“Affordability” is going forgotten again as Mayor Zohran Mamdani grabs some extra cash for his agenda by racking water rates.
Over the objections of elected officials, homeowner groups and rate-payers, the city Water Board on Tuesday approved a 6% water-rate hike as of July 1.
GOP gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman rightly slammed it as “a multimillion-dollar backroom deal to bail out Mamdani’s city budget on the backs of hardworking taxpayers.”
The fix was in from the start: Mamdani’s executive budget spending plan had already baked in the rate hike months ago.
The average homeowner can expect to shell out an extra $100 a year, while water and sewer bills for apartment buildings will jump $60 per unit.
Which points to one reason the mayor doesn’t care: Tenants don’t directly feel any pain from the hike, so they won’t blame Mamdani — and the landlords already know he hates them.
Since the days of Ed Koch, City Hall has collected a “rental payment” from the Water Board to “lease” the Big Apple’s water and sewer system; that revenue flows into the city’s General Fund.
The charge has soared in recent years, from $102 million in 2003 to $313 million in the current fiscal year.
Since 2004, it’s been based not on anything to do with the city’s costs, but on an obscure formula based on various bond-payment rates.
Way back in 2008, city Comptroller William Thompson blasted the change as sneakily exploiting New Yorkers for City Hall’s fiscal benefit; he wanted the lease revenue to go to lowering water rates for customers; naturally, City Hall nixed his recommendation.
And Mamdani, who campaigned on various pledges to make living in the Big Apple less costly, is continuing the rip-off of water customers to help bloat his city budget.
It’s hardly the only area where “affordability” takes a back seat to his urge to splurge: Last week, Mamdani’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development slammed Bronx tenants at Tracey Towers with a proposed 28% rent hike: No freeze for you!
Whenever he thinks he can get away with it, Mayor “Warmth of Collectivism” gives struggling New Yorkers the cold shoulder.