Every fall, Queens Community Board 2’s committees sit down and spend time debating a list. By the time they’re done, that list becomes the district’s official request to City Hall for the next fiscal year’s spending, capped at 40 capital projects and 25 expense items.
That back-and-forth happens every year, and it’s happening again now. CB2’s committees begin reviewing the district’s needs and drafting next year’s list in September, with a public hearing in the fall before the board votes and sends its Statement of Community District Needs to the Mayor and Queens Borough President.
Here’s how the process actually works, what it got HPS and LIC last time, and how residents can weigh in on what’s asked for next.
Disclosure:
The publisher of the Hunters Point Ledger is a member of Queens Community Board 2. We don’t speak on behalf of Community Board 2 or any other members.
Last fall, Queens Community Board 2 asked the city for 65 things: a public pool at Hunters Point South Parcel D, more uniformed officers at the 108th Precinct, dedicated bus lanes on Queens Boulevard, staff support to track the OneLIC rezoning’s promised commitments. Eighteen requests got fully funded. Twenty-five were turned down outright. The rest landed somewhere in between, with agencies saying they support an idea but can’t pay for it this year.
What The Statement Of District Needs Actually Is
The requirement comes from the City Charter, which requires every community board to submit a statement of expense budget priorities and a statement of capital budget priorities to the Mayor and borough president roughly 30 days before the Mayor’s own deadline for city agencies to submit their budget estimates. The Charter also caps how many priorities a board can list, which forces committees to rank rather than list every possible want.
Two documents come out of the cycle:
- The Statement of Community District Needs, a narrative describing the district’s top issues.
- The Community Board Budget Requests, the ranked, capped list of specific capital and expense asks.
read more explainers
-
How Queens CB2 Decides What To Ask The City For
Every fall, Queens Community Board 2’s committees sit down and spend time debating a list. By the time they’re done, that list becomes the district’s official request to City Hall for the next fiscal year’s spending, capped at 40 capital projects and 25 expense items.
The Timeline
- August 31st: The Survey Closes
- September: CB2 committees prepare their list of Capital and Expense budget requests
- October 1st – Full board public hearing (fall): Board presents its list of requests to Board and holds a public hearing for public comment. Residents can speak directly on what should make the list.
- October: The Community Board revise requests and the district narrative.
- November 5th Board Meeting: Vote to approve Statement of Needs and budget requests.
CB2 sends its Statement of Needs and Budget Requests to the Mayor’s Office of Management and Budget and Queens Borough President’s office. - January: OMB and city agencies publish the Preliminary Budget Register, responding line-by-line to whether each CB2 request was funded, partially funded, or rejected.
- February–March: CB2 reviews the Mayor’s preliminary budget and holds a second hearing.
- May: The Mayor’s Executive Budget is released, reflecting what ultimately survived.
- June: The City Council votes to adopt the final budget.
What CB2 Asked For Last Time, And What It Got
CB2 submitted 65 budget priorities for Fiscal Year 2027, split between 23 capital projects and 42 expense items, each ranked by the board. City agencies fully committed to funding 18 of them. Another 16 got a sympathetic but noncommittal response, agencies saying they support the request but don’t have the money this cycle. Twenty-five were rejected outright, and six came back marked unclear, with agencies asking the board to follow up directly.
DEP supported none of CB2’s seven requests. Zero funded, zero partially funded, all seven rejected.
| Agency | Funded | Supported, unfunded | Opposed | Already done | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Parks & Recreation | 0 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 9 |
| Transportation | 5 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 8 |
| Environmental Protection | 0 | 0 | 7 | 0 | 7 |
| Housing Preservation & Development | 6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 |
| Citywide Administrative Services | 0 | 1 | 4 | 0 | 5 |
| City Planning | 2 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 5 |
| Technology & Innovation (DoITT) | 1 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 4 |
| Police Department | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 4 |
| Cultural Affairs | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3 |
| Human Resources Administration | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 3 |
Land use and housing requests tied to existing city priorities (OneLIC, the HPS Site D plan) tended to get funded. Requests that require new standalone capital, like an indoor pool or new NYPD precinct headcount, mostly didn’t.
How To Weigh In
Residents don’t need to be CB2 members to shape the list. You can fill out the district needs survey now until August 31st.
District Needs Survey: Queens Community Board 2 Budget Request
This survey (~5-10 minutes) is for anyone who lives or works in Queens Community District 2 (Long Island City, Sunnyside, Woodside, and some of Maspeth) to offer input on our District’s needs. CB2 uses this info in our Statement of Needs submission, a formal part of the city budget process.
Randy Plemel
Publisher
✉️
The founder and publisher of the Hunters Point Ledger, a newsletter covering Hunters Point South and Long Island City. He serves on Queens Community Board 2, and all views are his own.
