Mamdanis groceries will have him competing against . . . himself

Mayor Mamdani’s city-owned supermarkets are ill-considered for many reasons.They’ll undercut minority-owned neighborhood bodegas.They’ll create an incentive for buyers to resell the cheap goods at higher prices elsewhere.These issues may not concern Mamdani, but something else should: Hizzoner will be competing against himself.That’s because another city program already provides financial incentives to private supermarkets to open in the same neighborhoods where Mamdani wants to open his socialist competitors.Since 2009, the city Economic Development Corp.

and Department of City Planning have run the Food Retail Expansion to Support Health Program.Its goals largely overlap with the mayor’s: “to develop and expand full-service grocery stores in underserved neighborhoods.”But rather than compete against existing markets, FRESH set out simply to create more of them, and to encourage affordability through private-sector competition “by lowering the costs of owning, leasing, developing, and renovating supermarket retail space.”The combination of lower taxes and zoning relief to make it possible to build large markets has actually been successful: 30 new 5,000-6000 square foot markets have opened across all five boroughs.One, Food Bazaar on 125th Street in Manhattan, is just a 5-minute walk from Mamdani’s proposed “La Marqueta” site; two others, the Lincoln Market on St.Nicholas Avenue and Ideal Food Basket on Lexington Avenue, are within walking distance or a short bus ride away.An EDC map shows a fourth FRESH market of 7,000 square feet planned for Park Avenue in Harlem.Anyone shopping at Fine Fair on the Grand Concourse in The Bronx, Food Bazaar on Northern Boulevard in Queens or Key Foods on Sand Lane Avenue on Staten Island is no longer “underserved,” thanks to FRESH.So, too, are shoppers at Ideal Food Basket on Pitkin Avenue in Brownsville.That’s especially welcome because it can serve the concentration of nearby public-housing projec...