New York City still struggles with improving its contracts process

Citizens Committee for Children of New York has something to say about where juvenile justice reform efforts should go. A blog post on the nonprofit’s website outlines ways that advocates can proceed in the wake of the successful passage of Raise the Age legislation. Here are a few of the top priorities, taken verbatim from the blog post:

• Expanding youth offender status for youth up to age 25
• Reducing the wait time for youth to have their criminal records sealed
• Raising the age of juvenile delinquency from seven years old to 12 years old
• Ensuring recently created youth justice reform policies are fully funded by the state budget

The Institute for Community Living has received a $25.52 million contract renewal from the New York City Department of Homeless Services. The money will fund shelter services for three years for homeless adult women at the Tillary Women’s Shelter, located at 200 Tillary Street in Brooklyn, according to the City Record. Bergen Basin Community Development Corporation Millennium Development has received a $289,000 contract to provide senior services on behalf of the Department for the Aging.

The Department of Social Services has given contracts to several organizations to fund legal services for immigrant workers. The contracts, which all run from July 1, 2019 until June 30, 2022, will go to Brooklyn Defender Services, and once again to Brooklyn Defender Services, Sanctuary for Families, Urban Justice Center, and again to Urban Justice Center, and to Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation.

State lawmakers and criminal justice advocates gathered on Jan. 31 at St. Paul’s Chapel in lower Manhattan. They were there to discuss criminal justice reform efforts in the state Legislature, specifically: ending cash bail, requiring prosecutors to disclose evidence sooner after arrest, and making trials happen more quickly. The big takeaway from the event is that while bills enacting such reforms are in the works, they are unlikely to pass in upcoming weeks as other high-profile pieces of legislation have. See the event below:

City Comptroller Scott Stringer has a sequel to a report earlier this year detailing delays in contracts awarded to nonprofits. Still Running Late: An analysis of NYC Agency Contracts in Fiscal Year 2018 outlines an issue that has regularly vexed nonprofits that provide services such as homeless shelters, domestic violence counseling, foster care, and drug rehabilitation on behalf of the city.

Today’s press conference with @NYCComptroller and @JustinBrannan We are calling for change as thousands of NYC nonprofits go unpaid for months and even years pic.twitter.com/yic4DWx1cY

— The Human Services Council of New York (@HSC_NY) January 31, 2019

Here are four key findings from the latest report, taken more or less verbatim from the report:

• In Fiscal Year 2018, 80 percent of all new and renewal contracts arrived at the comptroller’s office for registration after their start date had already passed. When removing discretionary contracts from the analysis, that rate improved only slightly to 75 percent.
• When examining human service contracts only, 89 percent arrived at the comptroller’s office after the contract start date. This is a higher retroactivity rate than the citywide average, suggesting that nonprofit organizations wait longer for their contracts to be submitted for registration than vendors that do business with the city overall. When removing discretionary contracts from the analysis, that rate improved only slightly to 81 percent.
• In Fiscal Year 2018, 40 percent of new and renewal contracts arrived at the comptroller’s office a full six months or more after their start date. When removing discretionary contracts from the analysis, this report found that over 23 percent of contracts were over six months late.
• The latest contracts are getting later. In Fiscal Year 2018, all new and renewal contracts that were submitted for registration more than a year after their start date were on average 589 days late, compared to 558 days in Fiscal Year 2017. Human services new and renewal contracts that were submitted more than one year after their start date in Fiscal Year 2018 were on average 541 days late, compared to 504 days in Fiscal Year 2017.