Traditionally, the city budget agreement is sealed with a handshake — and sometimes a hug — between the mayor and council speaker, sometimes weeks ahead of a July 1 deadline.

This year, that seems unlikely given the June 27 primary election, when many council members will be defending their seats.

“We cannot put politics in the way,” Mayor Eric Adams said at an unrelated news conference Thursday. “We are ready. The negotiations should start now, immediately.”

But the mayor and City Council have lately been at odds on issues, including the “right-to-shelter” law for the homeless and the Council’s passage of legislation expanding access to housing vouchers.

Neither side has disguised the friction.

“Our working relationship is interesting,” Council Speaker Adrienne told reporters last week.

“I’m still hearing City Council members every day calling for more spending, more spending,” Mayor Adams said Thursday. “I’m just not quite understanding. Do folks understand the basic level of accounting? You spend what you take in.”

What the city is spending on services for asylum seekers is now on track to exceed forecasts. And the city is taking in less than expected from the federal government, which allocated $800 million in funding to localities grappling with the migrant crisis.

City officials had expected to receive the lion’s share of that money; now they say they are expecting no more than 10%.

“We didn’t think the lion’s share was going to turn into a cub,” Mayor Adams said. “The amount of money that we receive, I think, is embarrassing to what this city has been handling.”

Separately, the Adams administration announced an agreement Thursday with DC37, the city’s largest municipal union, allowing some employees to work remotely two days a week under a two-year pilot program.

“Look, I’m a seven-day-a-week guy,” the mayor said. “And how I believe is not for everyone. And I’m not so rigid that I’m not willing to sit down and figure out, ‘How do we reach the goals that we want?’”