A police academy class of 600 recruits will begin training in April after Mayor Eric Adams said some budget cuts would be restored.
What You Need To Know
- New York City will avoid some of the previously announced budget cuts for the NYPD and FDNY
- Mayor Eric Adams insists the change was made possible after strong fiscal management
- Brooklyn Councilman Justin Brannan said the mayor is doing a budget dance with himself
In November, the mayor said the city couldn’t afford to hire the new officers.
“We need every officer we can get, which is why today is a great day for the NYPD and all New Yorkers,” Police Commissioner Edward Caban said during the City Hall announcement Wednesday.
Adams also walked back budget cuts for the FDNY — 20 engine companies will no longer lose their fifth firefighter. The change comes as the FDNY navigates a higher call volume.
“The fifth firefighter, in most simple terms, gets water on the fire faster,” Fire Commissioner Laura Kavanagh said. “We also use the fifth firefighter for certain types of weather emergencies.”
According to the mayor’s office, funding was restored to the NYPD and FDNY after the city was able to save over $2 billion by the reduction of spending on the migrant influx.
The influx is now expected to cost the city $10 billion through the 2025 fiscal year.
Last November, Adams announced all city agencies would have to reduce their budgets by 5% to help close a $7 billion budget gap — noting the rising cost of the migrant crisis, the end of federal pandemic funding and a slowdown in tax revenue.
Brooklyn Councilman Justin Brannan, who is also the finance chair for the City Council, said the mayor is doing a budget dance with himself.
“All of a sudden, the mayor has found money, with irrationally shifting explanations and numbers, cutting into the credibility of his narrative that the city has an insurmountable budget gap that demands overly broad cuts,” Brannan said.
