Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine and CM Erik Bottcher benefit from the granite slide. Picture by Gabriele Holtermann
One other Metropolis finances is on the negotiating desk, and tough selections lie forward as we brace for the chaos Trump may inflict on our metropolis. However one factor is evident: we should lastly fund our parks and greenspaces just like the essential infrastructure they’re.
The Parks Division maintains 30,000 acres of public area citywide — that’s extra land than the whole borough of Manhattan. But its finances nonetheless hovers at simply 0.6% of the Metropolis’s complete spending—lower than 1 / 4 of what cities like Chicago and L.A. put money into their parks.For years, advocates and elected officers have known as for a easy repair: dedicate 1% of the Metropolis finances to our parks. As a result of New Yorkers deserve higher.
New York Metropolis’s parks should not a luxurious. They’re an integral a part of our lives and communities, and they’re important local weather infrastructure—cleansing our air, cooling our streets, strengthening communities, and in some circumstances, saving lives. As our summers get hotter, storms develop stronger, and rainfall intensifies, we should make investments extra in bushes and inexperienced areas.
But yr after yr, we ask our Parks Division to do extra with much less. This isn’t nearly mowing lawns. It’s about scaling up inexperienced infrastructure to arrange New York for a warmer, wetter, and extra excessive local weather.
We laid out this imaginative and prescient in our Million Extra Timber plan—an bold proposal to re-green town by planting or restoring a million extra bushes throughout the 5 boroughs.
Timber aren’t simply lovely; they’re city workhorses. A avenue tree can cool the encircling space by as much as 9 levels, important as our summers proceed to get hotter. Timber filter our air air pollution, take in stormwater, and enhance psychological well being.
We’d like extra of them, and we have to care for those we now have. Which means absolutely funding tree planting and upkeep—not simply on Parks land, however alongside streets, schoolyards, NYCHA campuses, and different under-canopied areas.
We additionally know the place investments are most wanted. Low-income neighborhoods and communities of shade sometimes have the fewest bushes and parks—and undergo the worst city warmth and air pollution. That’s not a coincidence. It’s the results of environmental injustice. Investing in parks can also be investing in equity.
Prior to now yr, my workplace has labored alongside the Parks Division to plant and keep avenue bushes throughout our borough, together with in communities which have lengthy been ignored. From our Cherry Blossom and Chinese language Scholar planting occasion with the Chinatown East Neighborhood Council to our tree giveaways in Higher Manhattan and Harlem with the New York Restoration Mission, we’re chipping away at our Million Timber aim. However as a metropolis, we have to do way more.
At the moment, our Parks Division is brief 795 employees—the very individuals who maintain our parks clear and protected, look after bushes, and run household programming. With out restoring these jobs, even sustaining our present cover can be a wrestle.
That’s why my fellow Borough Presidents from the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Queens and I are calling on the Mayor to revive funding for these essential jobs.
The underside line is that this: Mayor Adams has an opportunity on this yr’s finances to commit boldly to our metropolis’s parks. Not with slogans—however with actual funding. Now’s the time to dedicate 1% of this yr’s finances to our parks for a greener, more healthy, local weather resilient metropolis.
