On February 12, 2020, the New York City Council voted to approve legislation to create and administer a citywide capital projects tracking system intended to improve transparency and accountability for city-managed capital construction projects. The bill closely follows key recommendations from CUF’s 2017 Slow Build report which highlighted significant delays and cost overruns in NYC’s capital construction projects for libraries and cultural instutitions.

This new legislation calls for the creation of an interagency task force to develop a public online capital projects database that tracks the project schedule and cost of all city-managed projects. This mirrors CUF’s recommendation for the city to “systematically track the real costs and timelines of all capital construction projects, including DDC-managed projects and those managed by other agencies.”

This is part of Center for an Urban Future's ongoing research on New York City's aging infrastructure, including studies A New Leaf: Revitalizing New York City's Public Parks Infrastructure, Caution Ahead: Overdue Investments for New York City's Aging Infrastructure, and Caution Ahead: Five Years Later and the commentary "Seize the Moment to Fix NYC's Broken Capital Construction System."