Rodents, Rejoice: Rat Czar is Leaving Adams Admin

NYC’s rats may be able to prowl more freely, after Mayor Adams announced that his “rat czar” would be leaving his administration. Nobody has been named to replace Kathleen Corradi, who was appointed to the role by the rat hating mayor back in April 2023.

Corradi will reportedly be moving to a position at the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), where she will oversee resident services as a senior vice president. Before her tenure as rat czar, she worked in the city’s Department of Education, at one point serving as the agency’s director of space planning.

Mayor Adams told the press that he “wished her” the best in her future endeavors, adding that she “thankfully...she is not going too far and will still be working to serve the city in a different capacity.”

When she ascended to her $176,000-a-year post back in 2023, which essentially involved promoting better sanitation practices to combat rodent proliferation, Adams said that Corradi would be “hated” by rats everywhere. In June of that year, they both featured in a social media video on the four “Ds of Defending” (against rats): Dispatch, Deprive, Disturb, and Demonstrate.

Dispatching rats referred to “dispatching better technology” such as modern bait stations, “depriving” rats was defined as starving them out via various trash cans, a bleach solution was touted as a useful “disturbing” agent, and Corradi promised to “demonstrate” the success of her war via Rat Academies hosted by the NYC Health Department.

Corradi also spearheaded the “Rat Pack,” a civilian auxiliary force in the rat war that conducted volunteer “Rat Walks,” and helped convene a National Urban Rat Summit last May. Yet according to records obtained via a freedom of information request by Gothamist, her daily schedule as rat czar was left “unfulfilled” beginning in June of last year.

In other words, it seems that her czarship became arguably less demanding after the rat summit, although she hosted “rat walks” as recently as this summer.

After Corradi’s departure was announced, a couple of politico critics denounced the whole shebang as little more than a gussied-up public relations gig. Brooklyn City Council Member Sandy Nurse, a progressive who once headed up the Council’s sanitation committee, called Corradi’s czarship a “made-up” product of “fanfare” rather than “substance.”

Republican mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa—who sits on the other side of the ideological spectrum—has also been a vocal critic of the “rat czar” premise, and called the gig a “fancy title” after her departure was announced.

In an August interview with the New York Post, he even expressed existentialist skepticism about the battle against rodents itself, saying that a war on rats “can never be won.”

”You can only have detente and keep them at bay,” he grimly concluded, before going on to propose unleashing legions of rat-eating feral cats on New York City instead.

Despite losing his foremost general in the battle, Adams is still promoting other efforts to combat rats, as he continues to mount a long-shot reelection bid. “A wise person once said: ‘The rats don’t run this city, WE do.’,” Adams posted on social media on September 25. He touted a 5-year low in rat sightings during inspections (19.7 percent).

”Our ‘Trash Revolution,’ more lidded bins, and fewer black trash bags on our streets are all making a HUGE impact in the War on Rats,” Adams added.