Budget Office Projects Surplus for City

WNYC News | Jul 12, 2010

New York, NY —

The Independent Budget Office is backing up Mayor Bloomberg's projections that the city will end this fiscal year with a nearly $4 billion surplus.

The IBO says that should wipe out the budget gap for fiscal year 2008, but Budget Office Director Ronnie Lowenstein says the city's not in the clear financially.

LOWENSTEIN: We are also anticipating along with most other forecasters that the City's economy is going to slow. The US economy is going to slow and that is going to bring down the rate of growth in the revenue growth and that it is going to make balancing the 2009 budget not so easy.

Lowenstein says by 2009 and beyond, the slowdown will translate into a $3 billion budget gap. Mayor Bloomberg has asked every agency, except the education department, to cut one and a half percent from their budget plans for the next fiscal year, and four percent for fiscal year 2009.

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