New York City leaders reach $112.4 billion budget deal
Mayor Eric Adams, here in a file photo, carried into the City Hall rotunda a model plane to show that he and the speaker “landed the plane.” Credit: AP / Peter K. Afriyie
New York City is poised to enact a $112.4 billion municipal budget for the upcoming fiscal year, Mayor Eric Adams and City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams announced Friday, capping months of acrimonious negotiations that involved mayoral threats to cut some funding for libraries, museums and other popular programs.
Ultimately, many of the cuts were reversed, although not all reductions, including to a program that provides free education to young children.
With smiles and a traditional handshake in the City Hall rotunda, the speaker and mayor, who aren’t related, announced a budget totaling about $5 billion more than the one announced in the same spot by the same two leaders a year earlier. The mayor carried into the rotunda a model plane to show that he and the speaker “landed the plane.”
“Today’s budget agreement is the result of our collective work to deliver on the priorities of New Yorkers,” the speaker said.
Under a state law passed in the 1970s, when the city almost went bankrupt due to declining revenue and out-of-control spending, the municipal budget must be finalized and passed by June 30, with the start of the 2025 fiscal year being July 1.
Months ago, the mayor warned of a dire fiscal situation for the city due to the foreign migrant crisis — now over 200,000 who have come to the city since spring 2022 — and the costs associated with providing room and board.
The speaker and other critics argued that the dire predictions were overly cautious, and over the past several months threatened cuts were progressively restored, vindicating their position.
The mayor played down bad blood between the two sides of government.
“I don’t live my life through the rearview mirror,” he said. “I live it through the front windshield. We made decisions based on the uncertainties that we were facing.”
With Jacqueline Cole
Matthew Chayes, a Newsday reporter since 2007, covers New York City.
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Newsday Live: A chat with Joan Baez Join Newsday Entertainment Writer Rafer Guzmán and Long Island LitFest for an in-depth discussion with Grammy-winning singer, songwriter and social activist Joan Baez about her new autobiographical poetry book, "When You See My Mother, Ask Her to Dance."