De Blasio suggests ‘politics’ motivating Times Square business leaders concerned about gun violence
Mayor de Blasio suggested Thursday that “politics” is motivating Times Square business leaders who have raised alarm about gun violence in the wake of the Midtown tourist hotspot seeing its third shooting in as many months.
Speaking during his daily briefing from City Hall, de Blasio said the NYPD is already beefing up patrols in the area and that those reinforcements need to “be respected” by the Times Square business community “because it’s going to work.”
“If someone has an opinion that’s great, someone wants to, you know, stand up for their particular area or their constituency — and I understand those politics — that’s great,” he said. “But let’s talk about what we see happening in New York City. We see businesses opening constantly, we see jobs coming back, we see outdoor dining booming, we see tourism coming back. It’s all happening. It’s happening because New Yorkers are fighting back.”
But business owners in Times Square beg to differ.
They say recent shooting sprees could hurt their bottom line as tourists avoid the area for fear of getting hurt.
“The de Blasio administration needs to stop making excuses and develop effective strategies and take immediate action,” Tom Harris, president of the Times Square Alliance, said Wednesday after at least four shots rang out earlier in the day in the Crossroads of the World as part of an apparent road rage dispute.
Reached Thursday, Harris declined to offer a response to de Blasio’s latest remarks.
But several hours later, Harris issued a statement striking a distinctly more deferential tone to de Blasio.
“The mayor has always been responsive to concerns I’ve raised. We are going to work together to solve the issues facing Times Square,” Harris said.
The Wednesday shooting came after four bystanders — including a 4-year-old girl — were hit by stray bullets in May and June incidents in Times Square that police said were linked to turf wars between street vendors and break dancers. No one was killed in the three shootings.
In Thursday’s briefing, de Blasio said NYPD is working around the clock to address the violence and asked for patience from the business community.
“We have been constantly engaging business improvement districts, Times Square and many others, making adjustments where people raise concerns. We take them really seriously. That’s why we’d like to see a little consistency if we’re working with people constantly trying to address issues together,” he said. “Times Square, we put a huge number of officers there, everyone sees it, and we’ll keep them there as long as we need, and we will address the issues.”
The Times Square shootings are part of a troubling trend of gun violence in the Big Apple.
Shootings are up citywide by 28.9% this year as compared to 2020, according to the latest NYPD data. The number of shooting victims is also up by more than 20%.
De Blasio has sought to put the data in a more positive light, noting earlier this month that shootings year-over-year were down by 20% this June as compared to June 2020.
Still, the mayor acknowledges that the overall uptick in violence is disturbing and ties it to the coronavirus pandemic.
“It’s been a horrendous situation where so much came unglued in our society because of COVID,” he said in Thursday’s briefing. “It is happening in cities all over the country.”
