If it’s true that behind every great man there’s a great woman, Diana Taylor, longtime partner of Mayor Michael Bloomberg and former New York State Superintendent of Banks, is one of the city’s greatest. Julie Menin, host of WNBC’s Give and Take, finds out more.
JULIE MENIN: Recently you chose to pursue a master’s degree in public health. Why did you decide to do that?
DIANA TAYLOR: When I was in business school at Columbia, I was actually in a joint-degree program, business and public health. I never finished my public-health degree because I went to work for Smith Barney, one of the evil investment banks. Then, about five or six years ago, the dean of the School of Public Health, Dr. Allan Rosenfi eld, a giant in the fi eld, was looking for alums to put together committees to fundraise and raise the profile of the Mailman School of Public Health. So we became good friends and he became sort of a mentor because I’ve always been interested in public health, especially as it relates to women and women’s issues. So he talked to me about getting my degree. Then Dr. Rosenfi eld was diagnosed with ALS and I decided that I needed to finish my degree quickly because I wanted him to hand me my degree, and so I did.
JM: And do you think you’ll pursue something in that field?
DT: Eventually. I’m on the board of the International Women’s Health Coalition, so I’m sort of using my degree there.
JM: You grew up in Connecticut. Did you know you would go into banking?
DT: No. Actually I grew up thinking I was going to eventually get married and have kids and live in the country with a white picket fence and two and a half dogs and a wood-paneled station wagon. But then I went to college, to Dartmouth, and I graduated and figured out I could go and get married and have kids, but I don’t have to. I want to have a life and work and have a career. Well, I did—I had a life and a career and I never did the get-married-and-have-kids part.
JM: You’ve been the companion of Mayor Bloomberg for the last eight years. Can you tell us a little bit about life with the mayor?
DT: It’s really exciting. You see parts of the city you never would have seen under any other circumstances. You’ve got 20 parades every weekend, you’re meeting people you’d never [have met] before, you find yourself sitting next to people at dinner sort of pinching yourself saying, I can’t believe I’m sitting next to this person. It’s great.
JM: What are your thoughts on the mayor running for a third term?
DT: As a taxpaying citizen of the City of New York, I am ecstatic. I think he has done an incredible job and I can’t think of anybody [else] I would want as mayor in the difficult times we are confronting over the next few years in this city.
JM: Some of his closest advisors had cautioned him not to run for a third term. Were you one of them who counseled no?
DT: I would not counsel him one way or the other. He is going to do what he thinks is right and what he thinks is in the city’s best interests, and I told him, “I completely and totally support any decision that you make.”
JM: Do you think there will still be a lot of anger about the term-limit issue?
DT: I don’t know the answer to that question. What I do know is that New Yorkers have a choice and they will go into the voting booth and will vote for who they want as mayor.
JM: Are you looking forward to the campaign?
DT: Oh absolutely, campaigns are fun. They’re a lot of hard work. It takes a lot of time and you have to be on all the time but he’s a great candidate. He’s the perfect person to be mayor. He loves it and he should defi nitely do it.
