Tell your NYC councilmember how to spend a million dollars
Participatory budgeting kicks off this week; From showers for the homeless to a picnic grove in McCarren Park
The sixth annual Participatory Budgeting (PB) Week has kicked off, and this year the City Council has launched digital voting, which means that you can now vote for projects in your district online or in-person at any PBNYC vote site.
In participatory budgeting, residents directly decide how to spend part of the city’s budget to improve their neighborhoods’ parks, schools, libraries and streets.
The PB process has been called “grassroots democracy at its best,” because who better knows the needs of a community than the people who live there?
Voting runs from March 25 to April 2. Residents can vote for as many as five of their favorite project proposals. Each district is dedicating at least a million dollars to fund projects, and each participating councilmember guarantees funding for the three proposals that tally the most votes.