Chair Lee opening remarks on FY27 DOHMH public health budget

Awesome.

All right, remember to do that.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome to the eighth day of the FY27 Executive Budget Hearings.

I'm Councilmember Linda Lee, and today we'll begin with the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Public Health section, followed by Department of Health and Mental Hygiene for Mental Hygiene.

And I'm pleased to be joined by our speaker, Speaker Menon, and my colleague, Chair of the Committee on Health, Councilmember Lynn Schulman.

And we have been joined today by Council Members Narcisse, Areola, and Felder, who are both on Zoom.

Councilmember Marte, Councilmember Wong, Councilmember Wilson, and Councilmember Cabán.

And welcome to our commissioner, Dr.

Alistair Martin.

Yes?

Oh, and Carmen De La Rosa.

I'm sorry.

So welcome, Commissioner, to you and your team for being with us this morning, and thank you all for answering our questions today.

So on May 12, 2026, the administration released the executive financial plan for FY27-30 with a proposed fiscal 27 budget of $124.7 billion.

The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene's public health proposed FY27 budget of $1.59 billion represents 2.1% of the administration's proposed FY27 budget in the executive plan.

And this is an increase of $59.7 million or 3.9% from the $1.54 billion originally budgeted in the preliminary plan.

This increase results from several actions, mostly tied to an additional $17.6 million for disease outbreak resilience, $12 million for the mobile food vending expansion, $7.2 million for tuberculosis management, and $4 million for sexual health clinics.

As of April 2026, DOHMH public health section headcount was 202 less than their fiscal 2026 budgeted headcount.

In the FY27 preliminary budget hearing, we raised concerns regarding disease prevention and treatment, chronic disease prevention, health equity, and immunization programs.

We were pleased to see that many of these priorities were reflected in the executive.

At the same time, this budget hearing comes at a period of significant uncertainty for public health agencies across the country.

Federal funding that supported critical disease surveillance, laboratory capacity, and emergency preparedness efforts is beginning to expire, while public health departments are simultaneously being asked to respond to emerging infectious diseases,

rising chronic disease burdens, and increasing health care access challenges.

That is why I'm encouraged to see investments in disease outbreak resilience, tuberculosis prevention, and childhood asthma initiatives.

And healthcare access programs.

However, it is also important that these investments are supported by a workforce that can successfully implement them.

With the agency still operating below budgeted headcount and at the same time eliminating long-term vacant positions, we must ensure that staffing capacity keeps pace with the growing responsibilities being assigned to the department.

I look forward to hearing from the commissioner today about how the department plans to sustain critical public health services, address federal funding uncertainty, advance healthy NYC goals, and continues protecting the health of all New Yorkers in the years ahead.

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