Comments on: Speaking out Against Community Board Budget Cuts

By: Community Boards’ Budgets Slashed Again «

Community Boards’ Budgets Slashed Again « — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 15:18:47 +0000

[...] revisit our letter, and use it as a template for your own – don’t let the City get away with taking away important [...]

By: Community Boards Gets Slashed « NYC Blogter

Community Boards Gets Slashed « NYC Blogter — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 19:01:34 +0000

[...] [Letter] [...]

By: Toni Carlina

Toni Carlina — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 16:25:55 +0000

I am the District Manager of Manhattan CB 6 and I want to thank you very much for your support. On several occasions, I have presented testimony to the city council requesting an increase to the OTPS budget. The last time the OTPS budget received an increase was in 1990, seventeen-years-ago and that was a mere $1,458.

Your voice is important to us; Thank you again.

By: Gotham Gazette - The Wonkster » Blog Archive » A New Day for Community Based Planning?

Fri, 21 Dec 2007 12:58:09 +0000

[...] The Campaign for Community Based Planning. One of the more interesting pieces from the blog is a post on the budget cuts that community boards are facing. It says that the boards have been directed by [...]

By: Tom Lowenhaupt

Tom Lowenhaupt — Sat, 15 Dec 2007 05:22:32 +0000

Here’s an additional thought to include in your letters.

Shaving $5,000 from the community board budgets will significantly diminish the boards’ ability to function. While the untrained eye might view this as a 2.5% cut of a typical board’s 200K budget, in reality its impact is 10 times that. Here’s why: For both humane and practical reasons most boards will choose to cut their OTPS budgets (Other Than Personnel Service – copies, pencils, postage, phones…) rather than fire an experienced employee.

And $5,000 is typically 25% of the OTPS budget. Cutting OTPS by 25% might just leave the 2-4 person staffs incapable of completing their everyday chores.

Tom Lowenhaupt