Opinion

Lew's View: Grading the mayor

Lew Leone is the vice president and general manager of WNYW-FOX 5. He is taking to the airwaves with his thoughts on current affairs. It's called "Lew's View." In this commentary, Mr. Leone gives the mayor a grade.

The year 2015 is coming to an end and once again it can't get here quick enough for Bill de Blasio. I give him a D as his midterm grade for all of the things he didn't accomplish this year.

SCHOOLS

On public education, the mayor didn't do anything to improve failing schools. In fact a recent report by an independent research group proved that Bloomberg's strategy of closing failing schools was working and de Blasio made the wrong choice by abandoning the practice.

HOMELESS CRISIS

On the homeless problem, there are a lot of things he didn't do. The first was not admitting there was a crisis. He failed to notice what we were all seeing and refused to take action is spite of mounting evidence and criticism.

HORSE CARRIAGES

On the horse carriage issue, he didn't take the hint. After promising to ban them on Day One it's been two years and he insists on proposing one lame proposal after another. He should just admit defeat and move on to something more important.

CURBING UBER

On his desire to curb the ride sharing app Uber, de Blasio didn't see it coming when super model Kate Upton embarrassed him by pointing out that by serving underserved neighborhoods it was truly progressive.

UPPER EAST SIDE DUMP

On the Upper East Side dump, the mayor didn't act to stop it despite legitimate concerns over air-quality flooding and safety.

LEADERSHIP

On leadership, he didn't make peace with Governor Cuomo and continues to get outmaneuvered. And he remains divisive by taking his election as a mandate to be 100% progressive and not consider other points of view.

So what did Bill de Blasio accomplish this year? Well in October he finally received his security clearance so that he could be briefed on classified information regarding terror threats to New York City and he improved his on time performance.

I hinted on social media that my grade would be a D and some of you wondered why it is not an F. Truthfully, the mayor did one more thing to avoid a total fail and that was to sensibly cancel his planned inequality forum in Iowa.

There is a saying when taking a course pass/fail and that is "D equals P." Well here in New York City we certainly deserve a mayor who is doing better than barely making the grade.