Michael R. Bloomberg was elected mayor in 2001 in part because he promised to run the city as efficiently as he had his business. Eight years later, a federal judge let him run for a third term because, as a businessman, Mr. Bloomberg said he was best suited to steer the city through tough economic times. But by the mayor’s own measure - admittedly a high standard - his record at delivering city services by the end of his tenure seems middling.
In his last full fiscal year in office, in fact, for the first time in his mayoralty, the Bloomberg administration failed to meet most of the performance targets it had set for itself the year before. Fully 51 percent of the goals were not met.
A Bloomberg spokesman, Jake Goldman, said that the 49 percent of indicators that met their targets - down from a high of 69 percent in 2008 - was attributable to two factors. One was the lingering impact of Hurricane Sandy. The other was that the administration routinely set higher goals for itself after it met them, which, in effect, made it a victim of its own success.
“They became harder and harder to reach,†Mr. Goldman said.
In the current fiscal year, beginning last July 1, barely 50 percent of the 499 indicators were listed as improving or stable compared with targets set the year before. A majority of indicators showed improvement or were stable in only one category: citywide administration, which includes Civil Service exams and energy conservation.
Those categories in which the highest number of indicators were declining compared with the year before were education (54 percent), infrastructure (49 percent), community services (45 percent) and social services (41 percent).
