The city’s Independent Budget Office projects that more than $4 billion of the city’s federal stimulus money is going to programs designed to continue well after the aid dries up — adding more fuel to criticism of de Blasio’s recent COVID-relief spending spree.

Among the most daunting tasks awaiting the next mayor of New York City will be stabilizing its public housing system — faced with a ballooning capital backlog and deteriorating living conditions among many of its developments.

City Council Speaker Corey Johnson said Wednesday the city should be “careful” how it spends its $6 billion in stimulus money, after The Post reported on Mayor Bill de Blasio’s profligate spending plans amid accusations he’s spending the taxpayer cash “like a drunken sailor.”

On Thursday night, the eight top candidates in the Democratic primary will face off in the first televised debate of the campaign season. For some, the two-hour event is a chance to land direct punches in conflicts that have been simmering on the trail for months. For others, it’s an opportunity to introduce themselves to voters, many of whom are just tuning into the race now.

Mayor Bill de Blasio is treating nearly $6 billion in federal stimulus money intended to bail out a pandemic-stricken city like a windfall — blowing tens of millions at a shot on big-government investments the city can’t afford and doesn’t need, critics say.

Andrew Rein of the Citizens Budget Commission and Howard Cure of Evercore Wealth Management dive into the New York City's operating and capital budgets. Paul Burton hosts.

Mayor Bill de Blasio calls it his “Recovery Budget,” but it’s actually a sad bid to put some shine on his legacy while sabotaging his successor.

De Blasio’s own announcement of his record $98.6 billion spending plan for fiscal year 2022 crowed that “almost $6 billion in direct local aid will be used now through 2024, $7 billion almost in federal education aid also will be used by 2024.”

Protests calling to “defund the police” have become a familiar sight in New York City. But this year, if Mayor Bill de Blasio gets his way, one of America’s most progressive cities will actually send more dollars to the NYPD than it did a year ago.

While the race for New York City comptroller has drawn few headlines compared with the joust for mayor, a dozen candidates are running for the office with primaries scheduled for June 22.

“The job of comptroller is essential to the fiscal health, governmental integrity and broader well-being of our city,” Andrew Rein, president of the watchdog Citizens Budget Commission, said at an online CBC candidates forum on Tuesday.

Six leading candidates running in the Democratic primary for New York City Comptroller in the June election appeared at a forum on Tuesday to offer their perspectives on the role of the office, solutions to the city’s uncertain fiscal future, and how they would wield their powers to ensure city government is effective and fiscally responsible.

The candidates at the forum, hosted by Citizens Budget Commission, a nonprofit fiscal watchdog group, included Brooklyn City Council Member Brad Lander, military veteran and entrepreneur Zach Iscol, Manhattan State Senator Brian Benjamin, financial journalist Michelle Caruso-Cabrera, City Council Speaker Corey Johnson, and Queens Assemblymember David Weprin.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis lauded a new state law he championed as "the strongest anti-rioting, pro-law enforcement piece of legislation in the country."

New York City officials last year said they agreed to remove $1 billion from the police department’s spending. (The Citizens Budget Commission, a watchdog group, said the net reduction to the police budget so far has been about $477 million.) The department’s total budget for 2021 was $10.2 billion.

Signing onto the letter to Empire State Development were the organizations Reinvent Albany, Citizens Budget Commission, Citizens Union, Common Cause New York, League of Women Voters of New York State and NY Public Interest Research Group.

Calls for the database began after a massive pay-to-play corruption case involving upstate New York developers who were involved in the Buffalo Billion economic development program. The case would also draw in former SUNY Poly President Alain Kaloyeros and Joe Percoco, a former close aide to Gov. Andrew Cuomo.