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3 days ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon |Donny Moss |Raj Goyle |Erik J. Blutinger
Author Archive Opinion Opinion: The Eric Adams I know I’m Eric Adams’ former “mayor class principal.” In a candid podcast interview, I grilled the independent candidate on his administration’s appointments, his battles with the media, his chances in November and whether he has any regrets from his first term.
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2 weeks ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
Allon: Let's look at one part of your record, Eric. When we elect the mayor of New York, we elect the CEO, right? An executive and the CEO, in my mind, should be judged by the quality of the people they bring into the administration. There were people around you who had some ethical issues. And again, I'm not going to name names, but there were a number of people. There was turnover in the police department that was unprecedented.
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2 weeks ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
We have some sad news to report: Our longtime City & State colleague and friend, Jim Katocin, died over the weekend. Jim was vice president of advertising and the first employee at City & State. He was hired in 2005, and our growth and success is very much attributable to his hard work and dedication the past two decades. Jim was a gentle giant, whose laugh and dignified manner ingratiated him to his colleagues, his clients and his array of longtime friends.
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3 weeks ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon |Donny Moss
Over the past two decades, major cities around the world – including Beijing, New Delhi, Paris and London – have taken horse-drawn carriages off of their chaotic urban streets. Motivated by concerns about public safety and animal cruelty, many U.S. cities – including right-leaning Palm Beach, Florida, and Biloxi, Mississippi – have done the same.
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1 month ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
Running into my building neighbor Tom Robbins was always a treat for me. Even in those brief, impromptu encounters, he’d educate me with a searingly insightful take on the latest City Hall shenanigans or entertain me with his sardonic – but never cynical – view of our crazy political world both locally and nationally. Tom Robbins was a journalist’s journalist. He was skeptical, probing and highly principled.
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1 month ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon |Raj Goyle
We are now in an era where government leaders both nationally and locally are struggling to meet the needs of the people they serve. In New York City, we are in the midst of a heated mayoral race, and the candidates have – in most cases – articulated detailed ideas on how to improve our city. Nonetheless, an infinitesimal number of voters will take the time to actually read their policy prescriptions.
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2 months ago | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
It’s often said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result each time. By that definition, New York City and New York state’s approaches to solving our systemic mental health and related homeless crises have been insane for more than four decades.
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Mar 10, 2025 | 
cityandstateny.com | Erik J. Blutinger |Tom Allon
It was a Sunday morning in early February 2020, and the governor of New York had just sent a text message: “When you’ve finished your second coffee, please give me a call.” Gov. Andrew Cuomo, then New York state’s strong and commanding leader, was sending a cryptic message to a media publisher. “Hi Tom, I know we were planning to meet in Albany tomorrow but something big has come up,” Cuomo said on the phone, speaking in hushed tones.
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Mar 6, 2025 | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
When Ed Koch was mayor in the early 1980s, he once famously said: “When a bird dies in Queens, they blame me.” The man whose middle initial (I) was also his favorite pronoun was humorously exposing a truism about New York mayors – and elected leaders in general. We invest a lot of our faith and hopes in the people we elect to lead our government. Some are better than others. And on rare occasions, we are rewarded with a stupendous leader who is the right person at the right time.
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Feb 19, 2025 | 
cityandstateny.com | Tom Allon
A wise professor in college once said to me: “Life is a series of choices.”New York state’s governor has to make a choice in the coming days that has tremendous consequences, and whatever she does is likely to upset a subset of New York City voters. Embattled New York City Mayor Eric Adams is in a vise – the wheel is turning slowly and squeezing him.
