CSCS: Council of Senior Centers and Services of NYC, Inc.

Wall Street Journal

Friday, February 18, 2011

By MICHAEL HOWARD SAUL

Publication & Publisher: Wall Street Journal

Mayor Michael Bloomberg on Thursday proposed a $65.6 billion budget that includes hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts to social services, thousands of teacher layoffs and the shuttering of 20 fire companies.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg proposed a $65.6 billion budget on Thursday that includes millions of dollars in cuts to social services and thousands of teacher layoffs. WSJ's Michael Saul reports.

With the city benefiting from $2 billion in unanticipated tax revenue, Mr. Bloomberg recommended closing a deficit of $4.58 billion for the fiscal year beginning July 1 without raising any taxes. But the preliminary budget plan relies on the state coming forward with $600 million in additional aid.

If the state fails to cough that up, Mr. Bloomberg warned, the city will be forced to lay off additional employees and cut services further. Gov. Andrew Cuomo has said he hopes the Legislature will approve an on-time budget before the state's fiscal year begins April 1.

Even if the state does provide more money, Mr. Bloomberg's budget proposal calls for the elimination of 6,166 teaching positions, 4,666 by layoffs and 1,500 via attrition. Elsewhere in city government, the mayor plans to lay off 1,034 other employees and slash another 1,733 positions through attrition.

The city's full-time and full-time-equivalent head count now stands at 293,903, a 6% drop from a head count of 311,804 on the day before Mr. Bloomberg took office in 2002.

Advocates for children and the elderly said the cuts to social services would be devastating, hurting some of the most vulnerable New Yorkers. Due to cuts in state and federal aid, the mayor's budget plan calls for the closing of more than 100 senior centers—more than a third of such facilities in the city—and the elimination of 16,624 childcare slots and 5,500 summer youth employment slots.

The reduction in state aid would also cut $192 million in funding for people in homeless shelters who are seeking permanent housing.

While delivering his 10th preliminary budget presentation in City Hall's Blue Room, Mr. Bloomberg said he spoke with Mr. Cuomo by phone Thursday morning and he's optimistic that Albany will come through.

New York City's recovery from the recession has been "faster and stronger" than cities across the nation, the mayor said. Still, "we don't deserve to be penalized for our responsible management," he added.

Josh Vlasto, a spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, said the governor "looks forward to working with the mayor during these difficult times." When asked whether Mr Cuomo would support the call for $600 million in state aid, Mr. Vlasto declined to comment.

To prevent what the Bloomberg administration described as "catastrophic personnel losses" to the nation's largest school system, the budget proposal provides a major increase in city funds dedicated to education. To replace reductions in federal and state education aid, the city is plowing $1.86 billion in additional taxpayer funds to the Education Department.

"Nobody should for a second think," Mr. Bloomberg said, "that we are not committed to education."

In a statement, a coalition of children's advocates described the mayor's plans to cut subsidies for 16,624 children as the "biggest single cut to child care services since the 1970s....Tens of thousands of young children who need to be prepared for school will enter kindergarten behind, and stay behind."

Lilliam Barrios-Paoli, commissioner for the city's Department for the Aging, called the potential closing of more than 100 senior centers a "huge loss."

Bobbie Sackman, director of public policy at the Council of Senior Centers and Services, an advocacy group, said, "With a $2 billion increase in tax revenue, there is a light at the end of the tunnel for the city, but it is still dark for older New Yorkers."

Asked about the criticism from social-services advocates, the mayor replied, "I'm as upset about it as they are."

"But the city can not make up for every single thing," he said. "We cannot live in a world where the state or the federal government says, 'Oh, we'll just shift the burden to the city.'"

Council Member Letitia James pledged to fight to restore the cuts. "This budget cannot be balanced on the backs of low- and moderate-income people," she said. "It's totally unacceptable that the mayor cannot see and will not hear other solutions."

Mirroring his plan last year, the mayor recommended closing 20 fire companies beginning July 1. Last year, the council restored the funding for the fire companies, and the mayor suggested the council might do the same this year.

Labor leaders criticized the mayor for moving forward with layoffs and service cuts. The mayor's proposed budget assumes the state Legislature will grant the mayor's controversial proposal to eliminate a $12,000 annual pension supplement to police and fire retirees.

"From one end of this country to the other, there is a war on public employees," said Lillian Roberts, head of DC 37, the city's largest municipal union, in a statement.

The administration previously announced plans to slash the city's capital budget by 20%, but on Thursday the mayor said he decided to roll back that cut to 10%, in part because of criticism from Council Speaker Christine Quinn, a Democrat. Earlier this week, she said the mayor's proposed cuts to the capital budget would siphon jobs from the city's construction industry.

Ms. Quinn said she was pleased the mayor altered his proposal, but said, "I still believe the appropriate approach is to not cut capital at all."

Council Member James Oddo of Staten Island, the council's Republican leader, said he hopes the city doesn't lose a "sense of urgency" as a result of the $2 billion revenue windfall.

"I hope people don't think the crisis is over," he said. "Painful decisions still have to be made."