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Squeezed city looking at midyear budget cuts
Schenectady has drained its rainy day fund down to a mere $75,000
By Lauren Stanforth
Published 08:47 p.m., Monday, April 16, 2012

SCHENECTADY — City Council members are looking into the possibility of midyear budget cuts after Schenectady drained its rainy day fund to a mere $75,000.

Councilwoman Leesa Perazzo has requested a breakdown of what's in the budget that isn't contractually locked down and what those accounts would look like if they were trimmed by 1 or 2 percent. The discussion was originally scheduled for Monday night's committee meeting, but has been delayed two weeks to get more accurate numbers for council members to evaluate, Perazzo said.

Perazzo and other council members are concerned the city is financially vulnerable after, under threat of lawsuit, it paid Schenectady County $1 million in February for a back taxes problem. That left about $75,000 in the city's fund balance. Another $5 million in restricted reserves can be used typically only for legal emergencies, like unexpected workers compensation claims.

Perazzo said she and others want a clear idea of what the city can live without if more unplanned expenses pop up.

"I'm not even saying we need to make these cuts now," she said. "But why start the discussion when time would be of the essence?"

A breakdown of about 100 line items was prepared for Perazzo by Finance Commissioner Ismat Alam. The list includes things like postage, which totals $121,290, and what a 2 percent, or $2,426, cut would look like. The budget breakdown includes mundane expenditures, like "laundry, windows, fumigation" at a cost of $41,400, and $119,830 for "clothing and dry goods." But Perazzo said the list also throws in expenses the city cannot arbitrarily cut, like shift differential payments for workers, at a cost of $56,700.

City Council is considering which employees should no longer get take-home vehicles. City workers who have cars include the street maintenance supervisor and all four assistant police chiefs.

Mayor Gary McCarthy rejected the idea that this year's budget needs to be slashed. "We're going to pay our bills. We're going to keep the lights on. It's just that we're an urban city under pressure," he said......................>>>>..........................>>>>...................Read more: http://www.timesunion.com/loca.....38.php#ixzz1sI3mhS6f

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SCHENECTADY
City’s foreclosure costs put at $70,000
New law firm contract could be source of funds
BY KATHLEEN MOORE Gazette Reporter

The city’s aggressive foreclosure effort is costing far more than expected, Corporation Counsel John Polster said.
The estimated cost to foreclose on more than 100 tax-delinquent buildings is $70,000. The city didn’t budget any money for that.
    Polster proposed a contract change that would save the city $54,000, with the savings being used for foreclosures. “We’re still a bit short,” he told the City Council at Monday’s committees meeting.
    They have no plans yet for how they’ll come up with the last $16,000 needed.
    But by agreeing to a new contract with Girvin & Ferlazzo, a law firm that handled their police union grievances, they can save most of the money they need.
    The council approved in committee a contract in which Girvin & Ferlazzo would accept a fl at $3,000 fee per month for grievances, instead of $200 an hour. Under the hourly contract, the fi rm earned about $90,000 a year, which was the amount budgeted for this year. The new contract would cap costs at $36,000.
    The total foreclosure costs still aren’t known. The Law Department is reviewing files for 750 properties, and may foreclose on hundreds of them.
    “That will be culled down as we get more information,” Polster said.
    The city may not foreclose on properties owned by nonprofi ts, for instance, he said. City offi cials might also set aside properties that are polluted or are bogged down in estate hearings because the owner has died. The final foreclosure list should be complete in three weeks, he
added. But as city offi cials prioritize each property, some are pulled from the list because the owners suddenly pay their long-overdue taxes. “We have a lot of people who are paying,” Polster said. Mayor Gary McCarthy said the city is receiving about $10,000 a month in unexpected revenue from owners who are finally paying their taxes.
    Some of them are paying after being dragged to court through the city’s new get-tough policy.
    The estimated $70,000 in unforeseen foreclosure expenses includes publicizing addresses, mailing letters to the owners, and hiring title companies to determine who holds the title to each property. .......................>>>>.......................>>>>...................http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....00700&AppName=1#

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PAY FOR PARK WORKERS
    In other business Monday, the council dealt with yet another cashflow problem. The long-awaited improvements at Steinmetz Park were in jeopardy because the city needs to have enough cash on hand to pay workers while waiting for the state to reimburse expenses through a grant.
    Council members said they didn’t want to take out another loan — which would bring interest expenses — just to float money for two or three months. They reluctantly agreed to use leftover money in the snow plowing budget, which they had hoped to use for something else.
    There’s $580,000 left in that budget line, but they were unhappy to learn that Commissioner of General Services Carl Olsen had signed two purchase orders to spend $382,000 of it already.
    He signed orders for salt and plowing, anticipating that there might be heavy snowstorms in November and December.
    That decision left the council with just $160,000 to use for cash fl ow.
    Councilwoman Leesa Perazzo said she’d hoped to use that for an unspecified project, but Finance Commissioner Ismat Alam said the money should first be used for cash flow for the park project.
    “The council can still make those decisions [to spend the money] in October when we get the money back,” Alam said.
    The city will essentially loan itself $160,000, using it during the park project, and then repay itself when the state reimburses the city. The state is covering the cost of the park improvements.

http://www.dailygazette.net/De.....00700&AppName=1#

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    There’s $580,000 left in that budget line, but they were unhappy to learn that Commissioner of General Services Carl Olsen had signed two purchase orders to spend $382,000 of it already.
    He signed orders for salt and plowing, anticipating that there might be heavy snowstorms in November and December.
    That decision left the council with just $160,000 to use for cash fl ow.
    Councilwoman Leesa Perazzo said she’d hoped to use that for an unspecified project, but Finance Commissioner Ismat Alam said the money should first be used for cash flow for the park project.

So I'm reading the first two articles and thinking what about the money saved from the lack of snow this year, then I read the third article  

So where is the salt they bought? Is it sitting at Park supplies in Woodlawn? You know the place where when a slight wind blows the salt and who knows what else blows into resident yards making noses run and eyes burn?  Our tax money is blowing away in the wind.

FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!!!!!!!!!!!!

Don't these dems have a brain in their skulls????????

They would have more money if they removed the 100%+ endless property & school tax deductions of all those downtown properties.

The use of tens, probably hundreds of millions of dollars of TAXPAYERS' money has resulted in the following UNDISPUTABLE FACTS:

1.  The TAXABLE tax based has gone down.
2.  Homeonwers have suffered DRASTIC losses via the plummeting value of their homes - far more than what has occurred because of the nationwide ecomy.
3.  The combined property & school tax bills for the city have grown so unbelievably high that they are almost the highest in the whole United States
4.  Well heeled and politically connected (to the dems) are getting richer:L   1) they don't own homes in the city so they don't pay the taxes and 2) their commercial properties in the city are exempt from taxes
5.  City services are being reduced
6.  Fees are being invented AND increased several times.
7.  Houses are generally NOT selling, many houses sit on the market for a year
8.  Many homewonwers are abandoning their homes to flee the city
9.  High level (and thus high paid) city employees are NOT being ordered to live in the city, and because they don't experience the burdens of being a city homeowner there is NOTHING that will cause them to reduce their budgets---they WILL continue to get their high pay, they will NOT be ordered to live in the city and pay taxes, in other words, they have NOTHING TO LOSE.
10.   The existence of Proctors in downtown is NOT resulting in people (from outside the city or county) to choose to buy a home here.   Heck, the existence of Proctors is NOT resulting in people (from outside) to even make the choice to RENT an apartment in the city.
11.   The moving of businesses/offices from other streets in the city and county into downtown had NOT resulted in people (who work at these places) from making the choice to buy a home in the city.  Heck, the moving of these businesses & offices has not even resulted in their employees from even making the choice to RENT an apartment in the city.
12.   The city dems are NOT doing anything to make cuts to the things that need to be cut, e.g., had it not been for Vince Riggi (the only ONE council member who represents the actual taxpayers--be they direct taxpayers via owning their homes or indirect via paying taxes through rents they pay), the city wouldn't be talking at all about the lavish vehicles taken by employees on a daily basis for their pleasure drives home far outside the city.

And the BIGGEST FACT of all, is that with all the hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money spent on downtown, with the move of existing businesses and offices from other addresses within the city and county to downtown, even with the government theaters, bakeries, gin mills, hotels, gym, hair salon, government catering hall and even with Proctors  --------- all of this combined STILL has not resulted in the biggest cheerleader (on these boards) from deciding to buy a house in the city (not even with the government, uh, taxpayer help).   He wont even move into the city to rent!   Talk about being a HYPOCRITE - the biggest (in more ways than one) cheerleader is the biggest hypocrite.

Now let's see if any of the pom-pom shakers for the dems, if any ONE of the names used by the lone pom pom shaker, responds with any evidence to disprove any of those items listed above.    IF there is a response, it will be nonsense babble or some obscenities.  

Unllikely there will be any response from the cheerleader because it's so embarrassing to see that the policies of the dems in the past 8 years has resulted in this financial situation.

GAAP Accounting would help.  

So fund balance is one variable in determining the ratings of our bonds?  I am sure Moodys loves our non GAAP accounting and our Intra-Department lending.  Ooooooops!  


Moody’s upgrades Glenville’s bond rating
Waning fund balance usage, conservative budgeting cited as strengths

By John Purcell
As of Wednesday, April 11, 2012 -6:36 p.m.
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Email, Facebook, Twitter .#GLENVILLE — Town Supervisor Christopher Koetzle’s persistence in reducing fund balance usage appears to have paid off.

Moody’s Investors Services upgraded the Town of Glenville’s general obligation bond rating to Aa3 from A1 on Tuesday, April 3, which moved the town’s rating from the top upper-middle grade rating to the bottom of the high quality ratings. Both ratings hold a low credit risk. The upgrade comes shortly after the Glenville Town Board approved refinancing of public improvement serial bonds from 2002 totaling more than $3.3 million.

“It is going to really impact our about $16.5 million of outstanding debt,” Koetzle said. “It is going to impact the $3.3 million that we are refinancing; we are going to get a lower rate on it, saving more money.”

Through refinancing with the upgraded bond rating, Koetzle estimated the town would save around $320,000 over the remaining 10 years of bond payments.

Koetzle applauded town officials for efforts to control spending during the Town Board’s Wednesday, April 4, meeting. After the meeting, he added the town has never been rated this high.

“What we have done over the past two and a half years are starting to come and pay dividends,” Koetzle said. “Generally speaking, I think they were very happy with the Town of Glenville’s financial position.”

Moody’s report said the rating increase was due to the town’s “strong financial position, favorable tax base and a manageable debt burden with minimal future borrowing planned.” Maintaining and continuing to increase reserves could lead to another upgrade, Moody’s said.

“How our fund balance holds up is going to be really an indicator of what our bond will be,” Koetzle said. “The investments that we’ve made in the town in economic development (figure) into that rating.”
Strengths for the town were holding substantial operating reserves and a “favorable” socioeconomic makeup, according to Moody’s. All three of the town’s fund reserves (highway, general and town outside village) were said to be “relatively stable.” The reserves collectively represent 30 percent of revenues, according to the report.
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I predict the RepubliCAN'Ts in Glenville will be soundly thrashed and the voters will indignantly toss them on their fannies..  The hijinks and tax increases they have imposed have caused many a Glenville resident to pronounce them the "Scumbag Town Board."

Quoted from Hamburg

I predict the RepubliCAN'Ts in Glenville will be soundly thrashed and the voters will indignantly toss them on their fannies..  The hijinks and tax increases they have imposed have caused many a Glenville resident to pronounce them the "Scumbag Town Board."

Awwww.   What's the matter.   Much to embarrassed to admit that the republicans in Glenville are the ones that have accomplished something good!

And the  city of Schenectaddy and their exempting millionaires from taxes which causes the homeonwers to bear the burden which they cannot pay because they have no money so the ctiy is in this terrible bind.....So ham, how come you REFUSE to address how VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY VERY BAD BAD BAD BAD the city's finances are, huh?   \

Ham, why are you NOT responding to or addressing the FACT that all the millions spent on downtown has done NOTHING for the ctiy.   You REFUSE to address ANY of the FACTS posted above.   Why now??????    Much to embarrassed at seeing the truth, huh?

So now, because you cannot provide any proof whatsoever that the city is getting better--not financially NOR for the residents---you're just going to spew obscentities?   Huh?


Shake your pom poms Ham




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you see how ratings are based on their choices....coming to your personal pocketbook soon....no choice as to the number you become....forget trading in cash...
you will be valued....

So schenectady is basically BROKE.......and yet they still SPEND SPEND SPEND!!!
What a freakin mess they've made!!
It will take decades to get out of this one! OMG!!

The CONS/REP unity team in Glenville has raised it's credit rating saving the taxpayers millions. How about the City, Rotterdam and Nisky? ROTFLMAO!! When's Proctor's Leeza is the only voice for fiscal restraint it is far worse than anyone could have imagined. After 40 years of DEM fiscal incompetence the highest taxed City in the area has $75,000 in cash reserves. But the Mayor has a new plan- lol. Keep the DEM implosion going! Got abandoned houses?

Quoted from benny salami

The CONS/REP unity team in Glenville has raised it's credit rating saving the taxpayers millions. How about the City, Rotterdam and Nisky? ROTFLMAO!! When's Proctor's Leeza is the only voice for fiscal restraint it is far worse than anyone could have imagined. After 40 years of DEM fiscal incompetence the highest taxed City in the area has $75,000 in cash reserves. But the Mayor has a new plan- lol. Keep the DEM implosion going! Got abandoned houses?

oh, they will,,,,when the appearance of 'the right deal' rears it's head......SHOW ME THE $$ TRAIL....they have a 'miracle' waiting in the wings to
paint the plebs a picture of feelgood freedom via the rating agencies....