By Kathianne Boniello
In a city facing a budget hole of at least $4 billion, Community Board 11 in Bayside reviewed and accepted its wish list of capital and expense projects at its monthly meeting Monday night even though most of the items will not get funding in the next fiscal year.
Each year the board, which includes the communities of Bayside, Little Neck, Douglaston, Oakland Gardens, Hollis Hills and Auburndale, gives the city a list of projects it would like the city to support financially, CB 11 Chairman Jerry Iannece said.
But with Mayor Michael Bloomberg talking about additional budget cuts to close the city’s gaping deficit, the likelihood of CB 11’s budget priorities getting money in fiscal year 2004 was expected to be slim, CB 11 member Joan Garippa said.
“There will not be much money around,” said Garippa, one of the members who worked on the list of budget priorities. “You’re going to see an awful lot of things getting delayed. There’s going to be a lot of pain spread around.”
Upon taking office Bloomberg instituted stiff budget reductions to narrow the budget gap and asked every city agency, including community boards and the five borough president’s offices, to trim about 15 percent from their budgets.
Garippa said “at this point there isn’t going to be too much funding for any of these.”
Nevertheless, the board gave its OK to the priorities list by a vote of 26-9.
CB 11, which is headquartered in Little Neck but holds its meetings in Bayside’s MS 158, splits its budget priorities into two categories: capital projects and expense items.
The 2004 list from CB 11 includes 43 items in all, while capital projects the board would like funded ranged from road reconstruction and environmental projects to requests for more street cleanings and park renovations.
The top five capital items CB 11 has requested funding for are:
• the rebuilding of West Alley Road in Douglaston, between 233rd St. and Douglaston Parkway. This construction was slated to be done as part of the reshaping of the interchange between the Cross Island Parkway and the Long Island Expressway.
• the Oakland Lake Ravine Project, a proposal to revamp the sewage system and eliminate flooding conditions around Bayside Hills and Queensborough Community College.
• the city’s purchase of private lands for preservation within Udall’s Cove, a wetlands preserve which borders Great Neck, L.I., Little Neck and Douglaston.
• the reconstruction of streets in Douglaston, where roads originally built on marshy areas have been sinking around utility lines in the street.
• the restoration of Aurora Pond, a small pond bordering the entrance to Udall’s Cove in Little Neck.
Expense budget items given priority by CB 11 include providing more money for city Buildings Department inspectors to enforce zoning codes, adding officers to the 111th Precinct, funding for tree pruning near traffic signs and signals, improving catch basin and sewer cleaning and increasing resources for CB 11 itself.
Reach reporter Kathianne Boniello by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 157.
