Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdaninamed an architect of New York’s controversial congestion pricing scheme as the city’s new budget director on Thursday.
Sherif Soliman will serve as director of the Mayor’s Office of Management and Budget under Mamdani, tasked with turning the democratic socialist’s pricey agenda into a reality and managing the city’s spending plan that has ballooned to $116 billion.
It will be the city government veteran’s fourth time serving under a New York City mayor, and he more recently was CUNY’s chief financial officer and vice chancellor.
“He has managed a multi billion dollar budget, reduced the structural deficit by nearly 80% in two years, and has deep competence navigating the political complexities of budget management,” Mamdani said from the Queens public housing development where Soliman grew up.
The father of two served on former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s Traffic Mobility Review Board, where he was a top financial official tasked with laying the foundation for congestion tolls.
Soliman then served under Mayor Eric Adams as chief policy and delivery officer and as one of his four members of the MTA board – before stepping down in 2023 to join CUNY.
He resigned from Adam’s MTA board months before it voted to approve the peak $15 congestion toll – which will go into effect after 2030.
The $9 tolls touted by pols, including Gov. Kathy Hochul and Mamdani, began hitting drivers in the Manhattan congestion zone below 60th Street in early January.
“I can honestly say that I am as excited today as I was 28 years ago about the opportunity to deliver meaningful change for public service,” Soliman said from the Queens Community House community center.
“Budgets are more than just numbers on a spreadsheet, lines on a graph, or statistics on a chart,” he said. “They’re about priorities. They’re about the hopes and dreams of New Yorkers for a more affordable city.”
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