The death toll from the major winter storm that pummeled New York City with snow, ice and frigid temperatures has risen to at least 10, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said on Tuesday.
The mounting fatalities come amid what is widely regarded as the first true management test of Mr. Mamdani’s tenure, which began Jan. 1. He ran for office promising to run a government of technocratic excellence, and his communication efforts during the storm earned praise.
Even so, Mr. Mamdani seemed to not immediately grasp the severity of the dangers to the city’s most vulnerable populations, saying on Sunday that he did not believe any of the then-five-person death toll involved homeless people. City officials now say that social services workers had been in touch with at least some of the victims at one time. It was not clear if those who died were homeless at the time of their death or had lived in shelters in the past.
As the city remains gripped in a cold freeze and the snow cleanup continues, the rising number of dead and the risk to those living outside has drawn more concern.
“I can’t remember anytime in my life when so many people have died in such a short period of time from the cold,” said Dave Giffen, executive director of Coalition for the Homeless.
One 2018 study whose lead writers worked at the city’s health department found that the city averaged 15 cold-related deaths a year.
New York City could possibly breach the freezing point next Monday or Tuesday, said David Wally, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, said. If it does, the cold snap would fall short of 2018 when New York City temperatures remained at or below freezing for 14 days.
In advance of the snowstorm that swept into New York City on Sunday, Mr. Mamdani took precautions.
Since Jan. 19, New York City has been in a nonstop “Code Blue,” an emergency state during which the city loosens intake requirements for the homeless shelter system; redirects calls from 311, the city’s informational help line, to 911; and sends outreach teams into the streets to connect people with shelter. Since Code Blue was activated, the city has moved nearly 500 New Yorkers off the streets, the mayor said.
On Tuesday, the mayor said that though the city remains in Code Blue status, the continuing cold snap compelled him to go further and implement “additional emergency protocols.”
“Code Blue alone is not enough in a cold this severe, this rare,” Mr. Mamdani said.
The city said it has 400 workers canvassing nearby streets for anyone who looks as if they might need assistance. Now, it is offering them paid overtime to do more. It has also reached out to religious institutions and nonprofit groups seeking volunteer assistance. The city has also added an additional seven warming shelters to the existing 11 facilities, doubled its number of warming buses and reminded hospitals not to release homeless patients overnight into the cold.
Officials have not yet determined if the 10 people died from exposure to the cold, and autopsies had not yet been completed.
One of the 10 who died appears to have been a 52-year-old immigrant from Ecuador who had lived in the city for many years and was found with discharge papers from Elmhurst Hospital in his pocket, said Jessica Ramos, a state senator who represents parts of Queens. Ms. Ramos said she was trying to reach a relative of the man, who was known to the local police officers, and that the last known address she could find for him was in 2014.
She said the man, whom she did not name, was found buried in snow at Junction Playground, near the border of Corona and Jackson Heights, just steps from a city health department building.
“We need to be doing, or the city needs to be doing, a better job of checking all of our city benches, and our playgrounds and our parks,” Ms. Ramos said on Tuesday.
She added that the city should “audit what their process was here” and make recommendations ahead of more severe weather this weekend.
“These are all preventable deaths,” she said.
On Saturday, two men were found dead outside in Manhattan and another two in Queens, according to the police, including a 52-year-old man and a 67-year-old man. On Sunday, a 64-year-old woman and a man of undetermined age were found dead outside in Brooklyn. On Monday, a 90-year-old woman was found dead in Brooklyn and a 47-year-old man was found dead in Queens. On Tuesday, a man of indeterminate age was found dead in the Bronx.
“When the cold is this deadly, we need to meet the moment and leave no stone unturned,” Mr. Mamdani said Tuesday. A spokeswoman described the weather as “historic.”
Before taking office, Mr. Mamdani said he would move away from his predecessor’s policy of using the police to clear homeless encampments. It was not immediately clear if the number of homeless people on the street has since increased, potentially leaving more at risk from the weather. An annual homelessness count planned for this week has been postponed.
On Monday, Mr. Mamdani acknowledged that some of the victims “had an interaction with the shelter system,” and city officials reaffirmed that on Tuesday, saying some had a history with the Department of Homeless Services.
The cold spell poses particular challenges for homeless people.
Mr. Giffen described a client who is now in the hospital about to have some of her extremities amputated because of frostbite.
“She’s somebody whose condition really deteriorated a couple of months ago, after she was subject to a sweep and all of her belongings were thrown away,” he said. “And that caused her mental health to really go downhill.”
More broadly, Mr. Giffen blamed the elevated death toll on four decades of failed homelessness policy.
“The city has been unable to provide what unsheltered New Yorkers want and need, and that’s why people are out on the streets,” he said.
Mr. Mamdani spoke to reporters about the weather conditions from City Hall on Tuesday, at the start of an unrelated event announcing three new commissioner-level appointments, two at agencies that were plagued by allegations of cronyism and corruption under former Mayor Eric Adams.
Yume Kitasei, a government veteran and published writer of fiction, will run the Department of Citywide Administrative Services. The agency’s management of city leases under Mr. Adams prompted a law enforcement investigation.
Sharun Goodwin, a decades-long veteran of the Department of Probation, will assume control of an agency that had been racked by allegations of nepotism under its former leader.
And Lisa Garcia, a former federal environmental regulator, will run the Department of Environmental Protection.
“She’s been a friend for 17 years and her track record as an environmental regulator and an environmental justice advocate speaks for itself,” said Rohit Aggarwala, the outgoing commissioner, in a text message.
Dana Rubinstein covers New York City politics and government for The Times.
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