Friday, June 10, 2022

MAYOR ADAMS, SPEAKER ADAMS REACH EARLY HANDSHAKE AGREEMENT FOR A BALANCED AND RESPONSIBLE FISCAL YEAR 2023 BUDGET

 

Budget Prioritizes Public Safety, Uplifting City’s Youth, Helping Working Families, Improving Public Spaces, Boosting Affordable Housing, and Combatting Food Insecurity

 

Sets Aside $8.3 Billion in Budget Reserves — Highest Level in City History

 

Builds on Investments Administration Secured in Albany This Session, Including Major Expansion of Earned Income Tax Credit and Historic Funding for Childcare


 New York City Mayor Eric Adams, New York City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, New York City Council Finance Chair Justin Brannan, and members of the City Council today announced an agreement for an early and balanced city budget for Fiscal Year 2023 (FY23). The budget protects the city's fiscal health by building record levels of reserves — more than $8.3 billion — and making prudent investments that support an equitable recovery and that make New York City safer, more prosperous, and a better place to live, work, and raise a family.

 

“At this critical moment for our city, this budget delivers early on the issues that matter most and makes the investments that will improve the lives of millions of our fellow New Yorkers,” said Mayor Adams. “With upstream investments to promote public safety, give young people real opportunities, provide relief for working families, improve our public spaces, boost affordable housing, combat food insecurity, and so much more, this budget promotes an equitable recovery for New Yorkers throughout the five boroughs. At the same time, we are protecting New Yorkers from the unexpected and building on the fiscally responsible approach our administration has taken throughout the budget process by increasing reserves to the highest level in city history. This is a historic agreement, and I thank Speaker Adams, Finance Chair Brannan, and our colleagues in the Council for their partnership and for ‘Getting Stuff Done’ for all New Yorkers.”

 

The agreement on the approximately $101 billion budget builds on fiscally responsible planning by the Adams administration throughout the budget process. It includes a number of new and expanded investments, including investments in low-income and immigrant childcare vouchers, as well as in adult literacy. To help keep public spaces clean, the budget adds resources for additional litter basket service, a waste containerization study, lot cleaning, and rat-resistant litter baskets. And out of a mutual commitment to parks equity, the agreement funds additional Urban Park Rangers, tree stump removal, and improvements to the city’s community gardens and forested areas.

 

The budget additionally includes an annual contract adjustment to help human and legal services providers who were on the front lines of the pandemic, relief to property owners with a property-tax rebate, and funding for the city’s Cultural Development Fund and Cultural Institutions Group.

 

The administration and City Council also partnered this year to secure first expansion of the New York City and State Earned Income Tax Credit in 20 years and $4 billion in childcare funding.

 

Given the importance of planning for the future, the administration and City Council have agreed to deepen their commitment to building reserves; boosting them to $8.3 billion  the highest level in city history. This budget adds $750 million to the Rainy-Day Fund, $750 million to the Retiree Health Benefits Trust, and $500 million to the General Reserve. There is now $1.9 billion in the Rainy-Day Fund, $4.5 billion in the Retiree Health Benefits Trust, and $1.6 billion in the General Reserve, as well as $250 million in the Capital Stabilization Reserve.

 

Separately, almost $3 billion has been added to the Labor Reserve over the financial plan in anticipation of negotiating labor agreements with the entire represented workforce. In total, the Labor Reserve has been replenished by nearly $4.7 billion over this budget cycle.

 

Driven primarily by growth in personal income taxes related to a record level of Wall Street activity, the city’s tax revenue forecast has been revised upward over the Executive Budget estimate by just under $3 billion in Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) and nearly $1.5 billion in FY23. These revenues allowed the city to increase reserves to a record level and reduce the FY23 budget gap by prepaying expenses.

 

Outyear gaps are manageable, and the budget reflects almost $300 million in savings over FY22 and FY23, bringing total savings achieved by this administration over those years to more than $2.7 billion and $4 billion in financial plan outyears. Additionally, the budget reflects more than $250 million in pension savings in FY23.

 

Highlights of this year’s budget include:

 

Public Safety is a Prerequisite to Prosperity

  • Resources for the Subway Safety Plan, including funds to expand the Behavioral Health Emergency Assistance Response Division (B-HEARD) initiative, and the addition of 1,400 new Safe Haven and stabilization beds by mid-2023 ($226 million in FY23).
  • Expansion of the Precision Employment Initiative to connect as many as 3,000 individuals at risk of participating in gun violence with green jobs ($54 million in FY23).
  • Resources for New York City Department of Correction dyslexia screenings ($1.5 million in FY23).

 

Supporting Human and Legal Services Providers

  • Baseline contract adjustment for human and legal services providers who were on the front lines of the pandemic ($60 million).
  • Increase access to benefits for New Yorkers in need by expanding capacity of community-based organizations ($14 million in FY23).

 

Improving Education and Expanding Career Pathways for Young New Yorkers

 

Boosting Working Families

 

Supporting Cultural Institutions

  • Add resources for the city’s Cultural Development Fund and Cultural Institutions Group ($40 million in FY23).

 

Providing Clean and Safe Public Spaces

 

Investing in Affordable Housing

  • Support for the New York City Housing Authority and the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development affordable housing programs ($5 billion in capital funds, bringing the city’s investment in affordable housing to a record $22 billion).

 

Fighting Food Insecurity and Improving Nutrition

  • Increase funding for Emergency Food Assistance Program ($30 million in FY23, for a total investment of $53 million).
  • Launch the Groceries to Go pilot program to provide New Yorkers living with food insecurity with access to an online marketplace for local grocery stores ($10 million in FY23).

Governor Hochul Updates New Yorkers on State's Progress Combating COVID-19 - JUNE 9, 2022

 Clinical specimen testing for Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) at Wadsworth Laboratory

Governor Encourages New Yorkers to Keep Using the Tools to Protect Against and Treat COVID-19: Vaccines, Boosters, Testing, and Treatment 

16 Statewide Deaths Reported Yesterday


 Governor Kathy Hochul today updated New Yorkers on the state's progress combating COVID-19.

"It is important we remain vigilant and keep using the tools at our disposal to protect ourselves and our communities," Governor Hochul said. "If you haven't, get vaccinated and boosted when eligible. Make sure to get tested if you are experiencing symptoms, and stay home if you're not feeling well. If you do test positive, talk to your doctor about available treatments."

Today's data is summarized briefly below:    

  • Cases Per 100k - 32.53
  • 7-Day Average Cases Per 100k - 31.93
  • Test Results Reported - 122,584
  • Total Positive - 6,357
  • Percent Positive - 4.84%**
  • 7-Day Average Percent Positive - 5.49**
  • Patient Hospitalization -  2,021 (-51)
  • Patients Newly Admitted - 327
  • Patients in ICU - 202 (+7)
  • Patients in ICU with Intubation - 74 (+3)   
  • Total Discharges - 310,380 (+353)
  • New deaths reported by healthcare facilities through HERDS - 16
  • Total deaths reported by healthcare facilities through HERDS - 56,272

** Due to the test reporting policy change by the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and several other factors, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data -- not percent positivity.   

The Health Electronic Response Data System is a NYS DOH data source that collects confirmed daily death data as reported by hospitals, nursing homes and adult care facilities only.     

Important Note: Effective Monday, April 4, the federal Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is no longer requiring testing facilities that use COVID-19 rapid antigen tests to report negative results. As a result, New York State's percent positive metric will be computed using only lab-reported PCR results. Positive antigen tests will still be reported to New York State and reporting of new daily cases and cases per 100k will continue to include both PCR and antigen tests. Due to this change and other factors, including changes in testing practices, the most reliable metric to measure virus impact on a community is the case per 100,000 data -- not percent positivity.   

  •  Total deaths reported to and compiled by the CDC - 71,670       

This daily COVID-19 provisional death certificate data reported by NYS DOH and NYC to the CDC includes those who died in any location, including hospitals, nursing homes, adult care facilities, at home, in hospice and other settings.          

  • Total vaccine doses administered - 39,043,974
  • Total vaccine doses administered over past 24 hours - 21,246
  • Total vaccine doses administered over past 7 days - 87,007
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with at least one vaccine dose - 92.6%  
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with completed vaccine series - 84.1% 
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) - 95.0%   
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 18 and older with completed vaccine series (CDC) - 87.5%   
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 12-17 with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) - 83.8%
  • Percent of New Yorkers ages 12-17 with completed vaccine series (CDC) - 73.7%   
  • Percent of all New Yorkers with at least one vaccine dose - 82.2%   
  • Percent of all New Yorkers with completed vaccine series - 74.5%   
  • Percent of all New Yorkers with at least one vaccine dose (CDC) - 90.7%   
  • Percent of all New Yorkers with completed vaccine series (CDC) - 77.5%         
Each New York City borough's 7-day average percentage of positive test results reported over the last three days is as follows **:       

Borough  

Monday, June 6, 2022 

Tuesday, June 7, 2022 

Wednesday, June 8, 2022 

Bronx 

3.70% 

3.55% 

3.65% 

Kings 

4.63% 

4.25% 

4.25% 

New York 

5.91% 

6.26% 

6.07% 

Queens 

5.57% 

5.50% 

5.52% 

Richmond 

5.71% 

5.15% 

5.38% 

VCJC News & Notes 6/10/22

 

Van Cortlandt Jewish Center

News and Notes


Here's this week's edition of the VCJC News and Notes email. We hope you enjoy it and find it useful!

Reminders

  1. Shabbos

    Shabbos information is, as always, available on our website, both in the information sidebar and the events calendar.
    Here are the times you need:  
    Shabbos Candles Friday 6/10/22 @ 8:08 pm
    Shabbos morning services at 8:45 am.  Please join the services if you can do so safely. 
    Shabbos Ends Saturday 6/11/22 @ 9:12 pm
     
  2. Sunday 6/12/22
    Sisterhood meeting at 10:30 am in the game room.
     
  3. Yizkor
    It's not too late to make a Yizkor donation for the Yizkor that was observed on 6/6/22. 
    It is customary to make a charitable donation in conjunction with Yizkor.  If you wish to donate to VCJC as part of your Yizkor observance, it can be done in person at the office or online through our website