NEW YORK • David Dinkins, who broke barriers as New York City’s first African American mayor but was doomed to a single term by a soaring murder rate, stubborn unemployment and his mishandling of a riot in Brooklyn, has died. He was 93.

Dinkins’ death Monday was confirmed by his assistant at Columbia University, where he taught after leaving office, and by Mayor Bill de Blasio, his onetime staffer.

The former mayor’s death came just weeks after the death of his wife, Joyce, who died in October at the age of 89. Dinkins, a calm and courtly figure with a penchant for tennis and formal wear, was a dramatic shift from his predecessor, Ed Koch, and his successor, Rudy Giuliani — two combative and often abrasive politicians in a city with a world-class reputation for impatience and rudeness.

In his inaugural address, he spoke lovingly of New York as a “gorgeous mosaic of race and religious faith, of national origin and sexual orientation, of individuals whose families arrived yesterday and generations ago, coming through Ellis Island or Kennedy Airport or on buses bound for the Port Authority.”

But the city he inherited had an ugly side, too.

AIDS, guns and crack cocaine killed thousands of people each year. Unemployment soared.

Homelessness was rampant. The city faced a $1.5 billion budget deficit.

Dinkins’ low-key, considered approach quickly came to be perceived as a flaw. Critics said he was too soft and too slow.

“Dave, Do Something!” screamed one New York Post headline in 1990, Dinkins’ first year in office.

Dinkins did a lot at City Hall. He raised taxes to hire thousands of police officers. He spent billions of dollars revitalizing neglected housing.

Political historians often trace the defeat to Dinkins’ handling of the Crown Heights riot in Brooklyn in 1991.

David Dinkins delivers his first speech as mayor of New York in 1990. Dinkins, New York City’s first African-American mayor, died Monday. He was 93.

the associated press file