Back in January, just weeks into his administration, Mamdani told New Yorkers the city was caught in a massive budget hole of $12 billion. He blamed the former Adams administration for underbudgeting in previous years and suggested that there were just two ways out of the hole: Finding savings, and raising taxes on the wealthy.<\/p>\n
On the savings front, he got to work and directed agencies to trim the fat, appointing \u201cchief savings officers\u201d in each city agency to identify areas that could be cut. Within weeks, Mamdani reported several reductions in the budget deficit; by the time he announced his preliminary budget on Feb. 17, the gap was down to $5.4 billion.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But in that same announcement, Mamdani insisted that the rest would need to be paid for with tax hikes \u2014 either through higher taxes on the rich with Albany\u2019s approval, or through a 9.5% property tax increase on every New York City property owner. Almost immediately, Gov. Kathy Hochul and City Council Speaker Julie Menin channeled their inner President George H.W. Bush and effectively told him, \u201cRead our lips, no new taxes.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, Mamdani stuck to his guns and kept pushing for property tax hikes as a \u201clast resort\u201d if Albany didn\u2019t \u201ctax the rich.\u201d Hochul acquiesced, but only slightly, in approving the pied-a-terre tax on the uber-wealthy for second homes in New York City worth more than $5 million. But a broader, more damaging tax increase on the wealthy or corporations was avoided.<\/p>\n
Instead, Hochul \u2014 in her re-election year \u2014 figured out another way to address New York City\u2019s budget crunch, and in the process showed Mamdani how to get things done as a common-sense executive.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the governor delivered another $8 billion in aid to the city over the next two years through a combination of pension fund restructuring and an easing of state spending mandates, including tweaking the class-size mandate that would have forced the city to invest millions at a time when it didn\u2019t have the money. That, combined with other cost savings that the City Council identified in its preliminary budget, effectively closed the city\u2019s deficit.<\/p>\n
It also ended Mamdani\u2019s pursuit of significant tax increases on anyone, at least for now.\n<\/p>\n
New Yorkers should feel encouraged today that common sense prevailed in this crisis, and that Mamdani eventually embraced the guidance both Hochul and Menin gave him. This is not the time for reckless spending or taxation \u2014 not with inflation out of control, skyrocketing energy prices and a two-tiered economy teetering on the brink of recession.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Working together, the mayor, governor and speaker got the job done for New York City \u2014 achieving fiscal balance without adding to the taxpayers\u2019 burden or gutting essential services. Common sense, the best sense, prevailed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back in January, just weeks into his administration, Mamdani told New Yorkers the city was caught in a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229827,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[34327,16842,90230,4736,58405,19077,426,58809,9,47790,56,63,81643,65,64,90231,90232,89890,42101,82],"class_list":["post-229826","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-budget-cuts","tag-city-governance","tag-cost-savings","tag-economic-policy","tag-fiscal-policy","tag-julie-menin","tag-kathy-hochul","tag-municipal-finance","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city-budget","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-deficit","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-pension-restructuring","tag-property-tax-debate","tag-state-aid","tag-tax-the-rich","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229826","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=229826"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229826\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229826"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229826"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229826"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}