How it is supposed to work

• January: The New York City budget process begins when the Mayor releases the preliminary budget for the upcoming year.
• Mid-January to April: Borough Boards and the City Council hold public hearings and respond with their budget priorities to the Mayor.
• Late April: The Mayor releases the Executive Budget.
• May to June: The City Council holds further public hearings and negotiates a final budget for the upcoming fiscal year, which begins on July 1st.

How it really works

The city budget process usually works as it should, with the final budget agreed upon by the first few days of June.

The Arts in the city budget

The primary vehicle through which the arts community receives funds from the city is the Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA). The DCA budget is divided into the expense and the capital budget.

The expense budget is divided into two categories:

Cultural Institutions Group (CIG) — 34 arts organizations in city owned buildings. Program — all other arts organizations in the city.

During the years of the Giuliani administration, the consistent theme of budget negotiations was to propose significant cuts to the DCA budget. For example, for Fiscal Year 2001, then Mayor Giuliani initially proposed $101.2 million for DCA’s expense budget, a decrease of $7.4 million from the prior year. This entire amount was to be cut from the Program category.

The efforts of the New York City Arts Coalition and its member organizations resulted in the restoration of these cuts by the City Council and increase of $7 million in the final DCA budget for a total of $139.2 million for the expense portion of the agency budget.

The Bloomberg administration has continued the pattern of recommending large cuts to cultural groups.

During Mayor Bloomberg's term, the DCA's budget has decreased, not only in total, but disproportionately to the city's overall budget. The city's overall proposed budget for FY06 has increased nearly 15% from FY03, but the DCA would be decreased by 14% percent in the same period if the Mayor's current proposed budget is accepted.

Here are the proposed budgets, as well as actual budgets for DCA, from 2003 through the proposed budget for FY06:

Despite a $3.3 billion projected surplus from FY05, the majority of arts groups would see a 12-13% cut in their proposed funding. None of the specified groups receive any additional funding through special Council initiatives, so their cuts demonstrate the broader impact of the proposed budget from Mayor Bloomberg.