(Washington, DC) – Today, Mayor Muriel Bowser presented her Fiscal Year 2020 (FY2020) Budget and Financial Plan to the Council of the District of Columbia as part of the District’s annual budget process. The $15.5 billion budget proposal includes investments in affordable housing, education, families, transportation, public safety, seniors, protecting DC values, and more.
“This budget is about ensuring that everyone living and doing business in the District is giving and getting their fair share,” said Mayor Bowser. “This is a budget that advances our DC values and addresses our city’s most pressing challenges – a budget that recognizes that these are very good times for Washington, DC, and asks our commercial property owners to share some of the upside so that we can invest more in keeping DC affordable for Washingtonians across the income spectrum.”
Investments in the budget reflect feedback gathered from residents during the Mayor’s annual budget engagement forums as well as senior and DC Government employee telephone town halls, agency budget recommendations, and mayoral programmatic recommendations. The FY2020 Budget marks the District’s 24th consecutive balanced budget.
Below are highlights of new investments and initiatives in Mayor Bowser’s FY2020 budget proposal.
Affordable Housing and Homeward DC
- Increasing the District’s investment in the Housing Production Trust Fund by 30 percent to $130 million
- Increasing the District’s investment in the Housing Preservation Fund by 50 percent to $15 million, which will yield an additional $45 million in private investment
- The creation of a new $20 million Workforce Housing Fund, which will leverage another $180 million in private sector investment
- $37 million in new funds to continue the implementation of Homeward DC to make homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring
- $5.2 million to expand and increase Schedule H – DC’s income tax credit to help offset rising property taxes
Education and Youth
- 2.2 percent increase to the Uniform Per Student Funding Formula
- $4.6 million in technology at DC Public Schools to provide a laptop or device for every student in grades 3, 6, and 9
- $6 million to expand school-based mental health services
- $52 million to expand child care and early childhood education opportunities at Old Randle Highlands, Old Miner, and Thurgood Marshall
- $305,000 for increasing the wages of participants in the Mayor Marion S. Barry Summer Youth Employment Program
Affordable for Families
- Elimination of the sales tax on diapers
- $4.7 million for Families First DC, a new plan to support family strengthening and stabilization by providing integrated services and using a community-based approach to help meet families’ needs
- Makes the Keep Childcare Affordable tax credit permanent
Transportation
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$122 million for a new K Street Northwest Transit Way, which will include a designated rapid bus lane
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$16.1 million to provide free DC Circulator service and expand East of the River routes
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$2.8 million for additional bike lane enforcement and rush hour towing as part of Vision Zero 2020
Public Safety
- $3 million to expand the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) workforce to 4,000 officers by 2021, focusing on bike and on-foot officers
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$3.5 million in new funds to add four ambulance units, including 45 firefighter paramedics or firefighter EMTs
- $3.3 million to bolster the efforts of the Office or Neighborhood Safety and Engagement, including $610,000 to support increased wages for the Pathways program to more participants and grow the reach of the Aspire to Entrepreneurship Program
- $1.6 million to our Office of Victim Services and Justice Grants to open three new offices where residents can get trauma-informed mental health support and where we can train community leaders in strategies for addressing trauma
Seniors
- $2 million increase for Safe at Home to support ability of senior residents to age in place
- $500,000 to provide grants for dental services to help seniors
- $100,000 to fund a new city-wide assessment of efforts to address dementia
DC Values
- $1.6 million increase (for a total investment of $2.5 million) to the Immigrant Justice Legal Service Grant program to provide direct legal aid and access to information programs
- $2.5 million to ensure every resident is counted for Census 2020