Residents vote to fund $1M worth of projects
This weekend, 2,812 residents of City Councilman Brad Lander’s Brooklyn district, which stretches from Cobble Hill through Park Slope to Kensington, voted in New York City’s second “participatory budgeting” election, a groundbreaking initiative that lets community members decide how to spend their own tax dollars on projects in their neighborhood.
Voters selected from among 24 projects proposed by neighborhood residents. The six projects receiving the most votes will be prioritized for funding as part of the City’s FY2014 budget, which will be adopted in June, with $1 million in city capital funds committed by Lander:
1) P.S. 230: Help kids connect and learn with technology — $180,000. The funds will help to install 34 Smartboards with supporting MacBooks in a high-needs school serving 1,300 students, many of whom are English-language learners..
2) Renovation of eight bathrooms, at P.S. 58, the Carroll School — $110,000. This amount will go toward replacing fixtures and flushing mechanisms. The school’s last renovation was in 1954.