


The Adams administration is stripping city agencies of their discretionary spending powers — in the latest attempt by the mayor to balance the Big Apple’s books with the impending migrants-fueled $12 billion shortfall, The Post has learned.
Agencies will now have to jump through a series of bureaucratic hoops to get approval for even the most common expenses to keep offices running normally, according to sources and a memo obtained by The Post.
“It could be like the coffee guy or someone who delivers water… It’s so vague,” a City Hall source who reviewed the plan said referring to freezing all general contracts.
“That’s a big spigot to turn off. That’s like all outside spending,” they said. “Maybe if it was like [over] a dollar amount, but you don’t need to look over everything.”
The directive sent out on Tuesday by the Office of Budget Management halts nearly all non-salary spending until next summer as part of the city’s attempt to reach the first wave of 5% cuts needed by November.
The memo rattles off more than three dozen budget codes that have been frozen, which include all:
To get approval to spend in any of those categories, agencies must obtain an exemption from OMB, Chief of Staff to the Mayor Camille Varlack and the First Deputy Mayor’s Office Sheena Wright.

If an agency spends any city funds in those categories without approval, “hires and promotions will not be approved for that month,” the memo threatens.
Exemptions can be made for services required by law or the council, associated with the migrant crisis or simply for mayoral priority.
The process though will take up to 10 days for expenses already covered by grants and up to 21 days for all others.
City Hall is using this to take a hard look at all current contracts, insiders say.

“Freezing spending in specific object codes is a pretty specific spending control that the city hasn’t typically done,” said Ana Champeny, one of the top budget analysts at the Citizens Budget Commission.
Champeny estimated the freeze would hit approximately $4.4 billion of the city’s $107.1 billion budget — but it was unclear how liberal the administration would be with granting exemptions.
“TBD how restrictive it will be in practice,” one agency staffer said.
City Hall did not immediately respond for comment.
The Adams administration says it needs to find up to 15% in savings by next year to account for the ballooning migrant costs as it cares for nearly 60,000 asylum seekers.
Some in the city are unsure that’s even possible.
“I don’t see how they are going to hit these PEGs, [mayor’s three phases of 5% savings]. Maybe one but not all three,” a council source said.
Additional reporting by Carl Campanile