Mayor Eric Adams, New York City Council strike budget deal hours before end of fiscal year
NEW YORK -- Mayor Eric Adams and the New York City Council struck a budget deal just hours before the end of the fiscal year Thursday.
CBS New York political reporter Marcia Kramer says the city's multi-billion dollar asylum seeker crisis impacted funding this year.
Members of the majority-women City Council choreographed their entrance -- female members wearing suffragette white, apparently trying to make the point that even in a fiscally tight budget year, they had fought the mayor to restore programs for the needy and downtrodden.
"We shaped this budget as responsible stewards of the city, making sure not to contribute to chaos and uncertainty that would ultimately hurt the very people we seek to help," Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said.
We ask mayor's office about budget deal
The $107 billion budget, hammered out hours before the end of the fiscal year, was constrained by the asylum seeker crisis, with the $4.35 billion price tag for housing asylum seekers taking money away from many initiatives.
Yes, there was $4 billion for affordable housing, but most of the council's "wins" were more modest:
- $36 million to keep libraries open,
- An extra $20 million for the Fair Fares program that provides transit discounts for low-income New Yorkers,
- $40 million for cultural institutions,
- $15 million to convert unused early childhood education seats to extended day seats to help working families,
- $9.6 million for highway cleaning programs,
- $5.3 million for more swimming lessons and lifeguards,
- And $100 million for something CBS New York has reported about extensively -- a cost-of-living increase for nonprofit human service workers.
"Securing pay increases for these workers, the majority of whom are women and people of color, is a matter of gender, racial and economic justice," Adrienne Adams said.
"Not all of these are big-dollar investments, we're clear on that, but they are smart, strategic and will have a big impact on the lives of everyday New Yorkers," Mayor Eric Adams said.
There was apparently no new money in the budget to fund a new buy-back program for dangerous lithium-ion batteries, but the mayor told CBS New York the city is testing new technology to put out the fires faster.
