Loree Sutton for Mayor

I am running to serve as NYC Mayor to lift up all New Yorkers and to lead forward during this time of unprecedented suffering and upheaval. Given what we now know, we must act differently, lest we repeat the negligence that got us here.

This is the time for bold leadership, relentless preparation and moral courage. A commitment to truth, rights, values and principles inform my broad policy agenda. Lifting up others and leading forward is not merely what I do; it’s who I am.

• Every New Yorker has a right to economic security
• Every New Yorker has a right to quality healthcare
• Every New Yorker has a right to affordable housing
• Every New Yorker has a right to an excellent education
• Every New Yorker has a right to civil liberty protection

• Honor — honesty, fairness and integrity in all actions
• Empathy — the ability to understand how others feel
• Accountability — to take responsibility for one’s actions
• Respect — to be considerate and embrace diversity
• Teamwork — to work together towards a shared goal

• My administration will reflect and celebrate the rich, culturally diverse landscape of New York
• My administration will, as a top priority, engage, actively listen to and partner with communities citywide
• My administration will recognize the extraordinary work of our front-line essential workers who have sacrificed their health and well-being to protect us

• Foster sustainable economic development & recovery, leading with actions to strengthen workers, families and small businesses
• Act to contain, mitigate and prevent the increasingly disruptive threats caused by climate disruption
• Reimagine K-12 education focused on quality in-class education and supplemented by enhanced technology
• Ensure accessible whole health care, including a robust strategy for public health preparedness

• Develop affordable housing options in all neighborhoods for individuals/families who are facing homelessness
• Strengthen our sanctuary city, while advocating for comprehensive immigration reform going forward
• Establish national, regional, public-private and community partnerships to modernize NYC transit

• We can become the global tech hub, leveraging talent and investing in our people, truly New York’s most valuable natural resource, to close the digital divide and set the conditions for entrepreneurship, innovation, creativity and prosperity.
• We can enlist teachers, students, families and communities to prepare our youth for civic purpose and service to others; let’s start with city-wide internet access and educational learning devices for all; and community resource hubs to connect families with career guidance, mentorship, and strength-based learning strategies.
• We can bridge differences in political views, religious convictions and life experiences to celebrate our shared humanity — all ages, all genders, all faiths, all races, all national origins, all disabilities and all relational orientations. Love is love.
• We can respect the strengths and needs of working families, by gauging the ethical value and moral nature of our actions based on how families will be affected; let’s start with affordable childcare, safe workplaces, career development and housing.
• We can serve as a laboratory, incubating, learning and leading New York’s Green New Deal, investing in green jobs, technologies, infrastructure and renewable energy sources while easing burdensome regulations, incentivizing public-private partnerships and implementing a carbon dividends program to remunerate New Yorkers based upon our success.
• We can restore our public housing, once the envy of the nation, restoring pride, respect and dignity to the over 400,000 New Yorkers who currently are living in dirty, toxic, broken, cold and dangerous conditions, unfit for anyone.
• We can design and implement a comprehensive system of care which invests in the potential of every homeless New Yorker and provides access to permanent housing, social services, healthcare, education and transitional employment.
• We can respect the dignity of all seriously mentally ill New Yorkers and their families through ensuring timely access to clubhouse communities, clinical treatment, caregiver respite, residential programs and, when needed, hospitalization.
• We can transform our current criminal legal system, working to design an approach characterized by fair and effective justice, public safety, community diversion, rehabilitation and strong re-entry, and restoration of voting rights.
• We can move forward to modernize our understanding of how marijuana may be legalized contingent upon ensuring necessary public health and safety provisions. Immediate actions should include decriminalizing personal use and possession of small amounts; expunging all related legal records; commuting existing sentences; and facilitating research by removing marijuana from the federal Schedule I drug list.

• We can work with our state and regional partners to create an infrastructure strategy and sustainable transit system — the backbone of our city — that works for all of us.
• We can serve as a sanctuary for our undocumented neighbors, while tirelessly advocating for comprehensive immigration reform for the 21st century, starting with renewing the dreams of our DACA youth and establishing pathways to citizenship for those whose labors are essential to our city’s success.
• We can build on our city’s commitment for providing access to timely quality healthcare as a right for all New Yorkers. Public health, however, is much broader than healthcare. It includes prevention of gun violence, intimate partner abuse, smoking cessation, addictions, sanitation and more. We must also improve upon how we prepare, plan and practice our disaster preparedness efforts to synchronize with the myriad needs, including ‘essential worker’ protection, medical equipment, supply chain management, shelter, nutrition, therapeutics, tiered phases and care facilities. As this pandemic reminds us, there is no health without public health.
• We can restore trust between communities and law enforcement, through greater transparency, focused training, community engagement, neighborhood outreach and the proven use of theater as a revolutionary public health intervention to cultivate conversations, connections and collaboration that wouldn’t otherwise happen.
• We can reach and provide care for those who are depressed and despondent, whose suffering may drive them to addiction and deaths of despair, whether by intention or accident.
• We can lift up and support our small business owners — truly New York’s heart and soul — to sustain their restaurants, bodegas, boutique shops and all that their labor and love bring to our city.
• Working together, we can do more, much more. Inspired by Project Liberty following 9/11, we can envision, design and implement Project GRIT as a bottom-up, community-driven and values-based campaign aimed at mobilizing New Yorkers to revise and renew our social compact. Everything we need already exists in the strengths of our city and ourselves, coupled with committed leadership.
• Together, we can lift up all New Yorkers following this wrenching pandemic — through listening, learning, helping and leading forward as a “team of teams” and a “community of communities.” Many voices. One future. Our city.
• More to follow — please stay connected with our campaign and elect Loree for NYC Mayor in 2021. Let’s make history together!