Budget Engineering and the NYC two-step dance

By Nayaba Arinde
Editor at Large
New York City’s budget negotiations with City Hall’s 51 council members and Mayor Eric Adams concluded with an on-time $112.4 billion budget. Yet, it is still controversial. The adopted budget was announced on Friday, 28th June, 2024.

“Happy new fiscal year… We stayed up late last night, popping corks,” said Mayor Adams.
All beaming and glad-handing on Friday City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and Mayor Adams announced the full $110 billion restoration of funding to libraries and cultural institutions in the upcoming Fiscal Year 2025 Budget.

But, if ‘We told you so’ had a face, it might look something like all the vocal and active opponents to the Mayor’s proposed budget cuts in November 2023
The People’s Plan (TTP) Director Zara Nasir stated, “The Mayor deserves no credit for such a cynical tactic. The Mayor’s last-minute reversals don’t fool us. Funding cuts for libraries and other key programs should never have happened.”

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams told Our Time Press, “Announcing services will be slashed, then reversing course months later, is not a sign of strong administrative management; it’s playing politics with programs that people depend on. We need to lead with fiscal and moral responsibility, consider the human cost of cuts, and move forward as strong stewards of not just the city’s finances but the city’s people.”

When Mayor Adams introduced his November Plan he announced a city-agency-wide 5%, with an additional $7 billion cut in January this year.
Education spending was decimated, and all-important libraries shuttered on Sundays; originally, the FDNY and NYPD were subjected to financial cuts. The uproar was immediate with people stating that city departments like Social Services, and education needed an increase in funding, not vice versa.

Perhaps Mayor Adams heard the outcry.
With a sudden summer surprise, he announced that some of those devastating cuts did not need to happen after all.
Is it creative accounting or surreptitious pre-election prospecting? Our Time Press asked Mayor Adams.

He did not respond by press time.
Political observers weighed in. Zakiyah Shaakir-Ansari, Co-Executive Director of the Alliance for Quality Education, told Our Time Press that every year the Mayor wants to “take the victory or look like the hero when the handshake comes when the reality is we wouldn’t be here with the speaker and everyone else, if he hadn’t proposed morally bankrupt budget proposals and cuts in the first place.

“We cannot do this budget dance every year. Our schools are struggling.”
In a statement, Adams said, “We have reached an adopted a budget of $112.4 billion. We guided the plane through all the turbulence…Adams and Adams United is here to say we have a deal. The budget is about making life in the city affordable for New Yorkers because we know there is an affordability crisis.

“Our actions have helped us arrive at a strong and fiscally responsible budget and have allowed us to partner with the Council together, invest in our early childhood education, cultural organizations, libraries, parks, public safety, housing, and healthcare.”

Ansari, a staunch fighter for NYC schools, charged, “What this mayor is doing is gaslighting, which he does really well. If he did not spend as much time creating and bringing props and his corny one-liners and, was instead listening to the people, then we would have a budget for the people. When this mayor stands up there and chuckles, and laughs, and makes plane metaphors and analogies, it is a slap in the face to educators who are watching with fingers crossed that there is money coming to the public schools – but now they know that they have to cut staff.”

“As a woman majority and the most diverse Council in our city’s history, representing every unique corner of this city, we understand the multitude of challenges that our communities and constituents face, the services they rely on, and what they need from city government,” Speaker Adams declared. “In my State of the City, I said, let’s get back to basics…It’s also important to recognize the fiscal realities we are up against. The expiration of significant pandemic-era federal funding meant we needed new funding resources to supplant the loss of federal funding. The Council also acknowledged the economic uncertainty we faced amidst new challenges that we had to confront, leading to budget gaps and the out-years that must be confronted.”

Adams said that the budget reflects the pressing need for the families and residents of this city for affordable housing and early childhood education. “Our students need support to continue recovering from historic learning loss from the pandemic, and we must prioritize resources for mental health care, community safety, cultural institutions, libraries, parks, senior services, and so many other vital programs. The Council worked hard to secure investments for these priorities within this budget.”

With his “fiscal conservative approach,” Mayor Adams said that with over $7 billion in savings, “We restored $349 million out of $7 billion.”
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams thanked the Council and the Speaker for an on-time budget agreement “with many important initiatives intact…such as affordable housing,” but, at the same time, he said vigilance is needed for “other unnecessary, less-visible cuts in this budget.”

TTP Director Nasir determined, “This year’s budget stops far short of reversing the Mayor’s multiple rounds of cuts, which have decimated core City services and harmed millions of New Yorkers who need and rely on the social safety net and public education, to CUNY, to make ends meet and help make our economy thrive. Mayor Adams pushed through many cuts to foundational services and programs, like CUNY (-$80M), universal childcare (-$150M), parks, and senior services, while favoring a $225M cop city that will further criminalize New Yorkers.

We must ensure future budgets won’t be dictated by revenue underestimations and budget games.”