The stability of the MTA's finances is increasingly reliant on its ability to find significant savings, grow ridership, and efficiently execute capital improvements. By prioritizing and delivering capital investments and continuing efforts to find ways to provide more cost-efficient service that remains safe, frequent and reliable, the MTA will ultimately improve the ridership experience. This will further strengthen farebox operating revenues and better prepare the MTA for uncertainty in the coming years.

The New York City metropolitan area is the second largest market for venture capital (VC) funding in the United States, with $28.5 billion in investments, or 13.3% of the national total in 2024. The amount invested in the region has more than doubled since 2015. Though overall VC activity remains stronger than before the pandemic, the second quarter of 2025 experienced a slowdown from the prior quarter that is reflective of federal economic policy that remains uncertain.

The neighborhoods of Long Island City (L.I.C.), Sunnyside and Woodside in northwest Queens are contributing to the borough’s business growth, share of the population employed, median household income and new housing. Even with its expansion, L.I.C./Sunnyside/Woodside faces some challenges such as air pollution, a level of crime higher than pre-pandemic rates despite recent declines, and income and housing pressures in parts of the area. Continued success depends on further monitoring of these factors, as well as supporting and managing housing, employment and infrastructure development.

This report highlights the results for counties, cities, towns and villages that reported annual financial data in time with the Office of the New York State Comptroller for local fiscal years ending (FYE) in 2024. Overall, the number of local governments designated in fiscal stress increased in FYE 2024 but remained near all-time lows. Included in this report is an analysis of both fiscal stress and environmental stress indicators and trends for non-filing local governments for fiscal stress purposes.

New York City’s revenues from water and sewer charges, fines and forfeitures, licenses and permits, interest income, rental income and other “miscellaneous revenues” reached an estimated $6.7 billion in fiscal year (FY) 2025, just 11% higher than in FY 2019. The weaker growth was due, in part, to the COVID-19 pandemic. The City should assess the many fines, fees, and charges for services it collects and whether these revenue sources are permanently affected by the changes that occurred during the pandemic and what that means for anticipated revenues.