Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WMYC. With us now, WNYC senior political reporter, Brigid Bergin, with some thoughts on the Eric Adams conversations we just had and other city issues, and even some still evolving election results. Hey, Brigid, welcome back to the show.

Brigid Bergin: Good morning, Brian.

Brian: Did the mayor-elect make any news there to your ear or say anything you found especially interesting about how he is pointing himself in this transition period?

Brigid: I think it is interesting to have him reinforce the analysis that my colleague, Liz Kim, wrote regarding this notion of whether or not he needed a big idea versus if, as we had heard really throughout the campaign, his goal is to improve the way the city is operating. He talked about wanting to stop this dysfunctional city, and I think that's part of why we hear him touch on this variety of different issues.

I actually also really thought it was interesting when you asked him about how emotional intelligence is something that he will be looking for in his city hall staff and that notion that it is something that is important in the corporate boardroom, which then also speaks to a different style of management, a different affinity for advisers. Certainly, we've heard and seen that he has more in common with perhaps the type of company that Mayor Bloomberg kept and perhaps some of the same people that Mayor de Blasio had within his inner circle in terms of management style and management advice.

I thought it was interesting to hear both of those two issues which, again, I think are consistent with how we've heard him describe and position himself during this past year. We're in a different phase now. He is now mayor-elect and now we are at this point of really understanding where the rubber hits the road. What's that going to mean in terms of how he runs our city?

Brian: What do you think about Sheena Wright, President and CEO of United Way announced today by Adams as the head of the transition team. That doesn't mean she's going to be one of the commissioners or deputy mayor, but running the transition team as they figure out who those people will be and her quotes to Crain's about connecting businesses with communities more, which seems to echo things that Adams himself has said in the past.

Brigid: Absolutely. I think the mayor elect's team put out a list of people who will be the co-chairs of the transition. It's interesting. We've got about 10 or so names, including Sheena Wright, she is one of the co-chairs, but also on that list, Kyle Bragg from 32BJ, Steven Choi from One For Democracy. I will spare the whole list, but one of the things that's striking to me, and Brian, you will probably remember this. When Mayor de Blasio came into office, he had a tremendous transition team and there was so much time spent brainstorming really, about what ideas that they wanted to drive the transition with, and so there was that whole transition tent down on Canal Street where people were meeting and going through these exercises of what types of policies and what types of communities, and really it was as much as schmoozefest and networking.

I think we're seeing a slightly different approach here with the Adams campaign. People who we know have been close to him, who will continue to be his advisors, who will be helping us figure out who some of the leaders of the city will be past this precedent. Some of these people may play a role in the administration. Carl Weisbrod was one of the members of Bill de Blasio's transition team, and then was the commissioner for planning initially. I think there is a potential for roles for some of these people, but it's not automatic. It's just certainly a sign of the types of people who have his ear and some of those are the same people who were very instrumental in his campaign.

Brian: Yes. On that kind of think tank environment that I guess you were just describing about the transition team when de Blasio came in and it refers back again to a colleague, Liz Kim's article on Gothamist about Adam's not running to be a big ideas mayor, but rather running to be an effective manager. He's got a quote from just the other day. Adam said, "After the election, I'm not going to be philosophical mayor, I'm going to be a mayor that's going to be a GSD mayor. Get stuff done." That puts it right out there as to where at least he says he's coming from.

Brigid: Absolutely. Again, there's the policy and the politics. Adams is coming into office at an incredibly important interesting time, certainly for the city and its recovery, but also given the politics of what is happening in Albany, that we are going into a gubernatorial election year that Governor Kathy Hochul's running for a full term, that there are many New Yorkers looking to challenge her and that this positions-- mayor Adams in a very interesting place when it comes to budget negotiations and what that could mean for the city.

Those have been very fraught negotiations in past years. I think there's a strong argument to be made that he comes into those negotiations in a very strong position. For New Yorkers, that's good for all of us. It will be very interesting to see how he leverages his idea of trying to get things done for the city but also is able to take advantage of the political opportunity that exists because of that impending election to the benefit of New Yorkers across the city.

Brian: As we talk to New York city politics after Eric Adams was just here with our City Hall and senior political reporter, Brigid Bergen. 212-433-WNYC for anything you want to add or ask 212-433-9692. One of the next things to come up politically will be the race for the second most powerful elected official in New York City, City Council Speaker. We've had Corey Johnson, Melissa Mark-Viverito, and Christine Quinn in that position taking us back a full decade and they've been very influential figures in negotiating with the mayor on all kinds of things.

In fact, Brigid, in my opinion, the biggest reason that Bill de Blasio was elected mayor in 2013 and not Christine Quinn, who was the early favorite is because she bottled up a paid sick leave bill in the council and de Blasio capitalized on that and made paid sick leave and that Christine Quinn won't give you that a centerpiece of his campaign in the primaries back then, so City Council Speaker matters. Any thoughts about who's in line or who's jockeying for position?

Brigid: Sure. I will just dovetail with that. Obviously, her role in extending term limits for Mayor Bloomberg was something that became an issue. That was something that the council played a huge role in. It was something that dogged her on the campaign trail. I will do another shout-out for one of my colleagues, David Cruz, who has a great explainer up on our website on gothamist.com listing who the contenders are. It's a really fascinating race. It always is.

It's an opportunity to see backroom politics a little bit get some headline treatment because, as we all know, the city council speaker is not something that voters actually have a say in electing, and yet we are already seeing a series of these forums happening where different groups and different organizations are trying to get these potential candidates to speak to their specific issue. I think it's as much about showing their specific audience that they will have some influence over whoever this person ultimately is because this person will be very powerful in terms of setting the legislative agenda.

When you listed some of those names, it's an interesting-- I think the term my colleague David Cruz used was the geopolitical battles that you see happening here in New York City because this is where you start to see where the different county committees and representation matters. We've got all these city-elected officials right now coming from Brooklyn. There are some Brooklyn contenders, city council member, Justin Brandon, is someone who has been seeking this position and he's still facing a pretty tough reelection fight, a very narrow contest in that Bay Ridge city council district, but someone who has been angling for this role for a very long time.

Does it hurt him that all the other city elected officials are also from Brooklyn? That's a question for these council members to assess. Another top contender is a city council member from Manhattan, and if you think back to the speaker's names that you just listed there Melissa Mark-Viverito, Corey Johnson, Christine Quinn, they all represented parts of Manhattan. Carlina Rivera from the Lower East Side is someone who is also considered a leading contender among the seven or so speaker candidates.

She held an event in SOMOS, that big conference where lawmakers from city and state gathered in Puerto Rico over the past weekend just after the election. I think that there are some who see the fact that she is a woman, that she is Latina as being really important parts of her candidacy since all of the current citywide elected officials are all men.

Brian: You mentioned Justin Brandon being in a close race for reelection even though he's a prominent Democratic member of City Council. City Council has 51 people in it and I think it only had two Republicans before this election and now they're going to have six. Am I counting that right?

Brigid: They had three and they're on poise to double, yes, and that's a interesting issue for the Adam's administration to contend with. It may be a good and bad thing at the same time. Brandon has talked about, he has done his best I think to spin what may end up being a narrow victory. Once Adam's team ballots are tallied into a reason why he would also be a good speaker, that he is a fighter, that is the nature of his district, that he can reach out to people and get support on both sides of the aisle, so to speak.

There are others who see how close this race is at this point because he has not been officially declared the winner yet and say that this definitely is damaging to his speaker bid. We won't know the outcome of this until the council meets in their first meeting in January of next year, so there's some time and there will be a lot more chatter in this space.

Brian: You reported on an election day outcome that might be shocking to many of our listeners. Many might not even have heard this with all the other big election news over the last week and all the other things going on. The ballot proposals to permanently allow mail-in voting for anyone. You wouldn't need an excuse like being out of town. That lost and so did the one that would allow same-day voter registration. These lost in blue New York state. They were statewide ballot proposals. It's the Republicans, of course, who've been trying to clamp down on mail-in voting and expanded voter registration using the myth of election fraud. How did these lose in New York?

Brigid: Yes. This was really quite a blow for people who have been pushing to overhaul the state's pretty antiquated election laws. These were two constitutional amendments, they took a lot of time to get to the ballot because they had to pass two consecutive legislative sessions and then go before voters. These propositions lost because there was a massive campaign against them led by the state Republican and particularly Conservative Party. They spent north of $3 million dollars is what they told me on ads that were in heavy rotation, particularly outside of New York City.

In some respects where there has been a lot of energy and a lot of organizing downstate and particularly within the five boroughs to push for some of these reforms. That opposition was not as much of a presence here. It was extremely strategic but these ads were in heavy rotation. It was called the Vote No Campaign. The result is while these measures did pass within the city.

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