Cracking down on tax-skipping deadbeats could fill much of Mamdani’s $5.4B NYC budget hole: critics

Instead of taxing the rich, Mayor Zohran Mamdani could fill nearly half of NYC’s projected $5.4 billion budget gap by simply collecting unpaid taxes and fines from deadbeats. As of Feb. 28, the city was sitting on $1.1 billion in uncollected property taxes, according to the city Comptroller’s Office. And it has also been unable to collect another $1.3 billion in Environmental Control Board fines usually issued for construction, zoning, and safety code violations, the Finance Department said. In all, the uncollected taxes and fines total an astounding $2.4 billion. That’s 44% of the amount Mamdani claims he needs to...