Socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani has revealed his plans for city-run grocery stores, a key promise he made to get into office.
Mamdani touted a similar experiment in 1936 by then-Mayor Fiero LaGuardia that provided city-run markets for New Yorkers in the throes of the Great Depression.
‘You know, it’s going to be more turmoil than anything else. It’s a great punch line for him and for the socialist movement. But New York is not a socialist city.’
“It cut overhead for pushcart vendors and lowered consumer cost,” Mamdani said during his 100 Days address on Sunday evening.
“LaGuardia said it was ‘an answer to those who said they had been forgotten,'” he added. “The New York Times described it succinctly, ‘City tries experiment.’ New York City, it is time for a grand experiment once again. Just like Laguardia used government to respond to challenges of the Great Depression, we will use government to respond to rising prices and unaffordable groceries.”
The effort will have a massive price tag.
Construction operations just at the first site are expected to run to $30 million.
Critics howled at the estimate, noting that it’s many times more what private industry spends to build a grocery store. And funding still needs to be approved by the city council.
Mamdani also said the stores would offer discounted prices on only certain staple items.
“The city will subsidize a core set of food staples,” the socialist mayor said. “A private operator will run the store but will answer to the standards the city will set. These standards include requirements that at our stores, bread will be cheaper. Eggs will be cheaper. Grocery shopping will no longer be an unsolvable equation. And workers will be treated with dignity.”
City Hall hopes to have the first city-run store running by 2027 and four others by 2029, the end of Mamdani’s term.
Critics are already lambasting the plan, including the spokesperson for a bodega group.
“These stores are going to get jam-packed. There are only four or five in the entire city of 8 million people,” said Fernando Mateo of the United Bodegas of America.
“What do you expect is going to happen? You’re going to have people rushing to these stores early in the morning to late at night, waiting on long lines,” he added. “You know, it’s going to be more turmoil than anything else. It’s a great punch line for him and for the socialist movement. But New York is not a socialist city.”
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Others noted that previous city-run grocery experiments ended with empty shelves and crime.
Mamdani spoke directly to the naysayers of his socialist plot.
“Some will insist that city-owned businesses do not work, that government cannot keep up with corporations,” he said. “My answer to them is simple. I look forward to the competition.”
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