Morning Read: Dismantling local government in the North Country?
The last couple of days, we’ve been talking about Essex County’s struggles with a $7 million deficit, and questions about the future of the Horace Nye Nursing Home in Elizabethtown.
This morning, the Watertown Daily Times is reporting on similar, big-picture questions facing St. Lawrence County, whose budget gap currently stands at $15 million.
As Martha Ellen reports, local officials are talking about a major rethink of what the county can and can’t do for its citizens.
“We’re at the point where we may cut out whole departments because we have nowhere else to cut,” County Administrator Karen M. St. Hilaire said. “Long-term, county government has to make some real structural changes.”
Ms. St. Hilaire has identified more than $6 million in potential cuts, including the possible elimination of the youth department. That could depend on whether the county must have a youth department to funnel state funds through for community programs.
In the following year, the county will also look at cutting mental health clinics, which cost the county $600,000, chemical dependency services, which cost $750,000, home health care, which is down 3,000 visits so far this year, and the solid waste department.
As we’ve seen in the Horace Nye debate, these questions all have human faces, and often the people affected are the most vulnerable in our communities.
Making sure kids have plenty of activities, providing safe and healthy housing for the elderly poor, and helping people with mental health and drug addiction — those are all good things, right?
But these services may now be unaffordable, as Albany and Washington begin to cut and the property tax cap takes hold.
So what do you think? Is this the “austerity” you were expecting?
Tags: politics
The whole reason government programs evolved is precisely to help the most vulnerable when times were difficult. And yet it’s precisely help for those groups, children, the elderly, people with health problems, that is slashed (not trimmed) when times get tight. The “Tea Party” wants to turn us into Somalia.
But this was always going to happen under Cuomo’s cowardly tax cap (cowardly because it was not twinned with mandate relief).
We can and should make cuts to what county government does, the key is going to be if we have the ability to do it in a way that does not radically hurt the most vulnerable.
I think the rhetoric of the tea party turning us into somalia etc, is nonsense, the tea party does not have any influence on these decisions and is not influencing NYS government These decisions are not based on the recent debt debate in Washington either. They are based on a declining NYS economy and an inability to cut spending for the past 30 years either by Democrats or Republicans they are a structural problem. Not all states have these problems nor provide all of these services.
However there are things I would cut before Chemical Dependency and Mental Health. For example SLC pays close to one million per year for “volunteer” drivers to cart people around the county to attend many of these mandatory classes. Start there.
Also how many people are attending Chemical Dependency and Mental Health who are choosing to attend and how many are simply going through the motions of mandated attendance? What is the success rates for these services in the county?
Hopefully we will take a hard look at what is working and what is not, but I have a feeling we won’t.
Yes, this is the kind of austerity I was expecting from conservative north country pols. Rampant disease follows disease follows decay.
Welfare and state mandated programs have ruined NY.
It’s time to tell Albany & Washington for that matter enough is enough.
I don’t think it has ruined the state, but I don’t think everything that we do is really needed nor about helping the poor. Sometimes it is mainly about those being paid to help the poor and protecting those jobs.
But given our economy in SLC, we do NEED those jobs it is a very bad time to be cutting jobs, I think we are over 10% unemployment now.
What is the county’s annual payment to the NYS Pension fund alone? And state law forbids the county asking/forcing employees to share any of this burden themselves. Did you know that an article of the State Constitution forbids the reduction of any public employees retirement benefits? How crazy is that?
I believe that most public servants would indeed give up some pension, health or salary to maintain employment levels. But the state system is about protecting the most senior employees not jobs.
The pension problem will decrease over time as the most generous tier 1 and 2 members pass on. Given tier 3, 4, the new 5, and the proposed tier 6 benefits, are much less generous. Add to that the fact that state employment most likely will decrease, the problem should lessen over time.
However, that is not to say there isn’t room for some give backs on the part of the current state, county, and local workforce who are members of the state retirement system. For instance, eliminate the 10 year contribution cap and require all workers to contribute 3% annually until retirement. That would make a big impact immediately.
I also think it’s important to remember why the member organizations are paying so much at present. The biggest factor is the loss in value of the fund due to the stock market tanking. Secondly, member organizations, for many years, paid very little into the fund. It’s only been the past half dozen years or so that member organizations have been paying large amounts into the fund. Had we had the foresight years ago and spread these amounts over many years, things wouldn’t be so bad now. In my opinion, part of the discussion on pension reform should include changing the structure of oversight to include a panel of elected professionals to oversee it rather than sole oversight being given to the State Comptroller.
It’s unfortunate that the structural problems of the pension system are only now getting the attention they’ve deserved. I suppose we have our current fiscal crisis to thank for that.
I guess this may be insane, but why not let each county set whatever salary and benefit structure they want for their own employees? Why is Albany involved at all in this minutia level of detail?
Mervel,
“I guess this may be insane, but why not let each county set whatever salary and benefit structure they want for their own employees? Why is Albany involved at all in this minutia level of detail?”
Because Albany panders to the public employee unions.
Time for state lawmakers to stand up to the unions and do what’s right for the people.
But the end result is a reduction in union jobs. If the counties were free of the mandated pension and benefits burdens from Albany they would not have to cut jobs.