“We must use every dollar of our $113 billion New York City budget as a brick in the wall against whatever fresh hell Trump tries to cook up next year.”
After weeks of negotiations, the unarmed security program that was poised to end on June 30 will continue.
“New York City’s Department of Education recommends schools spend just $80.15 per student on arts education—yet school leaders can use that money for other classes and programs, often resulting in the total elimination of arts programming in a school.”
Advocates are sounding the alarm over both Gov. Hochul and Mayor Adams’ spending proposals, which failed to include several flagship programs they’ve fought for in recent years as well as reductions to programs that provide English language, literacy and citizenship classes that immigrant New Yorkers rely on.
The new budget directs $2.4 billion to homeless services in the coming fiscal year, invests billions more in housing over the next decade and funds an increase to rental assistance programs, but is nevertheless facing criticism from advocates who say the spending plan fails to adequately address New York City’s affordability and homelessness crises.
“The arts are a form of embodied play that surpasses verbal processing and allows us to explore, connect with ourselves and others, and ultimately build or rebuild the muscles of imagination when life circumstances or the experience of trauma has taken them away.”
“Even in this wealthiest of American cities, fiscal austerity is too often the implicit mantra, as core government services remain starvation diets while wealthy institutions fatten themselves. That works well for the very well-off, and not so well for the rest of us.”
After two pandemic years that wrought havoc on all education but particularly on arts classes, advocates and educators have mounted a drive to win more—and more permanent—funding for visual art, music, dance and theater in the city’s public schools.
“For far too long, New York’s leaders have focused on stemming the tide of homelessness, and then struggling to meet that low bar. Mayor Eric Adams can change this with a visionary housing and homelessness plan and a budget to match.”
ANHD’s 2022 Housing Risk Chart highlights the compounding pressures, and risks, to affordable housing in dozens of neighborhoods. Indicators of speculation, gentrification, and displacement pressure are distributed throughout the city and show the necessity of tenant and homeowner counseling and support programs that defend affordability in every neighborhood.
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