No wonder it’s taking the de Blasios three months to move into Gracie Mansion.
The city’s first family has been slowly unloading all of their junk on passers-by, cluttering the sidewalk in front of their Park Slope house with raggedy stuffed animals, worn-out T-shirts, Halloween costumes and odd books like “The History of Spanx.”
Every day is a surprise for Mayor Bill de Blasio’s neighbors, who have taken to picking through Hizzoner’s old wine glasses, baking tins, SAT prep books and cracked plates.
“My granddaughter took the pogo stick. It wasn’t in bad shape,” said Leah Rivera, 51, a construction worker who also lives on 11th Street. She also scooped up a drill.
“Every day, there’s something out there.”
“It all gets taken, I think because of the novelty of, ‘Oh, the mayor lives in my neighborhood.’”
A stained dress, a child’s scooter and religious candles were among the items trickling out of the de Blasio house and onto the street recently.
The tchotchkes have been set on the sidewalk or hung over the fence in front with a “Free!” sign.
The items are near the mayor’s security officers, who guard the house.
The family has collected so much junk that Hizzoner’s 19-year-old daughter, Chiara, has been spending her summer helping mom Chirlane McCray pack up.
McCray announced on June 1 that she had started to prepare for the big move.
Tours of Gracie Mansion have been suspended until September, when the family plans to be moved in.
Some neighbors are less than impressed by the de Blasios’ collection of children’s books and baby clothes, which they rolled out 17 years after son Dante was born.
“I mean, there was nothing good,” said one, Susan LaRosa, who nevertheless took a baking pan from the pile last weekend.
La Rosa put her own items out for free. “I thought my stuff was far superior.”
LaRosa said her only regret was not snagging a 12×8 “Devil’s Harvest” poster, from the 1936 film that exaggerates the effects of smoking marijuana. The item was quickly picked up last weekend.
“The thing that was most remarkable is just how ordinary everything was,” she said. “If I didn’t know it was the mayor’s stuff, I wouldn’t have taken it.”
https://twitter.com/SusanLaRosa/status/487610763167944704/photo/1
Neighbor Geoff Vincent, 59, spotted a toddler-size yellow and red plastic tricycle and some novels for teenage girls.
“I just try to tune it out,” he said. “If it had been [former Mayor Michael] Bloomberg’s stuff, I might have been interested.”