Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Tuesday outlined two options to close a $5.4 billion gap in the city\u2019s budget, warning that a 9.5% property tax increase may be necessary if his plan to raise taxes on high earners and corporations fails.<\/p>\n
The deadline for a preliminary balanced Fiscal Year 2027 budget arrived Tuesday. The proposal totals a historic $127 billion, with about 40% allocated to the Department of Education.<\/p>\n
Mamdani\u2019s preferred option is a 2% tax increase on the city\u2019s top earners and corporations to address what he describes as an \u201cimbalance\u201d between the city and the state. If that plan is unsuccessful, he said he would turn to a property tax hike and a drawdown of the city\u2019s rainy-day fund \u2014 a move opposed by some members of the City Council.<\/p>\n
\u201cI agree that this is not something that should be on the table,\u201d Mamdani said. \u201cWe are looking at every which way we can to bridge a $5.4 billion deficit.\u201d<\/p>\n
The budget gap had initially been estimated at more than $12 billion over two years. During a budget hearing in Albany last week, the mayor said the estimate dropped by $5 billion due to updated economic forecasts that included Wall Street bonuses and about $1 billion in savings from ineffective programs.<\/p>\n
\u201cNew Yorkers voted for bold change and competent leadership. We will deliver both, and we look forward to partnering with Albany to protect working New Yorkers,\u201d Mamdani said.<\/p>\n
Gov. Kathy Hochul has agreed to allocate $1.5 billion in additional funding over the next two years but maintains her opposition to raising taxes on the wealthy.<\/p>\n
\u201cAcross the State of New York, mayors are having to do what they have to do,\u201d Hochul said at an unrelated press conference Tuesday. \u201cI\u2019m not supportive of property tax increases. I don\u2019t know that that\u2019s necessary, but let\u2019s find out what is really necessary for him to close that gap.\u201d<\/p>\n
The mayor has also established a Chief Savings Officer in each city agency to identify recurring savings through efficiencies and program consolidation, including eliminating or sunsetting programs by March 20.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo rely on a property tax increase and a significant drawdown of reserves to close our gap would have dire consequences,\u201d Comptroller Mark Levine said. \u201cOur property tax system is profoundly unfair and inconsistent, and an across-the-board increase in this tax would be regressive. Drawing down reserves during a period of economic growth would leave us vulnerable to economic turbulence next year.\u201d<\/p>\n
The comptroller\u2019s office plans to release an updated analysis of the city\u2019s financial health on March 11.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Tuesday outlined two options to close a $5.4 billion gap in the city\u2019s budget,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":136568,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,7739,4337,67,1445,22925,9,24,2925,63,2780,53460,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-136567","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-brooklyn","8":"tag-brooklyn","9":"tag-brooklyn-headlines","10":"tag-brooklyn-news","11":"tag-budget","12":"tag-department-of-education","13":"tag-education","14":"tag-mamdani","15":"tag-mayor-zohran-mamdani","16":"tag-new-york","17":"tag-new-york-city","18":"tag-new-york-city-department-of-education","19":"tag-nyc","20":"tag-taxes","21":"tag-taxing","22":"tag-zohran-mamdani"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136567","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=136567"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/136567\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/136568"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=136567"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=136567"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=136567"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}