The city's open streets program has shrunk significantly from the height of the pandemic — and the organizations that make them happen warn more cuts are coming if the City Council doesn't cough up enough funding.
"The limited funding and decreases in funding that have occurred over the years jeopardize the continuity and future of the program — funding pressure is already leading to downsizing and the disappearance of Open Streets programs," a coalition of 16 volunteer open street groups wrote in a letter to City Council Transportation Chair Selvena Brooks-Powers on Wednesday.
The groups want $48 million over the next three years to support their volunteer-led efforts to organize and manage streets across the city.
That $16 million per year for three years (about the same amount of money that it takes to employ Bogdan Bogdanovic) would be a separate pot of money from the $30 million the city allocates to open streets primarily through a contract with the Horticultural Society of New York. The new money would go directly to the organizations themselves, which currently have access to a maximum of just $20,000 per year in grants from the city.
The $20,000 cap prevents the open streets program from growing by forcing organizers to cutback their operations to save costs, as they have on Vanderbilt Avenue and Fifth Avenue in Brooklyn in the last two years, the letter said.
"Volunteer community organizations have taken on the brunt of the work executing Open Streets programs — everything from planning, fundraising, daily operations, community programming, communication and outreach, and site management," the groups wrote.
Signatories on the letter included the 34th Ave Open Streets Coalition in Queens, the Decatur Block Association in the Bronx, the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council in Brooklyn and the Loisaida Open Streets Community Coalition in Manhattan.
Open streets deliver major benefits to the city for the relative pittance that's been spent on them over the life of the program, the letter noted.
A Department of Citywide Planning study last year found storefront vacancy rates are lower on corridors with open streets than in the larger neighborhoods where they were located. Business owners have also praised the program as one that brings them customers and creates a feeling of community.
In the letter, the open streets volunteers noted that their efforts, and money for volunteer groups, wouldn't be as necessary if the city backed more permanent physical changes to the street as it did on 34th Avenue and 31st Avenue in Queens, and Berry Street and Underhill Avenue (eventually) in Brooklyn.
"Infrastructure investments reduce the amount of labor required to run the Open Streets, and thereby reduce operating costs. However, many of the promised street improvement projects and capital redesigns have been stalled, due to lack of staffing and resources at DOT, as well as interference by the Adams administration," the coalition wrote. "It is key that the City provide DOT with the funding, resources, and staffing required to realize this work."
Budget negotiations are just getting underway between the Council, led by Speaker Adrienne Adams, and Mayor Adams.
A rep for the City Council expressed openness to the coalition's funding ask.
"Open Streets are critical components of our city's public realm and streetscape, offering vital community programs and gathering space," City Council spokesperson Julia Agos said in a statement.
"This level of funding would require support from the mayoral administration, including the Department of Transportation, as contributing partners. The Council will review the funding request and discuss it in budget conversations with the administration."
A rep for DOT said the suggestions in the letter "will be reviewed through the budget process."
"NYC DOT provides financial and operational support to hundreds of Open Streets and plazas, helping expand to a record number of Open Streets at schools and sustain roughly 200 Open Street location across the city," agency spokesman Vin Barone told Streetsblog.
