Transcript: Mayor de Blasio Delivers Remarks at the Groundbreaking for One Madison

November 16, 2020

Mayor Bill de Blasio: This is a joyous moment. We’ve had a tough journey this year and we all understand what we’ve had to fight our way through. We’ve all been personally affected by this crisis, families that have been set back so deeply. But one thing you know about New York City is New York City never stops, New York City never gives up. We have suffered setbacks before, we’ve suffered pain before, but we do not know how to quit. So, I wanted to be here today because this is a sign of our strength. This is the beginning of our resurgence and our comeback. We need to celebrate every single of these moments because they mean so much. 

If this were normal times, we would absolutely be celebrating this project because it’s going to do good for Madison Square Park. And I thank you, Mark and everyone, for your commitment to this park. We would be celebrating this project because it’s a green project, because, yes, we passed legislation in this city – and thank you, Carlina and the whole City Council – we passed legislation to address global warming. We could not wait on Washington. We had to act here and we did, and SL Green and all the partners in this project are taking that idea and bringing it to life and proving that we can do something different and this city can be in the forefront of stopping global warming. 

That would be something to celebrate in any time. But I think the particular reason to celebrate today is because this is the start of something much bigger, a comeback story for the ages. And everyone has an opportunity to participate in that story. I want to thank my colleagues in public life starting with our Deputy Mayor Vicki Been who will be leading our comeback efforts. Thank you, Deputy Mayor. 

[Applause] 

And Borough President Gale Brewer. Mark, if she likes you, you have reached a high standard there. Congratulations. She’s very choosey.  

[Applause] 

And again, Council Member Carlina Rivera, thank you to you and the whole Council for your leadership. And a special thanks to Keats Myer and everyone at Madison Square Park Conservancy for the amazing work you do. This place is a jewel in this city and we thank you all for what you have achieved.  

Now, look, I’m going to give you a quick little metaphor here. Everyone, SL Green and everyone else involved in One Madison, they had a strong foundation to build on but they believed that they could reach greater heights. There is your metaphor for New York City. We have a strong foundation to build on. As recently as February – not ancient history, my friends – February, 2020 this city had 4.7 million jobs in the five boroughs. A lot of you had something to do with the development of those jobs and I thank you for it. 4.7 million jobs, an all-time high for New York City, and then we suffered a huge blow. We lost over 900,000 of those jobs in a matter of months. And you might think, well let’s just close this book now and say what a tragedy that was and it’s all over except here’s another fact you need to know, just in the last few months the comeback has begun. 300,000 jobs have now come back since this summer in New York City. The resurgence, the comeback has begun.  

[Applause] 

So, here we find ourselves taking that strong foundation and now building higher. And we have to remember why we are New York City, the talent, the spirit, the creativity, the entrepreneurship. This is not new. This is generations and generations old. And it gets recreated by newcomers and folks whose families have been here for centuries. Everyone together takes that New York spirit and makes it greater. And so I’m here to celebrate this moment and what it means right here for this park, for this part of our town, what this building will mean, the good things that will happen in it. But I’m really here to say to all of you, see this as a crucial milestone, see this as the beginning of something even bigger, and everyone of us can contribute to it. 

And I’ll conclude with this point, a week or two ago someone said to me, they very innocently said, “Do you think New York City will ever regain its past glory?” The question was heartfelt but I said to them very respectfully, I said I think that is the wrong question. Many, many things we love about New York City and many things we celebrate we want to continue but New York City has more work to do, New York City has disparities that must be addressed, New York City has to become a place that includes more people, that’s fairer to more people. New York City has to look at what we’ve learned in this crisis and answer it. So, the question is not, can we regain our past glory. The question is can we reach our greater glory and the answer is yes. The answer is yes. There are greater times ahead for New York City. This is one chapter. Let’s write the next great chapter together. Thank you, everyone.