The clock is ticking for NYC to close a multibillion-dollar budget gap. School funding is earning the largest chunk of the mayor's preliminary budget plan.

Chancellor Kamar Samuels and other top DOE officials took the hot seat in to kick off this week's preliminary budget hearing oversight hearings held by the City Council as they analyze every penny of the mayor's proposed $127 billion budget for fiscal year 2027.

Samuels says it's no easy task to find savings without limiting the quality of education for students, but they are up against the clock to reduce class sizes by September.

“I think its going to be very difficult to get to 80% by September," said Samuels.

The DOE must be 80% complaint on shrinking class sizes by the 2026- 2027 school year under state law, currently Samuels says they are about 64% compliant.

"We asked all our principals to respond to a survey that asks questions several questions do you have the space, what resources will you need, to get to class size?" Samuels said.

Samuels continued to say they are looking into whether some schools might need to add annex's and are looking into how they can use the buildings they currently have to maximize capacity.

Facing a $5.4 billion budget gap, Mayor Zohran Mamdani tasked all agencies with finding savings. The DOE's portion is the largest in the budget, estimated to receive 40% of the city's funds.

"The DOE's budget continues to have areas that appear to be over budgeted, for example the budget for books has been consistently over budgeted, when comparing actual spending to the adopted budget, on overage the DOE has under spent $43 million on books each year," said Eric Dinowitz, City Council member and chair of the education committee.

When questioned on where the DOE could find savings, top officials said they did not have the records handy but emphasized the importance of ensuring there are no disruptions to school services when finding savings.

The citizens budget commission says the city can close the gap without hurting students by aligning school funding with declining enrollment, consolidating small and underutilized schools and pausing new construction.

"The City could save at least $1.2 billion annually if the State rescinded the mandate. As of November 2025, DOE reported fiscal year 2026 class size reduction expenditures of $640 million; the City increased fiscal year 2026 spending on class size reduction $543 million, to $1.2 billion, as of the Fiscal Year 2027 Preliminary Budget. Projected funding for fiscal year 2027 is $400 million higher, at $1.6 billion," the Citizens Budget Commission wrote in their testimony.

A balanced city budget is due by June.