By Molly Sugarman
If you had $1 million to spend on improving the Upper West Side, would you upgrade the restrooms at Jessie Isadore Straus School ($300,000), or add adult fitness equipment in Riverside Park ($300,000)? You can do both and still have enough money for trees and tree guards on Broadway ($250,000).
By the way, you do have $1 million to spend on these projects and others. It’s called Participatory Budgeting (PB), which means residents of the district get to allocate money to capital projects they want rather than leaving it up to the City Council to decide.
If you are concerned about public safety, you can spend $600,000 on security cameras for Westside Urban Renewal Brownstones, and another $320,000 on security cameras on Broadway, Amsterdam, Columbus, and Riverside Drive. And you’d be able to add another $72,000 for security cameras at De Hostos Houses as well.
The PB process started in January, when Councilperson Gale Brewer put out the call for capital projects that cost at least $50,000 and have a lifespan of at least five years. Seventy-one projects were suggested by district residents. Volunteers and city agencies pared the list down to nine. Now, everyone — age 11 and up — gets to vote on the combination of projects they want for that $1 million.
Starting on April 2nd you can vote in person at one of several polling places throughout the district. Or you can vote online. Just do it before April 10th when the polls close.
Here are the nine 2022 Participatory Budgeting finalists, courtesy of CM Gale Brewer. You can choose three.
1. Sarah Anderson School Technology Grant: $117,000
[P.S. 9, grades K-5, 100 W. 84th St.]
Purchase 12 Promethean Boards & 30 laptops with 1 laptop cart to ensure each classroom has a smart board & laptops that are connected to the smart boards. This project will ensure that the school has technology deployed to the classrooms to support an enriched & interactive learning experience.
2. Center School Technology Grant: $117,000
[M.S. 243, grades 5-8, 100 W. 84th St.]
Purchase 12 Promethean Boards & 30 laptops with 1 laptop cart to ensure each classroom has a smart board & laptops that are connected to the smart boards. This project will ensure that the school has technology deployed to the classrooms to support an enriched & interactive learning experience.
3. Jessie Isadore Straus School Infrastructure Improvements: $300,000
[P.S. 199, grades K-5, 270 W. 70th St.]
Upgrade & repair 2 existing student restrooms (replace fixtures, stalls, floor/wall tiling, ADA accessibility).
4. Adult Fitness Equipment for Riverside Park: $300,000
Create an area with exercise equipment for adult use that includes a section for group classes and a cooling mist fixture.
5. Greening Broadway: $250,000
[Trees & Tree Guards for Broadway Above 72nd St.]
Install approximately 35 trees & tree guards on the sidewalks along Broadway. This would make the avenue a more attractive destination, is environmentally sound, & offers additional shade.
6. Bus Countdown Timers on Broadway: $320,000
[Intersection placement to be determined by DOT.]
Install four bus arrival time countdown timers on northbound & southbound multiple-route bus stops on Broadway, where they intersect with crosstown routes.
7. Security Cameras on Broadway, Amsterdam, Columbus, & Riverside Drive: $320,000
[Locations determined in consultation with NYPD.]
Install eight security cameras on Broadway, Amsterdam, Columbus, and Riverside Drive to deter crime and and ensure public safety.
8. Security Cameras for Westside Urban Renewal Brownstones: $600,000
[NYCHA, West 90th St.]
Install approximately 15 security cameras at Westside Urban Renewal Brownstones to deter crime and ensure public safety.
9. Security Cameras for De Hostos Houses: $72,000
[NYCHA, 201 W. 93rd St.]
Install four security cameras for the ground floor of De Hostos Houses to deter crime & and ensure public safety.
There is no point. Parents vote in all the school projects. Separate the school projects from the other projects.
You are absolutely correct, and the less diverse schools with wealthier parents win once more.
So why don’t the other schools get their acts together and mobilize. This is about as easy as it gets. It is very well publicized and easy to submit an idea then vote.
Their principals and/or PAs really need to get on the ball. Or else they need to stop complaining.
I’m in favor of an adult fitness center in Riverside Park.
There’s a very big outdoor fitness center on the East River near Chinatown that’s very popular. We should have one like that in our neighborhood.
Is is possible to see why some of these things so much money? Why do 15 security camera cost $600k? Each security camera is 40k? And what kind of laptops are these kids getting? Even with a MacBook it shouldn’t be 100k for these items.
DOE laptops are macbook air’s with a retail cost of about $1000 hardware only. Then, there is a software license cost, a warranty (extended) and service contract that goes on top of that, bringing the computer cost up.to around $1500 per computer. Promethean Boards run $3000 to $6000 depending on the model and installation location. They also require a service contract.
Ok, good to know! I hope there was an effort made to get a discount on these Promethean boards if we’re potentially buying 24 of them but regardless, this budget makes sense. It would be good to see this breakdown for each of these ideas.
Even though I think most of these prices are ridiculous, I understand the cost is not entirely up to the 6th district since some vendors are mandated by the government. I just think it’d be useful for me to know who to be angry at and who to email about these cost issues rather than blaming the 6th council because they’ve chosen not to be transparent in this process.
What type of security cameras (and installation) cost $40,000 (outdoor) and $18,000 (indoor), respectively? I’d love to see those detailed invoices.
I like #4 (adult fitness) and #7 because the security cameras will be in common areas used by the general public. The cost of #8 is really high, $600,000 for 15 cameras, did they submit invoices for that estimate?
Please do waste money on bus countdown timers, it will do nothing to improve service and bus safety. Building better lighting and actual bus shelters at the bus stops would be a better use of money. A few years ago, participatory budget money was wasted on bus countdown timers that broke right away.
** correction .. please do not waste money on count down timers. Sorry for the typo.
the BUSTIME app on a phone works very well
i use 2 different bus apps and they are never the same and neither one is accurate so please, which one do you use hat works ??? thx
Much more info is needed to make informed choices. Can we see detailed bids/estimates/components of the projects? Some seem rather exorbitant for what is listed — for example, $40,000 per security camera or $80,000 per bus countdown timer. Do the bids include the hardware only, or also wiring, labor, installation, ongoing maintenance, operating costs, warranty, insurance, etc. Can the entities receiving the grants afford to operate, maintain, and repair the items, and were they required to prove that in the application?
Who are the entities making grant requests and receiving funds? Why do the applicants themselves not provide such services? NYCHA (or the RAD private entities that are taking over management) should already be required to provide security including cameras. Further NYCHA as a city agency does not seem eligible (or even capable) as a grant applicant. Is the applicant actually the tenant association? Do the tenants want the cameras?
For the Broadway trees ($7143 per tree and guard), who is the applicant? Is this a consortium of property owners? Property owners are responsible for tree guards in front of their buildings, and Broadway property owners should be able to afford the guards. They already can get free street trees from the city . And there already is a city program for discount tree guards . So why use the PB program for something already covered in city budgets?
Links to the free tree and tree guard programs:
Request a street tree: https://www.nycgovparks.org/trees/street-tree-planting/request
Tree guard program:
https://www.nycgovparks.org/trees/tree-care/tree-guards
Security cameras will be my vote. This way we can have a recording of a perpetrator or an actual crime which is a positive step in fighting crime regardless what the current laws are like. Recording is a recording, it is a valuable evidence.
Most of the projects seem to be the same. In the past, there was a much wider variety in the types of projects to be voted on. And they seemed much more grassroots.
I understand there is no $, but it is baffling to have in school bathrooms on here- I can understand the ones at the school linked playgrounds.
Whoever designed this I appreciate the gesture and encourage more of this sort of thing. In order to make a good decision one needs good information. Is there a way to see the full proposals?
I emailed Gale Brewer’s office to ask them to post the proposals to the web site so constituents can make informed decisions and since there seem to be many questions… She emailed back that her staff does not have time to respond to me, and that I should call her directly and she can explain them. (?!?) While responsive, this seems the opposite of efficiency.
Sounds like someone doesn’t want you to see the proposals. How could these not be publicly posted from the get-go? Oh, right. We have a dinosaur in office who doesn’t do technology.
I am more than dismayed that this program — “Participatory Budgeting” — has continued into the Adams administration. This is nothing more than a free giveaway to the 51 council members who get to write about their “largess” and their “fight for the community” it in their newsletters and crow about “all their achievements” in their latest legislative term.
It’s not to say that some of these ideas and proposals aren’t meritorious, but they should have been addressed in the normal process of government if they were. Yes, some schools might need high-tech whiteboards and many other areas might benefit from increased video surveillance cameras, but then they should have been put in those respective budgets and been looked at a whole in terms city-wide needs from the start. “Bus timers on Broadway?” — Isn’t that an MTA expense? What does that have to do with the city budget?
This, on the contrary, in nothing more than free money given to 51 council members totaling (the math here is easy) 51 million dollars in the city budget. Is there really 51 million dollars laying around that has not been spent that can be handed out for these ‘worthy causes”? This is not how Government is run. We elect you, our council people to do the hard work and make these decisions. If you are not up to it, please resign. These are serious times to get our city back on its feet, not a time for participatory workarounds meant to pay off the populace with cheap gimmicks.
As an Upper West Sider, we owe a debt to Gale Brewer who has put up a good fight for the community for many years now, and so, I would ask you Gale to see reconsider how misguided this program is and put a stop to it in our name, and in the interest of the entire city at large. This boondoggle was expected from the previous occupant of District 6 and Mayor, but I thought that after your years as Borough President, you might have come back to your old job with a “bigger perspective.” I am not an anti-taxer voter, but if we don’t start looking at ourselves honestly here, we risk losing many years of past (and future) progress.
This is nonsense.
As an aside, I’m pretty sure I was at a school auction (mentioned here for a grant) where the PTA raised all the money for these “Promethean boards”, and we congratulated ourselves mightily for having done that – what a glorious night it was. I think Gale even came by. Did they not get them after all, and why are they asking for the same thing again? I guess our children moved on to new schools and there is a new generation of parents to promise things to. Something is wrong here.
Nobody has mentioned that anyone, even a tourist from another country, can pick up a paper ballot, or 2, or 3, or 10, and fill it out WITHOUT PROVIDING A NAME OR ADDRESS! Just grab a sheet and go. Second, the online system asks for a NAME and EMAIL but we know these can be made up; and again someone can vote 2, or 3, or 30 times. The system must absolutely require some form of identification whether it’s name plus address or name plus public school attending etc. You cannot just leave sheets of paper and let any Joe Shmo fill it out and call that a democracy. One District 6 resident = one vote. Address needs to be confirmed. Children don’t pay ConEd Bills. Must ask for address up front and verify it!
ttps://www.participate.nyc.gov/users/sign_up