- New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani asked residents to sign up for an emergency snow-shoveling program.
- The rate bumped from $20 to $30 an hour to boost sign-ups. The city says it had 7,000 shovelers.
- Business Insider spoke to three shovelers. They all said they have a renewed sense of community.
When a historic winter storm buried parts of New York City under as much as 20 inches of snow, City Hall turned to an unlikely workforce: everyday New Yorkers.
In a video that quickly ricocheted across social media, the city's online-native mayor, Zohran Mamdani, urged residents to sign up as emergency snow shovelers.
The program began in 1897, according to The City. This year, Mamdani sweetened the longtime program.
"Due to the historic nature of this blizzard, we've increased pay to $30 an hour," Mamdani said. "Grab a shovel, bundle up, and be part of getting our city back in business as you help us clear snow on crosswalks, bus stops, and fire hydrants."
Business Insider spoke with three residents who answered that call, bundling up and heading to their local sanitation depots. They described sore backs, soaked boots, and — perhaps unexpectedly — a renewed sense of civic pride.
A community effort
For Barbara Leung, a 36-year-old sales operations director who lives in Gramercy, the decision to spend 12 hours shoveling in Chinatown wasn't about the money.
"I wanted to give back to the community," she told Business Insider. "I see these people every day — and I think of my mom and my relatives. I don't want my mom to have to step into a puddle or slip on ice. It's like, 'Oh, I can make someone else's mom's life better, too.'"
By the time Leung's group of about 10 people got to work Tuesday night, much of the slushy snow was gone, leaving behind stubborn sheets of ice.
Her conversations with coworkers were largely tactical — how to chip away at packed corners, how to widen a path for strollers — but they still felt camaraderie.
"I normally wouldn't meet these people," she added. "I haven't done something like this for a while where I got to interact with a bunch of people, and we all had a common goal."
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In East Harlem, Stephen Bolles, a 33-year-old stand-up comedian who juggles several handyman gigs, said his temporary co-workers were jovial.
On Monday, he shoveled with a group of about 15 people. By Wednesday, the crew had grown to 25. Neighbors stopped to give thanks, and one man handed his group a large jug of purple Gatorade.
"The community really came together, especially where I'm at," Bolles said. "It was probably one of the most community-driven things I've done in this neighborhood."
Quick cash in a tough month
Ciara Leynes, one of the shovelers, said she was able to interact with different members of her community because of the emergency program - including her local fire department.
Ciara Leynes
Ciara Leynes, a 29-year-old former real estate agent in Astoria who is unemployed, said the shoveling appeal was straightforward.
"I'm unemployed, I'm trying my best to get a job," she said. "People are willing to work — they want to work. You just have to pay them and give them an opportunity."
Bolles said his roommate first sent him a TikTok about the program when it was advertised at $20 an hour.
"It's a low-money month for me," he said. He signed up that Sunday, filled out paperwork in about 15 minutes, and shoveled on Monday and Wednesday.
The work was grueling.
"Anything less than $30 an hour would have been criminal," he said. "This was one of the more brutal upper-body workouts I've ever done for a job."
Both Leynes and Bolles said the cash would help them pay for essentials.
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For the shovelers in Chinatown, Leung said the quick cash was important.
"There were folks that really needed the money, and said, 'I can finally have a hot meal and get groceries,'" she said.
Josh Goodman, the Department of Sanitation's deputy commissioner for public affairs and customer experience, told Business Insider that the city streamlined the program this year to help get the cash out quickly. All shovelers should expect payments within 2 to 6 weeks, depending on when they helped, he said.
More than 7,000 New Yorkers are now registered as emergency snow shovelers this season — the most ever, Goodman added.
Snowballing into a political moment
For some shovelers, the effort doubled as a quiet show of support for the city's new mayor.
"We were saying, 'Go Mamdani,'" Bolles joked. "I kept saying, 'Let's ditch this place and go shovel out Gracie Mansion.'"
He also said the program gave him a new respect for the Sanitation Department's work — and that it meaningfully improved pathways compared to recent other snowstorms.
"The sidewalks are so clear this time around," he added. "They did not make this $30 an hour announcement during the last blizzard, and there is a palpable difference."
In Astoria, Leynes was similarly enthusiastic. "I'm a fan of Mamdani, I would say," she said.
Room for shovel improvement
All three shovelers said some of the tools left something to be desired.
"It was easy to break the shovels," Leynes said, though she joked that she didn't manage to snap one herself because she wasn't lifting especially heavy loads. "The guys were doing a lot of the heavy lifting. I tried my best, but I just felt like I was getting in the way."
Bolles agreed: "Some of the shovels were not particularly great," he said.
Goodman said the department had not received complaints. "These are the same shovels we have always used," he said, adding that officials would be "happy to look into it."
Flimsy plastic aside, the sidewalks in many neighborhoods are now largely passable — carved out by thousands of residents who traded a night of sleep for sore shoulders and a $30 hourly wage.
For the three who spoke to Business Insider, it was also a chance to feel like the city was theirs to dig out together — one shovel-full of snow at a time.
The post Would you shovel snow after a historic blizzard for $30 an hour? These 3 New Yorkers did appeared first on Business Insider
