New York City Has A New Mayor And The Central Park Horses Better Be Gone By The Spring
Congratulations to New York City's new Mayor, Zohran Mamdani. About 50% of NYC residents voted for him and if I know anything, it's that 50% of a vote ALWAYS means the right decision was made.
I love living in New York, so I'm not one of the drama queens who claims to be "leaving" for X or Y reason - I've lived here for 11 years, and this will be my third Mayor. From my perspective - mayors have never, ever, done anything but serve as a punching bag for the city. I'm still cursing De Blasio's name, and he was elected twice! Here's what he got up to, all 8 years:
Dropping the groundhog was fucking hilarious and tragic (for the groundhog, RIP) but what we need to focus on here is this:
"Faced public criticism for breaking his own campaign promises on issues like affordable housing and homelessness."
So, he made promises he couldn't keep. Shocking!!!! You know another promise he made, didn't keep, and then pretended like he was going to follow through at the final fucking buzzer of his final term as mayor?
Getting rid of the Central Park Horses. "Political pushback" and "failing to pass a compromise" - De Blasio was taken for an absolute walk on this one, and he ended up being a complete failure for this cause.
Then, we had Eric Adams who, somehow is even worse than De Blasio ever was. When he ran, he was OPPOSED to banning the CP Horses:
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Until the most recent end of his own term, where he's trying to look busy and like he didn't do embarrassing shit like this throughout his 4 years:
New Trash cans (I've actually never seen a single one of these in the wild before):
And of course his most famous video (which happened BEFORE he was Mayor, and somehow still elected):
He did a bunch of shady deals with the Bodega owners, was heavily embroiled in some illegal vape/tobacco scandal, and suddenly he's back on the Central Park Horse crusade to make sure everyone forgets that he was indicted on Federal Charges in 2024:
Cute!
I've written at length about the Great Debate of the CP Horses over the years (and how they are horribly mistreated, live in disgusting conditions, and are worked to death). While Eric Adams should throw himself in one of his own garbage bins for being a shady liar (like they all are), he did make an effort to speak up about the horses when recently, one escaped from its carriage and ran through Central Park:
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As this was only in September, the Mayoral Race was still underway. ALL CANDIDATES then came out in support of the ban.
Free the horses!!! Should be simple, right? Here are a few wrinkles:
- They are supported by the Transport Workers Union Local 100
- The only person with the ACTUAL power to pass "Ryder's Law" is District 28 Speaker Adrienne Adams (who seems to be in the pocket of the union)
- Some people still think New York City exists solely to entertain tourists, and that "the horses are nostalgic."
Despite these hurdles, I've seen more about this discussion than I ever have, and unfortunately I'm starting to feel hopeful. The people of NYC are urging lawmakers to pass Ryder's Law, named after a horse who collapsed in the street and later died from exhaustion:
Horrible. Not to mention the horses' living conditions (a high rise, on the west side, next to the car dealerships):
The plan is to first, stop anyone from obtaining new carriage licenses. Basically, preventing people from starting their new "horse and carriage" careers from this point forward. This will then lead to the phase out of the current horses who are working in the park, by June 1, 2026. There are currently 68 licensed carriages, and over 100 horses living in NYC.
Here's the plan in black and white:
Absolutely INSANE that we're doing all this fighting over 68 carriage drivers, so much that we forget our humanity and allow this to happen REGULARLY:
Lady (Died June 2025):
Aisha (died March of 2020)
There's an entire site dedicated to documenting these horse incidents: https://www.banhdc.org/ch-acc.shtml
Absolutely ridiculous at this point.
SO!
Mayor Zohran Mamdani, you have until June 1, 2026 to win me over. Prove you aren't a liar, prove you care about the New Yorkers who spend a lot of time in Central Park and care about the animals of this city. Show us that your entire campaign wasn't just a very well executed marketing plan created by your (very, very good) Ad Agency:
Let's get them back to work to get this job done!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm not kidding. They convinced a million people to make Mamdani the Mayor of New York in 11 months. Surely we can get the horses off to their retirement pastures by June.
I know people assume I'm some sort of Super Lib because I'm a woman and I believe in autonomy over your body, not being shitty towards other people, paying fair taxes and generally minding your own business - but I also know that the mental health crisis in New York City is at an all time high. I don't get excited about the idea of "removing police from the subways" as someone who takes the subway twice a day at minimum and sees exactly the kind of unpredictable, disturbed individuals we are being "protected" from. Especially post COVID. I don't love the claims of "freezing rent" and "free bus fare" because I've lived here long enough to know that the money has to come from somewhere. It ALWAYS does. I want to be positive about the future of the city, I want to feel like we're moving in a more "caring" direction and less about shaking hands and cashing checks but - I haven't seen this yet in my lifetime.
If Zohran gets this Central Park horse thing done, I'll have no choice but to stan, and I'll meet him at Papi Juice to celebrate.