"michael bloomberg" news and stories

If New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg has his way, nearly 2 million food-stamp recipients in the five boroughs will be prohibited from using their benefits to buy soda or similar sugary soft drinks, according to The New York Times.

The move marks the latest attempt by the mayor to curb rates of obesity and diabetes in the city, which, as in the rest of the country, are on the rise. It's also part of Bloomberg's broader and much publicized public health campaign, which has included an expanded ban on public smoking, an effort to reduce sodium content in restaurant food, and an unsuccessful attempt to impose a state tax on sugary drinks. And like many of those proposals, this one has elicited strong opinions, both pro and con.

A joint op-ed piece by both the city and state heath commissioners, also published in the Times, lays out a number of compelling arguments to support the mayor's proposal, one of these being that recipients are already barred from using their stamps to buy other demonstrably unhealthy items, such as cigarettes, liquor, and prepared foods.

A mysterious maple-syrup odor that has baffled New York City officials for years has been traced to a spice used in Indian cuisine.

City officials traced the sweet odor to a food processing plant in North Bergen, N.J., which processes the spice fenugreek at a facility across the Hudson River from Manhattan, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Thursday.

"I think it's safe to say that the mystery of the maple syrup mist has finally been solved," Bloomberg said.