New York City Leaders Reach Deal on Austere Budget, Police Cuts -- Update
June 30 2020 - 7:56PM
Dow Jones News
By Katie Honan
Mayor Bill de Blasio said he and New York City Council leaders
had reached an agreement on an $88.19 billion budget for the coming
fiscal year that drastically cuts city spending while shifting $1
billion in funding from the New York Police Department to youth and
social services.
The council was poised to vote on the budget Tuesday night after
weeks of negotiations framed by an economic crisis brought on by
the new coronavirus pandemic and mounting calls for defunding and
reforming the police department. The mayor's preliminary budget,
proposed in February before the pandemic, was $95.3 billion.
More than a dozen of the council's 50 members vowed to vote
against the budget over varying concerns about NYPD funding,
according to people familiar with the matter. Some of the members
said the reductions to police funding weren't significant. Others
said they opposed major funding reductions to the NYPD.
Council Speaker Corey Johnson, a Democrat who is one of the most
influential members in the negotiation process, supported the
budget but said he wanted more cuts to the police department.
"To everyone who is disappointed we did not go deeper, I am
disappointed as well," he said. Mr. de Blasio wouldn't budge on
some of the larger cuts, he said.
A spokeswoman for the mayor said "he worked to find cuts that
allowed us to reinvest in youth and communities in need while
keeping our streets safe."
Under the budget agreement, overtime for NYPD personnel would be
reduced and an upcoming class of more than 1,100 police academy
cadets would be canceled. About $500 million would be taken out of
the NYPD's capital budget and allocated toward summer youth
programming, education, recreation centers and broadband
infrastructure at the city's public-housing developments.
A homeless-engagement unit and school crossing guards, which are
currently under the police budget, would be shifted to other
agencies, Mr. de Blasio said.
In all, more than $1 billion in funds would be shifted from the
police department to other agencies. The NYPD's annual operating
budget would drop to about $5 billion from nearly $6 billion.
"This is real redistribution," the mayor, a Democrat, said at a
press conference.
Councilman Ben Kallos, a Democrat who represents neighborhoods
in Manhattan, said Tuesday he wouldn't vote for the budget after
seeing part of what was proposed. He said he wanted more meaningful
cuts to the police department. He criticized the negotiations
process as opaque.
"People talk about the city budget like it's something that
anyone can read, and negotiate, when the truth is that it is
completely opaque, and on the day of the vote, council members
still haven't even seen the budget," he said.
Other council members said they wouldn't vote in favor of a
budget that makes significant cuts to the police.
"I do not support the excessive cuts to the NYPD," Councilman
Steven Matteo, a Republican who represents parts of Staten Island,
said Tuesday on Twitter.
The mayor and the council faced increased pressure to cut the
NYPD's funding after weeks of large-scale demonstrations across the
U.S. over the killing of George Floyd, a Black man, in police
custody in Minneapolis on May 25. For more than a week, protesters
have camped outside City Hall in lower Manhattan to push for large
cuts to the police department.
Mr. de Blasio said that the budget agreement focuses on programs
to assist New Yorkers who have been struggling during the financial
crisis and "helps us to become a fairer city." But the budget deal
cuts some initiatives that helped residents, including $65 million
from Fair Fares, a program that offers half-price MetroCards to
low-income New Yorkers.
The budget deal includes $1 billion in labor savings that are
still being negotiated with unions, Mr. de Blasio said. Officials
have said the city still faces billions in lost tax revenue over
the next two years. If the city doesn't receive more help, it could
resort to up to 22,000 layoffs and furloughs in the fall, according
to the mayor.
The mayor has said he still hopes the city will receive federal
stimulus money. He had also urged state lawmakers to grant the city
the authority to borrow up to $5 billion, but his request went
nowhere.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo said Tuesday that he still wasn't eager to
authorize city officials to borrow money to close gaps in the
operating budget. The Democratic governor had been skeptical of
earlier requests by City Hall, which landed with a thud in the
state Legislature.
"I don't want to have a de facto bankruptcy where the state's
going to have to come in and bail out the debt," Mr. Cuomo said on
NY1, adding that the timeline for the city's economic recovery is
uncertain. "I focus on the paying back, as do most taxpayers."
--Jimmy Vielkind contributed to this article.
Write to Katie Honan at Katie.Honan@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
June 30, 2020 19:41 ET (23:41 GMT)
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