Dear Neighbor, 

Last week, the City Council passed the New York City budget for Fiscal Year 2022, a $98.7 billion budget, the largest in the city’s history. After the pandemic threw the City into fiscal crisis, we received a lifeline from the American Rescue Plan (thank you President Biden, Senator Schumer, our Congressional delegation, and everyone who worked hard to win a federal government committed to investing in real pandemic relief). ARP funding allowed us to close large deficits in the city’s FY21 and FY22 budgets, and to invest in a wide array of urgently-needed recovery programs.

Unfortunately, we aren’t making strategic decisions about spending the ARP funding wisely. We aren’t doing enough to track the rescue spending, set goals, oversee contracts, monitor outcomes, or address projected long-term deficits. That’s why I voted no on the budget last week. I will keep working hard to win better oversight and transparency in ARP spending.

I also do not support increasing the $5.3 billion NYPD budget (over $10 billion when benefits are included) by $200 million -- when we already have the highest ratio of police officers to residents of any major US city, aren’t doing enough to demand accountability, and when we already spend more on policing than on health & mental health, community development, workforce development, youth programs, and supportive housing combined.

That said, the FY22 budget funds many critical initiatives that I support to help all of NYC’s communities recover stronger and fairer from the devastation of the pandemic.

For the first time ever, this budget funds 100% of the “Fair Student Funding” formula for all schools, $377 million for new 3K programs, $200 million for Summer Rising programs to provide summer education and enrichment for any student who seeks it, and $500 for academic, social and emotional learning supports to help students recover. (We’ll have more to say about educational funding next week, looking at issues of class size -- where this budget fails to make much progress -- as well as the need to better empower school communities to work together to get kids back in the classroom and to meet their needs.)

Small businesses that have taken body blows during Covid-19, and especially those in low-income and hard-hit neighborhoods, will be eligible for $100 million in small business rental assistance and grants.

The budget allocates $112 million to expand mental health crisis response citywide, including training for EMS and social workers for urgent non-violent mental health needs. Unfortunately, it also increases funding for new NYPD officers for this response as well, a cause for concern about how committed City Hall will be to the new approach.

And I’m very pleased that the budget restores cuts made last year to parks, sanitation, libraries and cultural institutions across all our neighborhoods. 

This pandemic spotlighted so many cracks in our society. The question for us now is: what will we do about those disparities? Many of these ARP investments are a good start. But a long-term plan for a just and durable recovery requires a deeper and more strategic commitment to setting goals -- including equity goals -- and then rigorously tracking our progress toward them.

And of course, yesterday’s flash flood highlighted even more tangible cracks. NYC’s infrastructure is not ready for the climate crisis. We are not paying nearly enough attention to the City’s capital budget, our long-term infrastructure plan. 

One small bright spot here: next week, I am attending the first meeting of the NYC Capital Projects Tracking Task Force, created by legislation I passed last year. As we move forward, I am committed to making progress on infrastructure planning and capital projects management reform. That work is so easy to forget, but the costs of doing so are catastrophic.

You can read the Mayor’s press release on the adopted budget, discretionary funding and initiatives added by the City Council (aka “Schedule C”), or find all of the FY22 budget documents on the City’s website. 

 

With a firm eye on a just and durable recovery, 

Brad