Advocates: '12 Budget Dance Has Heavier Beat

College students are pressing the state legislature to pass a New York version of an idea that's stalled at the federal level: Giving undocumented immigrant students a chance at a career in America.

Many in the Occupy Wall Street movement frame their advocacy in religious terms. For one Brooklyn clergyman, that means tension with some churches, and challenges for his own congregation.

A long subway ride from the Lower Manhattan epicenter of the Occupy phenomenon, community activists in one Brooklyn neighborhood are trying to translate the movement's goals into local action.

A pilot effort is under way in four City Council districts to give constituents some say in which capital projects are funded. Amid successes and snags, there are signs the initiative is getting citizens more engaged in government.

In Councilman Brad Lander's district, citizen budget delegates learned quickly how expensive simple projects can be. But they also found much could be accomplished without spending a dime.

Citizen budget delegates in City Councilman Eric Ulrich's district focused on two neglected neighborhoods—including one where a wall between the city and the sea has become a subject for debate.

Solar panels. Security cameras. A new church roof. There was no shortage of ideas for citizen budget delegates to consider in Councilman Jumaane Williams' district. But not all of them could work.

Delegates in Councilwoman Melissa Mark-Viverito's district had to get savvy about how to get the maximum out of their million. So they expanded the scope of potential projects and limited the number they'd consider.

Some Brooklynites who live and work near the borough’s two police watchtowers say the observation posts are affecting more than the incidence of crime.

The dramatic slow-down in housing construction at the Brooklyn site is fodder for opponents of the project. But supporters believe the development will still make good on its commitments.

In the looming debate over full-scale casino gambling in New York, it will likely be harder for foes to document the proposal's potential costs than for pro-casino advocates to predict benefits.

The city’s MillionTrees program fights asthma and global warming. But tightening maintenance budgets, increasingly severe weather and decades-old planting decisions complicate trees’ contribution.

The end of the Advantage subsidy program leaves advocates battling to salvage a policy they criticized, the city bracing for more demand for scarce shelter beds and low-income families wondering what comes next.

Is it too early to be thinking about the 2013 municipal election? Of course! But that hasn’t stopped New York’s mayoral hopefuls from collecting half a million bucks in Brooklyn last year. Who got? Who gave?

Now that they'll be counted in their hometowns rather than where they're incarcerated, state inmates could shift district lines. One thing neither they nor parollees can do, however, is vote.

Despite the Internet age and the e-book craze, Brooklyn's libraries are seeing increasing usage. But budget cuts are one challenge the system might not be able to surmount.

Great nations feature great cities. But American campaigns usually don't. Four years after voters elected a president who pledged to do more for cities, is that about to change?

The weeds were growing high in the Upper 9th Ward even before the hurricane hit.

While many hands have shaped the good and bad of today's Detroit, the impact of current federal policy is easy to spot.

Transportation advocates in the nation's largest city believe the 2012 election will decide the future of mass transit in the United States.