>> this is "eyewitness news upclose with diana williams." >> our quality of life is down. the vast majority of new yorkers feel the city's going in the wrong direction. >> his name is don peebles. perhaps you've not heard of him. but you might soon hear of him. he's a real-estate entrepreneur worth an estimated $700 million, and he was a supporter of mayor bill de blasio when he ran for mayor of new york. "was" is the operative word here. mr. peebles now contemplating a challenge of mr. de blasio two years from right now. good morning, everyone. i'm bill ritter in for diana. mayor de blasio ran as a liberal

progressive candidate, and he has pushed that agenda after becoming the first democratic elected mayor of new york in 20 years. now a flood of possible candidates coming forward, touted, rumored, talked about to challenge bdb -- those are his shortcut initials. is he vulnerable? if so, how much? and why take on an incumbent? one democrat considering a challenge is this man right here -- don peebles, a real-estate executive, who, if he wanted to -- and salute for this -- could finance his own campaign. he joins us on "upclose" this morning. welcome. >> thank you, bill. good to be here. >> good to have you here. why would you want to be mayor of new york city? >> well, look, i'm a big believer that we have to give back to our communities and we have to give back to our society. i've been an entrepreneur for many decades, for over three decades, been successful at it, and now i see that new york city is really going in the wrong direction and someone needs to do something about it. >> you were a supporter, a friend -- even a friend -- gave

money to bill de blasio. is he not taking it in the right direction? is that not the direction you thought he would take the city? >> yeah, no, he's disappointed me, and he's disappointed many voters. i think if you look at these surveys from around the city, you're finding that new yorkers are disenchanted with the direction he's taken us, and many of us have what's called buyer's remorse. the reality is, he didn't do what he said he was going to do. he has not improved the quality of life for new yorkers. he has not made the progress that anyone expected in terms of education. he has not made the progress in terms of bringing the city together. he ran on a tale of two cities, so the theme was the city was divided. it was divided on economic and racial lines. and he was gonna bring the city together, and that was what i was expecting, and instead what we're seeing is his politics, that he is dividing the city so that he can still hold his position as mayor, and i think that is a very disruptive method of managing our city. >> he would say he's looking out for the little person, the

little guy, the little gal, and the families that are on the other side of the tale of two cities. not your side, but the ones that don't have money. and he's trying to fight for them, improve education, look for affordable housing, get homeless people off the street. what's wrong with that? >> he's doing a poor job. i agree with division. look, i'm the product of the american dream. my two grandfathers, one was a doorman for 41 years and one was a janitor in a public school system in the segregated south, so i'm a big believer in looking out for people who haven't had a fair chance in life. the reality is, is this mayor's not doing that. bill de blasio promised that he would provide economic opportunities for all, but yet his government that he presides over, out of the $18 billion of contracts under his control, he's done less than 3/10 of 1% to african-american-owned businesses, 6/10 of 1% to latino-owned businesses, 1.5% to women-owned businesses. so here we have a city that's 65% minority, 52.5% female, and he can't muster up better

numbers than that. he's perpetuating this tale of two cities, because if we want to have equal pay, equal opportunity, we have to support community-based businesses and minority- and women-owned businesses. he hasn't done that. that's one example. >> where did you get the statistics for that? >> from scott stringer, the comptroller of the city of new york, an independent analysis of this, and it's on checkbook new york. there's a website that the comptroller who has been proactive on transparency, these are his numbers. these are the actual numbers. and yet the mayor came out recently saying new numbers. in reaction to my criticism, he issued a press release, got some of the people who he has supported for office, and tried to spin this and tried to spin his way out of this, and it didn't work out for him. >> a lot of people would say no matter who owns the businesses that he has not created the kind of jobs that this economy needed, whether they're black, white, hispanic, male, female, whatever. >> yeah, i would agree with that, but i think the bigger issue here, why minority-owned businesses are important and why

women-owned businesses are important is we know that there's a tremendous economic disparity. women are paid less for the same work. african-americans and latinos and other minorities do not get their fair share of jobs. they have the disproportionate burden of poverty, and that relates to educational performance. that relates to public safety and other quality-of-life issues. and the reality is, is that new york as a city, we need to focus on quality of life, education, and equal access to economic opportunity. if we do those three things, we would have an amazing city. greater. and instead, he wants to bring us back to a mediocre city, and be. >> he would disagree with that. you know that. >> i'm sure he would, but the facts would not bear him out. >> and he would say -- in fact, he said many of the same things that you said when he first decided to run for mayor, when he was public advocate. doesn't this show a little bit that the city's problems are intractable, many of them, education? >> no. no, it doesn't. what it shows is that he wasn't

that's a mistake i made and all of us made. there was nothing in bill de blasio's career to prepare him to run this city. nothing. his last job was public advocate. that's a $1.6 million budget with less than a dozen employees. the average duane reade in new york city has an annual revenue budget of $6.7 million. so the general manager of a duane reade is managing four times the size of a budget as de blasio managed before he walked in the office of city hall. so he's just not competent. well-intended, nice guy. just not competent. >> but he had been elected public office before. he had run political campaigns. he ran hillary clinton's u.s. senate campaign when she first ran. >> poorly, by the way. she almost fired him and had to bring in other people to help clean up the mess that he created. >> but she did win that election. and unless i'm misreading your r\sum\, you have not held any election, unless you were elected class president somewhere that i'm missing. but you've not held any elected office. >> in fact, i think that's a good thing. i bring a public perspective, but i'm not a neophyte when it comes to government and

at 23 years old, i started my own company that's in existence today, so over 32 years in business. at 24 years old, i chaired the most powerful board in washington, d.c., the property tax appeal board. i've been a past chairman of the greater miami convention & visitors bureau that branded miami as a destination. and i'm currently chairman of the congressional black caucus foundation board, which helps lead the legislative agenda of the 46 african-american members of the united states congress, so i know how to build consensus, i know how to lead, and i know how to manage -- something he's never done. holding offices in a position that is essentially a do-nothing position -- public advocate, a paid protester -- does not qualify you to run the largest city in america. >> if we look at the republican candidates for president, you know, the top three of them, three out of the four, have never held elected office, either. is that what you think americans and maybe new yorkers want to see now? bloomberg never held elected office. mayor giuliani, before he was elected mayor, never held elected office. >> yeah, i think that the public wants someone who can manage and

lead and have vision. they don't want the typical politician because they do what bill de blasio does. they're spin doctors. bill de blasio spins the statistics on education, he spins the statistics on minority contracting, he spins -- he said we just came off the safest summer in history, but yet as of monday, 21 more human beings were murdered in new york city than last year, so he just spins, and people are fed up with that. they want someone who can get the job done, and in my world, in the business world, doing nothing or keeping the status quo or making baby steps puts you out of business. >> you're ahead of the curve a little bit on this and certainly ahead of the other democrats who are saying, "well, i'm toying with the idea." have you decided for sure you're gonna run? >> no, but i'm talking to many people around the city, and i spend about 25% of my day talking to new yorkers from various perspectives, either business leaders, community leaders, religious leaders, and every-day citizens. and one of the things that's been interesting to me is that uniformly, no one is saying this man is competent for his job. uniformly, no one's saying he's doing a good job.

and if i walk into a restaurant, the chances are one or two people are gonna come over to me and ask me to run for mayor. if i walk into a building, the front-desk guard is gonna ask me to run for mayor because they've had it with these mediocre goals and this poor performance. >> i'm not sure the city's seen a situation where the incumbent mayor has gotten so much criticism from people in his own party and will probably get several people running against him in the primary. >> i don't think he'll get several people, by the way. but i will tell you it is unusual for a mayor who's an incumbent mayor to get this kind of criticism, but his performance is what warrants it, and that's what's causing this. >> would you fund your own campaign? >> yes, i would fund my campaign significantly in the vast majority of it, and, you know, my plan is to fund it all. and i believe that's gonna take somewhere between $10 million and $20 million. >> michael bloomberg spent $100 million, more than $100 million, the last time out. it cost him about almost $200 a vote, and he barely made it. >> that's a heavy lift. he was a republican, a businessperson.

>> he was also an incumbent for two terms. >> yeah. but a republican incumbent. i'm a different type of candidate. i would be a different type of mayor. i'm a progressive person. i believe in the access to equal opportunity. i believe that the government has a role in providing an environment for opportunity. i believe in a public education system, along with charter schools. i believe there's a role there. so i'm a different type of candidate, and i think i will -- you know, i'm not gonna buy the election. if i run for mayor, i will beat de blasio straight up. >> one of the things that's been raised about you is that you have houses in various cities. where do you live? you have a house in florida, you have a house in washington, you have a house in the hamptons. where do you live? >> i live in new york city. my daughter is in school in the new york city area. in fact, my son is getting ready to graduate from columbia university, and he did his senior year of high school in new york. and i'm a major property owner in new york, as well. >> finally, one thing -- you do not like the description of you as one of the wealthiest black americans in the country. why not? >> well, because i think in itself that's almost a divisive

statement. look, i think i understand the thinking here, is that african-americans have had to struggle, but the reality is, is i'm a businessperson. i want to be judged as a businessperson. just like if i were mayor of new york city, i would want to be judged as mayor of all of new york city. >> your campaign gonna be the "peebles" choice? >> good idea. >> i'm just wondering. >> very good idea. i like that. >> well, good luck to you. we hope to have mayor de blasio on the show to talk about some of the criticisms, and we wish you good luck. we hope to see you again. >> great. thank you, bill. >> don peebles, thank you very much. perhaps a possible candidate for mayor of new york and once bill de blasio's friend. when we come back, we're gonna switch gears. more than 122,000 people right now on a national list waiting for an organ. many of them are in new york state, but is organ donation registration here in new york so far behind the national average? well, i guess it is. in fact, it's the lowest in the country. we're gonna take a look at that and try to find out why and also talk to a thankful recipient of

come back. traveling through seas of oats and berries

i say to the bowl are you trying to temp me? the bowl says "come on down to the land of plenti." yoplait plenti, with oats, flax, and pumpkin seeds.

>> welcome back to "upclose." october is tissue and organ donation month. one organ donor can save up to eight lives. one tissue donor can improve the lives of up to 50 people. right now more than 122,000 people are on a national waiting list for organ donors. 10,000 of those are in new york. but listen to this figure. only 25% of new yorkers are registered organ donors. that's compared to 50% nationally. why the difference? joining us this morning are helen irving, a former transplant nurse, who is now the

c.e.o. of liveonny -- that used to be called the new york organ donor network. also with us is lauren shields, 15 years old. she received a heart transplant back in 2009. ladies, both of you, thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> lauren, how are you doing? how do you feel? >> amazing. i'm, you know, back to, you know, living life as a kid, and i feel great. >> tell me why you needed a heart transplant in 2009. >> i had caught a virus that attacked my heart, and we didn't know that i was in the midst of heart failure, but when i went to the doctor, you know, he didn't feel right just, you know, giving me, you know, any old medication, so i went into the hospital and they had told me that my heart was functioning at only 14% and i had an enlarged heart and a virus had attacked my heart. >> and you were physically okay, medically okay before that? no problems? >> you know, i was very tired all the time, and i wasn't eating normally, but other than that, you know, viral myocarditis is non-symptomatic, and that's what had happened to me. >> wow. what a shock to your

parents and you, as well. you must have been very scared. >> i was so scared, yeah. >> so you had this transplant, and you look totally healthy. who gave this to you? did you ever find the people who gave -- the person who gave this to you? >> no. you know -- >> the family of the person? >> no, but we do want -- you know, we wrote a letter to the family, but we haven't heard back from them. but, you know, it's a hard topic of conversation, and we wrote it probably like six years ago, and we definitely want to write another one to reach out again and hopefully get the chance to say thank you in person. >> how important is that to you? >> it's so important because their child, you know, saved my life, and it's such a difficult decision for them to make, and i just want to say thank you. >> yeah. helen, how many people? we hear stories all the time, when we join people with the donor, families of the donor. is that a typical thing, when people are hesitant to do that?

sometimes on the donor side when families have lost a loved one, they're dealing with their own grief. and they need to deal with that pain, and then they move on with their lives. so, sometimes families don't want to know. they're grateful they gave the gift, but they want to move on with their life. other families want to meet. and so what we try and do is pass on the letters that lauren writes to the family, and if the family chooses to respond back, we would then facilitate the letter coming back. once they have a written correspondence going and both parties wish to meet, then we facilitate that, as well. >> fascinating, 'cause we only hear publicly about the people. "oh, look at that. the mother of the son who gave this girl a heart, they get together." there is some great feeling of closure and meaning to this, right? but what percentage don't do that? >> oh, most don't. >> wow. that's interesting. >> we only see about 12 to 14 families really get together each year. and that's actually on the

increase. usually it was only one or two. but pretty much families are coming to us about once a month asking if they can meet their donor families or their recipients, and we'll work with them to set that up. >> let's talk about these numbers, because they're sort of staggering. i did not realize that. we are half the national average, the people who are registered, and have given their consent to do this on their driver's license. that's all it takes, right? >> yes. >> why is it so low, and how do you get around that? >> yeah, well, it's come up in a few years. it started out three years ago at 11%, so we are making some progress, but we're still last. there's some challenges we have. one is the actual operation of the registry itself. it's not electronic. it's actually still a paper system. so that in itself creates its own barrier. i don't know about you, but the last time i sent a letter was a long time ago. everything we do now is online. that's about to change for 2016, so that's good news coming our way, and hopefully it will make it easier for people to register. >> the governor has done this, right?

so we're very grateful to him, and that's gonna be a reality next year. the other issue is that 90% of people who sign up on the registry do so through the dmv. and now in new york, at dmv when you renew your driver's license, it went from four years to eight years. so once every eight years, somebody is asking you if you'd like to become an organ donor in the dmv. >> yeah. not enough. >> not enough, not frequent enough, and wrong place. >> here's what happened to me. i lost my license, and they sent me a new one, and just as i was researching this show, your interview, i looked at my new driver's license, which is only a year old. >> right. >> and i hadn't signed the back of it, and i thought i had, of course, 'cause i did the one i lost. and so i signed it. in fact, i was showing my daughter this. i said, "look, you got to sign this because if anything happens to me, someone else is gonna live." >> right. >> so you think this new electronic system is gonna solve that? >> the new electronic system is a part of solving the problem, having more frequent touch

points with the community -- to ask the question, and the work lauren does is invaluable for sure, so that people can see the benefits of donation. but having donor families say that this brought comfort for them is also important. you know, donor families say, you know, there's nothing we can do at the point when we're asking families to consider organ donation. everything medically that could be done has been done. but this gives the family an opportunity to make a difference in someone's life, and that is invaluable, because from grief will come life. >> that's a great way to put it. this last week, you had a great day. >> we did. >> you tried to register people, and you had a big organ donation day, and what happened? >> we went for it, and we got close to 2,800 enrollees in one day. it's a record for new york state. we've never seen that number of people sign up. people were coming up to us and saying, "oh, you know what? i'm glad you're here because i was thinking of doing it, and i just didn't get around to it," and that's really the number-one reason why people haven't signed on the registries -- that they

we just did a survey recently -- 9 out of 10 new yorkers support organ donation. there just isn't the right opportunity for them to go and sign up. >> lauren, you are a living example of what can happen when someone donates their organs, and i guess you can't ignore that. that's a calling for the rest of your life. >> mm-hmm. yeah. >> what's your message to people? >> you know, it's just -- you know, because my life was saved by someone else, it's so important that, you know, i go out now and tell my story, 'cause a lot of people don't have -- they don't think about organ donation unless they have a story that affects them themselves, and to share my story is really important because, you know, it shows people that organ donation does work and it saves lives and it's really important to me to share my story. >> and to the rest of us, as well. you know, 15 years old -- you got a long life ahead of you because someone donated their organ, so thanks for sharing your story with us. helen, lauren, thank you very

much. when we come back -- by the way, let's take a quick look at our website. we have more information if you want to be an organ donor at our website, abc7ny, and you can find out more information how to be an organ donor. when we get coming back, getting ready for the biggest columbus day celebration in the u.s. a preview of the big parade on fifth avenue -- happens tomorrow.

here when we come back. >> welcome back to "upclose." more than half a million people expected to turn out tomorrow for the annual columbus day parade. this is last year's parade. fifth avenue from 44th street all the way up to 72nd street. it's a lot of fun. 35,000 marchers, more than 100 groups. millions are expected to watch it on television here and around the world.

channel 7 will broadcast it live beginning monday at noon. joining us this morning are two people very much involved in this parade. the president of the columbus citizens foundation in charge of the parade, angelo vivolo, and this year's grand marshal, alberto "crabiare." >> cribiore. >> i knew i was gonna mess this up. >> cribiore. >> cribiore. >> caribiore. >> cribiore. >> cribiore. cribiore. well... >> very italian. >> you're very italian. and when you're not being the grand marshal of the parade, you are an executive at citigroup. >> i am. vice chairman. >> and angelo here, when he's not busy chairing this, is a restaurateur. >> yes, i am. >> and i can't let this go. i got to ask you about it. you fed the pope when he was at the residence when he was in town. >> yes, i had the honor of feeding pope francis along with my good friend livia bastianich at the residence of the papal nuncio. >> the east side, 72nd.

right to where the parade's going. >> yeah, we did this once before for pope benedict, but this was an exceptional experience, different experience. >> so tell me what it was like to feed the pope, literally and figuratively. >> well, he was, as the last pope, very gentle, holy man, but a little more personable. we had more conversation with him. >> with francis? >> with francis. pope francis. and he had a smaller group that we served, so it was more intimate than the last time we did it, and he was just a wonderful, blessed individual that i had the honor of serving. >> so you had a german pope the first time and now an argentinean pope the second time. what kind of food did you serve? >> well, we thought since he was argentinean, he was gonna like beef, but that wasn't the case. he gained 15 pounds since being the pope, becoming the pope, so they have him on a kind of restricted diet, so we served him everything we served everyone else at the table, except we managed it a little different. light fare. but he was a delightful person. i could tell you -- you don't

have enough time for me to tell you -- incredible experience. >> now that we've talked about italian food, let's talk about this parade. what's gonna happen that's different this year? >> well, alberto cribiore, number one. he's a leading personality in the italian-american community, and we are honored to have him as the grand marshal. we also have guy chiarello, who's at first data, president of first data, a wonderful, wonderful man who is an honoree. and we have aldo verelli, another honoree who has his own company in the world of finance. and a special award this year is going to be given to stefi germanotta and her daughter lady gaga for their founding of the born this way foundation. >> and lady gaga's mother and father own a restaurant that is in competition with you. >> joanne's, as a matter of fact, it's called. >> alberto, tell me about your involvement here and what does this mean to be grand marshal for you?

there can be a bigger honor for an italian living in america and having also an american passport than to be the grand marshal of the columbus day parade. the people that have preceded me in this role are incredible businessmen, incredible financiers -- ken langone, joe perella, mario gabelli. incredible artists like luciano pavarotti, frank sinatra, zeffirelli, to give you a sense. so it's unimaginable to be able to follow in their footstep and very humbling. but at the same time, i am moved and honored of doing that. >> you know, the contributions of italian-americans, it is such a part of the fiber of this country for, you know, for so many decades, scores of decades. there is controversy over the columbus day parade, as every

year, it seems to me. eight cities have now changed the name of the columbus day parade, and i'm not sure americans link columbus with saluting italian-americans. it's almost two different things in some ways, right? >> well, columbus discovered america and was an italian. and so this columbus day has been around since the 1800s, and we respect everyone in the country to decide what they want to do. but we wish they would come to new york city and join us at this incredible parade and see what italian-americans are all about and what we're really celebrating. we're celebrating our culture, our heritage, and great people like alberto cribiore. >> and we're gonna have it right here on channel 7. just to remind people, we have tomorrow, monday, ken rosato and michelle charlesworth will have live coverage of the columbus day parade tomorrow starting at noon right here on channel 7. angelo and alberto, you're great spokesmen for this organization, and thank you. good luck. good luck at the parade. it's gonna be a great one. >> thank you for having us. >> thank you. >> our honor, of course, to broadcast it. and that's gonna do it for this edition of "upclose." if you missed any of today's programs, you can catch it again on our website, abc7ny.

don't forget -- tomorrow, the