NewsChannel 13’s Dan Levy spoke with some people in Albany to find out what they thought the best action is to deal with a $55M budget deficit.<\/p>\n
ALBANY, N.Y. (WNYT)- Albany residents are reacting with concern as the city faces deep financial stress and difficult choices about how to close a major budget gap.<\/p>\n
Last week, the state comptroller\u2019s office determined Albany is the second worst most financially stressed<\/a> municipality in New York state out of more than 13,000 cities, towns and villages.<\/p>\n The options to dig out from a $55-million dollar hole<\/a> that come up more often are cutting jobs and services, furloughing police and or firefighters or other city employees and perhaps raising taxes.<\/p>\n NewsChannel 13 spoke to city residents about the dilemma and what they think the city should do about the deficit.<\/p>\n \u201cI think you start by auditing the police department\u2019s budget thoroughly,\u201d one resident said. \u201cCracking down on unnecessary overtime and just unnecessary expenditures period.\u201d<\/p>\n Another resident said they couldn\u2019t think of anyone who would want to pay more taxes in order to make up for the budget shortfall.<\/p>\n \u201cThe report reinforces the significant fiscal challenges the city was facing when my administration took office and is consistent with the State Comptroller\u2019s recent assessment of Albany\u2019s financial condition at the end of 2025,\u201d Mayor Applyrs said in a statement about the state comptroller\u2019s review of the city\u2019s 2025 and 2026 budget.<\/p>\n \u201cI am pleased that the Comptroller\u2019s recommendations, including a substantial increase in the contingency fund, reflect the careful approach we have taken in the Proposed 2027 City of Albany budget and in the improved financial management practices we now have in place,\u201d Mayor Applyrs said. \u201cThe plan I will present is a soundly balanced budget that stabilizes Albany\u2019s finances and puts us on a multi-year path to fiscal sustainability.\u201d<\/p>\n Mayor Dorcey Applyrs is scheduled to present her budget proposal<\/a> Thursday at 11 a.m. to the Albany Common Council at the Albany West Community Center. The presentation will be streamed on the city\u2019s website<\/a> and Mayor Applyrs Facebook<\/a> page.<\/p>\n NewsChannel 13 is planning on covering the mayor\u2019s budget proposal. Watch NewsChannel 13 online and on air for updates on this story.<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tFor Related Stories:\u00a0budget deficit<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0financial stress<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0NY Comptroller’s Office<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0New York<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0Albany<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NewsChannel 13’s Dan Levy spoke with some people in Albany to find out what they thought the best…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":363685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[4241,51300,110880,9,11,10,49,51,50,134995],"class_list":["post-363684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-albany","tag-budget-deficit","tag-financial-stress","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-new-york-state","tag-new-york-state-headlines","tag-new-york-state-news","tag-ny-comptrollers-office"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363684","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=363684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/363684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/363685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=363684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=363684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=363684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}