It’s been four years since Bill de Blasio first stood on the steps of City Hall and, placing his hand on a Bible that had once belonged to Franklin Delano Roosevelt, took the oath of office to become New York City’s 109th mayor. It was a frigid day, bitter and blustery, but after 20 years without a Democratic mayor, his inauguration seemed to herald a new moment of egalitarian possibility in New York City.

Four years later, as de Blasio heads back to City Hall, this time after taking the oath of office from Bernie Sanders, he finds himself at the helm of a city that is, indeed, less Dickensian. Thanks to a collection of creative interventions, New York has made real progress on the path to a more humane city.

Here are five areas where de Blasio can, and must, go bold if he is to seize the opportunities of a second term:

  • Housing: As rents continue to skyrocket, zooming north at twice the rate of wages, New York’s affordability crisis has become the signal symbol of inequality in the city—and the challenge the de Blasio administration must confront, with vigor and creativity, if it is to narrow the gap between the two New Yorks.
  • Homelessness: A society is measured by the fate of its most vulnerable, and with more than 60,000 people sleeping in homeless shelters each night, and many more on the street, the city clearly needs to do better.
  • Education: Now that de Blasio has proved with UPK that he can successfully roll out a sprawling educational game-changer, it’s time for him to turn the energy and resources he poured into that effort into transforming the school system for the remainder of New York City students—namely, the 1.1 million kindergartners through 12th graders who attend public school each year.
  • Criminal Justice: New Yorkers of color remain disproportionate targets of the NYPD, their lives upended, their children incarcerated, their parents harmed and abused by a criminal-justice system that remains riven by injustice. As he moves into his next term, de Blasio’s job will be to close this justice gap.
  • Transportation: With 662 miles of track transporting more than 1.75 billion people a year through five boroughs, night and day, the New York City subway system is a colossus of urban public infrastructure and a fundamentally progressive force. It is also, however, falling apart, having been underfunded and neglected by successive New York State governors as well as the federal government.

Read the full article about Mayor Bill de Blasio innovating New York from The Nation