Queens Borough Board blasts mayor’s preliminary budget

Acting Borough President Sharon Lee criticized Mayor Bill de Blasio’s preliminary budget proposal for giving Queens the short-shrift. Photo via Wikimedia

By Rachel Vick

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s preliminary budget proposal is out, and Queens is getting stiffed, at least according to Acting Borough President Sharon Lee. 

Lee and the Queens Borough Board, comprised of Queens community board chairs and district managers, shared its own 2021 budget recommendations on Monday, calling for increased funding for education, seniors and hospitals. 

“Queens — the Borough of Families — is the largest borough in the City of New York, and home to 2.34 million New Yorkers,” Lee said “While the needs are diverse and ever-growing, many of these very needs are persistently underfunded and underserved, with troubling disparities relative to the other four boroughs.”

The full response from the Queens Borough Board specifically requests more funding to mitigate overcrowding in schools. 

Queens has long led the city in the number of schools at or over capacity. Three of the four most overcrowded school districts in the city are located in Queens, according to a 2018 City Council report on overcrowding. Those three districts — 24, 25 and 26 — were all at or above 115 percent capacity in 2014-2015. Two others ― 28 and 30 — were over 100 percent capacity, according to the report. 

“While Queens has long managed to do more with less, it’s time for some overdue parity and a fairer share,” Lee said. 

After a series of hospital closures that began in 2008, Queens was left with nine acute care hospitals for its nearly 2.4 million residents. 

Community input from a Jan. 29 hearing helped shape the priorities that were submitted to the mayor’s office as part of city charter requirements.