Chair Althea Stevens delivers opening statement on ACS savings impact on youth

And I now want to turn it over to my co-chair for this hearing, Councilmember Stevens, for her opening statement.

Good morning and thank you, Chair Lee.

My name is Althea Stevens and I'm serves as the chair of Committee on Children and Youth.

For this first part of our hearing this morning, I look forward to discussing changes to ACS budgets since the preliminary plan.

The executive budget included investments in several areas, including child care vouchers, detention facilities, and staffing across the agency.

New needs of $55.7 million were added to the fiscal 2026 in the executive plan, growing to $104.6 million in fiscal 2027 and dropping to $80.7 million in fiscal 2028 and in the outer years.

Additionally, other adjustments in fiscal 2026 totaled $547.6 million, dropping to $2 million in fiscal 2027 and in the outer years.

While the city's budget now has been balanced without property taxes increased, all the agencies were required to meet savings and vacancy reduction benchmarks.

As agencies providing frontline services to some of the city's most vulnerable residents, understanding the impact of these savings targeted ACS is critical.

My theme for today, and will always continue to be, the city will not be considered affordable if it's not affordable for young people.

Because if we don't invest in our young people on the front end, we then ultimately invest in them on the back end when they are living and doing things that are not things that we want to see.

I look forward to discussing how ACS responded to the mayor's savings requirements, their methodology, the rationale, and identifying areas where savings could be made.

could be realized, and most critically, the effects on services or programming that these savings might have.

I'm also interested in understanding how the agency is working with the state partners to maximize the funding in vital services such as child care vouchers, preventative services, and programming.

I'm also really curious to hear about the plan for the money that was allocated from the governor because in our

preliminary hearing, that plan still had not been discussed with us and want to make sure that the money that was allocated for youth services and the raise the age that we are thinking about and also would like to hear if we're going to

put in a hardship application.

In the Council's responsibility to ensure that the city budget is fair, transparent, and accountable to New Yorkers, as the Chair of Children and Youth Committee, I will continue to push for accountability and transparency in the ACS budget.

Amidst the needs to eliminate budget gaps and meet saving requirements, our responsibility is in acting a budget that reflects the needs and interests of our city's youth, taking on even higher importance.

Like the Mayor has often repeated, this budget must not be balanced on the back of working people or young people.

I'm adding the or because nobody keeps talking about the young people.

So today, through and throughout the examination of AC budget, we ensure that this is the case.