New York City Hall
What to watch for this week in New York politics:
This week begins with continued focus on Governor Andrew Cuomo’s recently-unveiled 2020 State of the State policy agenda, anticipation of Cuomo’s executive budget plan that’s due by January 21, and the ongoing debate over reforming the state’s bail reform laws passed last year.
The City Council has its first busy week of hearings this year, and the state Legislature is in session on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday in Albany.
There’s also plenty of politics this week: candidates for office in New York City, mostly for the 2021 election cycle, will have to file their latest fundraising and spending disclosures with the Campaign Finance Board by Wednesday night. The board quickly makes those filings publicly available. Particularly of note will of course be the latest numbers from the declared and expected mayoral candidates, as well as those from candidates for city comptroller, the borough president posts, and City Council offices that will be "open" due to term limits.
Meanwhile, in Brooklyn, Democratic Party leader Frank Seddio is stepping down from the post, according to the Brooklyn Paper, which will make for a likely quick and interesting contest to replace him. There’s also another Democratic presidential primary debate this week, on Tuesday night.
The week will also see two of the city officials with the most responsibility -- schools Chancellor Richard Carranza and NYCHA CEO Gregory Russ -- give public speeches. See details of those events and others in our day-by-day rundown below.
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The run of the week in detail:
Monday, January 13
Mayor de Blasio begins his week with one public event: his weekly appearance on NY1’s Inside City Hall.
Governor Cuomo has one public event Monday: he'll make an announcement at 11 a.m. in Airmont.
The New York State Board of Regents will meet on Monday and Tuesday in Albany.
On Monday morning, Teens Take Charge members and allies will hold a walkout and “strike for integration” of city schools, outside Brooklyn Borough Hall. At 8:15 a.m., Public Advocate Jumaane Williams “will join Brooklyn students walking out in protest for equitable resources, opportunities, and diversity in New York City schools.”
Comptroller Scott Stringer is delivering keynote remarks at a Monday forum hosted by Center for an Urban Future focused on expanding and improving services for older adults in New York City. The conference will also feature City Council Members Margaret Chin and Adrienne Adams, among others.
At 9:30 a.m. Monday, Public Advocate Jumaane Williams will tour “Mobile Low-Dose CT Unit Providing Free Lung Cancer Scans” at “the Center for Early Detection (CEDC) mobile unit providing lung cancer screenings to underserved communities” in Brooklyn.
At the City Council on Monday:
--At 10 a.m. the Committee on Oversight and Investigations will hold an oversight hearing on “Strengthening Whistleblower Protections” and hear a bill, sponsored by committee Chair Ritchie Torres, that would “expand whistleblower protections for individuals facing adverse personnel action as a result of cooperating with a Council oversight or legislative matter,” among other changes.
--At 10 a.m., the Committee on Housing and Buildings will hold a hearing on two bills, including to make “Modifications to the Department of Housing Preservation and Development housing portal and another “Excluding cooperatives from the housing portal.”
Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul will deliver two State of the State presentations on Monday: at 11 a.m. at the Equal Rights Heritage Center in Auburn and at 2:30 p.m. at SUNY Schenectady Community College.
At 11 a.m. Monday at Bowling Green, “The grassroots Riders Alliance together with 'Build Trust' coalition partners TransitCenter, Tri-State Transportation Campaign, and Reinvent Albany will reveal a new analysis of MTA alert data showing that subway signal problems delayed trains during 78% -- nearly four of every five -- weekday morning commutes in 2019. The news comes at the official conclusion of the emergency Subway Action Plan and outset of the 2020 - 2024 MTA Capital Program. Advocates will call on Governor Cuomo and the MTA to release the timetable for signal upgrades promised to legislators last fall in the run-up to the approval of the agency's largest-ever capital plan.”
At 1 p.m. Monday at Atlantic Terminal in Brooklyn, “Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and advocates will join LIRR President Phil Eng to introduce a new, private ADA-Accessible space available for nursing moms who travel through LIRR’s Atlantic Terminal.”
At 1:15 p.m. Monday, city schools “Chancellor Carranza will attend the NYC Teaching Collaborative (NYCTC) Welcoming Event and deliver brief remarks.” “In the evening, he will attend a town hall meeting of District 27’s Community Education Council” at Goldie Maple Academy in Queens.
At 6 p.m. Monday, Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer will swear in new members of the West Side Urban Renewal (WSUR) Brownstones board.
At 6:45 p.m., Comptroller Scott Stringer will attend the Korean American Association of Greater New York 60th Korean American Night Gala.
Tuesday, January 14
At 8 a.m. Tuesday, Crain’s New York Business will host a breakfast forum with Gregory Russ, Chair and CEO of NYCHA.
At 9:30 a.m. Tuesday in Albany, the Assembly Standing Committee on Real Property Taxation will hold a public hearing on “real property taxation budget implementation,” particularly “To discuss changes in the 2019-2020 New York State Budget regarding the STAR Program.”
At the City Council on Tuesday:
--At 10 a.m., the Committee on Youth Services will hold an oversight hearing on “Afterschool Programming (COMPASS and SONYC)” and related bills to mandate creation of a “Universal after school program plan” and new reporting requirements on afterschool programs.
--At 10 a.m., the Subcommittee on Zoning and Franchises will meet.
--At 1 p.m., the Committee on Contracts will hold an oversight hearing on local food procurement.
--At 1 p.m., the Subcommittee on Landmarks, Public Sitings and Dispositions will hold a hearing.
At 1 p.m. Tuesday in Albany, the State Board of Elections will meet for “Public testing of the ES&S ExpressVote XL voting system tool, a component of the State Board’s voting system certification program.”
Wednesday, January 15
At the City Council on Wednesday, the Committee on Public Housing will hold an oversight hearing on NYCHA’s winter preparedness.
On Wednesday at 11 a.m. at the Queens Public Library in Flushing, "the de Blasio Administration will celebrate five successful years of the IDNYC program by holding a press conference to announce a historic addition to the card to increase accessibility and new national, regional, and local benefit partners. The program recently launched its #RenewYourIDNYC campaign. New Yorkers whose IDNYC is expiring in less than 60 days, or whose card has been expired for less than 6 months, are able to apply to renew their IDNYC through an online portal or in person at an Enrollment Center."
This week’s Max & Murphy show will air on WBAI radio, at 99.5FM or wbai.org, from 5 to 6 p.m. Wednesday.
On Wednesday at 6:30 p.m. at Brooklyn Historical Society, “Gentrification 2.0: The Good, the Bad, and the Blurry,” with “Matthew Schuerman, author of Newcomers: Gentrification and Its Discontents; Kay Hymowitz, Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and author of The New Brooklyn: What It Takes to Bring a City Back; and James Rodriguez, professor of history at Guttman and contributor to the book Racial Inequality in New York City Since 1965, for a balanced examination of a heated topic. Moderated by Jarrett Murphy, executive editor of City Limits.”
Thursday, January 16
At noon Thursday, the State Board of Elections will meet in Albany.
On Thursday at 6:30 p.m., Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer is hosting “Trash Talk,” a discussion for participants to “learn more about innovative sustainability projects in Manhattan and across the city to help New York reach its "Zero Waste to Landfill" goal by 2030. Each presenter will speak for 5 minutes on their project. The event will also include networking time for New Yorkers passionate about sustainability to meet and spark ideas with one another.” Speakers will include: Diana Blackwell, President of Frederick Samuel Houses Resident Association; Matthew Civello, Chair, Manhattan Solid Waste Advisory Board; Melissa Iachan, Senior Staff Attorney, Environmental Justice Program at New York Lawyers for Public Interest (NYLPI); Mark Prehn, Food Justice Coordinator, Hell's Kitchen Farm Project; Martin Robertson, Facilities Manager, Strivers Gardens and President of HHM Consulting; Nelson Villarrubia, Executive Director, Trees New York; NYC Department of Sanitation (invited).”
Friday, January 17, and the weekend
At 8:15 a.m. Friday, the Center for New York Law and New York Law School will jointly host a CityLaw Breakfast with Richard Carranza, Chancellor, Department of Education.
Mayor de Blasio may make his weekly appearance on WNYC’s The Brian Lehrer Show on Friday at 10 a.m.
Saturday will be the annual Women's March in New York City and elsewhere around the country.
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by Ben Max
@GothamGazette
(photo: Ed Reed/Mayoral Photo Office)
As Mayor Bill de Blasio enters his seventh year in office, on the heels of a failed presidential bid and at a time when his political clout appears at its nadir, he faces many major challenges and big decisions ahead.
2020, the next-to-last year of his second and final term, begins with a focus on public safety, including recent spikes in anti-Semitic hate crimes, murders, and byciclist fatalities, as well as how the city is adjusting to new state-mandated bail reforms that the mayor has criticized.
Then there are the intractable issues, such as homelessness, public housing, and school segregation, which continue to confront the mayor. There are issues that emerge every year during budget season, some predictably and others not, including how the state will treat the city, whether city spending can continue to rise as it has each year under de Blasio, and whether the city is prepared for the inevitable recession.
And then there are the more dormant issues coming to life or the surprises: Will de Blasio finally be forced to act on property tax reform? Will his jails plan advance on schedule? Who will he endorse in the Democratic presidential primary? Can he make more of his own good fortune by shifting course on any of his self-defeating habits or by becoming more creative and aggressive on certain challenges?
The mayor has two years to answer many crucial questions, determine where he will expend what political capital he has, and shape his legacy. While he will undoubtedly be known for his expansion of early childhood education, other elements of de Blasio’s legacy remain up in the air. He has shown some indications of attempted course-correction over the last few months after he abandoned his four-month bid for the presidency, the culmination, but perhaps not final chapter, in his yearslong quest for national prominence, largely at the cost of his work and image at home. Two key questions de Blasio will have to answer in 2020 are whom he will endorse in the Democratic presidential primary, likely Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren, and how much of a role he will try to play in the national conversation.
With six years down and two to go, de Blasio’s mayoralty has already been the subject of a great deal of scrutiny, including his own consistent attempts to dispute how many portray his shortcomings and accomplishments. One of the essential questions for de Blasio in 2020 is whether he can significantly alter the larger narrative about him and his leadership, and shift how so many New Yorkers see him. He enters the year with his most recent approval rating of 25% among New York City voters, according to a Siena College poll, the lowest of his tenure as mayor.
But underlying those broader, big-picture questions are the details, and the many specific challenges and decisions de Blasio faces. While many New Yorkers are awaiting his plans on a variety of fronts -- from school desegregation to property taxes and more -- and are hoping for more progress on crises like homelessness and public housing conditions, de Blasio has an array of strengths and weaknesses, advantages and vulnerabilities as his seventh year as mayor begins.
The city’s economy is still growing, poverty has declined, jobs are at an all-time high, and unemployment is low. Most major crimes are at or near historic lows, even as arrests and summonses have massively decreased; the number of complaints of misconduct against police officers is relatively flat over four years, while the mayor’s many critics assail him as too soft on crime or a weak reformer of the police department.
De Blasio’s universal pre-kindergarten program has been broadly welcomed as a success, with its expansion to “3-K” in the works. His affordable housing and street safety programs have shown progress, though remain the subjects of intense debates over their scope. De Blasio must also implement a wide variety of more recent announcements, promises, and laws, including the closure of Rikers Island jails and development of revenue-generating housing on public housing authority land.
These and many more policies and programs, challenges and relationships, form the backdrop for the mayor’s 2020, which may very well be the last year for him to announce any new ideas that he has any hope to implement. As he hits the second half of his second term, the race to replace him will begin to intensify, with most if not all the candidates pitching themselves as a break from de Blasio in various ways.
But in his lame duck months, however many they may be, de Blasio could find new opportunities to work with City Council members seeking to burnish their resumes as they run for higher offices, including the Speaker, Corey Johnson, who has his eye on the mayoralty. And as always, de Blasio will be navigating his complicated relationship with Governor Andrew Cuomo, beginning with what may be one of their most contentious budget seasons of their overlapping tenures.
Budgeting and Property Taxes
As the new year begins, the next budget season follows. The city’s budget has rapidly expanded under de Blasio, with projected spending hitting $94.3 billion for the current fiscal year which ends June 30, 2020, according to the latest budget modification released in November. That’s a whopping $21.6 billion more than the last budget modification under Mayor Michael Bloomberg, shortly before de Blasio took office.
The city’s Office of Management and Budget predicts that spending will break the $100 billion mark within the next two fiscal years, a number that has fiscal watchdogs worried since savings and reserves haven’t increased at the same rate.
The good news is that economic growth the city has seen for years is expected to continue, albeit perhaps at a slower pace, though fears of a recession have not entirely been eliminated. There are some signs of slowing – the growth of the national economy has fallen but the city’s economic growth experienced a slight uptick in the first nine months of 2019 compared to 2018, according to a December 13 report by Comptroller Scott Stringer. The report predicts that the city will have a modest surplus by the end of the current fiscal year (June 30) and that gaps in outyears will be smaller and manageable.
“We're six years into an administration and there hasn't ever really been a big push to reexamine how government is doing things and making sure it's doing it in the most efficient, effective way possible,” said Maria Doulis, vice president at Citizens Budget Commission, a nonprofit fiscal watchdog, noting that the City Council has been more focused on finding savings than the mayor. De Blasio has begrudgingly instituted certain budget savings programs and the results, according to watchdogs, have been more appearance than reality, and certainly more limited than those watchdogs would like.
At the same time as the Council has called for more savings, it has also pushed the mayor to provide more funding for its priorities, sometimes in the hundreds of millions, and has been effective in baselining several programs that will continue to be funded. The mayor will have to contend with that as well as any attempts by the governor to shift costs to the city, as he has done in the past.
Doulis also noted the “real risks” to the city budget from rising costs at three major entities – the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), NYC Health+Hospitals, which are city-run and supported by a mix of funding, and the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA), which is effectively state-run, but with some city say via board seats, and receives city funding.
De Blasio’s 2020 approach to the next city budget will be closely scrutinized as it becomes more clear what type of fiscal shape he will leave the city in when his tenure ends. The city’s budget, due by July 1, will also again be significantly shaped by the state budget, due by April 1, and it will soon become clear what de Blasio asks of the state in its budget and legislative processes, as well as how he will react to Governor Cuomo’s annual executive budget proposal and how it treats the city.
As has been the case in the past, some years more than others, de Blasio may have to marshal support among members of the state Legislature to push back on certain aspects of Cuomo’s plan.
Another issue that will have a major impact on the city budget, though not in 2020, and need collaboration in Albany is a potential push for property tax reform, which the mayor has promised for years.
A commission created in 2018 by the mayor and Speaker Johnson has yet to issue its initial report, well past a promised deadline, while a lawsuit over alleged inequities in the system is making its way through the courts. Developments from either could force the mayor’s hand in 2020, when he has promised action. De Blasio has said that he will evaluate the commission’s recommendations and come up with his own agenda, including a 2020 push for needed state reforms, though that timeline has been seriously threatened by the commission’s delay.
De Blasio has vowed that any changes to the antiquated and unequal property tax system will have to be revenue neutral for the city, which relies on property taxes for tens of billions of dollars annually to fund the city budget.
“I think what happens with property tax reform will be important and something that the mayor and the Council speaker should really march ahead on,” Doulis said.
[Read: City's Property Tax Reform Delay Threatens Promise to Pursue Essential Changes in Albany]
Homelessness, Housing, and NYCHA
Homelessness continues to be an issue where the mayor has shown too little progress, despite a variety of significant new programs, a great deal of spending, multiple resets in approach, and adjustments to the city’s housing plan to build more rent-restricted units across the city and reduce the cost of housing.
De Blasio has run into a number of obstacles as he’s sought to implement aspects of his housing policies, including local opposition to neighborhood rezonings and the placement of homeless shelters. The administration has passed a smaller number of neighborhood plans than it had hoped at this point, and the Inwood rezoning approved by the City Council last year was struck down by a judge just before the new year. Its fate, subject to legal appeal, is up in the air.
There are several rezonings left to accomplish and the city will have to make a concerted effort to move them across the finish line. Which ones de Blasio prioritizes and how effective the administration is at completing them are key questions for the year ahead. The list includes planned rezonings in Gowanus and Bushwick in Brooklyn, Southern Boulevard in the Bronx, and SoHo/NoHo in Manhattan, each at a different stage of the process. There is little time left for de Blasio to announce any new swaths of the city he may want to rezone before his time in office is up.
The administration is also hoping to advance a major redevelopment plan at Sunnyside Yards in Queens, the next iteration of which is expected to be released by the end of 2020. Some of the same elected officials who criticized the proposed Amazon satellite campus (a de Blasio-backed deal that came undone in shocking fashion, with some saying the mayor failed to aggressively sell its virtues and placate criticism) are apprehensive about how the city will approach this project.
In April, when he appointed Vicki Been as the new Deputy Mayor for Housing and Economic Development to replace Alicia Glen, the mayor promised she would oversee another adjustment to his 300,000-unit affordable housing plan. Like property tax reform plans, it has yet to materialize.
There have been several recent developments that fit into the larger housing and homelessness plans, which some advocates say should be more completely integrated, along with public housing and the NYCHA rescue efforts.
On December 17, the mayor announced a new five-year plan to end chronic street homelessness that includes opening 1,000 new “safe haven” beds, converting 1,000 privately-owned housing units into new permanent housing for those leaving homelessness, expanded outreach, health care, and rental subsidies. The administration has celebrated its effective efforts to cut down on evictions through free legal services for many low-income households and in re-housing thousands of people who have wound up in city shelters.
Still, there are estimated to be more than 75,000 individuals in various city-run shelters and another 3,500 on the streets or in the subways, and de Blasio has not adjusted his 2017 goal of reducing the city Department of Homeless Services shelter census from about 62,500 to 57,500 over five years.
“The main message that we would want for both Mayor de Blasio and any elected official to have going into 2020 is that whatever progress has been made is never going to be enough until we actually end homelessness in New York City,” said Jacquelyn Simone, policy analyst at Coalition for the Homeless.
She applauded a bill passed by the City Council in December, after a compromise with the de Blasio administration, that would require real estate developers who receive city subsidies for projects of 40 units or more to set aside at least 15% of new units for homeless families.
“We hope the mayor signs that bill into law soon and we also hope that the administration goes above and beyond the minimum requirements established in that bill,” Simone said. “Following through on and going above and beyond the general homeless housing commitments, I think would be one main priority. We would also like to see Mayor de Blasio accelerate the supportive housing pipeline that he has made.”
The mayor announced in 2015 that the city would build 15,000 supportive housing apartments in 15 years and Symone said that timeline should be shrunk to 10 years considering the urgency of the homelessness crisis.
On the public housing front, though the administration has been successful in stabilizing the operating finances of the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA), its plan to raise funds for capital repairs from new infill projects that create mixed-income housing, has stalled. The authority has a $32-billion five-year capital need for repairs and maintenance, and the city has managed to identify $24 billion over 10 years through various mechanisms that must be executed. A new chair and CEO, Gregory Russ, was appointed in June to manage the scandal-ridden agency, which is also under the watchful eye of a federal monitor who has been scrutinizing its functions and monitoring its progress in handling lead abatement.
De Blasio’s 2020 challenges include whether he can advance infill projects and ensure NYCHA is on track with lead testing and removal, boiler and elevator replacements and repairs, and more.
Transit and Infrastructure
The state and city have just over a year to prepare for the implementation of congestion pricing, the controversial traffic mitigation (and MTA revenue-raising) strategy that was approved by the state Legislature and Governor Cuomo last year. De Blasio was a reluctant supporter of the plan, which cedes much authority over city streets to the state-run and Cuomo-controlled MTA. But transit experts say the city must also undertake several measures to make the program a success, including by expanding and improving bus service.
“I don't know if he has a day-to-day grasp of some of the transportation issues,” said David Jones, president and CEO of Community Service Society, who is an appointee of the mayor on the MTA board, about de Blasio. “He seems somewhat removed.”
De Blasio has often been critiqued for having the ‘windshield perspective’ of a car-driver or -passenger, for not riding public transit with any regularity, and for prioritizing his ferry program over the city’s buses. More than a month after its launch, de Blasio rode the 14th street busway, which he green-lit, and while he has touted its successes, especially after initial data was released in late December, he has yet to indicate any plans for other such bus-dominant roadway plans.
Moreover, the mayor has faced increasing criticism for touting his commitment to Vision Zero – which aims to eliminate traffic fatalities – while the number of cyclist and pedestrian fatalities jumped in 2019 and advocates asked for more aggressive implementation of street and intersection redesigns and protected bike lanes. De Blasio has praised the aims of City Council Member Brad Lander’s “Reckless Driver Accountability Act,” which aims to take dangerous drivers off the road for repeated violations, but has not fully endorsed it or reached agreement with the Council on language so it can pass.
De Blasio may also have to decide in 2020 whether he is willing to increase the fare on the heavily-subsidized ferry system, where he has initially pegged each ride to the same price as a Metrocard swipe for the bus or subway, currently $2.75, and whether his plan for the BQX, or Brooklyn-Queens Connector streetcar, will truly advance.
School Desegregation
Six years into de Blasio’s mayoralty and New York City schools remain the most segregated in the country. The mayor and his two schools chancellors, Carmen Farina and Richard Carranza, have proposed a series of fairly tepid, incremental initial reforms.
De Blasio did empanel the School Diversity Advisory Group (SDAG), which released two sets of recommendations, with the administration adopting most of the first, more mild set. The second set, full of more controversial proposals, including related to the city’s admissions policies and gifted and talented programming, was released in August and de Blasio has yet to give them more than an initial nod, saying that there would be an extensive public conversation to come in order to engage parents and other stakeholders in crafting reforms.
“Moving forward in 2020, it would be great for the mayor to start moving on these recommendations,” said Nyah Berg, the Integrated Schools Project Director at New York Appleseed, which was represented on the advisory group.
De Blasio and Carranza separately proposed scrapping the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT), which determines admission at the eight “elite” high schools in the city. But that requires action by the state, where the proposal has not been warmly received. Even locally, elected officials and parent groups have complained that his proposal pits minorities against each other and will not have the intended effect.
De Blasio announced he was backing off of his proposal, which included a new system for more diversified admittance to the specialized schools, where black and Latino students are severely underrepresented, and would come up with something new this year.
“Outside of those eight specialized high schools, there’s still over a hundred screened high schools and also screened middle schools and exclusionary gifted and talented programs,” Berg noted. SDAG “has recommendations for how to work on integrating those, integrating our students better in New York City in that report. So I would hope that there is more of a focus on what he has the ability and power to do than a fight that’s happening in Albany.”
“I think if he was bold that he would have stood up and we would have already heard from him on the report,” she added.
Policing and Criminal Justice
One of the issues where de Blasio has disappointed many of his supporters the most has been policing. Though he came to power indicating he would take a more sweeping approach to reform of the NYPD, he has been more of an incrementalist and has often had to be pushed into accepting increased accountability and oversight of the department.
In 2020, de Blasio and the NYPD are expected to finally show evidence for their claims that the mayor’s neighborhood policing program is as effective as de Blasio often claims. The mayor will also likely have to continue to justify his support for the MTA’s planned addition of 500 new MTA police officers, many of whom are meant to patrol the subways and buses in conjunction with the NYPD in a plan that currently has more questions than answers.
The MTA plan was pegged as a way to reduce homelessness and fare evasion and other crime in the subways. De Blasio has also directed the NYPD to conduct outreach in the subways and on the streets, which advocates say turns homelessness from a social problem to a policing one. “One thing that's completely in the mayor's control right now would be if he would reverse this really misguided, overreliance on police for street outreach work and if he would, instead, focus more on the elements of his plan that are related to safe havens and permanent housing,” said Simone of Coalition for the Homeless.
“He's been perceived, obviously, as not taking on some of the hangover problems of broken windows policing,” said CSS’ Jones, who voted no during the MTA Board’s December budget vote due to his opposition to the police officer hiring plan.
Jones was particularly critical of the mayor’s recent choice to make Dermot Shea the new commissioner of the NYPD. It was the third time the mayor picked a white man to lead the department, again passing over First Deputy Commissioner Benjamin Tucker, who is African-American.
2020 will be a year of tests for Shea, and therefore de Blasio. Those tests include whether the city can reverse the 2019 increases in murders and hate crimes, as well as pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities, all while implementing additional promised reforms to bring police and community closer together, hold NYPD officers accountable for breaches of public trust, overhauling the Special Victims Division, and more.
The mayor and the NYPD also have their work cut out for them as new criminal justice reform measures take effect, including bail reforms intended to drastically reduce the detainee population in city jails.
And the Rikers Island jail closure plan is far from fruition. Though the City Council approved the plan to build four new borough-based jail facilities, the design and construction of the buildings is yet to come, not to mention navigating all of the logistical and community-based details.
“2020 is going to be a year of moving from big ideas to the nuts and bolts of implementation on many fronts,” said Greg Berman, executive director of the Center for Court Innovation.
Berman did have high praise for what the mayor has done in the last six years, reducing incarceration while keeping crime down and the city safe. “I think that de Blasio actually has a significant legacy to boast about in criminal justice,” he said.
Berman added that “the crucial thing is to not lose sight of the legitimate concerns that opponents” have raised about the jails plan, “in particular the concern that...what's to prevent these new jails from just emulating the dysfunctional culture that can be found in the Rikers jails?”
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by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette
Ben Max contributed to this article.
Mayor de Blasio (photo: Demetrius Freeman/Mayor's Office)
Reforming New York’s property tax system has for decades confounded mayors, legislatures, and governors who have struggled with (or avoided) the technical and political consequences of changing a long-standing system commonly described as outdated and irrational. When Mayor Bill de Blasio finishes his second term at the end of 2021, there is a chance he will be leaving office in the same boat.
With the latest delay in recommendations from the city’s Advisory Commission on Property Tax Reform, formed by de Blasio and City Council Speaker Corey Johnson in 2018, it is becoming increasingly doubtful the mayor will be able to make a full-fledged push for reform in Albany, where much relevant power resides, before his final year in office. If history is any indication, lawmakers may take years to work changes through the halls of the State Capitol. That would leave the bulk of whatever reform is passed, if any, to be implemented after de Blasio has left City Hall.
Yet de Blasio has been discussing the need for a concerted reassessment of the property tax system since he first took office as mayor in 2014 -- when he appointed Jacques Jiha commissioner of the Department of Finance. But the first concrete public steps he took toward carrying one out only began in his second term, four years later, when he empanelled the advisory commission in partnership with the City Council, and only after a lawsuit was filed against the city alleging the system disproportionately burdened certain racial and other demographic groups.
Now, as the calendar turns to 2020, a series of postponements and delays are pushing the prospect of a city property tax reform agenda and essential accompanying advocacy in Albany closer to the periphery of de Blasio’s tenure.
When de Blasio appointed Jiha in April 2014, four months into his first term, the incoming commissioner was asked by a reporter if he shared the view that the city’s property tax system is unequal or unfair. Jiha said, “It’s a major issue. We have a lot of unfairness and inequity.” He promised, “[W]e’re going to look into every aspect of...property taxes in New York to see what can be done. It’s a big project...If there are discrepancy and inefficiencies within the system we’re going to have to try to minimize them.” Acknowledging action in Albany would be needed, he said, “But our goal is basically to try to minimize to some extent the – as best as we can, to try to minimize the inequities...equally situated people should not be treated differently. That’s our goal.”
De Blasio then called it “a big, sprawling area of concern” and promised, “we’re going to look at it very closely.”
“Part of why we wanted a finance commissioner with Jacques’ experience and insight is to take a whole look at the tax system of this city and look at ways to make it clearer, more transparent and more equitable,” the mayor added. Jiha is a veteran economist of city and state government, who most recently served in the private sector as COO and CFO of Earl G. Graves Ltd., a multimedia firm.
“Some of that we can achieve locally. Some of that can only be achieved with Albany’s help. But first we have to come to an analysis of what is going on and what’s a better way to approach it. And then when we feel we’re on that firm ground, then we’ll start discussions with Albany,” de Blasio said then. The Department of Finance under Jiha has been preparing to assist in such an analysis by building models and cross-referencing datasets, according to a spokesperson.
Around the same time as Jiha’s appointment, then-City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito announced a Council commission to look at the issue, which quickly transformed into a task force on commercial tax breaks. Two members of the task force told Politico in 2016 they believed the de Blasio administration pressured Mark-Viverito to abandon property taxes. “My sense is the administration said that that was something that really needed its own conversation, that they'd work with them on, and haven't,” one of them reportedly said.
Property owners and tenants alike have lamented the system for years as they’ve observed real estate taxes fluctuate inconsistently across neighborhoods, property types, and tenancies.
The city’s property tax system is multifaceted and dizzying. Some aspects are controlled by the city, but many others are dictated by the state. State law determines the method for valuing different properties, while the Mayor and City Council have discretion over the tax rate. The city’s Department of Finance calculates a property’s assessed value based on the state’s methodology using data gathered by the city. Experts, elected officials, and everyday city residents have sought changes to each of these stages to make the system more fair and transparent.
Despite its complexity, the city did not move quickly to begin evaluating the issue and by the end of the mayor’s first term, he was only promising action in his second. “This one's exceedingly thorny and it has to be navigated. The pieces that can be decided administratively and legislatively at the city level, plus the pieces that have to be decided in Albany – that's a very careful balance that has to be struck,” he said in April 2017, adding shortly after, “I think it's something that has to be addressed, but it's not realistic to address it this term.”
It was at a news conference on an unrelated topic during his reelection year, and de Blasio was responding to questions about the scant action on property tax reform in his first term. “We didn't do it because we had to work on a lot of other priorities that were crucial and necessary and available to be acted on, versus this, which I knew would be a very involved, difficult process that would take the energies of our budget director, our first deputy mayor, our finance commissioner, and a whole lot of other people,” he said.
That year he was harried by a lawsuit, filed that April by a coalition of finance experts, civil rights groups, and development associations, challenging the city and state taxation practices as unconstitutional, alleging they disproportionately harm New Yorkers in less affluent neighborhoods. One of the most serious problems the coalition points to is the state’s method of assessing co-ops and condos, based on estimated rental income rather than sales price -- often vastly undervaluing some of city’s most expensive property and leaving others to foot the bill.
De Blasio also faced mounting pressure from his Republican challenger, Assemblymember Nicole Malliotakis, who made real estate tax reform a central issue in her campaign.
While calling such an undertaking a “huge, huge effort” and tempering expectations of a “quick fix” the mayor told reporters at the April 2017 news conference, “I'm telling people I'm going to do it. And if you look at my batting average of what I say I'm going to do, I do what I say I'm going to do.”
Just one day before voters elected him to his second term, on November 6, 2017, de Blasio appeared at an Association for a Better New York event, where during an audience question-and-answer session, then-president of Citizens Budget Commission Carol Kellermann asked de Blasio about the lawsuit and his plans to address property tax reform in his all-but-certain second term.
If reelected, de Blasio said, "we’re going to get to work on this in a very big and focused manner...there is no question that this current property tax system is broken in many ways." He criticized the push to put property tax reform into a judge's hands through the lawsuit, adding, "I’ve said it very clearly, we’ll gather all the stakeholders. It will probably take a year or two to complete this work. It will certainly take both city and state legislation. But here are the ground-rules that I see going forward: a wildly inconsistent system has to be made more consistent. I hear from people across different neighborhoods how blatantly unfair their property tax bills are and literally the way they change from neighborhood to neighborhood that makes no sense per se. Obviously people live in condos, co-ops versus single-family homes, the disparities there. There are so many issues that we have to get under the skin of that are really thorny, and really difficult."
"But were going to have to be blunt about it, we’re going to have to really be open about some of the tough choices, and then further we have to protect our revenue levels," the mayor continued.
He said that at a number of town hall meetings he had held, New Yorkers had raised the issue of property taxes to him, "Usually from a homeowner point of view."
"I say to them look, it’s going to be a massive undertaking," de Blasio recounted. "We will come up with a more consistent, more transparent, more fair system. But I want to put a caveat on it. We can’t reduce our revenue substantially. If we do that and I look at people in the eye and say if we’re going to reduce our revenue substantially it might feel great at first. But then we can’t have the same number of police officers, or we can’t sustain early childhood education, or we can’t provide the same sanitation services. Do you want that?...They say no, I don’t want to lose of those services."
He went on to say in closing, "I am ready to do it, it will take a lot of time and energy but I am ready to do it. And it’s not the kind of mission a lot of people want to take on in public life. But I’ve said it, because I mean it. And I will just say this one personal plug. When I say something that definitively, I mean it. I said we’d do pre-K, I said we’d do 200,000 affordable apartments; you know, I said we would bring down stop-and-frisk. You name it we’ve done it. We will create a property tax reform that will end up with a better and fairer system for this city."
Commission Formed, Report Delayed
Another six months later, in May 2018, a reelected de Blasio and still-new City Council Speaker Johnson announced the advisory commission to look at every dimension of the issue and recommend changes to balance the system without reducing city revenue. Its mandate is to issue a preliminary report and a final report with recommendations, gathering feedback at public hearings.
When de Blasio and Johnson announced a handshake agreement for the next city budget the next month, Johnson intimated that the commission’s goal was to have recommendations by the state legislative session beginning in January 2019. “The work will continue throughout this year and hopefully we’ll be able to bring a product to the state legislature in next year’s legislative session with some recommendations on fixing the property tax rebate,” he said at the June 2018 press conference.
The commission held its first public meeting in July 2018 and nine others over nine months, though the mayor didn’t sign the executive order formally empowering the body until December.
Since then, the commission has postponed releasing recommendations several times. While officials say they are getting closer, several steps remain before the administration sees the recommendations, puts its own stamp on an agenda, and takes it to state lawmakers.
Spokespeople for both de Blasio and Johnson told Gotham Gazette in May that the commission would be holding more public hearings in the second half of 2019 and produce a final report with recommendations by the end of the calendar year. A spokesperson for the mayor’s office confirmed last week that the additional public hearings had not taken place and wouldn’t be scheduled until a preliminary report was published. Commission Chair Marc Shaw told Gotham Gazette on December 4 that the preliminary report would be “out soon,” without specifying a new timeline.
“This is an enormously important issue for our city, and we want to get this right. We have made significant progress on the majority of the issues we believe are needed for reform, but a few do remain. Those issues need to be resolved before we release any report,” Shaw said.
“We expect to have a preliminary report out soon for the public to review,” he said. A spokesperson for Johnson said on December 16 that that projection was still the case, without giving a specific date.
At a press conference before the last full-body Stated Meeting of the year for the City Council three days later, Johnson said, “It’s not going to happen before the end of this year. It’s my hope that it’s going to happen in January. I actually feel pretty comfortable with where things are and I continue to talk to the commissioners.”
Once the commission releases its recommendation, there remains the task for city officials to mold them into a viable policy agenda. “After the Commission shares its report with the Mayor and Speaker Johnson, they will both review the report and its findings, and will decide how to best advance reforms,” said Marcy Miranda, a de Blasio administration spokesperson, in May.
Postponing the report’s release will have implications for the prospect of reform in Albany. The state legislative session only lasts from early January to early June this year, and is typically dominated by the state budget, as well as a long list of priorities from Governor Andrew Cuomo and the two legislative majority conferences. If the city property tax commission doesn’t hold public hearings on its initial report until 2020, which is now the earliest it can, it will push the city’s advocacy efforts later into the session leaving any wishlist items from the advisory commission on less sure footing.
“There’s been a constant pushing of the timeline. We get one timeline and we try to make decisions around that. Then that gets pushed off. Then we keep hearing it’s coming soon...I don’t know the definition of ‘soon,’” said state Senator Brian Benjamin, a Manhattan Democrat and chair of the Senate’s committee on budget and revenues.
Assembly Member Sandra Galef, a Westchester Democrat who chairs the Assembly’s committee on real property taxation, believes some of the recommendations will be controversial and will have to be negotiated through multiple committees, which can delay them or seal their fates if the discussions start too late.
The session ends in June and it is not typical for lawmakers to return to the Legislature later in the year outside of exceptional circumstances, leaving any outstanding items to be taken up in 2021. Because many experts, including some members of the commission, have agreed some of the most drastic but necessary reforms will have to be phased in over a period of years, it is likely many of the potential state-level changes will be implemented under de Blasio’s successor.
“I think it’s highly unlikely it will get fixed this legislative session because the issue is so complicated, but there is a possibility that it can be tackled during the 2021 legislative session,” Johnson said Thursday.
Independent of the constraints of Albany’s political calendar, the de Blasio administration says it has been making strides to improve some of what it can control, including the precision with which it values property.
“Under the leadership of Commissioner [Jacques] Jiha, the Department of Finance has made significant investments in staffing, data analytics, and technology to improve data collection and ensure the agency is using the most accurate data to provide fair valuations,” wrote Miranda, who now represents the city’s Department of Finance, in an email.
The DOF under Jiha has for years been preparing its analytical infrastructure for the eventuality of a comprehensive, system-wide evaluation, which has dramatically enhanced the advisory commission’s ability to explore solutions, according to a person with close knowledge of the commission’s work.
“These improvements have been made with New York City residents in mind, as the agency works to create efficiencies and increase accuracy and transparency in residents’ property tax values,” Miranda wrote.
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by Ethan Geringer-Sameth, reporter, Gotham Gazette
@GeringerSameth @GothamGazette
Ben Max contributed to this article.