The Brooklyn Delegation’s budget process has been completed for this fiscal year. The below information is for reference only. If you or your organization have questions regarding the status of your Council application, please email discretionary@council.nyc.gov, and for further questions, please contact Blake Shaw at bshaw@council.nyc.gov.

Speaker’s List Process – Expense and Capital 

This year, the Brooklyn Delegation will focus its Speaker’s List on two major issues impacting the borough – addressing the root causes of gun violence and expanding social services for longtime and recent Brooklynites. 

For the interest of time and staff capacity, the Brooklyn Delegation will ONLY be meeting with groups recommended by each Council Member of the delegation. If you are recommended by a Council Member for a meeting, you will receive an email from one of the Chairs’ offices with a meeting time and a link to a supplemental form. Expense funding meetings will be scheduled around the second week of March and capital funding meetings will be scheduled around the first week of April. 

We recommend that organizations seeking funding from the Delegation through Speaker Funding reach out to individual Council Members for recommendation. Each member has their own budget review process so please defer to them for their process. 

Parameters for Proposed Projects

• Addressing the Roots of Gun Violence
  • Expense Projects: The program or service rendered by an organization should either address the issue of gun violence itself (ex. Cure violence groups, gun violence advocacy groups) or a root cause of gun violence (ex. Youth mentorship programs, after school programming). All projects should serve at least three districts in the borough.
  • Capital Projects: The capital project must be for an organization that will do work on addressing gun violence and its root causes (ex. AV equipment for an after school program, van for organizations that work to support families) or for public spaces that contribute to neighborhood safety (ex. Park improvements, community center renovations) 
• Expanding Social Services 
  • Expense Projects: The program or service rendered by an organization should be a social service such as food distribution, housing support, legal services, and healthcare. All projects should serve at least three districts in the borough.
  • Capital Projects: The capital project must be for an organization that will need physical infrastructure improvements or acquisitions to provide a social services (ex. Food warehouses, affordable housing projects) 

Discretionary Funding 

The Brooklyn Delegation gets two forms of discretionary funding – borough designations and food pantries initiative. As done in the past fiscal year, this pot of funding will be divided evenly amongst the sixteen delegation members to use at their discretion (does not need to fall into the above categories of gun violence and social services). 

Since individual Council Members will be making the decisions on who receives this funding, please defer to their individual budget process.

Delegation Staffers

For any questions regarding the budget process, please contact the following staffers: 

• Council Member Chi Ossé’s Office: 
  • May Vutrapongvatana, Director of Policy and Budget Initiatives, mvutrapongvatana@council.nyc.gov and (929) 946-1687
• Council Member Farah Louis’ Office: 
  • Blake Shaw, Budget Director, bshaw@council.nyc.gov 
  • Ruth Guillaume, Community Outreach Liaison, rguillaume@council.nyc.gov