Adolfo Carrión Jr. (born March 6, 1961) is an American businessman and former elected official from City Island. He has three sisters Elizabeth Carrión-Stevens, Damaris Carrión-Harris and Lizette Carrión. He served one term as a member of the New York City Council, representing the 14th district. He served for seven years as the borough president of the Bronx, for a year and five months as the first director of the White House Office of Urban Affairs in the Obama Administration, and then for nearly two years as Regional Administrator for HUD's New York and New Jersey Regional Office. He left HUD in February 2012. In late 2012, Carrión registered as an Independent, to begin exploring a run for Mayor of New York City, and in February 2013 he was granted the Independence Party nomination. Currently, Carrión is serving as Commissioner of the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development. He was appointed by Mayor Eric Adams on January 30, 2022. Background Adolfo Carrión was born in Manhattan, in 1961. His family moved to the Baychester section of the Northeast Bronx when he was in fourth grade. He attended public school at PS34 (Manh), PS111 (Bx), John Philip Sousa Middle School and Harry S. Truman High School in the Bronx. Later, he graduated from The King's College, a Christian liberal arts college in Westchester County at the time, where he majored in world religions and philosophy. He followed in the footsteps of his father, a Protestant minister, and became an associate pastor at a Bronx church. Carrión went on to serve as a public school teacher in the West Bronx at Intermediate School 115 and CIS 234. During that time he participated in CCNY-based Salvadori Center program which uses the built environment as a teaching tool. Eventually, he went back to school to earn his master's degree in urban planning from Hunter College, part of the City University of New York. Upon graduating, Carrión worked for three years at the Bronx office of the New York City Department of City Planning. He later served as district manager for Community Board 5 in the Bronx (where he was responsible for overseeing the delivery of services to 150,000 residents within his district), was hired as vice president of human services and community outreach at Promesa, a community development organization, and served as chairman of the Bronx Puerto Rican Day Parade. He