Spend Better, Not Less?



Republican mayoral candidate Nicole Malliotakis is harshly critical of increased City spending under Mayor de Blasio, but she doesn’t have a plan to reduce that spending.  Malliotakis held a City Hall press conference this afternoon to criticize de Blasio for “outrageous amounts of money being spent on consultants” in the Department of Education.

Malliotakis regularly criticizes the $85 billion overall size of the City budget and the $15 billion increase in the budget since de Blasio took office.  Today I asked Malliotakis how much, if at all, she would cut the $24 billion Department of Education budget.  After a lengthy critique of de Blasio’s spending, including the line that de Blasio “has spent the taxpayers money like a Saudi prince,” Malliotakis offered that she’s “looking to make sure that that money is spent properly” but acknowledged that she does not have any plan to reduce the City’s spending.

Video:

Here’s our full exchange: