Central Park is about to get even more green.
Six months after hedge-fund billionaire John Paulson pledged $100 million to the Central Park Conservancy, the nonprofit that oversees the lush 843-acre park is due to get $90 million from the city under a new 10-year management contract.
That’s a huge increase over the current pact, which expires on June 30 and provides $39.2 million over eight years.
Parks officials defended the higher spending as necessary to keep the heavily used park in peak condition.
“In recent years, Central Park has experienced a dramatic increase in visitors — more than 40 million annual visitors compared to 12 million in 1985 — which makes it the city’s most visited institution and has increased the cost of its maintenance,” said Parks spokesman Phil Abramson.
The conservancy has also agreed to expand its responsibilities by maintaining the fountains at five other parks and the landscaping at eight parks and public spaces, including Columbus Circle and Frederick Douglass Circle in East Harlem, and by training workers who’ll be assigned outside Central Park.
It’s costing the conservancy $46.5 million this year to maintain Central Park, 85 percent of which it says has been raised from private contributors.
Even parks critics give the group high grades as the guardian of the city’s most popular outdoor recreational space.
“Clearly, the city thinks they’re doing a great job, which they are, for the most part,” said Geoffrey Croft of New York City Park Advocates, who has never shied away from pointing out parks shortcomings.
But Croft questioned how other parks in the 29,000-acre system will get by without wealthy benefactors or large city subsidies.
“There is an enormous difference [in] what this park gets and what others parks get,” he said.