DE BLASIO $92.5 BILLION EXECUTIVE BUDGET HAS OVER $9 BILLION IN RESERVE

The city no longer calls expected excess funds in the budget projected surpluses. They now refer to this money as reserves. It sounds like they are saving properly for a rainy day.

Mayor Bill de Blasio released his Executive Budget Summary last Thursday for fiscal year 2020 that starts in July. It is a $92.5 billion spending plan where spending is up from the current year.

How much will the city leave in reserve?

The answer is right in the summary:

• Preserving historic levels of reserves

— $1.25 billion each year of the financial plan

— $4.47 billion in the Retiree Health Benefits Trust Fund

• $3.6 billion due to our actions under this
administration

 By my simple math, that adds up to $9.32 billion in reserves. Not a bad rainy day fund. The slowdown in the economy that the city seems to be expecting that keeps city employee raises down is not yet materializing.

Every time one of these budget reports comes out showing the city doing very well financially makes me again ask this simple question:

Why are we waiting until October 2019 and October 2020 to get paid back in full without any interest for work we did from 2009-2011 that other city workers received in those years?

The city could have paid us back years ago and not missed a beat as the Independent budget Office estimated the cost of the lump sum payments to be around $1/2 billion to the city.

Also, why are city workers and retirees contributing huge healthcare savings to the city?

This year, according to the Budget Summary, it will be "healthcare savings of $1.6 billion in FY20 and $1.9 billion in FY21 and every year after."

Our unions are so generous with the city.