New York Mayor Bill de Blasio on Friday started the third day of his new administration with a predawn conference call to decide whether to close public schools after a major storm walloped the city with up to 6 inches of snow . `` I had a great night ; it was not the most sleep-filled night , '' de Blasio , an admitted night owl , told reporters Friday morning during what 's seen as the first challenge for a new mayor pushing a progressive agenda that promises to serve all of the city 's 8 million residents . `` I must say I have never done a 4 a.m. conference call in my life . '' For the moment at least , de Blasio 's vow to tackle a range of issues , from economic inequality to police and community relations , was superseded by a meteorological phenomenon that has famously haunted mayors in the past . `` We are working in all five boroughs equally , '' said de Blasio , surrounded by a small army of sanitation workers at a garage in Queens . `` I believe that that is not only a philosophical idea I believe in strongly ; it is also the fundamental belief of each member of this department to help each and every neighborhood equally . '' De Blasio said sanitation crews were working 12-hour shifts to clear the city 's 6,200 miles of roadways with 2,500 plows from various departments . He said 100 % of primary roads and 92 % of secondary roads had been plowed . About 93 % of tertiary roads were plowed with the help of private contractors . Emergency response times were delayed about a minute because of snow and traffic , he said . In 2010 , Mayor Michael Bloomberg was heavily criticized for his handling of a blizzard that shut down several subway lines for days . He was accused of allowing snow to pile up in Queens and letting large parts of Brooklyn go unplowed for days . Bloomberg defended city efforts to clear snow amid a swell of frustration by some snowbound residents , particularly outside of Manhattan , who wondered why their streets were still clogged days after the massive holiday storm . `` I was here in 2010 and it was a disaster , '' Kathy Nobles , a teacher and Brooklyn resident . John Doherty , sanitation commissioner since the administration of Mayor Ed Koch in the early 1980s , said de Blasio has handled the storm no differently from his previous bosses . `` He wants the job done , and he wants the streets clear , '' he said . `` That 's what we do . '' `` It would have been nice to talk about how to handle a snowstorm in an abstract exercise , but we did n't get to do that , '' de Blasio told Doherty . `` We got the real thing . '' De Blasio said the decision to close schools was made in the predawn hours because of the deceptively cold temperatures . `` With this kind of bitter cold , '' he said , `` we did not want children out there , exposed . '' Friday morning , de Blasio emerged from his row house in Park Slope , Brooklyn , with a shovel to clear his own sidewalk , something he said he has done for years . `` I 'm a proud Brooklynite , '' he told reporters later . `` I 'm an outer borough homeowner . '' That populist approach was well received during his first real challenge as mayor . `` We just consider him from our neighborhood and we expect he 's going to keep our interests at heart , '' Brooklyn resident Kathleen Axen said . `` I like his emphasis on middle-class people . '' A virtual unknown nationally , despite 25 years in New York politics , de Blasio defied critics who questioned whether his experience as a city councilman from Brooklyn and , most recently , as a public advocate -- a sort of civic watchdog -- sufficiently prepared him to run the Big Apple . He also ran Hillary Clinton 's first U.S. Senate campaign . The new mayor admitted that his son , Dante , a high school student , lobbied heavily for closing the city 's schools . On social media , Dante said friends were asking him to pull strings to get the shutdown done . But de Blasio 's wife , Chirlane McCray , tweeted a photo of a shovel and snow salts Thursday night to illustrate `` what Dante will be doing if he does not go to school . '' `` If Dante was not lobbying me , there would be something wrong with him , '' de Blasio said . `` Of course , he 's 16 . But unfortunately the decision takes more factors into account than Dante 's opinion . ''
Weather seen as the first challenge to a new mayor pushing a progressive agenda . Mayor Hillary Clinton 's : `` I had a great night ; it was not the most sleep-filled night '' `` We are working in all 16 boroughs equally , ` If Dante , said at a garage in New York .