NYC Magazine » budget cuts

Paterson Withholds Aid After Senate Plays Politics With Budget

Igor Derysh — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 18:13:44 +0000

After consistently pleading with the state legislature, particularly the state senate, to cut the New York State budget by $3.2 billion to prevent an economic collapse, Governor David Paterson has taken matters into his own hands and is now withholding 10% of the aid due to government agencies and schools.

Here’s a quick rundown of what’s been going on:

Seeing the state’s deficit rise to well over $3 billion, Governor David Paterson asked the state legislature to cut the budget by $3.2 billion to prevent the same type of economic collapse that happened in California from happening ...continue reading

MTA Gets Budget Cut, Won’t Raise Fares Till 2011

Igor Derysh — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 18:08:50 +0000

As the state cuts the budget for every state agency (except the legislature, of course), the fiscally irresponsible MTA will have $140 million less to waste next year.

The agency got its budget slashed by $140 million under the state deficit reduction plan in the legislature, $30 million more than they had expected. Despite the cuts, MTA head Jay Walder has said that he wont raise fares this year and wait until 2011 when the fare is scheduled to go up by another 7.5 percent.

Instead, the MTA is expected to cut services and continuing to ...continue reading

State Anti-Smoking Budget Slashed

Igor Derysh — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 23:00:59 +0000

As Albany begins to nitpick what parts of the budget will be cut, Governor David Paterson is on the verge of cutting funding for a program that he has pioneered more than any other governor in the country, New York’s anti-smoking campaign.

Ever since Paterson came into office, he and New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg have gone after smokers with a vengeance, both through taxes and through advertising.

Ironically, while the Governor’s campaign has been somewhat controversial, the $10 million cut in funding will affect the widely supported state program that provides free nicotine patches and helps ...continue reading

Paterson to Make Emergency Cuts

Igor Derysh — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 00:39:17 +0000

The state legislature has dragged its feet on budget cuts for more than a month and a half, despite the fact that New York is facing a complete economic collapse. Earlier this week, Governor David Paterson took matters into his own hands, going ahead with a plan that would allow him to make $1.6 billion in budget cuts and absorb any fallout by himself.

Seeing that Albany officials were much more worried about their jobs than fiscal responsibility, Paterson began to push for a plan that some have deemed truly courageous while others labeled as political suicide for ...continue reading

Budget Cuts Cause Even Bigger Classrooms in NYC Schools

Yelena Mandenberg — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 23:42:24 +0000

While all class sizes rose this year, high school students and kindergartners are particularly feeling the increase in class size.

Supposedly, in 2008, the average size of an English class was 24.7 students, although most high schools have at least 30 students in each class. The average number is up to 26.4 this year, according to preliminary figures from the Department of Education. The number of students in high school science classes has also risen from 26.1 to 27.4.

There was also a spike in enrollment in kindergarten classes, by about 5 percent, which is contributing to the increase in class size. In ...continue reading

Budget Battle Continues in Albany

Igor Derysh — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 21:58:19 +0000

While Governor David Paterson has been pushing the legislature to cut the state budget by $3.2 billion, top Democrats have been reluctant to make the tough cuts to education and hospitals, opting to push for bigger debt in order to keep their jobs.

While the State Assembly is on board, the State Senate, particularly the Carl Krueger-led finance committee, has been reluctant to make tough, unpopular, but seemingly necessary decisions.

In response to the stalling by the Senate, Paterson has proposed an emergency bill that would allow him to make the necessary cuts, and thus taking the ...continue reading

Bloomberg Budget Move Means Layoffs

Igor Derysh — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 22:00:08 +0000

While Mayor Mike Bloomberg is saying that he doesn’t want to layoff any city workers in order to get the city out of its economic funk, his office’s recent budget maneuvering has made layoffs all but certain.

Bloomberg had planned to layoff more than 20,000 workers earlier this year but the Obama stimulus package helped save those jobs. Not a year later, City Hall is moving back to original plan while New York City continues to see its unemployment rate grow. In Brooklyn, the unemployment rate is already a whole percent higher than the national rate.

According ...continue reading

Bloomberg Wants Even More Budget Cuts

Igor Derysh — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:00:26 +0000

While New York Governor David Paterson tries to convince the state legislature to cut $3.2 billion from the state budget, New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg wants to cut an additional $1.7 billion from the city budget.

Mayor Mike has said that he wants to cut $500 million from this years budget and $1.2 from next year’s.

His plan would involve cutting 1.5% of the education budget, 2% from the “uniformed services” (i.e. cops, firefighters), and 4% from everything else this year.

Next year, the education system would have its budget cut by an additional 4%, ...continue reading

Paterson, Senate Debate Budget Cuts

Igor Derysh — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 14:00:30 +0000

Despite New York State’s growing $3 billion deficit, state senate leaders did not respond to Governor David Paterson’s speech to a joint session of the legislature as he would have liked.

As New York faces an economic collapse similar to the one in California, state legislators are doing what they have always done, avoiding any unpopular yet necessary actions that could threaten their jobs, while the Governor avoids pushing too much and is all too willing to compromise.

New Yorkers have come to expect the state legislature to avoid any unpopular actions but many are starting to ...continue reading

Brooklyn Unemployment Rate Higher Than National

Igor Derysh — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 23:58:53 +0000

Many people were dismayed to see the national unemployment rate rise above 10 percent for the first time in three decades but that rate is even higher in Brooklyn where 125,000 people are out of work.

The Department of Labor announced earlier this month that the federal unemployment rate has hit 10.2%, the highest that it has been in more than 25 years. Later, the Labor Department also disclosed that the unemployment rate in Brooklyn had hit 11 percent.

This was not promising news for Brooklynites seeing as how every expert has predicted that the unemployment rate will rise even higher before the ...continue reading