Since the beginning, New York City has been a place where change is forged and embraced. Our brand is synonymous with innovation and global leadership, and our government has always been on the leading-edge, making society better both here and as an example for the world. That will continue to be the case if New York City plays a leading role in the AI revolution.
AI has enormous potential to transform how New York and cities elsewhere care for residents, workers, and visitors. The immense scale of the New York City’s operations — we have over 6,000 miles of streets alone — presents great opportunities for utilizing AI to increase efficiencies, improve data-driven decision-making, and target areas of inequality. AI could also be transformative in addressing our affordability crisis. At the same time, the mayor must be realistic about AI’s risks and the city’s responsibility to keep people safe from AI-induced harm.
Upon taking office, Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani must ensure New York City leads on AI. Fortunately, the city has built a robust technology infrastructure headed by a chief technology officer, with strong tech leadership at the agency level and talented public servants throughout government. Building on that foundation, the mayor should take these steps:
First, the mayor should fully deploy his CTO to direct all the city’s AI work and give agency heads the resources to support those initiatives. The mayor should charge the team to formulate citywide AI governance, propose deploying new AI tools, and analyze how AI can drive the affordability agenda. The CTO should also oversee all procurement of AI goods and services and negotiate favorable terms with vendors on data privacy and cybersecurity.
Second, the mayor must make AI innovation and risk mitigation a top priority in budget negotiations with the City Council. The city’s budget represents our values more than any other document, and the AI future must be reflected in it. The Mayor will likely have a strong partner in this work with Council Member Julie Menin, the incoming speaker of the City Council, whose members undoubtedly will view AI policy with import.
Third, Madani should create a task force on AI and human rights. Long a beacon for personal liberty and equality, the city has the nation’s most robust human rights laws. The task force will tackle how AI’s proliferation may degrade human and civil rights and propose city actions in response. If an AI tool creates bias and discrimination, the task force will expose it.
Finally, the mayor must engage with the governor and other state and local leaders to formulate coherent AI policy proposals. The president’s recent executive order on AI took an aggressive posture toward states and localities with vague assertions of federal preemption, while Congress has yet to seriously address AI policy. States and cities must fill the void, including by addressing how AI might exacerbate rather than improve our affordability crisis through unchecked deployment of power-hungry data centers.
We have barely scratched the surface of AI’s revolutionary benefits. But the mayor must mindfully navigate and transparently address potential downsides. New Yorkers will depend on the mayor to ensure we benefit from these technological gains while avoiding harms that prudent governance can address.
Michael Pastor is the dean for technology law programs and director of the Tricarico Institute for the Business of Law and In-House Counsel at New York Law School
