

I stand for

and you know stand for what I stand for

it really did

and that you know the

what streets blog was referring to

there was an email

we put out more broadly

I think the inclination

of an elected official otherwise

so when something like that happens

city bikes coming to your neighborhood

you know some people are

going to want it and like it

but then in each place

where the station is coming

and is going to take a couple of

parking places

people on that block

are going to reach out to your office

and say do you know how hard it is

for me to find parking

I'm never going to be able to find

parking again

I'm going to blame you every time

I'll be circling around cursing you

and the impulse

you know you got some ports

not that elected official

who's usually on the phone for that

you got some young staffer

and you know it's quite often well

we'll take a look at that one

maybe we can get them

to move it to the sidewalk

or move it to the next block over

or kind of work out a compromise here

and that's not a necessarily

a terrible impulse

some people will navigate this

by saying okay we are

going to have city bike come

but let's see how much

we can do to mitigate the anger

and the approach I took there

was a little different

it was to say

let's explain to people

why this is a good thing

try to ask them to see the bigger picture

a tiny percentage of the parking spaces

in the neighborhood

were being you know transitioned

into city bike

and every one of those city bike stations

was going to serve dramatically

more people for their transportation needs

than the two or three cars

that were parked there

that's a very different answer

to give people on a block than

okay we know you hate this

and you think it's terrible

we'll see if we could get it

you know moved around the corner

to say look

we respect you

we take your point of view seriously

here's why I believe

this makes more sense for all of us

and I'm going to ask you

I'm going to take your point of view

seriously but also ask you

to see the bigger picture

and your neighbors needs

and all our needs seriously

and and I do think that came from the

you know in part from the feeling

that you know the prospect park west lane

over time

everyone came to see that it was better

for the whole community

how do you cultivate that

in elected officials

because I think there's like a

memento-esque attitude

with some elected officials

is that they never really learn

oh we had that fight before

and it was fine

and every time we approach these

you know it's

New York is not Amsterdam

Manhattan is not Brooklyn

51st street is not 52nd street

like we some somehow forget

that these things work out

it's unfortunate that you're unique

in that sense

like there are other people

I think zoran is a really good example

of someone who's been through a couple

of street fights

and understood

this is better in the long run

but how do you

balance that

technocratic impulse of like

I'm going to explain how this works

with the empathy of

I know parking is very difficult

when you come back on a sunday night

or a grocery shopping trip or whatever

with

the long-term view

things are dramatically better than

they were in 2010 or 11

2016

so I do feel like

something is

working here

and you know some folks

I guess go back to that

but maybe not everybody does

it was so different than

there were just a tiny handful of people

Jeanette would come to the city council

and almost all the council members

repress

it was like they rep

could we're still cling

into the steering wheel

and it really played out as though

like the city council represented

drivers and car owners

and

Jeanette represented

you know other

other people

and that has changed dramatically

and mostly it's changed dramatically

because people see the benefits

because they

love outdoor dining

and because they've got open streets

in their neighborhood

or because they themselves are city

bike riders

like a whole lot more

of our elected officials are today

than possibly were then

so I guess I'd say

a couple of things

one

I do think there's a way in which

courage is contagious

it is easy

I mean unfortunately we are

you know

evolved biologically

to be motivated by fear

like that is just a thing we have

and you have to recognize it

and kind of managing yourself

and whatever you know

whether that's mindfulness

or that you do to try to not be

reactive to your fears

there's that in politics too

but nothing helps like

seeing somebody else

go out there

and say something you think

but that you were afraid to say

I think it's like why it's great

the podcast is called the war on cars

you know

it's

it helps

it you know

the first couple of times

I heard it even being an ally

I'm like

oh are we gonna alienate people

and no one

people might not like the agenda

but no one thinks it's meant

literally

you know

it's a good example of like

okay

there's something

courage is contagious

and it's useful

to have people out there

it's useful to have been

through a few of these battles

yourself and get to the other side

and see

it's gonna be all right

better than all right

we're gonna have some solidarity

from having worked together with people

and then we're gonna feel really proud

of that thing we won

and then

when you're in that plaza

or riding that bike lane

or on that open street

you get both

this is awesome

like all these New Yorkers out here

and

it was our courage that made it happen

and and you're seeing a lot of that

amongst young elected officials these days

well I was going to say

your successor

Shahana Hanif has been

an incredible partner

on so many awesome bike lane

I wouldn't even call them fights anymore

just a sort of

it's almost like the bike lanes

now are the default

and now we're just arguing

over the particulars of the design

and where

you know depending on the elected official

but still credit to her

like extending

we did the first little bit

of Kensington Plaza

and

but still closing

the piece of each second street

that they had to close

to expand

it took a lot of courage

got a lot of blowback

so I

you know and

and

now she gets to have that same feeling

in the neighborhood

where she grew up

of

doing something that took courage

that now both people love

it's clearly right in hindsight

and that feels good

because you risk something for it

we'll be right back

and hear more from Brad

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so Brad you

you have a reputation of being

a technocrat

with

I don't know a good

empathetic side as well

like not just

buy the numbers

but like I think the city bike

example is a really

good example of how you use

like here are the numbers

here's the percentage on parking

and yes I understand

that it kind of stinks

if you're looking for a parking

space on your block

but let's talk about something

that was much more

on the technocratic side

that's the reckless driver

accountability act

for years

people were saying

we have these tools

to identify the worst of the worst

when it comes to speeding

drivers

reckless drivers

why isn't the city doing anything

to at the very least

reach out to these people and say

hey

we know you're driving

in a way that could endanger other

people

I wonder if you could explain the

process that led to that

you know

it didn't get implemented the way

that you originally envisioned it

but we could talk about

how that came to be

like so many of these

unfortunately it did start

the real political energy

started from tragedy

not from

from

technocracy

you know

when we were talking about

prospect park west

but the

move to

you know reduce the speed limit

comes from the

death of semicolon

x-teen

the extraordinary

courage and generosity

of families for safe streets

to turn their pain into

something that saves the lives of

other people's children

I mean it's just

it continues to be

extraordinary to me

that that set of folks can

go through the worst possible

thing imaginable

and that is part of what happened

here

my office

when I was in the city council

was on 5th avenue

between 9th and 10th street

we were in the office

the day this

hideously reckless driver

who should not have been on the streets

went through a red light

and killed one and four-year-old

Abigail Blumenstein

and Josh Lu

and we're all wrecked by it

and there was a

engineering

a change

9th street solution

that we did work hard to fight for

that led to the protected bike lanes

on 9th street

but it was also clear

that that was a driver

who should not have been out

on the road

and something had to change

so the energy that propelled it

was that

families for safe streets

you must learn from those tragedies

but then

we did get deep down into the weeds

because okay

how do you know

who the reckless drivers are

and what is the data

and how much is it running

through speed cameras

and how much is it running through red lights

and could you use insurance data

my friend Aaron Napristeck said

let's talk to the insurance companies

and what else could we use

so we did a whole set of data analysis

to try to say okay

what do we know about

who are most reckless

what is predictive

can we show that there's a correlation

between these things

and dangerous crashes

then we had some like

okay we think we can identify them

the speed cameras

and the red light cameras

actually now that we didn't have before

and that people had had fight

fight a big political battle

to to get in place

tell us who the most reckless drivers are

but then the lawyers were like

well cameras get the cars

and not the drivers

and so you don't have a framework

and the state controls licensing

but we had Steve Vakaro

and Adam White to say

actually you could use

nuisance law

and say the vehicles themselves are

like it's true

that people are driving them

but those people are

the owners of those vehicles

are letting them be used

like weapons aimed at their neighbors

and whether they're driving them

or their kids are driving them

or someone they lent a car

are driving them

you can regulate

the harm cause

or the nuisance the car

and so that took a lot of work

but the combination of that legal

in the weedness

with that data

produced this reckless driver accountability act

that then yes unfortunately the pandemic hit

it did not get stood up at first

by the de Blasio administration

as robustly as we wanted

the Adams administration

never really cared about it

and so it was never implemented

with fidelity

but it still can show it

and I hope will be

because we do know

that if you take an escalating approach

the first times you start to show

recklessness

you get an educational opportunity

but with escalation

and if you can't stop

using your car

like a weapon aimed at your neighbor

then you can't operate it

and whether that's because

it'll be booted and towed

or whether that's because

your license will be suspended

or some combination of those things

we can save more lives

with that approach

the cool thing about it

I think also was that

there was a restorative justice component

too often in the livable streets movement

people get accused of like

you just want to punish people

we know that fines disproportionately affect

low-income people

rich people can afford that $50 ticket

it's almost like permission to speed

but your vision

of the reckless driver accountability act

involved like taking a safe driving course

which the imposition there is time

which really felt like

okay that's again to Sarah's point

like threading the needle

like okay we're gonna do this

we're gonna do this in a way

that isn't gonna cause undue harm

for people who can least afford it

but we're gonna do something

about that weapon the car

and this is a place where people get it

because they've been there

you know if you're a pedestrian

or a cyclist and you're out on the street

you want something more to restrain

you know drivers

if you're a driver yourself

who's pretty safe

you see that sociopathically

reckless driver out there

and you have the thought in your head

that guy's gonna kill someone

but you don't feel like you can do anything about it

and look at you know this is a place for me to be honest

if you're a driver who has sped

who has you know gotten speed zone violations

you know how you can drift into reckless action

with no intention to harm anyone

but do something that statistically over time

if it keeps happening is gonna cause harm

and so yes the system we need

is one that can change people's behavior

set some limits and boundaries

give you a chance

to get right in your action

and I mean

not everyone should have to have like I had

like accountability in the form of being on the

cover the New York Post

we should stop for a moment

Brad you had

we should explain to our listeners

like the New York Post

reported that you had accumulated

some number of speeding tickets

on your personal car

and that yeah that was a big tough moment

for us in the liberal streets movement

and obviously for you personally

this was really hard

like I feel like one of the times I had most

disappointed allies

and people who I trusted

and disappointed myself to

you know this was the time when I was fighting

for and navigating for

and and winning that reckless driver

accountability act

and also driving all over the city

as I was running for

controller

and I sped through school speed zones

not as many times as would get you

held accountable by the reckless driver

accountability act

but a lot more than I should have

and the form of accountability

that I wound up facing was yes

then the New York Post

put that on the cover

just at a time

when I was working with again

these sold same families

who have lost loved ones in traffic

crashes who I'd gotten

arrested in civil disobedience

with outside state senator

Marty Golden's office

because he was holding up the

speed zone and red light camera program

in the state legislature in Albany

and I had really deeply let down

not just an important set of allies

like an important set of allies

who I had stood with

who had lost loved ones to traffic

violence

and yes like that was very painful

but it in a certain way

it actually functioned to show

that accountability can be a way

of changing your behavior

this is different from

you have to take a

you know a safe driving class

or risk losing your vehicle

but still it's like a form of accountability

that comes from data

and an inconsistency between the values

I had and the actions I was doing

and you know that was now five years ago

and I have gotten one speed camera violation

over the last five years

so you know full disclosure

I'm not I'm not perfect on it

but that's a lot better than I

than I had been before

and hard

but actually makes me hopeful

that if we take accountability

seriously and give people an

opportunity to get right

in which their actions match their values

that does take like boundary and limit setting

it takes using data and transparency

it takes some clarity together

on what will keep people safe

and you know I wish I hadn't done it

I don't want to tell it as like a

just so story

but it also helps me believe

like change is possible

accountability matters

the answer was not to stop there

and say okay yeah fair enough

I was a hypocrite

and so I'm going to go hide under a table

the answer was to say no the values

I was expressing were the right ones

I got to change what I'm doing here

let's keep moving forward

and that's part of what truly being

in community does right

is it creates an environment in which

you are held accountable by a community

that then also understands

we all make mistakes

and we all need to

watch out for each other

and call each other out

and then repair together

the damage that's been done

when I had to make the cross endorsement

decision

which wasn't an easy one

I mean in many ways

it was effectively saying okay I see

that I'm not winning this race

I talked to a lot of people

and what I discovered was this

extraordinary community of people

I had been

had the good fortune the blessing

to build up over time

who on the one hand

had my back

like cared about me

thought protectively about me

and on the other hand

counted on me

to find my way to do the right thing

like with a form of accountability

like sort of parts love

and part accountability

and yes like that's what solidarity

actually is

and it's not easy

it's not saccharine

it's not sadly as nice

as just can't we all have

you know candy canes

and and and rainbows

it's like

there are gonna be hard things

in in your life

whoever you are

you know every advocacy you're doing

whatever role you have to play

and if you're fortunate

you will have built relationships

up with people

who yeah who care about you a lot

who share values

who know you're gonna make mistakes

and so are they

so that can't be the thing at which you

throw somebody overboard

or cancel them

and instead who say

let's keep oriented to

what the right thing to do is here

and who believe in each other

enough to keep pushing for that

and yeah like I found that to be

just an amazing blessing

at that moment

when I most needed it

to help me get on the right path

I'm gonna get a little Jewish for a moment

because Brad you know my wife

Leora from youth group

activities in the Midwest

and summer camp stuff from the Midwest

and I think she would

I'm channeling her

you know the Jewish concept of chuva

of repair

I do remember when the tickets happened

you called people

and apologized to them directly

including me

for letting us down

and that was such a gracious moment

I feel like a lot of elected officials

would issue a quick statement

and that would be the end of it

and like don't you see what I've done

for you people and move on

and you did the necessary work of repair

and I thought that was

you know that's why we have your back

because you do that kind of stuff

and that was a good lesson for me

as an advocate if you remember

I wrote like a big long thing of like

hey we got to hold our allies

to a higher standard

then we hold our enemies

and when one of them lets us down

we won't be taken seriously

if we don't take this seriously

and I really appreciated that call

and the work that I know you did

calling probably

Lord knows how many other advocates

and those members of families

for safe streets I'm sure

and I do think it's just one of those

hidden signs of sort of your

I don't know your empathy

but your toughness

because it takes some toughness

to have that happen to yourself

and to sort of take the punches

that you're gonna get

I mean look that was one of the hardest things

I have ever gone through

the calls especially

to those families for safe streets

members

yeah were some of the hardest

I've done

and it felt awful

and it over time

works out a lot better

at least in my experience

to try to act like that hard

in the moment

but then when you get to the next

thing like that

and there's going to be a next thing

like that

partly you just have the confidence

that you can go through it that way

got the muscle memory of being

willing to try to take accountability

of being genuine in it

and at least for me

it has paid off enormously

it's not just like a kind of

trying to do the right thing

it's like a much richer life

for having made some mistakes

try to own them

built relationships that moved through them

you won't all you can't

you don't save every one

like some people might just say

this is too much for me

but enough people will be there

and you wind up

I don't know my life has been much

much richer for finding ways to do that

so that's one kind of toughness

that you have learned

in your career

and as you say

you have that muscle memory now

there's another kind of toughness

that you've been called on

to demonstrate

as controller

as the Trump administration

has mounted a series of attacks

on New York

as part of its anti-urban agenda

and that anti-urban sentiment

has a long history

as I'm sure you're aware

in the United States of America

you can trace it back

to Thomas Jefferson

and his memorable words

I view great cities

as pestilential to the morals

the health and the liberties of man

okay so it

this this anti-urban strain

in American public life

is now being brought

into the fascist machine

of the Trump administration

and right as soon

he got into office

one of the things

that he said he was going to do

was stop congestion pricing

which was

talk about the long game

you were talking about playing

a long game

with the reckless drivers

accountability act

but the real long game

has been congestion pricing

because that has been going on

since basically

since I started covering this beat

in 2006

you know I mean we

I started supporting it in 2007

yeah so yeah

I mean it's

it's been a long long road

we finally got it in there

and then they wanted to take it away

right as soon as we

got it

so maybe you could talk about

specifically

your efforts to protect

what has turned out to be

an excellent policy

that is hitting its marks

and you know

policies aren't often

as effective

as this one is

so talk about your work

defending that

but also

what is called for

on a broader scale

that we have to defend

our cities

against these attacks

and how can we do that

effectively

and build those coalitions

that are needed to do that

so I started supporting

congestion pricing in 2007

you know with

Jeanette Sadiq Khan

as you know

as bold leader

Mike Bloomberg

proposed it

as part of his big

plan yc

sustainability initiative

I wasn't familiar with it

before that

and you know

that was another time

when this is something bold

that was proposed

and a few people got out and

and you know a lot of people

were like oh that's weird

that's going to be opposition

but I had some good

you know

tutors

here I'll give a big shout out

to Joan Byron

who was at the Pratt Center

at the time

and doing some amazing work

in the South Bronx

and

so we get on board

you know

then I'll skip the 15 years

of fighting for it

you know

and whatever Andrew Cuomo's

being against it

before he was for it

before he was against it

and of course it was tied

to the summer of hell

on the subways

which you know

got to kind of

roll yourself back to

but there was that summer

of just real

catastrophe on the subways

which did come in part

because Cuomo and other leaders

had starved the MTA

of the resources it needed

and it was mired and dead

and that was finally part

of pushing it over the finish

line

but even then

when they pushed it over

the finish line

they dragged its

implementation out

it was always going to take

a little while

because it needed federal

approval

and pretty complicated

but still it was

years added to it

for politics as well

but the amazing community

that it kept pushing for it

and in this case

is able to come together

it's not always

you know

it's pretty rare case

when a good livable streets

step

is also a good transit

financing step

that's a you know

what the sort of the beauty

of congestion pricing

is

is it really

brings those things

together

kept pushing

got it implemented

all that work done

and dogged

because yeah

like getting it through

the federal government

and you know

navigating this

city-state dynamics

you know

kept being work

and so when that was put

in jeopardy

because

Governor Huckle

who has

is now a good strong

supporter of it

put it on pause

look

believing it was going to be

bad politically

not only for her

but for democratic

congressional chances

and I never agreed

with that assessment

of the politics

but it wasn't

crazy to worry about

there was that same

suburban animus

toward the city

that was

being weaponized

by Republicans

we knew

we you know

we couldn't pause

that we had to be

pushing forward

and you know

it got put on pause

in the summer of 2024

and of course

there was this concern

oh my god

if Donald Trump is elected

he's gonna prevent it

but I also just think

there was this

if it gets paused

will it ever get

unpaused

regardless of what happened

so we reached out

to advocates

to say look

you know

we're happy to play

a supportive role here

let's talk about

what's going on

and there was good organizing

and people were out

in the streets

but no one had brought

together the stakeholders

for lawsuits

and it wasn't exactly

clear what the lawsuits

should be

because there were a few

different grounds

to be considered

a few different laws

there was some lawyers

who were interested

there were some

potential plaintiffs

so we said great

well we'll convene

the coalition

of legal experts

and stakeholders

who can then do the work

to figure out

who should be the plaintiffs

who should be the lawyers

should it be one suit

or two suit

or three suits

and

that's what happened

in our office

it led to the two lawsuits

that propelled energy forward

I think we're pretty clearly

gonna be decided

in the favor

of the plaintiffs

of congestion pricing

and that led

to a settlement

in which

Governor Huckle

agreed to take it off pause

get it implemented

before Donald Trump

could be in office

and yeah

then lo and behold

that put a

the state

and the MTA

in stronger position

to defend

against federal lawsuits

when they tried

to roll it back

and

I think we all knew

it would be a success

but honestly

it's more successful

than I even believed

it would be

in terms of

reducing traffic

easing congestion

and producing revenue

for

for mass transit

so

that says one

like stand up and fight

and you know

which was necessary here

through organizing

and litigation

and implementation

I mean credit to the

MTA

and Jano

and everyone who did the work

to implement it

as well as the lawyers

as well

as the advocates

and I think it also

just speaks to

in addition to

fighting back

against authoritarian

overreach

which uses cities

as its targets

part of why I am

still optimistic

why I'm excited

about Zoran's

mayoralty

I mean

if the line

of conflict

turns out to be

Donald Trump versus

New York City

which I think is

how it's very likely

to shape up

you know increasingly

after Kenahara

Zoran is elected

I mean

we don't want that

we wish we didn't have

National Guard

or federal troops coming

that we weren't fighting

these stupid retrograde

battles against lawlessness

but

to the extent that

that's how it lines up

we are the ones

with a place people love

to live

the fact that people

want to be here

from all over the country

and all over the world

that people are so

creative

that the artistic scene

that the business scene

that the creativity

that our vibrancy

like

we're going to win that

fight over time

because we have a model

which is creative

and economically generative

and

and people could just

see it with their own

eyes

so partly it's

stand up and fight

and then partly

it's lean into

what a joyful generative

creative economically

successful place we occupy

and let's just show that

to the world

keep carrying it forward

and I believe that's

part of how you

fight fascism and win

I'm basically a lifetime

New Yorker pretty much

and

when I was growing up

in the 70s and 80s here

things were rough

and there was

the almost universal

opinion that we could

not have nice things

then we got a few nice things

like Bryant Park

was one of the first nice things

and it was like wait

maybe we can have some nice things

looking at

the scene now

you've been in public life for

in one way or another

for 20 plus years in this city

you've seen a lot of change

in terms of

the appetite

and the understanding

of how our streets can change

what they can be used for

how they can serve

our residents better

has your sense of what is possible

changed

and

are you optimistic

about

the pace of change

and the momentum of change

could we have

even more nice things

than we ever dreamed of

I'll start by saying

the challenges are real

I feel very hopeful

and I'll get back to that

in a minute

but I don't want to do it

in a

Pollyannish

or naive way

New York City

faces a lot of very serious

challenges

and we gotta see them

and be honest about them

you know the affordability

when I started

we had an abandonment crisis

and you know the housing

I started renovating

a fit avenue committee

like the streets were abandoned

now they're so expensive

that people can't imagine

how they're gonna be able

to put down roots and live

and stay here

and that is a big challenge

and the city

will not be itself

if we can't address it

there is so little trust

in government

to deliver

and to build broader

community and solidarity

and that keeps getting eroded

by partisan political polarization

but also

when you have corrupt government

like Eric Adams

and so that

and putting that back together

and fixing it

is hard work

and you got this debate

between the

abundance and the populace

but you know

that it does

everyone's gotta figure out right

how do we make government

work better to deliver

Donald Trump is a giant threat

in all kinds of ways

that we could go on and on about

but everybody sees

and a whole new set of threats

you know like

what is AI

how's AI gonna work

and what do we do

all distracted by our devices

like so

that's a lot of problems

and so I don't want to

short shrift them

we do have the capacity

to confront them

and New York

is one of the most

brilliant places to do it

and you can see it

in like some days

you think

how could this city

work at all

and then you walk out

of your house

I mean this morning

I literally like

walked from my house

to coffee

about 10 blocks away

and I went by

three public schools

and the kids coming

into them

are just like

oh my god

that's the future

of our city

and it's because

we got some things

right in the past

of our city

and at PS1 18

there's a set of people

out defending

the open street

and saying

we need volunteers

to make it work

at my kids school

Brad was there

for the ribbon cutting

of our

bike corral actually

so yeah

it is

that sort of like

resolute optimistic

courage

and yes

can we have nicer things

like

we have to

if we're gonna make it

work

the things that they've done

in Copenhagen

or in Barcelona

that make it

lovely to live

in this city

and you know

sometimes you get those

things that push you

forward aggressively

in the way that

outdoor dining

emerged in the pandemic

and you're like

whoa

what the city

can be

is so much nicer

in a way that actually

really works

and then it gets

retrenched

and

then you got to go

push forward again

like it's gonna keep

being

some steps forward

some steps back

and sometimes

you're making progress

and sometimes

unfortunately

it's times of backlash

politically

these are times of

backlash

but

I think here

at the dawn

of the

Kenohara Mamdani

administration

at a moment

when

congestion pricing

is working

and

you know

34th street

even Eric Adams

is gonna help us

that become

a busway

and

we've got

the momentum

to pedestrianize

big swaths

of

lower Manhattan

and think about

what that looks like

in the outer borough

and momentum

on buses

and making them move

through the streets

of the city

this is a great moment

to make progress

and stitch those things together

I think people do get

that they're not

rarefied things

separate from

the fight for

inclusive

affordable

multiracial democracy

they're deeply woven together

and it's

our responsibility

to prove it

can't top that

nope

I think we can end there

Brad

thank you so much

for joining us

and for all you do

you know

I think

sometimes I think

of safe streets

and the fight for them

as

the canary and the coal mine

of

larger political

struggles

because they're really about

power

who deserves space

on the street

who matters

who's weak

who's strong

who gets harmed

and who stands up

for those people

who get harmed

and I don't think anybody

in city government

there are more and more

examples these days

but I don't think

anybody has your track record

of standing up for people

who need help

whether that's on our streets

in our courtrooms

in city government

in general

and I just appreciate

that you'd approach

government

as a force

for helping people's lives

and

I'm looking forward to seeing

what happens next

as you said

hopefully under

Mayor Montani

and wherever you

wind up

next too

so thank you

for joining

The War on Cars

it's been great to be here

that's it

for this episode of

The War on Cars

thanks again

to comptroller

Brad Lander

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