Are we at the boiling point yet? Are we cooked yet?Over and over again, year after year we continue to get Albanys debt dumped in our laps and over and over we sit back and take it as the temperature in the pot gets hotter and hotter.
So much for capping anything, so much for reducing the costs of anything. Albany will do what they do because we let them. How many Albany legislators will get re-elected this year? Can we say 98%? All so they can do it again next year. It doesn’t matter what platform they run on…. They LIE, CHEAT and STEAL everything right out of our pockets….
I don’t know about you but I really enjoy the continued punishment.
The Buffalo News:Spitzer eyes counties to balance budget
To balance New York State’s next budget, Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer lays more expenses on county governments.
The tab for Erie County in 2009 will be an additional $6 million if the State Legislature goes along. That amounts to half of this year’s property tax increase.
For decades, counties and the state of New York have split 50-50 the portion of their safety net programs that the federal government does not cover. But the Spitzer administration now wants counties to pay 52 percent, the state 48 percent.
If implemented, the change would cost Erie County $1.2 million for the remaining months of this year and $1.6 million for the next, according to an analysis by county Budget Director Beth A. Kornbrekke.
The second change ends another 50-50 split in paying to detain youths in county facilities when ordered by a local Family Court. State budget officials propose that counties take on the entire obligation.
For Erie County, that would create an additional $3.4 million expense for the remainder of this year and $4.4 million for next year, Kornbrekke said in her analysis.
Erie County is slowly rebuilding reserves so it can weather surprises, such as unexpected expenses from Albany. But if for some reason Erie could only raise property taxes to cover the new costs, tax bills would have to go up about 3 percent.
The county for this year did not raise its tax rate but let increases in property values generate an additional $12 million a year— a 6 percent increase over 2007.
Spitzer’s budget division expects counties will generate new income for themselves by raising certain fees imposed by their county clerks, and the division figures counties will receive their share when sales taxes are charged on Indian reservations and on Internet purchases from within New York’s borders.
But is that income reliable?
In his own analysis of the state budget, County Comptroller Mark C. Poloncarz said it will be difficult to forecast the gain from Internet purchases, and the collection of taxes on reservations “is not likely to materialize in 2008.”
In her analysis, Kornbrekke said the income-generating suggestions — such as raising the cost to record a mortgage at the county clerk’s office, for example — just burden county residents.
The state Association of Counties, which began studying Spitzer’s budget for 2008-09 after it was unveiled in January, alerted its members to the provisions that seem to shunt more state expenses onto property owners. The association is expected to bring officials from 19 counties around the state to Buffalo on March 13 to discuss their problems with the governor’s budget.
“New York has the highest local taxes in America, and that’s not because every Democrat and every Republican, upstate and downstate, doesn’t care about taxes. It’s because the state has forced expenses down to the local governments,” said the association’s executive director, Stephen J. Acquario, when testifying before the state Property Tax Commission this month.
State government in recent years has tried to suppress the property tax load. Former Gov. George E. Pataki and the Legislature at the time implemented the School Tax Relief program, or STAR, and under Spitzer the Legislature has granted additional relief. The state also capped the growth of the Medicaid program, which was choking county governments.
Facing a budget gap of nearly $5 billion for 2008-09, Spitzer proposed halting a planned increase in STAR rebates. Homeowners statewide were to receive about $1.8 billion in rebate checks, but under his budget they would get $1.3 billion, or an average $386, the same as last year. Senior citizens would still receive an increase.
Other state budget changes might affect county budgets. Spitzer wants to cut the amount of aid given to community colleges, dropping it from $2,675 to $2,625 for a full-time student. That could prompt calls to increase the county’s contribution to Erie Community College, Poloncarz said.
He also said that in raising the salaries for state judges, the budget raises the salaries for district attorneys in each county. Erie County District Attorney Frank J. Clark’s pay would rise from $136,700 to $165,200, an increase that would be retroactive to April 2006 and laid on county taxpayers, Poloncarz said.
At the same time, Spitzer’s budget increases aid to Buffalo by $13.9 million — 9 percent — to $169 million. Most suburban towns would get increases averaging 3 percent, while other cities, including Rochester, would receive a 13.5 percent increase. Spitzer also proposed a $1 billion upstate revitalization fund.
mspina@buffnews.com
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Tags: Erie County Insanity
Fun WOW…
Just keeps getting better and better doesn’t it…. YeHaw.
Taxes are too high…WAAAAAAAAAAAA.
Where else in the country will you be able to find a decent house for under $100,000. In Buffalo they are everywhere. Try that in North Carolina or California.
We are one of the only Metropolitan Areas in the nation that has largly avoided the subprime crisis, and one of only a few metro areas that have not seen housing prices drop. Buffalo’s home prices actually rose last year by 9% (good news for all you homeowners out there who are actually increasing home equity, while most of the country loses equity in their homes)
We may pay higher tax rates, but on lower overall values. A $500,000 house in Sacramento California wouldn’t get more than $150,000 here. So we pay a higher rate, but overall a lower amount.
Things arent as bad as you make them out to be.
Where is the post about how New York’s violent crime rate has dropped 59% since 1993? Where is the post about the record investment in the City of Buffalo? Where is the post about all the positive things happening in this area?
When all you do is focus on the negative, all you see is the negative.
Look around you, Mike. We live in a pothole-ridden, toxic-waste infested dump. And we pay the highest taxes, utility rates, gasoline taxes, etc. of anywhere in the nation. You’re happy with how your taxes are being misspent?
WNY Voter. If you can live in the same house in an area with a tax rate half ours, but the house is three times the cost, who do you think pays more in taxes?
The last time i checked, electric, gas, and now water are all run by private companies. If you have a problem with utility rates, perhaps you should take it up with the shareholders of those corporations. Same with the toxic waste dumps…run by private corporations.
Potholes are caused by the freezing and thawing of water. If you know of a way to control that, you should be rich and have no time to post on blogs.
As far as I know, our gas company (whose rates are not unreasonable) is the only one of our utilities that’s privately owned. We should have the lowest electric and water rates of anywhere, considering the huge resource at Niagara Falls, and yet our massively mismanaged Water and Power Authorities have managed to find a way to withhold our cheap natural resource, and charge us, the taxpayers, the highest rates anywhere in country. It costs more for water here than it does in the desert southwest.
I know a way to control the freezing and thawing problem. Hire non-union companies to do our roadwork. That way, they wouldn’t use low-grade asphalt that has to be replaced every few years, that presently ensures low-quality, high-priced workmmanship for many years to come.
BTW, the toxic waste to which I refer is part of the Manhattan Project, which was given to us by the Federal Government. It’s easy to blame big private corporations without inconvenient facts to back it up.
Niagara Mohawk (electric) is a private company, so is American Water Systems (the company that runs the City of Buffalo’s water system).
What does the status of workers at a company (unionized vs. non-unionized) have to do with the quality of the ashphalt? And i have yet to hear of pothole-proof pavement…talk about making up facts!!!
That toxic waste you speak of was disposed of by the government by paying a private company to dump it. The company they chose is located here…its not like federal agents transported the waste and told the residents of Niagara Falls they must accept it. What about the toxic waste dump at Love Canal, that was Occidental Chemical, and i can assure you, it was a private corporation!
Look around you, Mike. We still live in a pothole-ridden, toxic-waste infested dump. And we pay the highest taxes, utility rates, gasoline taxes, etc. of anywhere in the nation. You’re obviously happy with how your taxes are being misspent.
That is simply untrue. I dont live in a toxic waste infested dump. My street is actually quite nice and doesnt have any potholes (and its in the City).
Maybe you live in a waste infested dump, but i havent been over to your house, so i cant be sure.
Like i said before, if all you focus on is the negative, that is all you will see. I love living in Buffalo…its a great town and my entire family’s roots are here.
If you hate it so much, stop bitching and leave.
Give me something positive to post about Mike, anything.
Crap flows downhill.
Just a couple toxic landfills
How about the fact that despite a national housing slump, home prices in Buffalo/Niagara have bucked the national trend and remained steady and actually increased 9%.
While most of the homeowners in the nation are losing equity in their homes, the homeowners in Buffalo/Niagara are gaining equity in their homes.
AND
There is record investment in the City of Buffalo. The Statler renovation, the new courthouse, the Warehouse lofts, The Schoolhouse lofts, The Webb building, the Dulski renovation. The amount of construction equipment i see downtown reminds me of North Carolina or something!
Buffalo/Niagara region took in $1.8 billion (that billion with a ‘B’) in tourism dollars last year.
Thanks in part to your efforts, there is talk of ridding the area of the GI tolls. The 190 tolls are also gone.
Airport traffic at the Buffalo Niagara international Airport is 15 years ahead of schedule, AND fares have dropped considerably in the last 10 years…