TRANSCRIPT:
MAMDANI: "Above all else, this budget offers a road map for the years to come. This is only the first budget of our administration. Many more will follow. And every budget that follows will build on the principles established here: honest budgeting, fiscal discipline, transparent government, and an unwavering belief that working people deserve a city hall that delivers for them every single day. We will return to this budget as a reminder of how much more is made possible when we shake off the shackles of the status quo and pursue the transformative change that New Yorkers deserve. That means finding efficiencies, it means cutting waste and it means taxing the rich. We will return to this budget when we are told, as we so often are, that we must budget with austerity rather than ambition, and we will return to this budget as a model of how to invest in our city, how to place working people at the heart of our political decisions, and how to govern with an enduring commitment to fiscal health and fiscal responsibility. Thank you."
