NYC Agencies Get Mixed Marks From Citizens Budget Commission

New York City gets mixed grades when it comes to implementing priority initiatives across its agencies, according to a report released on Tuesday by the Citizens Budget Commission.

Before Monday's release of Mayor's Management Report for Fiscal 2016, the budget watchdog had said it would be looking at data from 10 critical areas. The CBC said on Tuesday that the city had shown progress on three fronts, produced ambiguous results in five, and raised a cause for concern in two areas.

Upon release of the report on Monday, New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said "From increases in the number of IDNYC cards and graduation rates, to decreases in murders and emergency response times, we're seeing improvements across the board in key areas."

The CBC cited areas of progress which included fire, sanitation, and affordable housing.

The NYFD's response times to life-threatening medical emergencies and structural fires held steady between Fiscal 2015 and 2016. "While not an improvement, the department nevertheless deserves credit as it was able to maintain service quality even as the number of medical emergencies increased by 8%," the CBC said.

While the volume of refuse disposed increased slightly, the Department of Sanitation improved the recycling diversion rate by 6% to 16.9%.

The Department of Housing Preservation and Development surpassed its unit "completion" and "start" goals in fiscal 2016, increasing completions by 82% and starts by 15% compared to fiscal 2015, the CBC said.

Ambiguous areas included prisons, health and hospitals, housing work, human resources, and education.

Fiscal 2016 data show the incidence of inmate assaults on staff fell 8% while the incidence of violence between inmates increased 26.5%. New York City Health + Hospitals (H+H) increased MetroPlus enrollment by 6%, though the number of unique patients that H+H served continued to decline.

Placements by the Human Resources Administration in employment rose 0.9% in fiscal 2016; however its overall caseload grew by 2.6%. The New York City Housing Authority took 1.6 fewer hours to resolve emergency work requests, but response time to non-emergency requests increased 5%.

The Board of Education's graduation and college/career preparedness rates for the 2015-2016 school year won't be available until the Fiscal 2017 preliminary MMR.

The CBC also said that there were two areas for concern – crime and homelessness.

The watchdog said the city's long trending decline in major felony crimes suffered a reversal in fiscal 2016, with a rise of 1.7% from fiscal 2015.

The average number of families with children in city shelters per day rose 2.3%, while the adult family population grew almost 5%, and the number of single adults in shelters per day increased 12.3%.