Controversial Mamdani BSA pick confirmed after quelling concerns

The City Council came around on Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s controversial pick to run a housing board with newly expanded powers, confirming John Mangin on Thursday. Lawmakers initially recoiled at Mangin’s nomination, despite his long track record at the Department of City Planning across administrations, specifically zeroing in on a 2014 paper he published in the Stanford University Law and Policy Review that mentioned “wealthy homeowner cartels” blocking denser housing.  After holding one-on-one meetings with Mangin and a long hearing last week, Council members representing majority-homeowner districts like Nantasha Williams ended up voting to confirm him, signaling that he had quelled […]

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