It’s Still Not Infrastructure Week. We Must Change That.
While New York City’s economy gets stronger by the day, our infrastructure weakens. If we do not take urgent measures to address the literal foundation of our city, we risk its fiscal peril and endanger its residents. That’s why this week, we passed New York City Council Resolution 11 calling on the federal government to create an Infrastructure Bank, a mechanism that would help fund these critical investments.
Most of our city’s infrastructure – especially everything underground that we can easily take for granted – is well over a century old and operating far beyond its useful life expectancy. The examples are everywhere we look. One need only drive along the BQE and its famously deteriorating triple cantilever; walk around Coney Island after a rainstorm and see flooding streets; or bike through Central Brooklyn and dodge sinkholes collapsing in on themselves.
Without strong infrastructure, our very way of life in this city is threatened. But overhauling it is extraordinarily costly, and it is clear that the City cannot handle these sums on its own. We need federal support.
H.R. 4052, the National Infrastructure Bank Act of 2023, would create a federal bank that would help provide revolving and low- or no-interest loans to municipalities across the country, including ours, to make infrastructure overhauls more feasible. These investments would also provide opportunities for high quality union jobs, another built-in boost for our municipal economy.
The incoming administration should understand that infrastructure is not a Democrat or Republican issue;and, frankly, infrastructure investments, when done right, can be enormously popular because voters can acutely feel the difference in their everyday lives.
One well-known anecdote that comes to mind is about a man who lives on the end of a dead end street that floods when it rains and is lined with potholes. Every four years, a politician knocks on his door and asks for his vote, and every four years he refuses. Why? Because, he explains, “No matter who knocks on my door, that street has never been fixed.” All too often politicians run on lofty ideals when it’s the potholes in the road that need to be focused on. That’s why Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer won reelection in a purple state — she promised to fix the roads and did it.
With this resolution, we are sending a message to Washington, D.C.— that this is crucial for all of us. We’re not naive about the likelihood of the new administration stepping in to help our great city out of the goodness of their hearts, but they’d be wise to do it purely out of self-interest. To allow the foundation of the nation’s largest economic hub to deteriorate would be financially detrimental, well beyond the five boroughs, and that’s a risk that the country simply cannot afford to take.
Crystal Hudson represents Brooklyn’s Council District 35 (Crown Heights, Fort Greene). Justin Brannan represents Brooklyn’s District 47 (Bay Ridge, Coney Island)
