Welcome back to our weekly behind-the-scenes glimpse at what’s getting our team talking. Let us know what you think at [email protected].
The Big Apple freeze
The cost of living is spiraling in New York, especially for rent, forcing people to make extremely difficult decisions about how they spend their money. It’s also a significant driver of homelessness in the city. By promising to freeze rents for every rent-stabilized tenant in NYC if elected, mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani offers hope to a million households. This explainer from THE CITY details what a possible Mayor Mamdani can and can’t achieve.
Will says:
Can New York’s likely next mayor freeze rents on a million apartments as promised? I wasn’t sure how that would work, but THE CITY has a great explainer. The short answer is: Not unilaterally, but there’s a good chance that, by getting the right officials in place, he can make it happen.
A giant leap
It’s not often that a story puts a human face on the hate that’s presently polarizing the world, but this Positive News feature has done exactly that. It tells the story of Nigel Bromage, a former neo-Nazi, far-right extremist who renounced his past and created a space for others to do so too through an organization he founded called Small Steps.
Geetanjali says:
Bromage says we have to listen to people who feel the extreme right offers them a voice and we have to fill that void. This story made me realize how big these voids actually are, and that perhaps we’re all guilty of creating them.
What else we’re reading
🐠 Meet the Small Business Owners Electrifying Maine’s Rural Coast — shared by Executive Editor Will Doig from The Daily Yonder
🦍 The Need For Success Stories in Conservation — shared by Interim Editorial Director Tess Riley from Mongabay
🌳 How a District in India Came Together to Plant 15 Million Trees — shared by Audience Engagement Manager Vignesh Ramachandran from The New York Times
In other news…
For the past year, Reasons to be Cheerful’s Our Electrifying World series has been exploring how electrification is creating a more sustainable energy transition across the U.S. Now we want to hear from you. Whether it’s an EV, e-bike, heat pump, or induction stove — tell us why you went electric and what impact it has had on your life by emailing us at [email protected]. Show us any photos of your projects in action too! We’ll use the responses in an upcoming story and on social media.