What’s NOT in the New York City budget?

If “affordability” is New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s favorite buzzword, “austerity” is almost an expletive. “There is nothing fiscally responsible about balancing the budget on the backs of working people,” he said Tuesday as he announced the budget deal with City Council Speaker Julie Menin. “We will return to this budget when we are told, as we so often are, that we must budget with austerity rather than ambition.”  

He may reject austerity, but that doesn’t mean Mamdani’s $125.8 billion budget has room for everything. From cops to parks, here are some of the major items that didn’t make it into the fiscal year 2027 budget. 

More cops

The mayor irked his progressive base after his May budget proposal included a $70 million plan to add 580 officers to the NYPD headcount – despite his campaign promise to keep the headcount flat. The New York City Democratic Socialists of America, which has been hesitant to publicly oppose the mayor, even put out a statement criticizing the proposal. The increase didn’t make it into the final budget, with Mamdani saying that he and NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch worked together to keep the headcount at 35,000. Initially, though, Tisch and Menin both supported the proposal, and Menin said on NY1 that she “strongly disagrees” with the mayor's decision to scrap the proposal.

1% Parks funding

Mamdani (like other mayoral candidates before him) promised on the campaign trail to raise the Department of Parks and Recreation’s funding to 1% of the total city budget. This year, that would have been about $1.2 billion. And Mamdani (like other mayors before him) fell short of that by a few hundred million, with a final budget allocating roughly $709 million to the Parks Department for fiscal year 2027. But those advocating for parks funding, including Council Member Ty Hankerson (Parks Committee chair) and Council Member Shekar Krishnan (former committee chair) still celebrated the fact that the budget baselines some staff and program funding that could otherwise be on the chopping block next year. In her remarks in council chambers when voting for the budget, Council Member Alexa Avilés also celebrated new baselined funding, but urged the necessity of “getting to 1%.”

Full CityFHEPS expansion 

Over the last couple of days, much ink has been spilled on the City Council’s fight to secure more funding for a rental voucher program known as CityFHEPS. It became a major sticking point in the final arc of negotiations, delaying the passage of the budget well into the 11th hour. The resulting agreement came in the form of a $175 million allocation in new funding for rental vouchers, with $125 million baselined for future years – far less than the City Council had been pushing for, though technically still an expansion. Instead of allocating that funding towards CityFHEPS, the City Council passed legislation to create a new program expanding rental voucher access. Additionally, both the legislative body and the Mamdani administration agreed to end the protracted legal fight started by the City Council several years ago after former Mayor Eric Adams refused to comply with a set of laws passed by members in 2023 to expand eligibility for the program. 

Many City Council members weren’t thrilled with $175 million. It was far less than the $300 to $500 million they’d been pushing for. (As a candidate, Mamdani had promised to fully fund the CityFHEPS expansion.) And while ultimately nobody ended up voting against the budget because of rental vouchers, members of the Progressive Caucus expressed disappointment over where things landed before casting their vote. 

Libraries 

On the campaign trail, the mayor promised libraries would get .5% of the city budget. The reality is less, to the disappointment of city librarians. The budget includes $538 million for libraries, about .4%. While this does not meet the campaign promise, the mayor touted a decision to baseline $31.7 million in funding the library budget.

Fair fares

The initial Fair Fares proposal by the City Council asked for $130 to $135 million additional dollars to their current $100 million budget to expand the program and give participants completely free bus and subway fare. This did not happen as of Tuesday, instead the budget increased to $174.6 million dollars to go toward increasing eligibility to 200% of the federal poverty level. The mayor’s executive budget proposal had no mention of an expansion of the program. 

Fifth firefighter 

The City Council requested an additional $91.7 million to bring back a fifth firefighter position at nearly 100 of the city’s busiest Fire Department engine companies – something supporters argued would bolster firefighter and public safety. This was not included in the budget to the disappointment of Republican City Council Member Joann Ariola, chair of the Council’s Committee on Fire and Emergency Management.

“There’s a lot of good things in this budget and it’s a shame that this was tainted by the mayor’s betrayal and ideological demands – demands that put all New Yorkers in harm's way and will only lead the city down a path of ruin,” she said before voting against the budget.