Q&A
Council Member Carr discusses financial reforms and sidewalk damage claims with Comptroller Lander
0:41:36
·
4 min
Council Member David M. Carr engages in a Q&A session with Comptroller Brad Lander, discussing potential financial structure reforms for New York City and issues related to sidewalk damage claims caused by street trees. Lander affirms the importance of maintaining fiscal responsibility measures while suggesting updates to certain practices.
- Lander emphasizes the need to continue core fiscal reforms from the Financial Emergency Act, with some updates and improvements.
- Carr raises concerns about the process for claiming reimbursement for sidewalk damage caused by street trees, suggesting a change in how the claim period is determined.
- Lander acknowledges the significance of the sidewalk damage issue and promises to look into potential changes to the claims process.
David M. Carr
0:41:36
Thank you so much.
0:41:37
Thank you so much, chair.
0:41:38
Comptrollers, great to see you, and thank you for your recent visit to CSI.
0:41:41
It's truly a gem of the CUNY system.
0:41:44
I'd like to talk a little bit about, some of the financial structure reforms you were alluding to that perhaps may become part of charter revision consideration.
0:41:54
You know, I think that the, the structure we have from the recovery from the bankruptcy of the city or near bankruptcy of the city in the seventies has been incredibly helpful to keeping the city fiscally solvent.
0:42:05
And so I just wanna know your thoughts on some of the key aspects of the system we have, namely, the balanced budget requirement, budget deadlines, the oversight of the fiscal control board.
0:42:18
Are these still things that you think are relevant today and are important in including in whatever structure may emerge moving forward?
Brad Lander
0:42:26
Yeah.
0:42:26
It's a great question, and I really agree with it.
0:42:28
You know, 50 years ago, the city faced a fiscal crisis, and out of that developed some of the best standards for fiscal responsibility of any city anywhere, not just balanced budget requirements, but by GAAP, generally accepted accounting principles.
0:42:44
We're one of the few cities to do that.
0:42:47
You know, a 4 year plan with quarterly updates.
0:42:51
So, yes, the the set of the core set of, of reforms that were adopted in the Financial Emergency Act, broadly should be continued.
0:43:01
Some of them, though, are continued currently only through bond covenants because the Financial Emergency Act expired.
0:43:09
So one example, we've got this really good feature where property tax collections go immediately into what's called the general debt service reserve that's held by the state comptroller and is used to pay our debt before it comes back to the city to pay everything else.
0:43:23
So, of course, that makes our you know, it is good for our our ratings, and our fiscal discipline, but that is not in state law.
0:43:30
That's in the the bond covenants.
0:43:32
That should be updated.
0:43:34
We've got a few other suggestions like that to make an efficiencies program regular part of the budgeting cycle, and to give you more incentives for law things that actually produce long term savings instead of just kind of one time vacancy hits.
0:43:49
I mentioned the claims update, and we'll have some more coming.
David M. Carr
0:43:52
Absolutely.
0:43:52
So I'm glad to hear that.
0:43:53
I think we're on the same page.
0:43:56
Another question I'd like to ask about some of my colleagues and I were talking to the parks commissioner on Monday about tree and sidewalk program and claims that come to your office for folks who have the money to do the repairs upfront even when the city has accepted responsibility for damage done to sidewalk by street trees.
0:44:12
And in the past, when I work for my predecessor, minority leader, Mario, what we found is the comptroller's office was denying claims because the impact of the street trees was cumulative over time as opposed to a singular incident where the 90 day clock clearly started for a claim to be made with your office.
0:44:31
And this is a problem that long predates your tenure.
0:44:33
And so I was just wondering if your thoughts on that, why can't we have a clock that begins when the city accepts responsibility for the damage as opposed to this sort of nebulous, well, the tree got damaged the sidewalk maybe a few years ago and then it drip, drip, drip over time created a unsafe condition.
0:44:50
And this would actually entitle so many New Yorkers to receive a reimbursement, at least in part, for work that the city should be doing?
Brad Lander
0:44:59
That's a good question, but I'll have to get back to you on the answer.
0:45:03
We don't have our claims experts here with us today, but I promise that we'll look into this, figure out, you know, why someone in the past had said that couldn't be done, and take another look at it and see if it's something that would be appropriate.
0:45:16
I I certainly remember from my days as a council member representing a district with a lot of street trees, what a significant issue this this can be.
0:45:25
Actually, I, you know, I remember, you know, you go door knocking, you know, and and you ask people, what's the big issue?
0:45:30
And, you know, they're looking past you at their tree, and they're like, oh, I remember the time when so, yes, it's a real issue.
0:45:37
Let me get back to you with an answer.
David M. Carr
0:45:38
Thank you, comptroller.
0:45:39
Thank you, chair.
