New York City Mayor Eric Adams unironically dubbed this latest city budget the “Best Budget Ever.” He held a roundtable at Gracie Mansion last week with ethnic media to discuss what policies made it in.
“The record is clear,” said Adams. “So to really show the success of our fiscal management, we rolled out a budget that zeros in on children and families.”
This year, the city’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2026 Executive Budget is $115.1 billion, with a $1.9 billion savings plan. The city also maintains a record $8.5 billion in reserves.
The budget focuses funding on improving public safety, clean city streets and parks, affordability, education, health, sustainability, transportation; and expands educational opportunities like early childhood education and universal after-school. Key initiatives include $500 million to combat gun violence, increased NYPD officers (aiming for 35,000 by 2026), support for mental health services for individuals with severe conditions, the Mayor’s City of Yes for Housing Opportunity plan, and $173.4 billion 10-year capital plan to build out city infrastructure, among other things.
Adams was especially proud of the early childhood education and universal after-school initiatives. “That is huge for working class people. Children will be in a safe place. Children will learn socialization skills and other academic skills. Parents will be able to go on with their lives…knowing that their child’s in a safe place,” said Adams. “This is all part of what we have done in this budget.”
His administration has been harshly criticized over the years for going back and forth on budget cuts to the city’s pre-K and 3-K programs, and many of his challengers in the upcoming mayoral race have built their platform around the benefits of universal after-school programs.
As this city budget relates to the state budget, Adams pushed back that the state had failed to include enough funding for immigrants and asylum seekers. “They’re giving us no asylum seeker funding at all, as though the problem has disappeared,” said Adams. “This is a state problem. We send more money to Albany, than we get back. We send more money to Washington, than we get back. At this point, we’re the economic engine for the state, and we’re the economic engine for the country. We should not be left to fight these issues on our own.”
However, he did express support for Gov. Kathy Hochul’s changes to the discovery law (also referred to as Kalief Browder’s Law), for the involuntary removal of street homeless individuals with severe mental illness, and making a Class B misdemeanor for people wearing a mask while committing a crime.
“On the ground, people are tired of the recidivism in our system,” said Adams, referencing a recent police shooting in Brooklyn and a grandmother who was killed by a stray bullet in Harlem. “And so the discovery change is not to take away a person’s due process or right to get a fair trial, but it’s not to have these trials impacted because of the discovery rules. Albany has to fix the recidivism problem that they have.”
Adams promised that the involuntary removal process would not over-rely on medicating and releasing individuals hospitalized or taken in for treatment, which many in Black and Brown communities have expressed is a real concern. The budget indicates a $650 million plan to take on a more “comprehensive, well-rounded approach to mental health issues.”
Tying in to Adams’ now firm stance on ‘Not Closing Rikers’–– perhaps the most divisive position he could take going into a reelection campaign as an independent this November –– the Mayor said that “overwhelmingly” homeless Black and Brown men with severe mental illnesses are the ones occupying the streets and subways because of the lack of access to mental health services at facilities, like Rikers Island.
“We have criminalized mental health disorders, and I say no to that,” said Adams. “We need to give people the services and support what they need.”
Adams said that the city’s Brooklyn detention center is going to likely be finished by 2026, and can include state-of-the art mental health facilities to help off-load Rikers. He also said that more psychiatric beds in hospitals will be made available, and clubhouses, which he invested $4 million into from the city budget, are crucial.
As of now, the city law, passed in 2019 under former Mayor Bill de Blasio, mandates that Rikers be closed by 2027 and replaced by borough-based jails. Adams has been slammed for “abandoning” the plan.
“As someone who has had loved ones detained at Rikers and has borne witness to the horrible conditions they’ve experienced while detained there, it is absolutely disgusting what Mayor Adams is doing,” said Ziyadah Amatulmatin, member of the Katal Center for Equity, Health, and Justice, in a statement.
“Throughout his term as Mayor, he has failed to address the crisis at Rikers, and under his watch nearly 40 people died in city jails. As this crisis continues to grow, he is now outright abandoning the city’s plan to close Rikers. He is laughing in our faces and completely disregarding the lives of the thousands of people currently detained at Rikers who are trying to survive it every single day. We’ve been sounding the alarms since day one that this Mayor is not committed to shutting down Rikers,” continued Amatulmatin.
Additionally, Adams said that he supports the state’s mask ban classification when it comes to people committing crimes, and the exclusion of a mask ban for medical purposes. “Too many people have been using face coverings for their crimes,” said Adams. “You get that person on camera, it cuts the investigation down.”