Oh they are patting themselves on the back, proclaiming what I think I hears was a 0.75% increase "in taxes."
Those of us who are adult, intelligent, and taxpayers ourselves, know that means nothing.
That would be an increase in the LEVY.
Since both assessment roll is largely finalized except for certorari lawsuits (more impacting the city), let's hear the county state what the tax rate will be so we can calculate our tax bils and see how much larger the tax increase really is!
Optimists close their eyes and pretend problems are non existent. Better to have open eyes, see the truths, acknowledge the negatives, and speak up for the people rather than the politicos and their rich cronies.
Schenectady County budget growth small Manager’s proposal for 2014 has 0.74% tax levy increase
Monday, September 23, 2013 By Justin Mason (Contact) Gazette Reporter
SCHENECTADY COUNTY — Schenectady County Manager Kathleen Rooney proposed a 2014 budget Monday that increases appropriations by 1.2 percent and the tax levy by 0.74 percent.
Rooney’s plan would spend $298.99 million, roughly 84 percent of which she blamed on unfunded mandates from the state. Her budget calls for $68.79 million to be raised through the tax levy, which is an increase of about $507,000 over this year.
The spending plan allows legislators to avoid the controversial override of the state-mandated tax cap they approved during last year’s budget discussion before ultimately hiking the tax levy by 5.9 percent. Rooney said she crafted this year’s budget with the goal of falling at or below the tax cap.
“The key focus of the budget this year was a drive to attain the property tax cap,” she told legislators during a special meeting Monday evening. “We’re proud to report the property tax levy increase for 2014 as proposed is less than 1 percent.”
The budget relies on 24 positions being cut, all through attrition. Among them are 10 food service and maintenance positions that are expected to be shed when the county opens the new Glendale Home.
Rooney stressed that her approach to budgeting is long-term. Even including the increase approved last year, she said the average tax levy increase between 2009 and 2014 was about 0.9 percent.
“This is not a one-year approach,” she said. “If you look at the property tax increases over a long period of time, it isn’t that we’ve just done it this year. Over the course of time we’ve really worked to stay within that tax cap.”
Rooney also credited cost-cutting measures from the past in helping the county to rein in spending today. She said initiatives that were implemented five or six years ago are reflected in the nominal tax increase she was able to proposed in the 2014 budget.
“It has been a multiyear approach,” she said. “Many of the strategies we initiated in 2007 and 2008 impact what we were able to present today and where our levy increase is today.”
The budget does rely on $5.7 million in reserve fund spending, which is slightly less than in this year’s spending plan. Rooney warned legislators that the county needs to wean itself from reserve fund spending.
“We need to continue to reduce our reliance on the surplus,” she said. “It’s really critical.”
Rooney said sales tax revenue seemed to be on target, but wasn’t as robust as she hoped. She said she’s also seeing an increase in need for services for a large percentage of county residents.
Rooney singled out Medicaid as the single highest cost the county is facing. She estimated the county’s mandated cost would be about $34.5 million next year — nearly twice the amount paid in 2001 and roughly half the total tax levy included in the 2014 budget.
Rooney credited this year’s restructuring of the Schenectady County Public Library System for $480,000 in annual savings. She said the project to build a family literacy center on State Street at no cost to taxpayers will close down two smaller branches, but result in a facility that will better serve the county.
“In fact, it will generate some efficiencies,” she said.
Rooney also cited the new Glendale Home for helping the county cut costs. She said the new home expected to be in operation by the first quarter of 2014 will help drastically reduce energy usage at the existing nursing home, which is inefficient.
Rooney’s budget was well-received by both the Legislature’s Democratic majority and Republican minority leaders. Majority Leader Gary Hughes said the budget was “thoughtful planning” coming to fruition.
Minority Leader James Buhrmaster, the Legislature’s lone Republican, credited Rooney for staying within the tax cap. Yet he still believes the county’s government is too bloated.
“It’s still to big,” he said. “Our county government is still too big.”
Optimists close their eyes and pretend problems are non existent. Better to have open eyes, see the truths, acknowledge the negatives, and speak up for the people rather than the politicos and their rich cronies.
Just wait for the comments that this is wonderful, the dems are going a great job and that the renaissance continues.
Optimists close their eyes and pretend problems are non existent. Better to have open eyes, see the truths, acknowledge the negatives, and speak up for the people rather than the politicos and their rich cronies.
The restructuring at the library, does that mean cutting the hours and staff? Because that has been having a negative impact on the service they provide, and even if you don't use the library, this is still a cutback to a fine system and to one of the things that taxpayers personally benefitted from. Reducing services and raising taxes is not something to brag about. Medicaid costs, is that the only unfunded mandate? We hear all the time about the high cost of medicaid. You would think that poor people were going to the doctor too much, for all that money, but poor people in this area are actually lacking in health care, from my observations. Also the story about them using the emergency room instead of the doctor doesn't wash, either. I think the extravagant costs have more to do with the general waste, fraud, and abuse in the medical industry and Poverty Inc., in general. So they can't do too much about the medicaid at the local level, but with all the "generated revenue" from Proctor's and the other metroplex projects, from which the county was deemed worthier than the city of a bigger share, and the windfall sales tax we always hear about, how is it at budget time they can't break even? If I was short of money to meet my expenses, and I took some of my money and invested it, and the money from my investments did not help me meet my expenses, I think I would ditch the investments and just go with the budget cuts, personally. But the "investments" in this case are keeping a whole slew of leeches afloat, so that's not gonna happen.
We will get another 6% next year. They fish always bite the same hook.
"While Foreign Terrorists were plotting to murder and maim using homemade bombs in Boston, Democrap officials in Washington DC, Albany and here were busy watching ME and other law abiding American Citizens who are gun owners and taxpayers, in an effort to blame the nation's lack of security on US so that they could have a political scapegoat."
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