Eric Adams Still Wants to Cut Library Funding—But Don’t Worry, We’re Getting 1,200 More Cops

Would he or would he not restore his proposed cuts to library funding, which leaders of New York City's library systems had warned would force them to reduce opening hours to only five days per week? That was the question on a lot of people's minds as Mayor Eric Adams prepared to release his finalized budget for fiscal year 2025 on Wednesday.

There was good reason to think he might backtrack—City Hall, after warning of financial doom and gloom for months, had finally admitted that revenue forecasts are not as dire as they spent the past six months making them seem, something that the City Council and groups like the Independent Budget Office and the Fiscal Policy Institute have been saying all along. (Maybe…all those cuts…weren't necessary after all?) Lately, Adams has been restoring other cuts he's made to essential City services, especially those that have generated the most outcry from New Yorkers and quite a bit of bad PR for the mayor—most recently, he announced that he had found $500 million to fund a slew of education programs, including universal 3-K. (Congratulations are in order to Ms. Rachel, though as Chalkbeat noted, that funding "won’t, however, cover the entire $1 billion fiscal cliff set to hit this summer, meaning significant cuts are still expected," and childcare advocates say the funding doesn't go far enough.) Adams's proposed reduction in library funding is also fairly minor, in the bigger picture; surely, it would be relatively easy to find $58.3 million so kids can go to their local library six days out of the week?

Oh, and there's this recent voter survey by the Manhattan Institute, of all places, which paints a picture of a flailing mayor whose reelection prospects are dim: 

But it seems not even bad press, a truly atrocious approval rating, and the prospect of an easy win could overcome the mayor's dislike of public libraries—in the budget that he unveiled on Wednesday, the $58.3 million in cuts to our libraries remained. 

What did our mayor have to say about all this? "We did not tell libraries to close on Sundays," he said on Wednesday, adding, "They had the options of finding where they wanted to find those savings." On Thursday morning, he all but said he was wielding library funding as a bargaining chip between him and the City Council. "This is the negotiation part of it," Adams said in an interview on PIX11, adding, "The cake will be baked, and everyone will be pleased."

Don't worry though—his budget, as expected, restores $62.4 million in funding to the NYPD to hire 1,200 new cops.

And some links that will surely please everyone:

• Sleeping on the floor is a fire hazard, so the City is now telling migrants at drop-in centers to sleep on chairs instead.
• As Eric Adams denies that CCRB Interim Chair Arva Rice was pushed out, the Daily News reports that as early as last summer, Deputy Mayor Phil Banks "worked to oust" her.
• Here's a video of people calling the NYPD "fucking fascists" after arresting protesters at NYU on Monday night: 

• Some of the worst people in the world have decided to stop by Columbia University. (I guess security is kind of lax!)
• And some of the worst people in the world are Columbia University business professors. (Maybe don't call anti-war, anti-genocide student protesters "terrorists," Shai, just a thought.)
• Meanwhile, the New York Post continues to be the New York Post:

• "The Bourgeois Morality of 'The Ethicist'" 
• "Man busted in misogynistic Manhattan attacks raved, 'You have to check women sometimes': prosecutors"
• The Avengers, but for terrible people who love cars and also losing.
• Chuck Schumer, please, put your neighbors out of their misery.
• The HEAT Act could still pass as part of this year's legislative session.
• And here's how one co-op is navigating Local Law 97.
• Via Spectrum News: "President Joe Biden has pardoned a Capital Region resident and commuted the sentence of a Hudson Valley resident who were sentenced for drug-related offenses."