NEWYORK: New York city Mayor Eric Adams said that their early preparations allowed them to look at tax receipts better than we thought and we were able to really land the plane.
Giving interview on WCBS-TV’s “The Point with Marcia Kramer”, Mayor Adams said that “they had a lot of programs that were sunsetting because they were being held up with temporary stimulus dollars, with union contracts to settle, which we were able to accomplish. Then out of nowhere, 200,000 migrants and asylum seekers, over $4 billion.”
Replying to a question about the most meaningful change in this budget, Mayor Adams said that they did combination of things in the budget.
“Number one, when you look at our cultural institutions, we were able to put $58 million in our cultures, reaching out to them and they were constantly calling me. I said, listen, have faith. Listen, I love my museums. I love my culture. Let us do this. Then when you look at the $53 million that we put back in libraries. Seven days a week. Exactly. I said it often, even when I was on the show, I said, Marcia, I got to let us figure this out,” he said.
“As any parent knows, when you are managing your household, you have to make sure that you’re making the smart decision. Then the $100 million we’re putting back into the school system. When you do an analysis, we have taken the hit that, Okay, you guys are hurting the school system. There hasn’t been a mayor that has put more money over $500 million. All our pre-K, all of these programs were sunsetting. Now we have put permanent dollars and not temporary dollars,” he added.
To a question as what happens if more people apply for pre-K and pre-K than the money allows, Mayor Adams said that it has to be expanded. “I made it clear every child that wanted a seat will have access to a seat. We’re constantly shifting. This is the problem we were having. It was really challenging to communicate this to people. The previous administration had a large number of seats, but there were no children in the seats. Taxpayers were paying for seats without bodies in the seats,” he said.
“We’re realigning the program. We’re identifying exactly where the need actually is. Trust me, it takes a lot of guts and courage to say we have to do this right, because you take a lot of income and criticism. When New Yorkers look at, here you have a mayor and an administration that said we’re not wasting taxpayers’ dollars. We’re not just going to do things because it sounds good to do it. We have to get quality for the product that taxpayers are paying for,” he said.
Regarding fair fares program, Mayor Adams said that millions of dollars were being put into the fair fares. “We think it’s important that people, if you’re able to bring down the cost of your transportation, that MetroCard cost goes a long way,” he said.
He said that everyone should pay their fare unless they have extenuating circumstances. “You can go to the token booth to speak to the individual there. There were a lot of New Yorkers who got accustomed, although they had the money, they said, let other New Yorkers pay for it. We said no to that. If you have money to pay, you will pay,” he said.
He said that their goal is really working class people because the city must be affordable to them. “That’s why you’re seeing over two billion dollars we’re putting into affordable housing,” he said.
“When you do an analysis of our administration from dropping the cost of child care from $55 a week to less than $5 a week, high-speed broadband to our NYCHA residents, invested in foster care children, you see this whole package of saying, how do we make this city more affordable within our powers like the earned income tax credit? There’s a whole list of things that we’re doing,” he added.
To a question about cost of migrants, he said that if we would have sat on our hands, we would have had 200,000 people in our system where we would have to pay for it.
“I said, no, we need just as I’m asking my agencies to do efficiencies, we need to come up with initiatives will drop down that population. That’s what we did. 30 days, 60 days,” he said.
“People say, oh, this is terrible. It was not. The majority of people found their way. That’s how it is in America. That’s how it is in New York. We did it in a humane way. You don’t see people sleeping along our streets, our highways. We have been successful in dropping our population. We’re still getting over 4,000 a month. That’s a real number, he added.
He said that it’s a huge problem and the federal government should pay for this. Most importantly, we should allow people to work. What is more dignified than having a job? They want to.
“Those migrants and asylum seekers are saying to me, “Mayor, we want to work. We want to be part of the city and give back to the city and not have to sit here and depend on the city.”
