The NYPD will freeze academy classes for the foreseeable future as the city braces for “extremely painful” spending cuts set to be unveiled by Mayor Eric Adams on Thursday, the New York Daily News has learned.
The mayor warned Tuesday that the city budget update he’s expected to release will contain a laundry list of deep cuts impacting every municipal agency and millions of New Yorkers.
“In all my time in government, this is probably one of the most painful exercises I’ve gone through,” Adams told reporters when speaking about the forthcoming belt-tightening during a City Hall briefing.
Without going into specifics, Adams said Tuesday that the cuts are necessary to offset the hundreds of millions the city has shelled out to shelter and provide services for the tens of thousands of migrants who have arrived in the city since last year.
Major spending reductions are also expected for the Fire Department of the City of New York, which is set to slash all overtime and also end any after-work training sessions and Ceremonial Unit activities with the exception of department funerals, a source with knowledge of the matter said.
A hiring freeze has been in place across city government since October, but agencies that deal with public health and safety were exempt.
When the new budget goes into effect, the public safety exemption ends, sources told the Daily News on Wednesday.
Emails to both the NYPD and the FDNY for comment were not immediately returned.
Adams spokesman Charles Lutvak declined to comment on the looming budget announcement, but referred to the mayor’s remarks Tuesday, when he hinted that the cuts will touch on NYPD operations.
“When we look at around police, what the numbers of our police officers are going to be … it’s going to be extremely painful for New Yorkers,” he said.
Adams first announced in September that the November budget modification plan would include 5% cuts for all city agencies.
Unless the city receives a lot more federal and state migrant crisis aid, Adams warned in September that he will likely move to enact an additional 5% government-wide cut in January and yet another 5% in April — proposals that progressive Democrats have said would effectively wreck the city’s social safety net.
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