Mayor, City Council reach agreement on most costly budget yet

Mayor Bill de Blasio has reached an agreement with the City Council on the budget for 2018 ahead of schedule.

The announcement of the more than $85 billion budget, which is budget is one of the earliest and most costly city budget ever passed on record, was announced Friday night.

Some of the highlights in the budget include over $105 million for universal physical education, $110 million toward public library improvements, property tax exemptions for veterans who served during a war that will average a little over $440 a year, $9 million to help expand the city’s summer youth employment program and more than $10 million to expand the free school lunch program.

"We understand what's happening in our nation, we understand the challenges in anything from Washington, D.C., so we have to both achieve those strategic investments while constantly being prepared for what may lie ahead," says Mayor de Blasio. "If you annualize that for the fiscal ‘18 budget, our reserves will total $5.65 million, by far the highest the city of New York has ever had."

The mayor stressed the importance of building the city's savings in the budget agreement because of what he call the uncertainty from the Trump administration.

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