Mayor Eric Adams vowed to make city streets safer, but that hasn’t stopped him from getting chauffeured around the Big Apple by lead-footed cops.
Two of the city-issued SUVs used by Adams’ NYPD security detail have been nabbed on camera three times in the past five months speeding in school safety zones — racking up $225.30 in fines and late fees yet to be paid, a review of city records shows.
It’s unclear who was driving the vehicles when they were speeding. Adams’ younger brother Bernard, a retired NYPD sergeant, oversees the mayor’s security, but doesn’t typically drive him.
“This is yet another case of ‘Do what I say and not what I do,'” quipped Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa, a Republican who lost the 2021 mayoral race to Adams, a retired NYPD captain.
“He fought for more speed cameras because he said speeders are a menace to society, yet he won’t set an example. He always operates under a different set of rules than the average person.”
Adams has long supported the expansion of the city’s speed and red-light camera program and its round-the-clock enforcement – despite a bumpy history of drivers assigned to him when he was Brooklyn borough president racking up plenty of camera tickets.
On April 22, one of Adams’ assigned vehicles was caught on camera speeding at least 11 mph above the limit at 9:26 pm on Northern Boulevard in Queens. Less than a half hour earlier, Adams left a gala two miles away where he had joined the Sino American Commerce Association in honoring then-Knicks center Taj Gibson and Rep. Grace Meng (D-Queens), according to the mayor’s public schedules.
The vehicle was issued a $50 ticket that went in judgment last month after not being paid. It’s since accumulated another $25.30 in late fees and accrued interest.
On July 6, the same SUV was nailed for speeding at 6:38 pm on Adams Street in downtown Brooklyn — 22 minutes before the mayor was scheduled to begin hosting a “Community Conversation on Public Safety” four miles away at Boys and Girls High School. That $50 summonses accrued $25 in late penalties and as of Friday had also yet to be paid.
On July 15, another SUV used by the mayor’s detail was issued a $50 ticket after being caught speeding at 6:59 am at the intersection of Flushing and Johnson avenues in Brooklyn. Adams is a notorious early riser, but his first scheduled appearance that day was 10 am at City Hall to greet Rohey Malick Lowe, the first female elected mayor of Banjul, Gambia.
The $50 ticket accrued $25 in late penalties, but the Department of Finance recently wiped away the entire debt, records show.
The Finance Department also recently scrubbed three parking tickets issued to the same vehicle this year in Queens that totaled $400 in fines and late fees. Adams was not in the city, but rather on business in Washington DC, when the vehicle was issued one of the summons in June for parking too close to a fire hydrant.
Neither the Finance Department nor the Mayor’s Office returned messages.
Since taking over as mayor this year, Adams has used city vehicles less than his predecessor Bill de Blasio. But Adams has yet to live up to promises made on the campaign trail and the early weeks of his administration to rely more heavily on mass transit and biking.
The mayor is typically driven throughout the day by one SUV while another vehicle also driven by a cop trails nearby. Responsibilities for the mayoral detail also include arriving at City Hall or anywhere else the mayor is heading before he gets there to ensure the area is safe. They also accompany him whenever he travels by mass transit, bicycle and by foot.
Eric McClure, executive director of the safe-roads group StreetsPAC, said city workers operating government vehicles should follow the rules of the road unless they’re responding to emergencies.
“All city employees should drive in a safe and careful manner, and the mayor more than anyone in New York City has an opportunity to lead by example,” he said.