Bloomberg Stock Is Way Down in New York
NEW YORK — It should have been a golden moment at Coney Island. On a soft summer evening, New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg had just thrown out the first pitch at the home opener for the Brooklyn Cyclones, a popular minor league team.
But as he strolled off the mound, a man stood up behind the first-base dugout and shouted: "Hey, Bloomberg, off the field! You one-termer!"
Politicians are used to getting booed at sporting events, and the mayor seemed oblivious, waving to the crowd. Yet the taunt did not come out of left field: Less than halfway through his first term, Bloomberg's poll numbers are in the cellar and he is struggling with the image of a billionaire businessman who is cut off from the needs of working people.
It's a galling situation for a leader who has received little public credit for his tough decisions to balance the city's bleeding budget and to push through a sweeping reform of New York City's troubled public schools that could spur long-overdue changes.
Crime continues to fall, and the tensions between minorities and police that flared under former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani have cooled. These achievements should be enough to burnish a mayor's image -- but that's not what many New Yorkers see.
Instead, Bloomberg is largely known as the politician who raised taxes and told people they can't smoke in bars and restaurants. He's the official who defended a police crackdown on partygoers drinking beer at the beach, while concertgoers freely sip wine in Central Park; he's a leader who talks about shared economic pain, but is able to jet off to his Bermuda home for the weekend.
"You're hearing more people say that he doesn't understand how his policies come across to working people, and I do think that's a fair criticism," said veteran political consultant Hank Sheinkopf. "In New York, it can be a prescription for disaster."
Even his worst critics say there's still time for Bloomberg, 61, to turn his image around. He says he wants to be reelected and is prepared to spend millions out of his own pocket. But there is a growing concern that he is a stubborn official who does not understand the intricacies of city politics and could be voted out of office in two years.
"Every mayor gets blamed for things that go wrong, and when you think of the bad news this guy has delivered, it's understandable he'd have problems," said George Arzt, a political consultant and former press secretary to Mayor Edward I. Koch. "But clearly [Bloomberg] has to find a way to show people he cares about them."
