Mayor Adams Appoints Two Frum Jews to Top City Hall Positions

By Yehudit Garmaise

Mayor Eric Adams appointed two Orthodox Jewish men, Menashe Shapiro and Fred Kreizman, to serve high-ranking roles within his new administration.

Both graduates of Yeshiva University, Shapiro will serve as Adams’ deputy chief of staff, and Kreizman will serve as the commissioner of the mayor’s Community Affairs Unit.

Shapiro, who also attended YU’s law school and served as a key advisor throughout Mayor Adams’ campaign, has also run his own consulting firm from which he advised political candidates, companies, and non-profits.

Kreizman, who earned a Master of Public Administration at Pace University in New York City, after attending YU, previously served as the deputy commissioner for community outreach for former Mayor Michael Bloomberg and served on the board of directors of the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation from 2005 to 2016. 

Recently, he served as the managing director of Capalino, an urban strategy and government relations firm.

“We are at a pivotal moment in our city’s history, and we need strong leadership to bring New York back better than ever,” said Adams’ Chief of Staff Frank Carone.

Mayor Adams’ recent appointment of Menashe Shapiro and Fred Kreizman signal a real friendship with the Orthodox Jewish community in New York City,” said a Boro Park askan. “In recent weeks, Mayor Adams has strongly defended our yeshiva education, and with public safety and a prosperous NYC being his top issues, we all look forward to a thriving future in this great city.”

“I can’t remember a time in recent history when there have been two Orthodox Jews at senior levels in an administration,” David Greenfield, the CEO of the Met Council, who is co-chairing Adams’s health and human services transition, told the Jewish Insider.

Last year, Adams, told the Jewish Insider that his “warm relationship: with the Jewish community of New York City was strengthened during his 22-years of working in law enforcement, when he got to see firsthand the active ways in which the frum Jews care for each other.

“I think [our good relationship] was born out of policing when, as a lieutenant, I was introduced to many of these security patrols, and from those patrols, I started to see the high level of volunteerism,” Adams recalled. “The Jewish community, particularly the Orthodox community, within their language, is giving back.” 

Aside from Shapiro and Kreizman, the mayor also named Edward Mermelstein, a Soviet-born Jewish attorney, and investor who is well-known within New York City’s Russian Jewish community, as commissioner of international affairs.

In addition, Andrea Shapiro Davis, CUNY’s interim vice chancellor for university advancement, is another high-level Jewish staffer who will serve as a senior advisor and the director of public service engagement in the mayor’s office and who is, “an inspired choice to be in charge of appointments and talent,” according to Mitchell Moss, a professor of urban policy and planning at New York University.