Mayor Eric Adams and City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams announced last week their $107 billion adopted budget agreement for fiscal year 2024 (FY24). The council voted to pass the budget.
“We are proud to have reached a budget that makes strategic investments to keep our city safe and clean, and ensures working families have the services they need, while simultaneously maintaining strong reserves that will allow our city to be prepared for the future,” said Mayor Adams. “Despite the myriad challenges and unexpected crises we have faced, I am proud to say we have successfully navigated these cross-currents to arrive at a strong and fiscally responsible budget that will continue to ‘Get Stuff Done’ for New Yorkers.”
Speaker Adams said “through difficult negotiations,” the council pushed to restore investments in essential services and fund community programs. Communities had rallied against proposed cuts to the city’s library systems and CUNY, and groups demanded funding for the MTA’s discounted Fair Fares program and NYCHA’s Vacant Unit Readiness Program.
The city said there was higher than expected revenue of $2.1 billion in FY23, driven by continued strength in the local economy—although tax revenue growth is still expected to slow in coming years. These additional resources were used to pay for agency needs, meet increased asylum seeker costs, and fund council discretionary spending. The adopted budget maintains $8 billion in city reserves.
The adopted budget includes increased funding for youth jobs, the expansion of Fair Fares ($20 million), extending the hours for vacant early childhood education seats ($15 million), restoring additional $36 million in funding for libraries and $40 million for cultural institutions, and no cuts to public schools even if their student population has declined.
It also includes funding for the Crisis Management System (CMS), $40 million for contracted human services providers, $5.3 million toward swimming education and lifeguards, $5 million for the mayor’s Mental Health Agenda, and $32.9 million for vacant readiness programs.
“When money is tight, decisions must be made,” said Councilmember Justin Brannan, chair of the council’s Committee on Finance. “Our negotiations were no different from the often-tough conversations working families have around their dining room table as they try to make ends meet for another month in the most expensive city in the world. But even with an uncertain fiscal future and a migrant influx everyone agrees New York City cannot handle on its own, with a nearly $107 billion budget, we knew there was still no reason for cuts with a scythe.”
At least 11 council members voted “no” on the budget: Councilmembers Alexa Aviles, Charles Barron, Tiffany Caban, Carmen De La Rosa, Jennifer Gutierrez, Shahana Hanif, Christopher Marte, Sandy Nurse, Chi Osse, Lincoln Restler, and Kristin Richardson-Jordan.
“I voted NO on this Mayor’s austerity budget that guts services and calls it a “win,” Aviles said via Twitter. “Apparently, the City can’t find money to provide school aids with a living wage, or pay parity for EMS workers, or school social workers and guidance counselors.” She also criticized the size of the NYPD overtime budget, misconduct settlements, and school police hiring at about $12 billion.
Aviles and other advocates were angered by the police portion of the city budget. Darian X, lead campaign organizer at the Brooklyn Movement Center, said in a statement that cuts to critical resources like housing, public education, and mental healthcare is a “death sentence to the residents of our communities who rely on those critical services.”
“This budget violence is generational and has resulted in Black and brown neighborhoods around the city where surviving, not thriving, is the norm,” continued X. “We deserve a future where our people can afford quality and dignified housing; where they have more access to mental healthcare in a mental health crisis than they do to armed police. While Mayor Adams may see an increase to the NYPD budget to over $12 billion, we know that the safest communities have the most life-affirming resources, not pathways to incarceration. We demand a budget that prioritizes thriving Black futures over systems of Black death.”
Another major concern in terms of the budget included an allocation of $40 million for human service workers, which organizations were demonstrating for in front of City Hall. The Human Services Council (HSC) said the budget “falls well short” of what they asked for: a 6.5% Cost of Living Adjustment (COLA) and a multi-year deal of 16.5%.
“This budget is not good, and it is not just,” said HSC Executive Director Michelle Jackson. “Almost two-thirds of our workforce lives near poverty, and this agreement will not fundamentally change that—even though the mayor found plenty of money to give generous raises to other workers.”
Federation of Protestant Welfare Agencies (FPWA) CEO and Executive Director Jennifer Jones Austin also chimed in to defend human service workers, a city industry that predominantly comprises women of color.
“We at FPWA are astounded to see that the largest city budget on record willfully disregards both the criticality of human services and the workers providing them,” Austin said in a statement. “This budget includes millions in cuts to vital services, from 3-K to home-delivery meals, to criminal justice reform and prisoner re-entry. The city also failed to follow through on pay equity for the community workforce it depends on day after day. Wage and occupation segregation will worsen as a result.”
Ariama C. Long is a Report for America corps member and writes about politics for the Amsterdam News. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://bit.ly/amnews1.
