Pat Kiernan: After weeks of talk about where cuts might be made, Mayor Adams is scheduled to unveil his executive budget proposal this afternoon. A final budget for the city's upcoming fiscal year will have to be worked out with the City Council over the next couple of months. Mayor Adams has been sounding the alarm that the growing cost of caring for asylum seekers is going to force other city programs to make due with less. Some of those programs that are funded by the city are pushing back. There was a joint statement provided to New York 1 by the city's libraries — the Queens, Brooklyn, and New York public library systems warning — that funding cuts could mean an end to Saturday hours at some branches and could completely eliminate Sunday service.
Mayor Adams is with us this morning for an early look at what is and isn't going to be covered in this budget. Mayor Adams, thank you for joining us.
Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you so much. It's great to be here, Pat.
Kiernan: How much of a dose of fiscal reality are New Yorkers going to get when they see your budget plan this afternoon?
Mayor Adams: Well, I believe I have been completely honest with New Yorkers, not only during the current asylum seeker economic crisis, but even on the campaign trail. I stated throughout the trail — Pat, when you look at what I'm doing, it's exactly what I stated when I was running for office. I knew we were dealing with fiscal times crises coming out of the pandemic, and we told all of the agencies we had to do Programs to Eliminate the Gaps. Then we looked and reviewed and determined what money we would put back in certain areas, and one of them clearly is the libraries. When we did an analysis, we were fortunate enough to look at all the other efficiencies we did, and we were able to leave for this round of Programs to Eliminate the Gap, the libraries are harmless. We looked at our parks, we looked at FDNY, and other areas, and so, it was extremely a successful way that our commissioners came to us and stated, "Here the efficiencies and let's make sure we try to leave as many services harmless as possible."
Kiernan: So just to be clear on the library question, you're saying that those fears are not justified at this point, that they'll be able to have the funding level similar to what they've had?
Mayor Adams: Yes, that's exactly what I'm stating. That is how we did the analysis. We knew we had to first have everyone participate in a Program to Eliminate the Gap, to find the efficiencies, and then we'll sit down with the budget team and say which dollars we can return to certain locations. Because everywhere and every entity stated that they didn't want to see any form of efficiencies, but we knew we had to make these hard choices because of the 4.3 potential billion dollar issue we are facing with the economic crises of the asylum seekers issue.
Kiernan: I want to get into specifics. You said to reporters a few days ago that you prefer the term finding efficiencies to talking about cutting government programs and cutting government spending. Obviously, the goal of anybody in creating a more efficient city budget is the idea that you would find where the waste was, you would eliminate the waste, but continue to spend just as much money on the actual programs. At some point, maybe you've exhausted the idea of there was wasteful spending here and you actually have to get in to cutting programs. How do you find that line?
Mayor Adams: Well, let me give you an example. When we did an analysis of the New York City Police Department’s overtime, we looked at all of the events such as parades, and anyone who has participated in a parade will notice how many police officers they see lined the parade route. We went in and said, these are too many police officers. We should substantially cut the number of police officers, deploy them better, look at those who are assigned to the precincts where the parade is located instead of having police officers come from other location and incur overtime. Because of the successful deployment of police personnel, as an example, we saw a reduction in the overtime that came from the city's budget.
Those are the types of things we were asking all of our agencies, Department of Sanitation — garbage route. How do we pick them up? How do we get more efficiency to do so? We've noticed that when you start running the agencies in efficient way with the participation of the teams that are there and our commissioners, we're able to find those efficiencies we're looking for. Without layoffs, without cuts and services, and at the same time produce the product that New Yorkers are looking for.
Kiernan: We have mostly been talking about spending here. Is there anything on the revenue side? Is there some fee you could increase? Is there a tax increase that could help you to balance this budget, or are you mostly focused on the spending side?
Mayor Adams: Well, right now we are looking at the spending side. Every New Yorker is looking at how they're balancing the budgets of their households, so shouldn't government do the same? These are extremely challenging times, Pat. When you look at Wall Street as the economic engine of our city, there is a real downturn from the 2021 days. It just doesn't exist. It's going to impact our tax base. It's going to impact how much dollars we have available to run our city. And so it is required of us to have a balanced budget. And in the process we must make the tough choices and tough decisions without hurting New Yorkers.
The goal is not simply just to raise taxes or to do layoffs. That is going to aggravate our economy. We want to put money back in the pockets of New Yorkers, like our Earned Income Tax Credits, like paying for childcare, like ensuring that we allow foster care children to go to college and get the supports they need. When you look at our reduced fare MetroCards. So we're putting money back into the pockets of New Yorkers, and so giving them additional fees and raising taxes on them is not going to help our economy. Instead, it's going to help hurt it.
Kiernan: It was just last week that you said the Biden administration has turned its back on New York. You went to Washington on Friday. How did your conversations go there? And at this point, are you thinking that there would be any additional money for Washington that would help you with this budget, or are you assuming that you've got what you're getting?
Mayor Adams:
Well, we met with several officials, the White House chief of staff, as well as FEMA officials. There's an allocation of close to $800 million that's coming down. The first round of dollars is $300 million. We believe New York should get the entire $300 million amount, and we're looking for an additional $350 million based on the pot of money that's available. Many people come into the country through our borders, but they pass through other cities and end up in New York City. When you think about close to over 60,000 people are here seeking refuge, fleeing persecution, and fleeing conditions in their countries. This is a national problem I said over and over again and New York City should not be barring the cost of that problem. And the White House and our federal government has a responsibility.
I want to commend Senator Schumer, Congressman Jeffries for getting us in allocation through FEMA. But the reality is that the White House must do more and the Republicans must stop the failure to move forward with real true immigration reform.
Kiernan: Mayor Adams, we're wearing a series of reports on New York 1 this week about the Administration for Children’s Services, and a key concern that Annika Pergament has highlighted in those reports is that ACS is not transparent enough in a case when a child who is in the system dies. Do you think the public has a right to know more about these cases?
Mayor Adams: Well, first my heart goes out to the family members. I have one son and I know how traumatic it is if something happens to a child. And the workers in ACS, the entire city, our desire is to make sure we create an environment to raise healthy children and families. But when you look at ACS, you have to balance the rights of families and, by law, what we are restricted to turn over. We are restricted by law to turn over certain information to really protect the privacy of children and families.
And the job of an ACS worker, yes, we will be transparent as much as we can. Yes, we continue training in so many levels, including simulations, on how to make those very important calls. Are you going to remove a child from their family or do you believe that they're safe enough to stay where they are? And so ACS workers must balance both of that. And you have those who advocate that ACS remove children too quickly. You have those who advocate that ACS don't move quick enough. And so that's the balance we must show. How do you stabilize the family without traumatizing that family?
Kiernan: But I think one of the core issues here is do we take their word for it that they did the right things? Or is there a chance for you and for the public to really assess what ACS is doing? Have you communicated your expectations to the commissioner?
Mayor Adams: Over and over again. And I take my hat off to the commissioner and that team. I interact with ACS because it's such an important entity for our city. And I think that when it comes down to turning over information to the public, we are willing to do so within the restrictions of the law. We're not going to break the law. The law is very clear because the goal of the laws that were put in place, we want to protect children and families. Anything that we can turn over without violating that we are more than willing to do because transparency will give the confidence to the city that we are doing the right thing. And those employees at ACS are doing the right thing. They committed. They spend a lot of their time volunteering beyond the call of duty, and I thank them for a very difficult job of making that determination if a child is going to stay in a household or be removed from a household. That is not an easy call to make.
Kiernan: Mayor Adams, I know you've got a busy day ahead. At noon, you'll be briefing the Council members on what your hopes for the budget are. They'll no doubt have some ideas about whether they think the ideas are good ideas or bad ideas. And then at two o'clock we'll have live coverage here on New York 1 as you brief the public on what you have planned with the full budget presentation. Thanks for being with us this morning.
Mayor Adams: Thank you, Pat. Take care.
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