Mayor Mamdani Establishes Office of Mass Engagement to Transform How New Yorkers Participate in City Government

January 2, 2026

What you should know

Tascha Van Auken to lead new office, bringing unprecedented mass-organizing success to City Hall

NEW YORK, NY — Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani today signed an Executive Order establishing the Mayor’s Office of Mass Engagement (OME), a new City Hall office designed to transform how New Yorkers engage with their government. The office will work within City Hall and across City agencies to strategize, coordinate, and execute on engagement that reaches the masses of everyday New Yorkers.

The Mayor announced that Tascha Van Auken will lead the Office of Mass Engagement as Commissioner. On Mayor Mamdani’s campaign, Tascha spearheaded a historic field operation — mobilizing more than 100,000 volunteers, knocking on over 3 million doors, and making more than 4.5 million calls to New York City voters. Now she will bring this experience and approach to City government.

“For too long, city government has only listened to the wealthy and well-connected while working New Yorkers remain further and further disconnected from those elected to serve them. The Office of Mass Engagement will fundamentally change this, creating a deeper connection between City Hall and community organizations, faith-based groups, and everyday New Yorkers looking to make their voices heard. Tascha Van Auken has been instrumental in creating the mass movement that delivered us to City Hall, and she will bring the same urgency, discipline, and principles to her work as Director of the Office of Mass Engagement,” said Mayor Zohran Mamdani.

The Office of Mass Engagement will revolutionize how City government conducts community engagement. City government functions best when there is a direct line of communication between the Mayor, his team and the people who built this city and keep it running. The Office will transform community engagement to ensure that it reaches New Yorkers where they are, organizes them, and builds long-term participation. It will also serve as a constant drumbeat within City government to ensure that New Yorkers’ needs and perspectives are integrated into all elements of New York City government.

“We are all too familiar with wanting to participate in City government and not knowing where to go. On a daily basis, this limits the capacity of our government,” said incoming Commissioner Tascha Van Auken. “At worst, when New Yorkers need support — when they are facing eviction, when they are denied unemployment, when they need to find care for a loved one — they do not know where to go. We will demystify government so all New Yorkers can be active participants and have the resources they need to thrive.”

“Our current systems of governance do not work because power is concentrated at the top of government, and access is freely open to the powerful, but not to the vast majority of people. To achieve functioning transformative governance, we need practices of participatory democracy between the government and communities, and for collaborative strategizing between the government and movements. We look forward to working with the Office of Mass Engagement towards deep meaningful democracy,” said Fahd Ahmed, Executive Director at DRUM.

Van Auken is a veteran grassroots organizer who previously served as campaign manager for State Senator Julia Salazar and Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest, and as Deputy Campaigns Director for the Working Families Party. On the Mamdani campaign, she led the highest voter turnout in a New York City mayoral race since 1969, with more than 2 million New Yorkers casting ballots — nearly double the turnout of the previous mayoral election and approaching presidential-level participation across neighborhoods in Brooklyn, Queens, and Manhattan. Earlier in her career, she served as Artistic Direction Manager for the Blue Man Group, bringing a creative, people-centered approach to large-scale public engagement.

The Office of Mass Engagement will:

Lead mass engagement campaigns that organize New Yorkers to participate in City decision-making;
Create and maintain accessible, inspiring channels and events for residents to share feedback with government;
Proactively reach communities that have historically been excluded from policymaking;
Embed public feedback directly into City policies, programs, and services through strong, transparent feedback loops;

o Support agencies in delivering high-quality engagement and more effective public services.

Under the Executive Order, the Office of Mass Engagement will oversee and coordinate the City’s key engagement entities, including: