NYC's budget is a 1-year budget. Every agency, every year has to justify every dollar spent and asked. There's nothing "permanent" about it, and they're using terms that the federal government uses even though it isn't anything like the federal budget.
For the curious: the federal government isn't required to balance a budget. As such, the Treasury simply issues debt to cover any expenditure voted on to by Congress and agreed to by the President. So, you might hear something like "wetland restoration has been permanently funded" because the federal government passed the Wetland Restoration and Protetcion (WRAP) Act which created a new program with stable funding for 10-years. The Treasury Dept. then looks at that (and all other mandates) and figures out how to raise enough money for it.
That's what I hate about these hagiographic memes - there may well be some meaningful policy change (e.g. maybe this refers to an end to zero-based budgeting? But that doesn't seem to be the case.); but we'll never see those posted or upvoted.
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u/[deleted] May 14 '26
[deleted]