Nearly $1 Billion Is Shifted From Police in Budget That Pleases No One

New York City officials on Tuesday agreed to a grim coronavirus-era budget that will sharply curtail municipal services, impose a hiring freeze and, in a move meant to placate calls to defund the police, shift roughly $1 billion from the Police Department.

The $88.1 billion budget reflected the economic shutdown that followed the outbreak, causing a $9 billion revenue shortfall that forced the city to make drastic across-the-board spending cuts.

But the virus was not the only external factor that affected the budget.

The protests that followed the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis led to calls to defund the police around the nation, including in New York City, where protesters have gathered at City Hall since last Tuesday, as well as outside the homes of City Council members.

Mayor Bill de Blasio and the Council speaker, Corey Johnson, had agreed in principle to cut $1 billion from the Police Department’s $6 billion operating budget, but doing so successfully — especially when crime and shootings are rising — would be a tricky “balancing act,” the mayor said on Tuesday.

Sure enough, the details seemed to please no one, and the budget passed the City Council early Wednesday with more noes than usual, in a 32-to-17 vote.