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Brannan criticizes budget management and transparency issues
0:07:50
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Council Member Justin Brannan criticizes the Adams administration's approach to budget management and transparency. He accuses the administration of framing fiscal choices as inevitabilities rather than policy decisions and creating manufactured crises that erode public trust.
- Brannan points out inconsistencies in budget cuts and spending, such as the ballooning NYPD overtime budget while other services face cuts
- He highlights issues with collecting fines and fees, excessive spending on consultants, and delayed payments to nonprofit organizations
- Brannan characterizes these patterns as mismanagement rather than fiscal discipline
Justin Brannan
0:07:50
But we're not here today just to discuss numbers on a spreadsheet.
0:07:53
We're here to hold this administration accountable for its budget decisions.
0:07:57
And make no mistake, budgets are about priorities and those priorities are a choice.
0:08:02
Indeed, the Adams administration has too often framed fiscal choices as inevitabilities rather than policy decisions.
0:08:09
The cuts we're we are seeing, whether to three k, libraries, parks, cultural institutions, or mental health services, are not mandatory.
0:08:17
They are policy choices, choices that this council and we believe most New Yorkers do not agree with.
0:08:22
This administration has leaned heavily on doom and gloom rhetoric when talking about the city's finances, claiming that cuts are necessary while refusing to engage in real transparency about where the money is and where the money is going.
0:08:35
Just last year, we saw the administration announce major budget cuts only to later magically find billions of dollars that were never actually missing to reserve reverse some of the harmful cuts made just months prior.
0:08:47
These types of manufactured crises erode public trust and put working families on edge, people who rely on the very services this administration keeps trying to cut.
0:08:58
The NYPD's overtime budget has ballooned past $1,000,000,000 while schools, libraries, and essential services are forced to make do with less every year.
0:09:08
The administration continues to fail on collecting hundreds of millions in fines and fees owed to the city with no plan that we're aware of to make this right.
0:09:17
The administration continues to spend record amounts on outside and obvious dubious consultants while underfunding city agencies that actually do the work and desperately need the funds.
0:09:27
At the same time, nonprofit organizations that provide essential services like housing assistance, food programs, and mental health care are still waiting to be paid back for work that they've already done.
0:09:39
Our nonprofit organizations step up when the city needs the most, but instead of being paid on time, they're often left chasing down funding that was already allocated to them.
0:09:48
It's a broken system, one where politically connected vendors and consultants get their money quickly while the nonprofits actually doing the work for our communities are left struggling to make payroll.
0:10:00
This pattern is not one of fiscal discipline but of mismanagement.
0:10:03
It's a false choice of fake austerity and New Yorkers are tired of it.