Clean up on aisle free.
A leader of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s socialist grocery store project suggested that the Big Apple could funnel taxpayer money to shop owners losing business to the city-owned supermarkets, which are already projected to cost at least $70 million.
The gobsmacking comments from Waverly Neer, senior vice president of groceries at the project-leading Economic Development Corporation, sparked City Hall to furiously attempt to backpedal Thursday after furious backlash.
Neer, during an NY1 interview on Wednesday, said that “grants” could be used to support independent businesses alongside city-owned grocery stores, prompting a reporter to ask whether she meant private outlets.
“Something on the table,” she said. “We’re exploring a lot of different options and opportunities.
“I think there’s a whole host of levers that the EDC is able to work within to make sure everyone has equitable and equal access to opportunities here.”
The prospect of using tax dollars to prop up private grocers hurt by competition from Mamdani’s city-owned supermarkets — a program anticipated to cost $70 million for five stores across the boroughs — prompted many New Yorkers to blow their gaskets.
Many carted their rage to X, where an interview clip with Neer was viewed 1.6 million as of Thursday afternoon.
“Succinctly: the government spends tax dollars to create an insanely bad problem. Then, to solve the problem that THEY CREATED, the government spends more tax dollars,” one X user posted.
“Utterly insane.”
“Socialists always come up with more ways to steal your money to solve problems they created by giving away money they already stole from you,” posted Daniel Di Martino, a fellow at the Manhattan Institute think tank.
Some X users wondered why Mamdani would invest millions of dollars into new grocery stores — with $30 million slated to build a shop on an East Harlem vacant lot — instead of directly into hardscrabble shoppers themselves.
“How is this making any fiscal sense? Mamdani is going to drop $30,000,000 just on one store which will operate at a huge loss, then give additional handouts to local grocers who might be impacted? Why not just give out vouchers for eggs & milk and be done with it?” an X user posted.
EDC officials eventually tried to walk back Neer’s government free-for-all, but left the door open for a whole menu of other options.
The group’s grocery task force is evaluating program and policies to support local grocers, along with the effort to open five city-owned store by the end of 2029, an EDC spokesperson said.
“We are not currently considering any grant programs for existing grocers,” the spokesperson said.
The spokesperson then added, “However, we are looking at the potential for tax abatement, incentives, and zoning benefits through existing City programs to ensure that the City is doing everything in our power to alleviate cost pressures for small businesses across the city.”
Mamdani pitched the grocery store plan as a plank in his affordability focused mayoral campaign in 2025.
Once in office, an undaunted Mamdani revealed the stores would sell a “core basket” of essential goods at a 30% discount.
But city officials have still yet to reveal how they’d calculate that cost and many, many basic questions about the stores’ operations.
Critics, not least grocery store owners, have lambasted the proposal for potentially bigfooting private businesses.
Many industry experts argued the vow to bring New Yorkers cheaper groceries by “publicly-funded, privately-operated” supermarkets didn’t make sense in the real world.
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