Eric Adams, the second African-American mayor in the history of the City of New York, has now completed 8 months in office. That is a long enough period of time for us to be able to draw, objectively, certain conclusions about his tenure.

To begin with, The National Herald revealed that the relations of the then- Brooklyn Borough President with the Turkish-American community and Turkey turned out to be more than friendly. His outrageously ahistorical statements and the great closeness they show to the Turkish side place him in opposition to the Greek-American community.

He could, however, improve relations if he made a truly sincere effort towards this end.

His first attempt to restore his relations with our Community was his meeting with leaders of the Community at the mayor’s residence – Gracie Mansion – but after it ended he did not make a statement or issue a press release, apparently so as not to offend the Turkish-Americans.

The second was his presence at the Clergy-Laity congress as an invitee of the Archbishop, where he did not even make a generous gesture of goodwill – i.e. announcing a visit to Greece and Cyprus – let alone express his regrets for his earlier statements. His mere presence was not enough to restore his relationship with the Community.

Now for the performance of his duties: Despite admittedly honorable first efforts, Mr. Adams seems to have lost it. It seems as if the demands of the mayor’s position are beyond his capabilities.

The situation in the city is not good. A serious example is crime. Our hope was that Adams, as a former senior police officer, could improve public order. Instead, crime is getting worse. The general crime index increased by 27.8% in May 2022 compared to May 2021.

This is certainly an alarming increase.

Something similar is happening with the cleanliness of the city streets.

One might wonder if a mayor alone can improve policing and cleaning the streets, these crucial municipal services.

The answer is that it demonstrably can. Case in point being mayors Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg.

Giuliani took over a city almost out of control and imposed order and cleanliness and thus contributed to making the city attractive to tens of millions of tourists a year – as well as to the building boom that followed. And Bloomberg improved the situation even more, as a result of which they left a thriving city with great momentum.

Unfortunately, I fear that Adams may fail in his duties and turn out to be a bad mayor.

Something like or worse than Bill de Blasio, and this will have a negative impact on the quality of life in New York.