Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio received an award in Puerto Rico as he spoke at the annual Somos el Futuro conference of Hispanic elected officials from New York. Grace Rauh filed the following report.
SAN JUAN, PUERTO RICO – Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio is getting a hero’s welcome in Puerto Rico.
At the Somos el Futuro conference of Hispanic lawmakers from New York, held annually in San Juan, de Blasio spoke briefly and received an award.
“Chirlane and I are so honored to be here and to accept the key and to take the accountability point very, very literally. The key means that I have an obligation to the leaders and the activists here to work as your partner and to work vigorously for the kind of progressive change I talked about over the past year,” he said.
After his remarks, elected officials, labor leaders and others flooded the stage to shake his hand, take pictures and wish him well. This is the first big public celebration de Blasio has had since Election Night. And he seemed to be soaking up all the attention.
His speech was fairly short, though he hit upon many of the same themes he’s been talking about on the campaign trail: building more affordable housing, raising taxes on New Yorkers who make more than half a million dollars to pay for pre-K, and reforming stop and frisk.
He also talked about the makeup of his administration. He said he wants city government to look like New York City. He then took a swipe at Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former Mayor Rudy Giuliani for not bringing enough diversity to City Hall.
“Over the last 20 years, a lot of times when you visited City Hall or different agencies, it didn’t exactly look like New York City. So it’s time to go there again. It’s time to have a government that truly understands the people it serves,” he said.
De Blasio’s wife, Chirlane McCray, was by his side. She is expected to be a key player in her husband’s administration.
“Thank you for being here, thank you for giving this award to my husband who is going to be a fierce warrior for all of us,” she said. “And I personally look forward to getting as many of you, getting to know you better.”
Afterwards, de Blasio spoke with reporters, fielding questions about his involvement in the next big political contest. the race for city council speaker.
“At some point we will focus on the issue of the speaker’s race and then we’ll decide how to handle it, but we are not there yet,” he said.
De Blasio is close with one of the speaker candidates, Melissa Mark Viverito. She was the first members of the City Council to endorse his bid for mayor.
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