NYC Comptroller
- Seal of the City of New York
The City Comptroller is the Chief Financial Officer for the city whose primary duty is to guarantee the financial soundness of the city by advising the Mayor, the City Council and the people about fiscal responsibility. He makes recommendations concerning financial transactions or other fiscal matters after conducting audits of the operations of city agencies. In other words, he ensures that New Yorkers’ hard-earned tax dollars do not go wasted.
The Comptroller is required to invest the city pension funds, approve contracts and also oversee the budget. As New York City has the largest municipal budget and pension fund in the country, this is a huge responsibility. The comptroller is elected by the city residents for a 4-year term and can serve up to 3 terms as of the 2008 term limits extension passed by the NYC Council. Term limits were extended for not only the Comptroller, but also the Mayor, Public Advocate, and City Council Members.
History
The position of Comptroller was first created in 1801 as an appointive office and was not directly elected by the people until 1884. Finally, in 1938 the Comptroller led an autonomous part of the New York City government’s executive branch, along with the Mayor, the Public Advocate and the five Borough Presidents. The Comptroller served on the New York City Board of Estimate, along with the Mayor, the President of the City Council and the 5 Borough Presidents until that body was found unconstitutional in 1989. The current City Comptroller is Bill Thompson, a democrat, who is serving in his second term.
- Comptroller Bill Thompson
Comptroller At Work
In fulfilling his routine duties of conducting audits of city organizations, Comptroller Thompson recently discovered that the New York Mets have not been paying all their rent to the city. In fact, through an audit covering the time span of 2003 through 2007, Thompson determined that the baseball team owes New York City approximately $2.7 million in rent money and insurance premiums on the new stadium, among other things. Although Thompson insisted that the Mets uphold their end of the lease agreement, he claimed that “the Bloomberg administration is turning a blind eye on the issue” in a press release on July 17, 2009.
In May Thompson prepared a report about the ways in which the Department of Education precluded parent participation in school decisions, despite Education Law. In that study he detailed specific recommendations for ways that parents could become more involved in the education process in New York City.
Get updates and research reports from the Comptroller’s office on the Comptroller’s website HERE.
This article was written by Nicole Tatz and edited by Al Benninghoff.
