It's a real Erin go brouhaha.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg apologized Thursday for making a crack about public drunkenness during an event hosted by an Irish-American organization this week that has some community members fuming.
"I apologize," the mayor said in a statement Thursday. "I certainly did not mean to offend anybody."
The mayor, at a book launch at the Upper East Side headquarters of the American Irish Historical Society, made the ill-received quip on Wednesday.
"Normally, when I walk by this building there are a bunch of people that are totally inebriated hanging out the window waving," he said on Wednesday, according to a transcript obtained from his office by the Associated Press.
He added, "I know, that's a stereotype of the Irish but nevertheless, we Jews from around the corner think this."
Later, Bloomberg clarified he was referring to the Historical Society's St. Patrick's Day party.
"I was talking about a party that they have every year on the, on St. Patrick's Day, when it sort of is traditional to hang out the window and yell and scream and it's in good fun, and I certainly didn't mean anything that anybody should take offense to."
Members of the Irish-American community, including City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, were displeased with the mayor's remarks.
Quinn said in a statement that "given the mayor's long history of support for the Irish community, his remarks last night were both surprising and inappropriate."
St. Patrick's Day parade chairman John Dunleavy, in an interview with The New York Times slammed the mayor's comments as "outrageous and totally uncalled for."
With the Associated Press