Gov. Cuomo is cruising toward his third consecutive on-time state budget, which will no doubt be cited as further evidence that a new era of fiscal responsibility has dawned in Albany. Yet the governor hasn’t turned his back on budget gimmickry. Read More
In the second year of New York State’s property tax cap, proposed school district budgets will be subject to an average tax levy limit of 4.6 percent—more than double the statutory base cap of 2 percent and well above the 3 percent average limit for school budget proposals last year, according to data from the state comptroller’s office. Read More
Be warned, New York: The next mayor will face an epic challenge in protecting you from paying a whole lot more to get a whole lot less. On Inauguration Day, Jan. 1, Michael Bloomberg’s successor will confront huge unpaid bills whose payment would require dramatically raising taxes, slashing spending, or both. Read More
Mayor Bloomberg's preliminary budget was surprisingly easy on city employees, even though personal service costs comprise more than half of the total budget. His proposed workforce reduction of 5,000 to 7,000 positions out of a total workforce of 306,000—20% higher than was previously reported—is many fewer than the number Mayor Giuliani proposed to cut in 1993 when he faced a similar budget gap. Read More
Mayor Bloomberg's proposal to raise the city’s cigarette tax to $1.50 from 8 cents per pack is expected to cut taxable consumption in half, as many more smokers quit, cut back, or turn to alternative sources out of state or on the Internet. This would undermine the financing for Governor Pataki’s health care programs, which depend partly on revenue from the state’s cigarette tax. Read More
The collective bargaining table will be the most important field of action for Mayor Bloomberg over the next 18 months. Bloomberg's tenuously balanced Executive Budget assumes little change in the size of the city workforce in the year ahead and no net wage increase for city workers in the three years after current contracts expire. If this assumption proves overly optimistic, next year's budget will be knocked out of balance, and huge projected budget gaps in subsequent years will grow by another $1 billion or more. Clearly the mayor cannot bring city finances back under control unless he wins significant concessions from municipal unions—and reduces the employee headcount in the process. Read More
Mayor Bloomberg could realize more than $1.2 billion a year in city budget savings if he can get municipal employee unions to agree to proposed labor givebacks and productivity reforms including a health insurance co-pay, a longer work day for teachers, more scheduling flexibility for cops and firefighters, and less vacation and leave time for newly hired workers. But it all starts with ‘the zero option’—a pay freeze after current contracts expire in fiscal year 2003. Read More
For all the hue and cry about the ‘cuts’ needed to close New York City’s $4.9 billion budget gap, a funny thing happened on the way to the 2003 fiscal year: the first adopted budget of the Bloomberg era does not reduce overall city spending. The nearly $800 million increase in the "city funds" portion of the budget is the key to understanding why New York City continues to face massive potential deficits for as far as the eye can see. Read More